The Singing of the Dead

Kate Shugak joins the staff of a political campaign to work security for a Native woman running for state senator. The candidate has been receiving anonymous threats, and Kate is to become her shadow, watching the crowds at rallies and fund-raisers. But just as she's getting started, the campaign is rocked by the murder of their staff researcher. To track the killer, Kate will have to delve into the past, in particular the grisly murder of a 'good-time girl' during the Klondike Gold Rush of 1915. Little can she guess the impact a ninety-year-old unsolved case might have on a modern-day psychotic killer...
"She walked out on stage wrapped in fifty yards of sheer white chiffon, a pair of high-heeled shoes with jeweled buckles, and nothing else. There was a second of stunned silence in the packed, smoky saloon, before deafening and prolonged approval threatened to raise the roof She waited, a faint smile on her face, for the first roar to moderate and pitched her voice to be heard. “Good evening, gentlemen, and welcome to the Double Eagle’s Christmas Eve auction.” Her voice was husky, with the slight hint of an accent she tried to control. She let her smile broaden, giving it her special up-from-under and through-the-lashes look, part Madonna, part whore, all woman, and added, “I’m the best present you’ll ever find under any Christmas tree you ever saw.” This time the stage literally trembled beneath her feet, and she gave a fleeting thought to all the gold dust spilled on the floor this night, now being shaken through the cracks in the floorboards. It wouldn’t go to waste. Japanese Jack and Big Ben Bentson would crawl beneath the building the next morning to sweep it up and add it to the night’s till. Likely she wouldn’t see her percentage, but at the moment she couldn’t allow herself to be distracted by that realization."