Eighty-year-old Earl Donovan is a stubborn and wealthy father of four. His children are... * a bookish bachelor who hates Earl; * a handsome, young lawyer who desperately wants to start his own law firm; * a beautiful daughter and veterinarian who wants her own hospital; * a cash-strapped scientist whose personal overhead exceeds what he earns. The four continually beg Earl to help them financially. He refuses.Earl's first wife is bitter about the divorce, but tells Hank Tower she is not interested in his money. His second wife is extremely interested in it and is entitled to half of his fortune when he dies, unless he writes a will excluding her. It's a possibility she fears, for she needs a sum of money that only Earl's dying without a will can provide. Hank Tower is hired to protect Earl from these dangers. Just before he's about to declare the assignment a false alarm, a sibling is murdered. The remaining three are terrified that one of them did it and will kill Earl and anyone with a claim on his estate. Two siblings have access to deadly poisons; the third has access to hit men. They all say they are innocent and plead with Tower to find the killer before they are killed. Then there's a surprise murder. Now, even Tower's life is in danger. Worse, he fears the killer may have been using him all along. The rising tension in this masterful tale of scheming heirs versus a rich and selfish patriarch peaks with the murderer and Tower confronting each other in a duel to the death.
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