Book 10 in the 9 Lives Cozy Mystery Series

The latest book in the 9 Lives Cozy Mystery series pits Christy Jamieson and her fellow sleuths against a ruthless blackmailer.

Kim Crosier is being blackmailed. Desperate and scared, she turns to her friend Christy for help. Together, they concoct a risky plan to expose the blackmailer. The plan goes awry when the blackmailer turns on Christy, sending her a vile deepfake photo and a payment demand. Then the blackmailer is found dead and Christy becomes a suspect.

With a crucial Child Services hearing looming, Christy cannot afford to be entangled in blackmail and murder. She and Quinn must race against time to solve the case and clear her name. As they dig deeper into the blackmailer’s web of deceit they discover a trail of victims, each with a motive to kill.

Join Christy, Quinn, and Stormy the Cat, as they navigate a labyrinth of lies and uncover secrets that could ruin reputations and lives. Will they find the true killer before it’s too late?

Available now in e- and print format at:

Barnes & Noble / Kobo / Google Play / Amazon

EXCERPT

Christy stared at the email. The instructions were blunt, to the point, unforgiving.

Deposit $50,000 to the following offshore account within 72 hours. If you do not comply, the attached picture, and others like it, will go viral over social media. The caption will include your name and contact details.

She clicked on the image. It was a picture of a much younger her having sex with her late husband’s best friend Aaron DeBolt. The mere idea of that was ridiculous, of course. She and Aaron had been at odds from the time she married Frank and neither of them would ever consider being together in a bedroom, let alone having sex with each other. But the worse thing about the photo was the third person in the image—her daughter, Noelle. She was standing by the bed and very obviously watching her mother engaged in what appeared to be very physical and very active sex, and completely unaware of her presence. Or perhaps worse, aware and uncaring.

Cold shivered through Christy as panic grabbed her by the throat, making it difficult to breath. She swallowed hard, took a deep breath, forced herself to focus. Panic was what the snake who sent this photo wanted her to feel. He’d blackmailed many people, she knew, and they usually paid up. Not surprising if they received targeted threats like this one. He was adept at figuring out a person’s weak spot, then taking advantage of it. All in all, he was very good at his job.

The scene depicted in the image had never happened, so the photograph had to have been doctored. She blew the picture up to look for the flaws she knew must be there.

The woman on the bed appeared to have much the same body shape she did, so any changes done to make the individual appear to be her would be in the head area. She scrutinized the face—her face—looking for the joins that must be there. After a couple of minutes of peering carefully, it dawned on her that the expression was wrong. It was calm, almost thoughtful, the way she looked if she was listening to something interesting. Her head was slightly turned, too, again, probably because it was taken from a photo where she was looking over at the speaker. Aaron was positioned beside and above her, making the slight head turn look realistic, but the expression was definitely not that of a woman lost in physical pleasure.

She looked past the expression, searching for more evidence. She could detect no telltale breaks where skin color was slightly different, or points where a join wasn’t perfect, but there was one place… yes there, where her hair was darker than it should have been as it flowed over her shoulder. She’d been dying her red brown hair golden blond in those days, yet here the long hair was dark, almost a chocolate color, which was as far from her natural color as the blond was.

She scanned further down the picture and found a mole on the woman’s hip where she didn’t have one.

Sitting back, she rubbed her temples in a vain attempt to eliminate the headache that had begun to throb there. Whoever had manipulated this image had done excellent work. Two little mistakes and the wrong expression were not enough to provide deniability in the perilous arena of social media.

She moved down to the place where a child’s image had been pasted into the photo. At least, she hoped it had been pasted in. The thought of a child actually being part of the original photo shoot that had created this picture turned her stomach.

Whether pasted in or not, the child looked to be about four or perhaps five years old. Her age was of course what this picture was all about. These days, the scandal of a married woman having an affair with a man not her husband was of little interest to those outside their personal circle. But a woman lost in the throws of active sex, oblivious to her small child, was quite another issue.

And if that woman was Christy Jamieson and her child was the heir to the vast Jamieson fortune, there were plenty of people who would be quick to decide that Christy was an unfit mother who must be removed from her daughter’s life before she truly scarred the child’s young mind.

Well, that wasn’t going to happen. She was Noelle’s mom and her child would stay with her until Noelle herself decided she was ready to move out. Her jaw hardened and her eyes turned cold.

Time to take this blackmailer down.