She was in a room with a low ceiling and concrete walls. A lightbulb hung from a long cord above a metal chair. A camera on a tripod faced the chair. Plastic sheeting was spread on the ground beneath the chair in a sloppy semi-circle. Her heart leaped to her throat. This was a death trap… They were going to torture her and kill her and let the plastic collect her body fluids before they wrapped her body in it. — from “Shepherd and The Fox”

(Severn River Publishing)

“I hesitate to say anything that makes this book sound like it’s all about me,” Kristi Belcamino says of “Shepherd and The Fox,” the new thriller she wrote with Brian Shea, New England-based former Navy officer and detective whose novels are nonstop action.

Belcamino, award-winning crime reporter and author of dark mysteries about fierce women seeking justice, lives in Minneapolis and is a Pioneer Press reporter. She’s written more than 30 novels, including her Gabriella Giovanni series.

Kristi Belcamino (Courtesy of the author)

What’s unusual, if not unique, about this project is that it was born during Zoom talks between four people — Shea, Belcamino, a respected Hollywood producer and a screenwriter. (She isn’t releasing the producer’s name now because the screenplay is still being written based on the book.)

“The intellectual property for the characters is owned by all four of us,” Belcamino explains. “In the contract we are on board for the book being published and a movie deal being sought. I don’t think this kind of situation has ever happened before.”

It all began a few years ago when the producer reached out to Shea suggesting they come up with an idea for which Shea would write the book and the producer would get a movie deal. Shea agreed but he wanted to bring in Belcamino to write the book.

Shea offered Belcamino the job even though they had never met in person.

“Brian had seen my books on Amazon and realized there was a lot of overlap between our readers,” Belcamino says. “A few months earlier he had offered me a different collaboration but I said no because it wasn’t my brand. But ‘Shepherd and The Fox’ sounded exciting, something my readers would enjoy. And it involved Hollywood.”

Once the team was gathered, they’d “hop on Zoom and brainstorm in all directions,” as Belcamino puts it. “We came up with the entire idea with input from everyone.”

“Shepherd and The Fox” features big ex-Delta Force mercenary Adam Shepherd and beautiful Lucky Rodriquez-Toscani, alias The Fox, an accomplished thief looking to avenge the deaths of her parents. They work undercover for a mysterious entity known as the Foundation, run by equally mysterious Uncle Max, whom they have never seen. Shepherd and Lucky have history, teasing one another about how many times each saved the other’s butt. As the book begins, they haven’t seen one another since they were at a bloody massacre in Kabul. They are assigned by Uncle Max to work as partners to infiltrate a Mexican drug cartel by moving the cartel’s money. The mission turns deadly when they collide with a very bad guy who wants to take over the entire drug trade. It’s Shepherd and The Fox against a vicious killer with his own private army. Luckily, a tough gang of “loco” women motorcyclists is on their side.

When Belcamino began to write this fast-paced story, she worked from an outline Shea had written, including a couple of paragraphs about who the characters were. “Then I’d build the flesh into it,” she says. “Brian did a lot of work behind the scenes, including plotting action points. We are a good mix; Brian has a strong military and police background so he was great with the action and I had to make the characters come to life, writing their emotions. We complemented each other. He was for action; I want to make you cry.”

Brian Shea (Courtesy of the author)

Belcamino admits this genre is new to her but it was fun to write: “In my previous books I skirted around more violent action themes. This one pushed me to grow as a writer. I joined Muay Thai and kickboxing classes to help me figure out how to write action, such as how it feels to kick someone.” (In the book, Lucky is very good at this.)

It was Belcamino who named the novel’s protagonist Lucky, in honor of Jackie Collins’ 1998 novel of the same name, one of Belcamino’s favorite books as a young reader. Collins’ protagonist, Lucky Santangelo, was Belcamino’s heroine: “She was the first Italian-American I read about who was powerful and strong and sexy.”

Although there are brief scenes of lovemaking between Shepherd and Lucky, this never takes away from the deadly danger they are in and how they handle it.

“It’s nice to have romance but that is not the main point of this book,” Belcamino stresses. “I looked at it as an action movie when I was writing. I like the dynamics of Shepherd and Lucky, righting a wrong, ensuring justice. I like that they are doing bad things for the right reasons.”

Belcamino grew up in Paradise, Calif., and fell in love with journalism when she attended California State University Long Beach. She has worked at the Contra Costa Times, Monterey Herald and Carmel Pine Cone newspapers in California, as well as White Bear Press in Minnesota. When she was a police reporter for the Contra Costa paper she looked into the eyes of serial killer Curtis Dean Anderson during interviews. He was a cab driver awaiting trial for kidnapping a 7-year-old girl in a small California town. She and two colleagues broke the story about Laci Peterson’s remains being found in the ocean and she was among the first with news that passengers fought back when United Airlines Flight 93 was hijacked on 9/11 and crashed in Pennsylvania.

Belcamino’s debut novel, “Blessed are the Dead,” came out in 2014. It is based on the notes, articles and other material she kept during her time writing about Anderson, who died in prison.

Now that “Shepherd and The Fox” is in the world (Severn River Publishing, $16.99), Belcamino is working on a domestic suspense novel and finishing a proposal for a nonfiction book about dating for people over 50. She’s also mom to two daughters in college whose father is her ex-husband.

Good question: Will The Four who gave birth to “Shepherd and The Fox” ever meet in person?

“Maybe on the red carpet in Hollywood when the movie comes out,” Belcamino says with a laugh.

Belcamino and her award-winning friend Jess Lourey (“The Taken Ones,” “Unspeakable Things” and other thrillers) will be guest authors at Minnesota Mystery Night on March 18 at Axel’s restaurant in Mendota. The event is sold out, though you can sign up for the wait list.

“Jess is one of my favorite people,” Belcamino says. “I am so grateful for her friendship. She’s an inspiration to me in most areas of my life. And she probably works harder than almost any writer I ever met.”

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