Gus Dyer

Gus Dyer is a hardcore detective in the big city. He knows what crime is, and he has seen the worst of the worst walk her streets and taken those same people down. Some to jail, some to the gates of hell where they belonged in the first place.
This time he is on the trail of a hired killer, Jimmy West. West works out of the city. It is his base and fortress, the place where he can roam free among millions of other people unseen, unchallenged and free to continue his crimes.
Jimmy west makes millions, working for the people of power. Corporate, Crime, Drugs, it doesn't matter. The money speaks and Jimmy reacts. Gus Dyer makes his living as a detective, just a few rungs up the ladder of an everyday cop but he will pit himself and the resources of the department against Jimmy West and his money. In the end there can be only one who triumphs...

From the book

Gus's investigation took him from opulent penthouse suites to grimy back alleys, from high-stakes poker games to clandestine meetings in dimly lit bars. He interviewed disgruntled employees of Phoenix Investments, former associates of Volkov, and even some of the charity's volunteers, each conversation painting a more complete picture of the vast, intricate network of corruption.
One particular encounter stood out. A former employee of Galerie Celeste, a nervous young woman named Anya, provided vital information about the gallery's role in the money-laundering operation. She described how the gallery's owner, a suave and charming man named Jean-Pierre Dubois, used a complex system of invoices and appraisals to disguise the movement of illicit funds. Dubois, it turned out, was a key figure in The Serpent's inner circle, tasked with managing the flow of money through the art market. Anya had become increasingly uneasy about the nature of the gallery's dealings and had secretly been documenting suspicious transactions for months. Fear of retribution had kept her quiet but the burden of her knowledge was too much to bear.

The more Gus uncovered, the more he realized the sheer scale of The Serpent's operation. It wasn't simply a criminal organization; it was a shadow government, quietly manipulating events from behind the scenes, pulling strings, and influencing decisions that affected every aspect of civic life. The seemingly disparate pieces of the puzzle-the assassinations, the real estate deals, the arms trafficking-were all connected, intricately interwoven into a larger scheme of control and domination.