Crime for Christmas

Set in Indianapolis and featuring a PI who's almost 70, Tierney's ``Deets'' Shanahan series offers characters of depth and sensuality and well-placed swipes of razor-sharp humor. After the body of Senator Holland's wife is fished from a river, unclothed and strangely marked, Deets investigates to protect his friend Harry's soon-to-be son-in-law, the man who found the corpse. The senator, poised for an election campaign, seems distracted by another woman and makes sudden changes in his staff. The dead woman's brother, who enjoys simulated S & M via 900 number while admiring his newly purchased antique rug, seems a possible suspect--even after he's knocked out and awakens tied upside-down from his 16th-floor balcony, wearing only his shorts. The most likely suspect is the dead woman's unlikely friend, an Hispanic middleweight boxer with a big punch and not much of an alibi. Shanahan's mouth and his mind work a lot faster than many of his peers' do; his body too, subject to the attractions of his live-in 44-year-old girlfriend Maureen, is getting more of a workout than it has had in years. Only the somewhat cliched conclusion mars this third entry, after The Steel Web , in a series packed with new angles and delights. (Dec.)