Showing results by author "Melinda Leigh" in All Categories

In a quiet suburban neighborhood in upstate New York, single mom Kelly Gibson is slain in her home—the victim of a rage killing. Right away, Sheriff Bree Taggert has three persons of interest: an angry soon-to-be ex-husband, a furtive rebound boyfriend, and an obsessive neighbor. But as Bree and investigator Matt Flynn work together to narrow the field, there’s a shocking twist in the case: a second woman is murdered in the same brutal fashion.

After the devastating loss of her husband in Iraq, Morgan Dane returns to Scarlet Falls, seeking the comfort of her hometown. Now, surrounded by family, she’s finally found peace and a promising career opportunity - until her babysitter is killed and her neighbor asks her to defend his son, Nick, who stands accused of the murder.

For more than twenty-five years, Philadelphia homicide detective Bree Taggert has tucked away the nightmarish childhood memories of her parents’ murder-suicide…. Until her younger sister, Erin, is killed in a crime that echoes that tragic night: innocent witnesses and a stormy marriage that ended in gunfire. There’s just one chilling difference. Erin’s husband, Justin, has vanished.

During a vicious heat wave, a county maintenance worker stumbles upon two suspicious suitcases abandoned by the side of the road. Sheriff Bree Taggert responds to find two bodies stuffed inside the luggage. The press demands action. The community is on edge. Suddenly, Bree is at the center of a media firestorm. In Oregon, a senator’s daughter goes missing. FBI Special Agent Mercy Kilpatrick agrees to keep the politically sensitive case on the down-low.

A teenager returns home from work and finds her parents shot to death in their bed. Responding to the call, Sheriff Bree Taggert realizes the crime wasn’t a burglary gone wrong. The couple was executed. The sole survivor: their traumatized teenage daughter, Claire Mason. Bree teams up with investigator Matt Flynn to work the case, but together they uncover more questions than answers. When Claire is stalked at the park, it’s clear the killer isn’t finished—and she’s the next target.

A pair of hikers find a tarp-wrapped body in a clearing in the woods. When a search in the surrounding area yields two more, Sheriff Bree Taggert knows they’ve stumbled onto a serial killer’s dumping ground. With the help of investigator Matt Flynn, Bree works the case. They go to interview Jana, the best friend of one of the victims. But when they arrive at her apartment, it’s been ransacked and set on fire. And Jana is missing.

When a terrible accident abruptly ends her riding career, Rachel Parker returns to Pennsylvania to rebuild her family’s horse farm. But her welcome home is anything but warm. Her sister’s abusive husband and a violent vandal threaten Rachel’s new business and her life. Someone is systematically trying to destroy her. Someone who knows private things about her. Someone who’s been watching her.

While fighting in Afghanistan, Major Grant Barrett receives devastating news: his brother and sister-in-law have been murdered in Scarlet Falls, the sleepy suburb of Grant's youth. Emotionally scarred from war, the career soldier returns home on emergency leave to temporarily care for his orphaned nephew and niece. But when someone tries to kidnap the kids and their teenage babysitter, Grant knows it's not a random act... and neither were the murders.

All communities have their secrets...but on Widow’s Island, there’s a skeleton in every closet, as Deputy Tessa Black knows all too well. When Tessa stumbles upon a half-buried body in the woods, a peaceful morning hike suddenly turns into a race to catch a killer. Tessa identifies the skeletal corpse as Aurora Franklin, a young college student and aspiring actor. She’d come to Widow’s Island for a summer job, only to be strangled and discarded. Aurora has been dead for over a month - and not a single islander has reported her missing.

On Widow’s Island, the secrets are dark...and everybody has one. So when Deputy Tessa Black responds to a call about an explosion in a quiet neighborhood, she gets more than she bargained for: the body of a teen who went missing weeks ago. Until recently, Gavin was living in a reputable foster home. But now that he is found dead - Tessa can’t help but wonder if sinister forces are at play. Who would want to hurt him, and why?

After corporate attorney Hannah Barrett tries - and fails - to stop a kidnapping in Vegas, she can’t shake the haunting image of the terrified young girl she couldn’t save. She tells herself that a visit to her hometown in Scarlet Falls could be a welcome distraction. But soon, Hannah realizes the kidnappers have all the info they need to track her every move. And when chilling e-mails about the victim appear in her inbox, it’s frighteningly clear what happened in Vegas has followed her home.

When a mysterious package lands on Louisa Hancock's doorstep, the Philadelphia museum curator can hardly anticipate the nightmare that's about to envelop her. The package is addressed to her father—an expert in Viking culture—and inside is a ninth-century sword, a chilling thank-you note, and photos of two dead bodies in a tableau evoking a Nordic funeral. The gruesome images match a recent crime scene.

The sleepy town of Solitude, Oregon, has turned into ground zero for a turf war between the manufacturers and distributors of a lethal new drug. When a teenage witness disappears, social worker Carly Taylor must find him before he's silenced permanently.

Deputy Tessa Black spots a man disturbing a grave in the local cemetery and gives chase. But when Tessa catches him, she learns that the ghoulish trespasser wasn’t robbing graves; he was burying a box of bones. With the help of her fiancé, park ranger Logan Wilde, Tessa discovers that the remains belong to a missing teenager from a nearby island. After the girl disappeared nine months ago, police labeled her a runaway. Now, though, it’s clear the teenager was murdered.

When a retired sheriff’s deputy is shot to death in his home, his troubled teenage stepson, Evan, becomes the prime suspect. Even more incriminating, the boy disappeared from the scene of the crime. Desperate to find her son, Evan’s mother begs PI Lance Kruger for help. She knows her son is innocent. Kruger and defense attorney Morgan Dane want to believe that too, but the evidence against the boy is damning. Just as the trail goes cold, another deputy vanishes.

When two hikers disappear from their hometown in Maine, everyone blames the blinding storms. But the truth is far more sinister. Unaware of the danger, tabloid photographer Jayne Sullivan follows an anonymous tip to find the most reclusive sculptor in the art world. Instead, she finds mysterious handyman Reed Kimball - and a small town full of fatal secrets.

After Sheriff Bree Taggert’s takedown of cold-blooded murderer Travis Ekin, his family vows revenge. Travis’s mother and brothers are every bit as violent, and Bree is in their crosshairs. To complicate matters, Bree’s best friend, Dana Romano, walks into her date’s home and finds him shot in the chest. Dana tangles with an unidentified intruder, but he escapes through the back door. The crime scene is in another police department’s jurisdiction, and the lead investigator focuses on Dana as the prime suspect.

When a man is shot in the head, Bree Taggert and her new partner, veteran detective Dana Romano, respond to the call. They break the news to the victim’s ex-wife and learn the estranged couple’s five-year-old daughter was supposed to have been with him. What starts as a murder investigation quickly morphs into a desperate search for a missing child. The case stirs memories of Bree’s own traumatizing childhood. To find the little girl, Bree will have to relive her own terrifying past.

Twenty-seven years ago, Sheriff Bree Taggert’s father killed her mother, then himself. Now Bree and her younger brother, Adam, find human bones on the grounds of their abandoned family farm. The remains are those of a man and a woman, both murdered in the same horrible way. When the investigation determines the murders occurred thirty years ago, Bree’s dead father becomes a suspect, forcing Bree to revisit the brutal night she’s spent most of her life trying to forget.

When true-crime writer Olivia Cruz disappears with no signs of foul play, her new boyfriend, Lincoln Sharp, suspects the worst. He knows she didn’t leave willingly and turns to attorney Morgan Dane and PI Lance Kruger to find her before it’s too late. As they dig through Olivia’s life, they are shocked to discover a connection between her current book research on two cold murder cases and the suicide of one of Morgan’s prospective clients.