The sheriff called it an accident. Juniper Nash called it a lie.
When Vivienne Marsh is found dead at the bottom of her own porch ladder on a cold December morning, the sheriff closes the case before noon. Slippery rungs. Old wood. A tragic fall. Case closed.
But Juniper noticed the smell near the ladder. A specific, deliberate smell. The kind that belongs on metal fittings, not wooden steps. The kind someone applies by hand, in the dark, to a surface they know a woman will climb.
Vivienne had a system. Tea first, then the upper hooks. Warm hands before height. She had done it the same way for twenty years. Someone knew that system. Someone used it against her. And now that someone is watching Juniper ask questions in a town that wants very much to move on.
With a grieving son who inherits everything, a twelve-year rivalry next door, and a sheriff who decides what things are before he finishes looking, Juniper has to untangle a murder designed to look like no murder at all.
A gripping small town cozy mystery for readers who love amateur sleuth fiction, quiet tension, and a bakery owner who notices what everyone else walks past.
Start reading today. Juniper is already at the counter.