Missing

In his latest case, following Second Chance, Harry Stoner, the tough but soulful Cincinnati PI, discovers that detective work in the age of AIDS is a hard business. Soon after Cindy Dorn hires Stoner to find Mason Greenleaf, her bisexual boyfriend who has been missing for four days, Greenleaf is found dead in a seedy downtown hotel, an apparent suicide. If Greenleaf had been as happy with Dorn over the last four years as she believes, why would he kill himself? What had he been doing in the gay bar where he'd been spotted hours before he died? And what is the explanation for the blood that Stoner finds on the back seat of Greenleaf's car? In searching for answers, Stoner deals with a police force that has a history of harassing homosexuals. And he finds himself falling in love with his client. Valin's usually crisp writing sometimes plods here and Dorn's chronic helplessness annoys, but the villains aren't always evil and even the good guys show some flaws as the fragments of Greenleaf's tormented life come to light. Readers are left with an unexpected solution and an unusually affecting portrait of the victim and his times. (Feb.)