The Joe DeMarco Series

From a bluff overlooking Georgia's untamed Chattooga River, an assassin fires three shots. The President of the United States is wounded; his best friend and a Secret Service agent are killed. Two days later, a man in Landover, Maryland, commits suicide, and in the man's home is overwhelming evidence that he was responsible for the assassination attempt.

When the Secretary of the Navy's nephew says he believes that two colleagues at a U.S. naval base may be committing fraud, his uncle is skeptical. Reluctant to launch an official investigation based on a relative's vague suspicions, the secretary asks John Mahoney to send his troubleshooter, DeMarco, to check out the story. As DeMarco and his friend Emma, a retired CIA agent, began to investigate, they come to the terrifying realization that an espionage ring has infiltrated the naval base.

First there was the bomb meant for the Baltimore Harbor Tunnel; then a private plane headed straight for the White House is shot down. An atmosphere of fear and panic overruns the country, and when a senator proposes to run background checks on all Muslims and deport any who aren’t citizens, his bill gains surprising traction. John Mahoney, the Speaker of the House, is not pleased. But Mahoney has a connection to one of the attackers, one he wants kept a secret....

DeMarco is sent to investigate the death of a reporter, the son of one of his boss’ old colleagues, even though it appears to be nothing more than an unfortunate accident. He soon learns that the reporter was on the trail of Senator Paul Morelli, a rising star considered a shoe-in for his party’s presidential nomination. Some politicians are lucky, and Morelli has been luckier than most, but his past has already been thoroughly scrutinized and he looks clean. But then, why is DeMarco being followed by a pair of rogue agents who freelance for the CIA?

When an American defense contractor goes to Iran to sell missile technology, the CIA knows all about it, thanks to a spy in Tehran. But when the story is leaked to an ambitious journalist, the spy is burned, brutally tortured, and executed. The director of the CIA isn’t about to let the callous sacrifice of his valuable spy go unpunished.

When the National Security Agency is caught wiretapping US citizens without the proper warrants, a political scandal erupts, and the secret program comes to a screeching halt. But Dillon Crane, the NSA genius who spearheaded the most sophisticated eavesdropping operation in history, isn’t about to sit idly by while spineless politicians sleepwalk the country into another 9/11—and Crane cleverly moves his illegal eavesdropping program into the shadows.

In House Blood, Lawson introduces us to Orson Mulray, CEO of Mulray Pharma, a cold and calculating man obsessed with profit and prestige. Mulray believes he has discovered a drug that could prevent a previously incurable disease. It could be the salvation of millions of people and earn him billions of dollars. But the drug needs to be tested on human subjects, and Mulray needs more than blood samples - he needs autopsy results. When DeMarco is asked to look into the murder conviction of a lobbyist, he has other worries on his mind....

Washington fixer Joe DeMarco has been asked to handle a lot of difficult situations over the years for his boss, Congressman John Mahoney. But nothing has ever been quite so politically sensitive, or has hit so close to home, as the task Mahoney hands DeMarco in House Odds, the latest novel from critically acclaimed thriller writer Mike Lawson. Mahoney’s daughter, Molly, has been arrested and charged with insider trading. An engineer with a high-flying technology firm, she allegedly placed a half-million-dollar bet on one of the firm’s clients.

Joe DeMarco always knew that his father, Gino, had a shady job for a local mafioso, but he didn't understand that Gino had been a hit man until he was murdered. Now, nearly 20 years later, one of Gino's former mob associates is dying of lung cancer, and he wants to get something off his chest before retiring to his grave: the truth about Gino's killer. The shocking information, and the powerful position the killer now occupies, sends DeMarco on a mission of revenge with terrible consequences.

As a fixer for influential congressman John Mahoney in Washington, DC, Joe DeMarco has found himself in plenty of unexpected and dangerous situations. In House Rivals, DeMarco is taken further out of his element than ever before, sent to North Dakota to protect a passionate but naïve 22-year-old blogger who has put herself in harm's way.

In House Revenge, congressional fixer Joe DeMarco is dispatched to Congressman John Mahoney's hometown of Boston. Mahoney wants him to help Elinore Dobbs, an elderly woman fighting against a real estate developer intent on tearing down her apartment building for a massive new development. Mahoney is in it just for the free press until Sean Callahan, the developer, disrespects him, and Elinore suffers a horrible "accident", likely at the hands of two thugs on Callahan's payroll.

Minority Leader of the House and Joe DeMarco's long-time employer John Mahoney has kept more than one secret from his wife over the years but none so explosive as this: He has a son, and that son has just been shot dead in a bar in Manhattan. Mahoney immediately dispatches DeMarco to his native New York to provide prosecutor Justine Porter with any assistance necessary, but with five bystanders willing to testify against rich boy Toby Rosenthal, the case seems like a slam-dunk - that is, until Porter begins to suspect that someone is interfering with those witnesses.

As the fixer for Congressman John Mahoney in Washington, DC, Joe DeMarco has had to bend and break the law more than a few times. But when Representative Lyle Canton, House Majority Whip, is found shot dead in his office in the US Capitol and DeMarco is arrested for the murder, DeMarco knows he's been framed. Locked up in the Alexandria Jail awaiting trial, he calls on his enigmatic friend Emma, an ex-DIA agent, to search for the true killer.

When Congressman and DeMarco’s long-time employer John Mahoney gains custody of his 15-year-old goddaughter, Cassie Russell, he sends DeMarco to evaluate the situation. Cassie’s parents have just perished in a plane crash that Cassie survived, and she has now inherited her father’s billions. DeMarco plans to advise Mahoney to leave Erin Kelly, manager of the Russell’s fund, in charge of Cassie’s finances, but he soon learns that Erin may not be as trustworthy as she first appeared.

When someone close to him is shot dead in a roadside motel in a small town in Wyoming, DeMarco shirks his responsibilities as the speaker of the house’s fixer to make sure the authorities are doing everything that can be done to catch the killer. He soon realizes that the rural area is dominated by Hiram Bunt, a wealthy rancher with an obstructionist streak who is willing to take on the federal government at gunpoint and seems to have a number of politicians under his thumb.

Joe DeMarco likes to call himself a troubleshooter. It sounds better than “bagman” or “fixer.” With more than a decade of troubleshooting under his belt on behalf of John Mahoney, the Speaker of the House, DeMarco has seen his fair share of dangerous situations. When Andie Moore, a twenty-three-year-old working in the DOJ’s Inspector General’s Office, is murdered in cold blood in Florida’s Everglades, it falls on DeMarco to get to the bottom of things.

Joe DeMarco, on the other hand, is paid to get his hands dirty. So when John Mahoney, the former Speaker of the House, calls, DeMarco knows it’s time to get to work. Brian Lewis, an intern for Mahoney, has been found dead, seemingly from a drug overdose. But Brian didn’t seem like a drug user, and even more concerning, he seemed to be on the cusp of releasing a report that identified a group of politicians who had taken bribes in helping dismantle a recent bill.

Brandon Cartwright was a rich guy worth a couple billion bucks—inherited, of course—meaning he hadn’t worked a day in his life. But he sure knew how to party, and the people he rubbed shoulders with were all sorts of rich and famous: politicians and movie stars and British royalty and Russian oligarchs. So when Brendan Cartwright is executed in his own home, the cops quickly conclude that he was most likely killed by one or more of the rich, powerful people he partied with.

Ella Fields was supposed to serve 14 long years, but thanks to a combination of good behavior on her part and prison over-crowding, she was now free after just five years. Well, not quite free, thanks to parole. If she behaved herself—if she was a model citizen—she would go from being a supervised parolee to a mostly unsupervised one and might eventually be able to live a normal life. A life that might not even be worth living, because she was completely broke and the only skills she had were the ones that had landed her in prison.