Detective Rory Scott was in college when six-year-old Savannah Armitage vanished and the body of a missing teen was found nearby in a shallow grave. The case went unsolved, but Rory's mother's partner, Stephen, was convicted in the court of public opinion. When Rory's mother refused to leave him, Rory broke familial ties.

Six years later, Rory has built a life with her girlfriend Cade. When another child disappears and the unidentified body of a missing teen is found nearby, Rory knows it's more than a coincidence. She steps in as the lead investigator, determined to find the killer and bring home the missing girls. As media swarms law enforcement for details, the state steps in, and a rookie special agent yanks Rory's case.

In a renegade move, Rory teams up with Savannah's mother, a woman still desperate to find her daughter alive. When the investigation leads to the two people Rory most wants to avoid-her own mother and Stephen-Rory must face the fallout of her estrangement.

As Rory's personal and professional lives converge, it's a race against time to find the connection between the cases and bring the killer to justice.

Meredith Doench's short fiction and creative nonfiction have appeared in literary journals such as Hayden's Ferry Review, Women's Studies Quarterly, and Gertrude. She earned a Ph.D. in creative writing from Texas Tech University and served as a fiction editor at Camera Obscura: Journal of Literature and Photography. She teaches writing and literature at a university in southern Ohio. Crossed is her first novel.