Mystery Church

Charlie takes my breath away from the moment we meet, when he is dropping his adorable little girls off at the school gates at the same time as I’m waving goodbye to my son. Being a single mother has been hard. So when his gorgeous green-blue eyes hold mine and his lips curve into a smile I wonder if this is my chance to find happiness and escape the secrets in my past.

Pete never wanted another child. Before baby Erin was born, they were happy. If Natalie hadn't got pregnant, he would never have done what he did. Natalie knows things have been difficult since the surprise arrival of Erin. Life with Pete and their two other children—Emily and Zadie—has been balancing on a knife-edge. Now their home is full of guests at a party Natalie didn't want to throw—and she's about to reach breaking point. But so is her family. Because everyone has a secret that they've been hiding and when Erin suddenly disappears everyone becomes a suspect.

Ava Kirilova has reached the very top of her profession. After years and years of hard graft, pain and sacrifice as part of the London Russian Ballet Company, allowing nothing else to distract her, she is finally the poster girl for Swan Lake. Even Mr K—her father, and the intense, terrifying director of the company—can find no fault. Ava has pushed herself ahead of countless other talented, hardworking girls, and they are all watching her now.

In a close-knit English village, Chrissy and Alice were once best friends. So were their sons, Leo and Robbie. Until the night Leo killed Robbie with a single, devastating punch. Now Leo has gone to prison, Chrissy has lost her pub, and Alice has been pouring her anger into a twisted project . . . As Leo’s parole date approaches, the villagers are incensed and fearful about the prospect of his return. But when Chrissy arrives to collect Leo from prison, he isn’t there. The staff tell her he has already been released, but nobody knows where he’s gone.

In a lonely village in the Peak District, during the onset of a once-in-a-lifetime snow storm, Constable Ellie Cheetham finds a body. The man, a local ne'er-do-well, appears to have died in a tragic accident: he drank too much and froze to death. But the facts don't add up: the dead man is clutching a knife in one hand, and there's evidence he was hiding from someone. Stranger still, an odd mark has been drawn onto a stone beside his body.

For myself and Lauren, my 10-year-old daughter No 3 Beech Close was to be our refuge after two years of hell nursing my sick mother. In need of a fresh start and wanting to distance ourselves from the bad memories of my mother’s house we moved to Beech Close, a small cul-de-sac of six houses situated around a picture-perfect green. It seemed perfect but I had underestimated the secrets that this tightknit community shared. Within hours of moving in my next-door neighbour Valerie made it abundantly clear we were not welcome.

An amateur autistic sleuth. A wry English detective. A murder case that thrusts them both into the wealthy world of the rare artifacts trade… Jo Jones can't seem to catch a break. Trading in city life for the cozy, peaceful hills of the English countryside to take over her family estate should have been a chance for a “fresh start.” Instead, she's been driven further into the past than she thought possible—and not just her own. The estate is littered with traces of ancestors that Jo never knew existed, including a mysterious woman depicted in a half-destroyed painting.

My wedding was the perfect whirlwind of a day. The happiest I’d ever been. That was until I discovered my beloved husband, Ryan, tucked away in a compromising summer house clinch with Liza, his best friend’s wife. Reeling with this ultimate betrayal, my world in freefall, with nowhere to turn, I flee my own wedding unable to face anyone, not even my family. I just want to escape this nightmare. With our flight, to our luxury honeymoon leaving in a matter of hours, could ten blissful days of Cretan Island life, minus my cheating husband help me figure out my future?

One September afternoon in 1999, teenagers Matthew, Zoe, and Duncan Lang are walking home from school when they discover a boy lying in a field, bloody and unconscious. Thanks to their intervention, the boy’s life is saved. In the aftermath, all three siblings are irrevocably changed. Matthew, the oldest, becomes obsessed with tracking down the assailant, secretly searching the local town with the victim’s brother. Zoe wanders the streets of Oxford, looking at men, and one of them, a visiting American graduate student, looks back.

Lizzie Riley is sure that the local academy school, with its excellent reputation, is perfect for her eight-year-old son Tom. But there's something strange happening at school. Parents are forbidden from entering the grounds and there are bars across the classroom windows. Why is Tom coming home exhausted, unable to remember his day? What are the strange marks on his arm? And why do the children seem afraid to talk?

Four hikers enter the mountains. Only two return. But is it tragedy? Or treachery?

I loved the anonymity, flexibility and solitude that working the night shift at Storage Queen gave me. The unsociable hours paid well, helping me fund my university degree and giving me a quiet place to study while the world slept peacefully in their warm, cozy beds. It was the perfect job for me. But that Friday night proved to be more than I bargained for when a man walked through the door, dragging a large suitcase. My immediate instincts told me something was wrong. That’s when my ordeal began. I just had to make it through the night shift.

Everything my husband and I have always dreamt of has finally come true. Our new home with its open-plan kitchen and marble countertops couldn’t be further from the small, damp flat where we lived only months ago. I’d hoped this would be our fresh start, an escape from my past, but the handwritten note that arrived on our doorstep makes my blood run cold – you don’t deserve this life.

It’s a simple enough favor. Jude hasn’t seen Liam in years, but when he shows up at her work asking for a favor, she finds she can’t refuse. All Jude has to do is pick Liam up at a country train station—without telling anyone. So what if she has to lie to her fiancé? Jude is still committed to him and their imminent wedding, even if she and Liam were in love once. She owes him.

Ali and Christopher Tolfrey's one-year-old daughter, Eden, is abducted whilst in the care of Ali’s best-friend. Snatched in broad daylight from Bushy Park on a trip to the swings, Eden disappears without a trace. Brooke Simmons regains consciousness, dazed from a blow to the head, to find Eden, her best friend's child, missing. Someone has taken Eden, and Brooke knows who. But it's a secret she can't share with Ali or the police without revealing the web of deceit she's spun.

When local woman Deborah goes missing, her colleagues Adrian, Yvonne and Merriel are all left in shock. Gossip around the office begins to swirl – what could have happened to Deborah? Is she dead or alive? And who could be responsible for her disappearance? Everyone is terrified that they could be next...except the one person who has all the answers. The last person people expect. Because Deborah is being held captive by a monster, a psychopath. But not a stranger...it’s someone she knows all too well.

Anna and Peter desperately need to escape London for a fresh start. And they’ve found just the place: a perfect house on a perfect street in a perfect new development on the Scottish coast. But before they’ve even unpacked, they discover that the community they’ve moved into might be keeping secrets of its own…

Beth Haldane is gazing at enchanting paintings of the rolling English countryside when her daydream is rudely interrupted—by the discovery of a teenage girl unconscious on a marble bench. Shocked, Beth realizes this is no snoozing schoolchild. Someone dastardly has carefully crossed the girls’ hands across her white dress, as if she’s in a painting herself. And the girl’s discarded red backpack, found in a corner of the museum, is totally empty. Is someone suspicious hiding evidence? And who would want to harm this innocent soul?

Murder/Mystery missing persons investigation into a church burning in Central Texas - revolving around history, religion and the creation of medical science.

Laurel Nightingale wants to start again. However, after discovering a dead body shortly after arriving in the tight-knit community, she wonders if village life is as wholesome as she first thought. . . Local police are convinced the death was accidental, but Laurel suspects murder, and enlists new friend Maggie to join her quest in uncovering the truth. When a second body is found, Laurel ruffles feathers by pointing the finger at one of the locals. But, when her accusation backfires, she's left alienated and afraid.