The Churchgoer

In Mark Haines's former life, he was an evangelical youth pastor, a role model, and a family man--until he abandoned his wife, his daughter, and his beliefs. Now he's marking time between sunny days surfing and dark nights working security at an industrial complex. His isolation is broken when Cindy, a charming twenty-two-year-old drifter he sees hitchhiking on the Pacific Coast Highway, hustles him for breakfast and a place to crash--two cynical kindred spirits. Then his coworker is murdered in a robbery gone wrong, and Cindy disappears on the same night. Haines knows he should let it go and return to his safe life of solitude. Instead, he's driven to find out where Cindy went, under stranger and stranger circumstances. Soon Mark is chasing leads, each one taking him back into the world where his old life came crashing down--the seedier side of Southern California's drug trade and ultimately into the secrets of an evangelical megachurch where his past and future are about to converge. What begins as an investigation becomes a haunting mystery and a psychological journey both for Mark and for the elusive young stranger he won't let get away.