Driving force - Dick Francis

When one of his drivers returns to base with a dead hitchhiker in the horsebox, retired steeplechase jockey Freddie Croft is swept into a complicated conspiracy where he has to fight to save not just his business but his very life.

Punching at shifting shadows, trying to outwit adversaries whose existence he only suspects, not knowing what to believe or whom to trust, Freddie Croft is faced with dangers very different from the old familiar perils of jump racing, and he is forced to find in himself a different sort of courage.