When Vic Malloy, head of Universal Services — an organization undertaking any job that a client wants done — is hired to watch a millionaire’s wife suspected of kleptomania, it is just another routine assignment — until an operator working on the case is suddenly and brutally murdered. Then the millionaire’s wife vanishes; and the husband denies he has ever hired Malloy, and threatens to sue him if he goes to the police. Faced with this extraordinary situation, Malloy is determined to avenge the death of his operator and, playing a lone hand, sets out to find the killer. From that moment, he and his two aides, Paula Bensinger and Jack Kerman are involved in a series of ruthless murders and macabre situations. Strange people flit across the scene; any of them could be the killer. There is the ex-prize fighter, Caesar Mills; the millionaire’s crippled daughter, Natalie; the nightclub owner, Bannister; the playboy, George Barclay; the photographer and blackmailer, Louis; the cowboy sharpshooter, Thayler; and the red-haired, green-eyed Gail Bolus, a girl with a past

A thrilling plot that involves a wayward heiress, an antagonistic police official, numerous shady characters and at least three murders…

From the moment Lee Dedrick, husband of the fourth richest woman in the world, disappears, believed kidnapped, Vic Malloy of Universal Services is snarled up in a vicious vortex of murder, glamorous women and violent non-stop action. The curtain goes up on the sprawled, lifeless body of Dedrick’s chauffeur, shot to death by an unknown hand. A frightened and lovely brunette flits across the scene, but vanishes almost immediately, shooting from a well-turned hip. Five hundred thousand dollars ransom is paid over to the invisible kidnappers, but Lee Dedrick is not returned. The whole of the country as far north as San Francisco and as far south as Los Angeles joins in the hunt for the kidnappers. Nick Perelli, gambler, is framed for the kidnapping and is arrested. Determined to save him and to find the real kidnappers, Vic Malloy, with his aides Paula Bensinger and Jack Kerman, takes a header into this mystery and intrigue which finally lands him in a situation of unparalleled danger and horror. Then, after the most gruesome and exciting experience of his already turbulent career, Malloy finds the key to the riddle of Dedrick’s kidnapping