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| Graphic Image designed by Sandra Lopez |
A picture is worth a thousand words. But this photo is worth a lot more: it might cost Adelaide her life.
Suddenly her computer’s being hacked, she’s being watched and getting death threats.
Adelaide’s being hunted.
And the only way to save herself is to solve an unsolvable murder before she becomes the next victim.
If Adelaide can get her next-door neighbor, a cranky and recently fired Secret Service agent, to help her solve the case, she might actually have a shot.
But this is D.C. and the killer’s spent 35 years rising through the ranks. And Adelaide’s running out of time.
Can Adelaide catch the killer before he catches her? Or will this summer be her last?
Available on Amazon
Night of
1986: a boy named George was killed, his blood under the cherry blossoms.
Present: An
adjunct professor named Adelaide was researching old crimes for her book and
stumbles across an old photo, one that could be THE clue to a killer. When she tried going to the police about it,
no one would listen. What did she really have here? But the odd thing was that everything
about this old case just vanished—research, Google articles, emails,
everything. It was just gone. Spooky. Then things turn deadly when Adelaide
starts receiving threatening messages. Was she in danger now? Were George’s
killers still out there?
Can she
finally close the case and put George’s spirit to rest?
Intriguing
and compelling. There were some typos here and there, but it doesn’t deter from
a fascinating case that hooks the reader. Adelaide was determined to find the
killer no matter what, and you just had to know how it ends.
A quick and
gripping read!
My rating: 4 stars
Blood under
cherry blossoms- excerpt
“I actually
wanted to talk to you about that,” Adelaide said. “Is there any way I could
find out who lived in apartment 203, in 1986?”
Ruth steepled her
fingers. “That depends. Generally, that’s an invasion of privacy. Why would a
professor need that information?”
Adelaide leaned
forward. “Remember that box of old photos you let me have? I found one that was
taken of the Oakwood murder scene. Something I don’t think the police ever saw.
And it has to have been taken from that apartment. It’s a longshot, but if we
could find whoever lived there in 1986, and get them to talk to the police, it
might uncover something that could finally solve the Oakwood murder.”
Ruth studied
Adelaide. “Hmm.”
“Do you remember
who lived there?” Adelaide asked.
“Yes, actually.”
Adelaide
straightened. “Really? That’s amazing. If you could just give me their name–”
But Ruth was
already shaking her head. “I can’t do that. And if I did, that person won’t
talk to the police, not for something as old as that.”
“But if you could
just give me their information, I can at least try–”
“I said no,” Ruth
said, raising her voice, and Adelaide stilled. It was the first time she’d ever
heard Ruth raise her voice like that.
She’d heard Ruth
angry, heard her try to corral a crowd, but this was something different.
This was fear.
Ruth closed her
eyes, took a deep breath. When she opened them, she was calm, and Adelaide was
tempted to think she’d imagined the whole thing.
“Ruth,” Adelaide
says. “Is there more to this than just local history?”
Ruth looked out
the window. “Sometimes history is viciously ugly. And it only gets worse when
you bring it into the light.” She sighed. “I never should have given you those
photos.”
And then she
rolled her shoulders, shaking it off, and when she looked back at Adelaide her
smile was bright. “You know about this weekend’s potluck right? Of course
everyone in the building’s invited but I’m really trying to get you single
people to come out. Leave your screens! Meet people! Y'all have too much time
on your hands. If I get one more complaint about not using organic cleaning
supplies, or offering an adequate meditation space…”
Adelaide laughed
politely, knowing she was being dismissed.
But as she
wrestled with the old fashioned elevator gate, and rode up to her fourth floor
apartment, Adelaide felt the miscellaneous fear settle into cold hard
certainty. This wasn’t in her head. Someone had scared Ruth, and probably
others, out of talking about the Oakwood murder. When she got up to her one
bedroom apartment, Adelaide dropped her purse, kicked off her shoes and cracked
her neck. Then she ordered takeout, scooped her hair up into a bun, and sat
down to her keyboard.
Someone was
trying to erase the George Oakwood’s murder from the Internet.
And she wasn’t
going to let them.
Adelaide pulled
up every cold-case website and message board she could find. And then she
started posting everything she could about the Oakwood murder.
By the time she
was done, there wouldn’t be a cold case fanatic anywhere on the Internet who
hadn’t seen the photo of George Oakwood’s killers, running away from what
they’d done.
