A beleaguered bookie, a blackmailed quarterback, and a cheating mob wife are all in day's work for Miami PI Mike Shayne.

When Harry Bass, the big man in bookmaking and casino gambling takes a hit, everyone in Miami takes notice. And this one is big. In one afternoon, a longshot mare at the track wins, a football game is fixed, and Bass is the victim of a violent stickup, being robbed of $200,000. Word has it that, in going more legit, Bass has gotten slow and is prime for a takedown. He hires PI Mike Shayne to sort it all out.

For Shayne, all the clues lead to the day's big winner: supposedly retired Chicago mobster Al Naples. Sensing blood in the water, Naples might be making his move. But Shayne knows that Bass won't go down without a fight. The man is walking around like a ticking time bomb, and it's up to Shayne to defuse the situation, before Miami's underworld goes up in flames . . .

"The hard-drinking, hard-fisted, quick-thinking private eye!" —Dayton Journal-Herald