Count Backwards to Zero

When a suicidal scientist decides to go out with a bang while on a cruise ship, he'll take everyone down with him, including PI Mike Shayne.

 

After investigating a heroin smuggling case on Bermuda, Mike Shayne needs some downtime, and decides to hitch a ride back to Miami on the Queen Elizabeth II. But just as he bellies up to the bar, he's accosted by a gorgeous woman who needs his help, and won't take no for answer.

 

While sailing from England, Anne Blagden has befriended a British atomic physicist who's been hired by an American aerospace company. Saddled with a wife he hates, financial problems, and ungrateful children, the depressed scientist has decided to turn his fresh start into an explosive end by smuggling onboard seventeen pounds of plutonium and a detonator: a functioning atomic bomb.

 

Needless to say, Shayne finds the story truly unbelievable, until the facts begin to fall into place. With Anne at his side, he'll have to wade through a morass of petty criminals, double agents, and arms dealers, who are all willing to kill to get their hands on the bomb. And this time, Shayne just might be in over his head . . .

 

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