A lawyer who specialises in French-African relations is found brutally murdered after suffering 'the torture of Father Lebrun' - a burning tyre is placed around his neck until he suffocates.

The case is already explosive because of its connections to high-profile members of the Franco-African arms trade. But for Lola Jost, the case has a darker resonance - her much-loved assistant, a mixed race policeman named Toussaint Kidjo, was murdered in the same manner five years before - a crime that was never solved.

Weaving in our favourite larger-than-life characters from The Dark Angel, this is a far darker story, as Lola and Ingrid become embroiled in a case that draws attention from all the wrong quarters.

Dominique Sylvain worked as a journalist in Paris before relocating to Asia where she lived for spells in Japan and Singapore. She is the author of thirteen crime novels and now lives once more in Tokyo where she writes full-time.