A poisoned pastry. A dead surveyor. And one tiny black flag that should never have been there.
In rain-soaked Whispering Willows, Tessa O'Malley would rather spend her mornings serving coffee from The Daily Grind than chasing killers. But when a man collapses at the marina market after eating a specially marked apple pastry, her quiet routine is shattered ? and suspicion quickly falls on the baker next door.
For fans of a small town female amateur sleuth, this mystery blends sharp observation, dry humour and a close-knit community where everyone knows everyone else's business... or thinks they do.
As police close in on Tessa's friend, the investigation becomes far stranger than a simple case of contaminated food. A suspicious seal on a pastry box, poison hemlock growing near disputed land and troubling discrepancies in survey records suggest the victim may have uncovered something worth killing to conceal.
What begins as a coffee truck murder mystery soon pulls Tessa and her loyal friend Brody into a web of secrets involving powerful developers, frightened witnesses and a town whose future may be worth millions. The colourful stalls and familiar faces give this farmers market cozy mystery its warmth, but beneath the friendly surface, somebody is working very hard to control the story.
With a wrongly accused baker mystery at its heart, Tessa must separate rumour from evidence before an innocent woman pays the price for someone else's crime. Set against the rain, forests and waterfront atmosphere of a Pacific Northwest small town mystery, the clues lead towards an increasingly dangerous land development conspiracy mystery where altered records may prove as deadly as poison.
Tessa is determined, Brody is impossible to discourage, and together they bring the humour and loyalty of friends solving murder mystery readers love ? even when Detective Miller would strongly prefer they left the detecting to him.
Someone marked that pastry for a reason.
And if Daniel Rook discovered the truth before he died, what else might be waiting beneath the surface of Whispering Willows?
