Steal Away

"David, something awful has happened to your mother and your father," said the stranger in the van. "You're in great danger. You've got to come with us. . . ."

Rachel Stark is about to live every parent's nightmare, the strain of her troubled marriage intensified by a far greater tragedy: her nine-year-old son, David, snatched off the street in broad daylight while on his way home from school. With no apparent motive. No immediate witnesses. And only one clue: his red bicycle lying, as if dropped in a hurry, on the side of the road.

Now Rachel must summon up all her strength and channel every ounce of rage, terror, and anguish into a desperate search for David. Her rocky relationship with her husband, Stephen, will face the ultimate challenge--and a callous act of betrayal.

Into this precarious mix come Rachel's sister, Miranda, recently divorced and living under foot--a bombshell who conceals explosive secrets; the unfriendly Detective Gallagher, infuriating in his cold detachment--and unspoken attractions; and John Robinson of the Missing Child Foundation, a seeming saint who harbors his own hidden agenda.

Then there is Rachel's uncanny connection to her son, both a blessing and a curse--a link that takes the form of fleeting visions, where a deathly white and terrified child cries out to a mother who cannot reach him. . . .

A frantic search propelled by a tidal wave of panic. Real characters and raw emotions. Simmering resentments and shocking revelations. Katharine Clark weaves these elements into a richly compelling novel of a family in crisis in a story that twists and turns at a breakneck pace until its stunning conclusion.