Checked Out (Dead-End Job Mystery)

Author: Viets, Elaine

Color: White

Number Of Pages: 304

Details:

PI Helen Hawthorne goes undercover at a local library to find a painting and solve a murder in the national bestselling mystery series. Wealthy socialite Elizabeth Cateman Kingsley has hired Helen to find a missing John Singer Sargent painting, owned by her late father. After his death, many of Davis Kingsley’s books were donated to the Flora Park Library, and his daughter suspects the small watercolor—worth a million dollars—was tucked away inside one of those dusty tomes.   To search the stacks, Helen applies for a job as a library volunteer and discovers the library has a catalog of complaints—from a mischievous calico cat to the mysterious disappearance of various items that some of the staff are attributing to a ghost. Things only get worse when a dead body turns up in a parking lot. Now Helen is bound and determined to find the killer as well as the painting—before she’s taken out of circulation herself.  

Reviews:

“Snappy . . . Helen and Phil are as entertaining as they’ve ever been.”

— Publishers Weekly  

“Brilliant . . . Another great read from a master storyteller. Check it out for yourself.”

— Suspense Magazine  

“Fun . . . The story is very intriguing, and the culprits will surprise readers.”

— RT Book Reviews

About the Author:

Elaine Viets has actually worked many of those dead-end jobs in her mystery novels, just like her character Helen Hawthorne. She is also the author of the Josie Marcus, Mystery Shopper series; the Francesca Vierling mysteries; and numerous short stories. Elaine has won an Anthony Award and an Agatha Award. Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. Also by Elaine Viets OBSIDIAN For the librarians who gave me so much entertainment between the covers ACKNOWLEDGMENTS CHAPTER 1 “I need your help,” Elizabeth Cateman Kingsley said. “My late father misplaced a million dollars in a library book. I want it back.” Helen Hawthorne caught herself before she said, “You’re joking.” Private eyes were supposed to be cool. Helen and her husband, Phil Sagemont, were partners in Coronado Investigations, a Fort Lauderdale firm. Elizabeth seemed unnaturally calm for someone with a misplaced million. Her sensational statement had grabbed the attention of Helen and Phil, but now Elizabeth sat quietly in the yellow client chair, her narrow feet in sensible black heels crossed at the ankles, her slender, well-shaped hands folded in her lap. Helen studied the woman from her chrome-and-black partner’s chair. Somewhere in her fifties, Elizabeth Kingsley kept her gunmetal hair defiantly undyed and pulled into a knot. A thin, knife-blade nose gave her makeup-free face distinction. Helen thought she looked practical, confident and intelligent. Elizabeth’s well-cut gray suit was slightly worn. Her turquoise-and-pink silk scarf gave it a bold splash of color. Elizabeth had had money once, Helen decided, but she was on hard times now. But how the heck did you leave a million bucks in a library book? Phil asked the question Helen had been thinking a little more tactfully: “How do you misplace a million in a library book?” “I didn’t,” Elizabeth said. “My father, Davis Kingsley, did.” “Is it a check? A bankbook?” “Oh, no,” she said. “It’s a watercolor.” CHAPTER 2 Elizabeth sat with her hands folded demurely in her lap, a sly smile on her face. She seemed to enjoy setting off bombshells and watching their effect. “Perhaps I should explain,” she said. “My family, the Kingsleys, were Florida pioneers. My grandparents moved to Fort Lauderdale in the 1920s and built a home in Flora Park.” The Kingsleys might have been early local residents, Helen thought, but this pioneer family hadn’t roughed it in a log cabin. The Kingsleys had built a mansion in a wealthy enclave on the edge of Fort Lauderdale during the Florida land boom. “Grandpapa Woodrow Kingsley made his money in oil and railroads,” Elizabeth said. “The old-fashioned way,” Phil said. My silver-haired husband is so ...

EAN: 9780451466334

Release Date: 03-05-2016

Languages: English

Item Note: Good shape with typical wear. Has a remainder mark. Mass Market Paperback Used - Good Ships fast! 2016

Item Condition: UsedGood

Binding: Mass Market Paperback