Freezeout, Rick Gadziola’s second Jake Morgan mystery, begins with the murder of Las Vegas mobster Carmine Bonello in 1959. Bonello was out in the desert burying cash when his chauffeur did him in. The rest of the novel takes place in the present, with former cop turned poker dealer Jake Morgan assigned to babysit a young relative of his casino boss – a girl who resembles Britney Spears, and is also the granddaughter of Carmine Bonello.

It turns out that Bonello’s body was never found, and nobody knows if he’s been dead for 45 years or if he’s spent those decades lounging on a tropical island. Morgan and his young charge quickly discover that the mob has never forgotten about her grandfather or the cache of cash that disappeared with him.

Morgan takes a few body blows, and dodges more than a few bullets, as he tries to figure out just what happened all those years ago. Since the reader knows Bonello was gunned down that long-ago night, the possibility that he ran off to the tropics, raised by almost everyone, is illusory. The spectre of physical danger from the two hoods who are hounding Morgan adds spice to the babysitting job, but it begins to wear thin as a plot device. The story kicks into a higher gear when Morgan finally finds some clues, apparently left by the deceased himself.

Freezeout’s opening – the death of Bonello – is moody and evocative. The reader is dealt a hand of mob justice, human greed, and the psychological pressure on a murderer, all shrouded by the blowing sands of the desert and the darkness of the night. It leaves us wondering if the murderer has all the treasure, or was much more left behind? Will the murderer make good his getaway? Will he be drawn back to the scene of his crime to see if more loot is to be found? Will anyone ever know what happened here? The remainder of Freezeout answers some of these questions but I was disappointed that others, like what happened to the murderer, were never raised again.