In Chicago, DEA Special Agent Pierce Hunt, the hero of this action-packed series launch from Gervais (the Mike Walton thrillers), is saddled with Luke Moore, a pompous TV reporter, while executing a major drug bust on the Mexican drug cartel run by Valentina Mieles (aka the Black Tosca), "the most powerful woman in the drug world." The bust goes bad after Moore tweets a heads-up to his followers before the raid. The minor injuries the reporter sustains in the botched raid are blamed on Hunt, resulting in a six-month suspension for the DEA agent. Meanwhile, the Black Tosca begins an operation to take over the Vincente Garcia drug cartel, during which Hunt's 15-year-old daughter, Leila, is accidentally kidnapped. To save Leila's life, the agent must ally himself with Garcia's daughter, Anna, with whom he fell in love several years earlier on an undercover mission to infiltrate the Garcia cartel. As a former drug investigator for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, Gervais portrays this world convincingly, but readers should be prepared for stock characters and predictable plotting. Agent: Eric Myers, Myers Literary Management. (Jan.)