Cleis Press, June 2013; ISBN-10: 1573449296
Dan Stagg is an ex-military man who fell foul of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell. Dan is in his late 30s, tall, and muscular. He had a successful career with the US Marines and rose to the rank of Major, with active service in the first Gulf War, Kosovo and Afghanistan. Since 2009 he’s been back in civilian life, and is finding it very hard to adjust. Like Jack Reacher, Lee Child’s protagonist, Dan is prone to violence, always upholding what he views as justice. He has few personal ties, nearly no belongings, tries to live under the radar.
Dan gets fired from his low-paying job as a security guard at a New York City nightclub after a fight with some particularly obnoxious patrons. Jobless, living in a crappy room in Harlem, and broke, Dan’s offered a great deal of money to do a protection job for the young male “secretary” of a powerful real estate developer. The young man in question is vain, shallow and, Dan is forced to admit, very attractive—and it’s quite clear that his idea of ‘protection’ includes sex. But Dan quickly realizes that something strange is going on: he’s being used as a shield for a much more sinister operation, and is forced to choose between the easy money and sex that his new job offers him, and living up to the ideals of service and duty that he embodied in the Marines.
Why should he do the right thing—particularly when the army betrayed him? Dan finds himself playing a dangerous double game which will take all his combat skill and military training to survive. The Hardest Thing is a sexy gay mystery as only James Lear can write it: filled with lots of sexual encounters, romance, sweat, violence and conspiracy.
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