The Innocent

When an infamous cop killer escapes from an upstate New York Maximum Security prison with help from the inside, warden Jack "Keeper" Marconi personally leads the hunt to catch the fleeing con, not only to restore his reputation, but his own life.

In 1997, Green Haven Prison went insane...

They call him Keeper, but lately Jack Marconi has specialized in losing things. Just last year, he lost his wife in a mysterious traffic accident, and ever since, he's felt like he's losing his mind. As the warden of the maximum security Green Haven Prison, home to 2,500 of New York's most hardened criminals, Marconi can't afford to drop focus, even for an instant. But he's been slipping up on the job, and he's tormented by flashbacks to the Attica uprising. All of which makes him ripe for the role of patsy when a convicted cop killer named Eduardo Vasquez stages a daring breakout on his watch.

From the start, Marconi suspects an inside job. What he doesn't suspect is that he'll become the target of a frame-up. Soon drugs are planted in Marconi's office, embarrassing photos are circulated, and he finds himself facing trumped-up charges of obstruction of justice. With his supervisors clearly setting him up to take the fall, Marconi hatches a desperate scheme to clear his name. Kidnapping the escaped killer's girlfriend, he arms himself with a .45 and takes off in pursuit of Vasquez--and the truth.

Once sworn to uphold the law, Marconi will have to elude it if he wants to bring this conspiracy to light. Otherwise Keeper could lose everything: his job, his reputation--and even his life.

What the critics are saying:

"A hugely successful series...Vincent Zandri's The Guilty is a gripping combination of old-school hardboiled detective yarn and a '80s high-octane action movie. Immensely enjoyable."
--Paul D. Brazill, Pulp Metal Magazine
"Tough, stylish, heartbreaking." --Don Winslow, bestselling author of Savages
"A riveting story..oh, what a story it is: grisly, surprising, and page-turningly suspenseful. A terrific old-school
thriller." --Booklist (starred review)
"Captures readers' attention from the opening scene...creates a story that... is hard to tear away from once a reader is hooked."
--BookPage
"Sensational...Masterful...Brilliant." --New York Post
"The action never wanes." --Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel
"Gritty, fast-paced, lyrical and haunting." --Harlan Coben, bestselling author of Six Years
"Non-stop action." --I Love a Mystery