Forgotten by David Baldacci (2012)

One more exciting, escapist Baldacci story, the second I've read with John Puller as the lead character. He goes down to Paradise, Florida, because his father received a cryptic note from his sister, Puller's aunt. Of course when he gets down there, she is dead, seemingly drowned in a shallow pool in her back yard. All of Paradise doesn't quite seem to live up to it's name, as he runs into the shadier side near the hotel he can afford. He keeps running into the local police, though hits it off with a competent police woman. At one point he asks his boss and friend, General Julie Carlson, to join him and back him up. She has a desk job and enjoys spending her vacation being shot at - in Puller's company. To each his own.

Then we have Mecho, who is even larger and more lethal than Puller with his own agenda. He gets taken by slave traders in Mexico, who use abandoned oil rigs out in the Gulf of Mexico as stations, but escapes them and also lands in Paradise, gets a job with a landscape company, and works on a rich guy's property that requires tending every day. Here he is approached by a gorgeous woman who has also been having sex with the rich guy.

Of course they all come together in a series of action packed adventures to stop the slave traders. It is scary to think that the slave trade is alive and well in the U.S. I am sure the novel reflected realities, like the different categories of slaves - sex slaves, mules, and basic laborers. There was also a category I hadn't thought of - children used to create "families", so the adults will not be scrutinized in airports and elsewhere. And they are all kept in place with the threat that their families will be killed if they don't comply. Horrible. I wish our governmental institutions would spend less energy harassing immigrants and on the war on drugs and concentrate on preventing the slave trade.