It's one of the hottest summers in memory and Chris and Pamela Cross are gearing up to open their new supper club, Gin Mill Grill.Tillie Babcock, Chris's grandmother, has moved to town and she's ready to take over - everything. She loves a good cause and wants nothing more than to help a few homeless people come in out of the heat and gain a second chance in life. Unfortunately, a few of these people are disappearing right out from under her nose. At Tillie's insistence, Chris and Pamela now have a cause, or case, of their own. To find the missing people before it's too late.
Sandi and Pete take a vacation along with friends Felicity and Stanley, to visit her parents at their Bed and Breakfast in Arizona. What could possibly go wrong?Sandi's stepfather, Frank, takes the four out ATVing to a seldom traveled part of the desert, and a missive left by Jennifer Crisp over fifty years earlier is found on the underside of a rock outcropping.That short note grabs hold of Sandi's curious and stubborn side and leads to the discovery of bodies buried in the desert dating back to the 1960s era. The desert is, unfortunately, a good place to hide bodies.Can Sandi find the right clues to lead her to what happened so many years earlier? What happened to Jennifer Crisp? Almost a bigger question is, will Sandi's relatives help or hinder her investigation?
Taking a vacation can lead to an unexpected case for private eye Sandi Webster-Goldberg. Taking a vacation with your menopausal mother, an eccentric aunt, a pregnant friend and her husband, and a flustered husband can lead to total chaos. Pete Goldberg and Stanley Hawks take a leisurely walk in the country, only to discover an abandoned house. When Sandi, her mother, Livvie, and her Aunt Martha decide to explore, they discover that the house isn't quite as abandoned as previously thought. A young woman and her baby are hiding out from unknown danger. She needs help, and the three women are more than happy to oblige her.
Sandi and Pete have earned a reputation for solving old cases, and they're approached by a woman who'd like a 1930s crime solved. A man was brutally murdered and his brother immediately disappeared. The authorities believed the brother was their best suspect, but they weren't able to track him down. Case closed - or was it? A lone police officer didn't like the results and spent the rest of his life searching for answers. Their client's father had tried to clear the name of Harley Glosser, the dead man's brother, but his efforts were futile. His interest in the case? Horace and Harley Glosser were his cousins. With the discovery of a private room in the house where the crime was committed, Sandi and Pete must change their thought processes and start running down other suspects and looking at other locations, including an old speakeasy. The potential suspects are people in their nineties, so they also have to hope they're still living. Why would someone in the current day try to put a halt to the investigation? After all, the murder took place in the 1930s. Circumstances are often not as they seem, and this case is no exception.
