First Mystery

Adolescence is a time of "firsts." First kiss. First love. First loss. First job. And in this case, a very different type of "first": murder. This short story collection of murder mysteries adds a sinister spin to the joy and pain of firsts that have always been a major part of life, whether it be high school cliques who take the term "backstabbing" too seriously, stumbling upon a body on the way home from school, or receiving a Snapchat message that promises something deadly.

Grief...has no time limit. It has no destination in mind when it hits. It has no care as to whether or not the world still turns. And when it finally does catch up, it feels like being hit by a freight train, or being bowled over by a hurricane...maybe even being ran over by a semi-truck. It just doesn’t care. Ben should have known this. As long as he has been alive...he should have known this. But he didn’t. He didn’t even expect it. His Angel, his life, his mate asked him one simple question, and it sent his world spiraling.

Ein Thriller, der eine Gänsehaut nach der anderen verursacht! Shane Schofield sieht sich mit dem weißen Nichts der Antarktis konfrontiert, als seine Elitegruppe dorthin entsandt wird, weil Wissenschaftler ein riesiges Objekt bei einem Routine-Tauchgang gefunden haben. Dieses Objekt, welches aus Metall ist, wurde inmitten einer über 100 Millionen alten Eisschicht entdeckt. Und auf einmal verschwinden die Männer in den Tiefen des Ozeans und sind nicht mehr aufzufinden. Der weißen Hölle der Antarktis trotzend, beginnt nun ein Wettlauf um Leben und Tod.

The day Tracy Seavers dies, Detective John Peters arrives on the scene of the car accident to find she has miraculously walked away. An impossible conclusion, had the same thing not happened to him five years before. John suspects Tracy is now host to an alien entity with incredible healing power, and sometimes sinister needs. John wants Tracy almost as much as the entity inside him yearns for the new alien hiding within the beautiful brunette. The last time John got involved with another host, though, it ended in disaster.

Reverend Byron Butler enters the hospital room of an old Marine who wants to confess a dark secret. But Butler can't discover the whole truth until he investigates other leads - Helen and Howard's letters, Josiah Jackson's son, and a mysterious footlocker. Known as the "forgotten battle," Peleliu marked the first time segregated black troops mixed with white Marines on the front lines. The integration wasn't mandated. It was attributed to the ferocity of the battle as black soldiers aided the wounded.

A shipping container washed ashore leads Seattle television news anchor Stevie McNeal and reporter friend Melissa on the trail of a scam involving the importation of illegal aliens. A career stepping-stone for McNeal, the investigation puts her at cross-purposes with the Seattle Police Department's Lou Boldt and Sergeant John LaMoia.

Zoey has only ever known a world with few women and a society capable of unimaginable evil. Now she's about to learn she may be the only hope it has for salvation. After she and her companions flee a vicious attack, barely escaping with their lives, Zoey finds herself faced with a new threat: video evidence suggesting she is the mother of an unborn baby girl - and the key to mankind's survival. Knowing that her former captors will stop at nothing to control the power that lies within her, Zoey sets out on her own for the last American city, Seattle, in search of answers.

Twelve-year-old Frankie Bishop is a model kid: quiet and bright. So everyone, especially his family, is shocked when he's arrested for drug possession - and horrified when he's sentenced to juvenile detention at Eldridge Academy. His uncle, Bruce Kantor of the Help Innocent Prisoners Project, wants to help but knows he's too close to the case.

Back on the job as a cold case detective, Sutton has the chance to delve deeper into the only case of his career he's been unable to solve. As boundaries blur and the difference between truth and lies becomes indistinguishable, Detective Sutton finds himself in a race against a ticking clock. Only one thing is certain: if Sutton doesn't stop him, the monster will keep on killing, and another innocent woman will be lost forever to his darkness. But Sutton is not about to let evil win this time.

The Spanish Flu killed 30 million people worldwide in 1918. Now with history threatening to repeat itself, a scientific expedition speeds toward a remote island in the Arctic Sea to recover strains of the lethal virus preserved under layers of ice. For Washington Post reporter Frank Daly, it is the story of a lifetime. But his plan to join the expedition is ruined by a ferocious storm that delays him. And when he meets up with the ship upon its return to port in Norway, it is clear something has gone wrong.

A down-to-earth forensics expert has just discovered a crime scene that is out of this world. In criminal forensics they train you to uncover evidence, no matter how brutal or bizarre the murder. But what if one night you encounter a crime scene so terrifying that no one on earth can explain it? It begins deep in the woods of the Pacific Northwest, at the site of a reported shoot-out. Investigator Colin Cellars cannot find a trace of perpetrator or victim - or even confirm that anyone has been killed.

Washington, D.C., 1861: As the United States teeters on the brink of civil war, Colonel Charles P. Rook organizes security in the nation’s capital and monitors the death threats pouring into the White House. He surrounds Abraham Lincoln with bodyguards, covers rooftops with sharpshooters, and investigates rumors of conspiracy fomented by secessionists. Yet amid the chaos and confusion, a mysterious killer slips into the teeming city.

Accounts vary, but most likely in either late 1917 or early to mid-1918, the unofficial and institutionally suppressed discovery of a woman’s skeletal remains—the victim of a crime—rocked the Catholic community of Holy Rosary. The fact that the remains found were those of a Catholic nun who had gone missing from the community a decade earlier made the story even more intriguing. That her bones were found buried in a shallow grave in the basement of the same church where she had regularly attended Mass added multiple layers of sensationalism.

Mit einem milliardenschweren, geheimen Waffenprogramm will das Pentagon für klare Machtverhältnisse im Nahen Osten sorgen. Doch der Versuch geht nach hinten los: Tristan Nazir, der Empfänger der Zahlungen, treibt ein doppeltes Spiel mit den USA. Er nutzt das Geld zur Gründung einer Terrormiliz des Islamischen Staats. Ex-Delta Dewey Andreas wird nach Syrien geschickt, um Details über den Verrat ans Licht zu bringen - bis seine Tarnung auffliegt. In letzter Sekunde gelingt es ihm, Einzelheiten nach Amerika zu übermitteln.

Ted Darling was about to kill a man. For the first time in his life... You’ve never met a copper like Ted Darling. He’s small, quiet. He doesn’t smoke. He’s packed in the booze. But he’s a Specialist Firearms Officer. With black belts in four martial arts. Then a shift in circumstances makes him swap guns for the CID. His first case is the brutal murder of a teenage girl. His new boss thinks he can wrap it up easily. Ted has doubts over the suspect. Has he made the right choice in switching jobs? Or has he, as his Firearms boss warned him, committed career suicide?

Undercover and using moves she didn’t learn at the Detroit Police Academy, Harlee races to identify the cold case murderer who has struck again. While juggling a charming ex-fiancé, a friend with benefits, and a partner who is too darn handsome for his own good, Harlee begins socializing with the potential suspects outside of work...until the killer learns of her double identity. This mystery has a perfect blend of humor, sexiness, and suspense.

When Gabriel Wolfe, a government assassin afflicted by PTSD, travels to Africa to recover the body of a former SAS comrade, he has the backing of the British prime minister. But every favor comes at a price, and now Gabriel has to complete another hit before he can continue his search for salvation. What he discovers next shakes his faith in everything he trusts. He has marched headlong into the heart of a corrupt web of land deals, blood diamonds, and the global arms trade.

The Honorable Alice D. McKerrity is no stranger to violence. From the bench at Manhattan Supreme, she has seen the most hardened killers pass through her courtroom. But there’s something about this trial―a defendant charged with the murder of a pregnant woman―that affects her as no other case ever has. Her chaotic, stressful home life only adds to her mounting feelings of panic and fear. She’s also harboring a secret that could have far-reaching ramifications, personal and professional. And now, unbeknownst to Alice, her daughter has begun a search for her biological father.

Down the beach, she can just make out the rusting hulk of the Ferris wheel through the dawn mist. The hairs prickle on her neck as she drags her focus back to the chestnut hair fanned out in the shallow water at her feet, to the grains of sand decorating the beautiful girl’s white cheeks like freckles.

When "Love Doctors" Ian and Kate Culpepper are brutally murdered in their Carmel mansion on Valentine's Day, Ava knows it's karma. Because Ian's leaving her for perfect Kate four years ago had cut her bone deep. And then they had the nerve to show up here, on her turf. With their perfect house and their perfect daughter and their matching perfect smiles. It's no wonder Ava can't stop watching. It's no wonder she can't let go. But Ian is far from perfect, and Ava owes a debt too. For the unforgivable thing they'd done together. The dark deed that severed their marriage in two.