President Gordon Hale is up for re-election when his wife, Gloria Hale, is assassinated.
The killer, Diego Acosta, is shot during his attempted getaway, and the FBI, CIA, and every law enforcement agency in the United States concludes Acosta acted alone. Meanwhile, a grieving President Hale wins the election.
Jump ahead five years, and Michael Harris, a lawyer and thriller writer, is doing a book signing when he's approached by a man named Paul Faraday. Faraday says his father, Ron Faraday, was a Secret Service agent who took it upon himself to re-investigate Gloria Hale's assassination. 
Ron Faraday thought Acosta was part of a conspiracy, and he filled a room in his house with news clippings, photos, and other research, as well as his journals. Ron recently died, and Paul offers the material to Michael Harris, with the idea of collaborating on a book. 
Michael agrees to think about it, and he borrows Ron Faraday's journals and uses his phone to photograph everything Ron collected. After studying all the material, Michael thinks Ron may have been on the right track. Michael then interviews former President Hale's chief-of-staff Kevin Arnold, and brings up the material Ron Faraday accumulated. 
That's when big trouble starts. Ron Faraday's house is burned down, and Michael is accosted by a mugger who demands his phone. It so happens an employee in Michael's building - a woman named Stacey - interrupts the mugging, and this leads to friendship and romance.
Michael reports the attempted robbery to the police, and connects it with the fire in Ron Faraday's house, and Gloria Hale's murder. But the cops insist it's all a coincidence. They say the FBI, CIA, etc. found no evidence of a conspiracy in the death of Gloria Hale, so it's case closed.
After this, Michael gets help from Patrick Gorman, publisher of a supermarket tabloid called Exposed. Gorman agrees to keep copies of Ron Faraday's research, and he hires private detective Dana Cutler to look into the conspiracy allegations.
The investigation of Gloria Hale's shooting becomes conflated with another case. On the same day Gloria was killed, a woman named Marsha Hart vanished from the hotel where the first lady was giving a presentation.
It becomes obvious a cover-up is occurring when homes are bugged and people are murdered, one after another. 
By the end of the story, the Gloria Hale and Marsha Hart cases come together in a roundabout way, and both crimes are resolved.
I've read a number of Phillip Margolin's books and enjoyed them. Unfortunately, this isn't among Margolin's best novels. The plot strains credulity, the characters aren't fleshed out, and the clues are too obvious. That said, mystery fans might like the book for a plane ride or beach read.
I had the digital book and the audiobook, narrated by Thérèse Plummer, who does a fine job.
Thanks to Netgalley, Phillip Margolin, and Minotaur Books and Macmillan Audio for ARCs of the book.
Rating: 2.75 stars
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