Crime novels often feature hit men, but the best portray complex personalities rather than mere murderous thugs. And while hit men with psychological issues may be something of a comic television trope, that doesn’t make them any less engaging in print. Indeed, that engaging complexity is what characterizes Lucky, the star killer in E.A. Aymar’s new thriller, When She Left. 

Stressed out about his marriage, Lucky dissolves into copious tears when assigned his next hit, much to the embarrassment of his tough guy boss. Later, having broken into a house and tied up its occupants, he discovers one is a therapist and unburdens his emotional woes to her, while she’s bound to a chair, with her protesting that these circumstances are not conducive to helpful therapy. There are other instances of such incongruity, as one line sums up: “Lucky covered his mouth with his hands and wondered, very calmly, if he was losing his mind.”

The comic aspect of this disjunction notwithstanding, When She Left is a fast-paced, gripping thriller. Set in the D.C. metro area, the author (longtime host of D.C.’s Noir at the Bar, who has previously written for City Paper) peppers the action with social insights. “He knew what men wanted, what they trusted. Men will believe anything if it has a sense of superiority to it. For some it was wealth, for others strength,” Lucky thinks at one point in regard to belonging to the male cop crowd. Later, when considering women while one shares an awful update in just a few words, the narrator observes, “the communication unique to women, when something wrong is conveyed in a short, understated phrase.”

The novel is darkly humorous, its shades of night deriving mostly from the crime family employing Lucky, the Winters. “The Winterses were never interested in sending a message or torturing someone to prove a point. Death was the most effective message there was,” Aymar writes of the family. The Winters’ shadow envelops everyone in this novel and its depictions of extremely brutal violence. From the first scene to the last, leading characters are running for their lives, pursued by implacable murderers who wreak havoc, mayhem, and, ultimately, death on anyone who gets in their way.

This gangster empire, of course, rots from top to bottom. Its front is a commercial real estate firm in D.C. “Their operation was,” Aymar writes, “like the most callous criminal enterprises, ostensibly legal, a business powered by ruthless capitalism and tireless expansion.” The firm stretches from D.C. into Maryland and Virginia, “visiting neighborhoods decimated by poverty … Gentrification tied to the enticement of a Black-free block, the photos … on their advertisements showing cheery white families.” The Winters’ crimes include human trafficking and gun smuggling, and their recent history has made them notorious: When their don, Victor Winters, was murdered, scandal erupted, so afterward, the crime syndicate kept a much lower real estate profile.

What causes the plot’s violent chaos? Why the incessant bloodshed? Because a crime boss’ girlfriend walks out on him (hence the title). Determined to kill her and her new boyfriend, the capo’s orders result in a trail of blood, wherever the pair is to be found. When She Left serves up nonstop collateral damage, alongside the ambiguous souls of those associated with a gangster empire. In this, the novel is deeply and expertly true crime fiction, fans of which will enjoy its page-turning action.

The narrative switches between the viewpoints of four main characters. Each gets their own chapters, all of which interweave, creating a plot full of surprises and alarmingly expendable minor characters. With occasional detours into suspicions and subplots that don’t pan out but which do heighten the drama, the plot barrels on to its inevitable gory conclusion, as assassins stalk their prey and each other.

Threading through this blood-red tapestry is a theme about Panamanian immigrants to the U.S. One main character, Melissa Cruz, is originally from Panama: “She had a couple of close Latina girlfriends, but like her, there was an embarrassed loss of identity, Spanish only spoken when they wanted to convey something secretive—and more often than not, they didn’t use the right words.” The author, likely thanks in part to his own Panamanian roots, handles this theme knowledgeably and deftly. It’s a rare distraction from the story’s blood-covered juggernaut of a plot.

But it never distracts for long. That’s because Lucky often takes center stage, and his life motto is “Slaughter everyone standing in the way of his happiness.”

E.A. Aymar’s When She Left, published by Thomas & Mercer on Feb. 6, is now available. eaymarwrites.com.