A pair of armed robbers, one big, the other small, knock over a store in the rough Compton neighborhood of Los Angeles. The owner refuses to report the crime, but a little boy tells the cops.

The same pair (apparently) hit another store shortly thereafter, killing a well-liked storekeeper and a wino on the sidewalk.

In Danny R. Smith’s Echo Killers, Detective “Dickie” Jones has a new partner – a feisty Latino woman named Josie – and they join the hunt for a team of outlaws who mirror themselves, in a way – a big Anglo and a Latina. We learn the story of these two outlaws, too. They are Army deserters, and the woman doesn’t know she’s still being hunted by an officer she spent a night with once. Their almost star-crossed story bears the marks of tragedy, as the two hurtle toward one another on a fatalistic trajectory.

This is the third volume in Smith’s “Dickie Floyd” series. “Dickie” and “Floyd” haven’t actually been partners since the end of the first book, but they keep gravitating together. Their personal bond is a tight one. The book’s mood is somber, but the ending is rather sublime – an affirmation of what Luther would have called the policeman’s “vocation.” Another book is coming, according to Amazon.

I liked Echo Killers it a lot. Cautions for foul language, cop humor, and intense situations.