Aim for the Heart

This in-print equivalent of a buddy movie, a sequel to Dead Aim , begins with the crash of a small plane in Idaho and proceeds nonstop from there. Chris Klick, L.A. tracer of lost music royalties, is vacationing at the rustic, but posh, digs of his friend Jim Lyel, rich ex-NBA star. Both are well over six feet tall, tough, smart, sensitive--it is 1990--and by the end of the book they've fought a fire, drag-raced, dodged killers, rescued a beauty in distress, then saved her father, thwarted land-grabbers and gone fishing. Klick agrees to look for a missing local girl, Bert, and almost simultaneously begins to trace the murky ownership of a San Francisco building for beautiful Alicia Gelbhardt and her rich father. Klick's two ``cases'' come together when Alicia, whom he's bedded, abruptly calls off the title search and he uncovers evidence of Bert's death that suggests that Alicia's father might be involved. In a series of climaxes Klick fends off vicious killers before he and Lyel uncover a real estate scam. Not very deep but fast. (Nov.)