A Geek Girl's Guide to Arsenic
Read A Geek Girl's Guide to Arsenic Online
Authors: Julie Anne Lindsey
A Geek Girl’s Guide to Arsenic
By Julie Anne Lindsey
The
Geek
Girl
Mysteries
It’s been three months since Jake Archer rolled into town, accused Mia Connors of murder and stole her heart. She hasn’t heard from him since. So when a man collapses at the fall Renaissance Faire, she’s surprised to see the US marshal arrive on scene. And shocked when he points the finger at her—again. Mia would sooner be able to resurrect the poor fellow than poison him.
Jake Archer’s career has been rising fast, but it’s about to come to a crashing halt. The Ren-Faire victim was in protective custody—Jake’s custody—and they were painfully close to nabbing a major crime boss. If Jake doesn’t solve the murder soon, he’ll be fetching donuts instead of protecting his nation. A difficult enough task without the alluring Mia Connors in the way.
Working with Jake to catch the killer might push Mia into crazy-cat-lady territory. But with a murderer on the loose—and Mia’s reputation on the line—they’ll have to work fast to find the killer before the killer finds them.
Carina Press acknowledges the editorial services of Deborah Nemeth.
77,500 words
Dear Reader,
You know that moment when you’re reading a great book and you
hit around the 70 percent mark and you realize:
this book is going to
end
. And then you’ll be done with it. And will have to leave the
characters behind. And find another (hopefully equally amazing) book to read
next? So you want to slow down but instead you speed up because you just have to
know what happens. The next thing you know, it’s done, you’ve got that
happy-book-sigh feeling and...now you really do have to decide what book to read
next. The great thing about reading is that there
is
always another
fantastic book available, and I think you’ll find a few that will help with this
issue in this month’s releases, because they are awesome!
Shannon Stacey is one of our most popular authors and her
Boston Fire trilogy has not disappointed readers (or her editor)! But I’m
particularly excited about
Fully Ignited
because it brings us not only
the alpha men of Boston Fire but also a badass female firefighter who is
unapologetically good at her job. I love a strong, confident heroine who makes
no excuses for who she is, and that’s what we get with Jamie. Scott can’t stop
thinking about Jamie, despite the fact that she’s his temporary superior and not
sticking around. Chemistry can crush the best-laid plans, though, and while
Jamie and Scott might not be each other’s future...there’s no resisting the
right now.
Laura Carter debuts with a darkly suspenseful, erotically
charged Vengeful Love trilogy that’s a return to the glamorous, jet-setter
romances of Jackie Collins and Sidney Sheldon. In book one London city lawyer
Scarlett Heath’s neat little world is shattered when she meets Gregory Ryans,
the mysterious, irresistible CEO of GJR Enterprises—and her new client. Too
late, Scarlett realizes the truth about the hostile takeover she’s been brought
in to handle: the man she’s fallen in love with is out for revenge. And he’s
taking her with him. Gregory and Scarlett’s story continues across Rome and
Dubai in the next two installments releasing in April and May.
A.R. Barley is debuting in male/male contemporary romance
with
Out of Bounds
. A line of tape down the center of the room is the
perfect plan: boundaries established for college sophomore Jesse Cole and his
sexy new roommate, senior Nick Moretti. These two strong-willed men are as
opposite as opposite can get. But as their initial friction moves into
straight-up dirty talk, who wouldn’t want to cross the line?
Also in male/male contemporary romance, j. leigh bailey’s
heroes
Fight to Forgive
as they face family manipulation, past betrayal
and an uncertain future to find their second chance at love. Perfect for those
of you who love the second-chance trope!
We have two erotic paranormal romances for you this month on
two ends of the paranormal spectrum: vampires and shifters! In Dee Carney’s
Hunger Untamed
, a beautiful courtesan must overcome her fear of a
beastly vampire mercenary if she’s to avenge her sister’s death. And on the
shifter side Laurent, the second-in-command for the Cherchez Wolf Pack, didn’t
expect to find his destiny in a roadside café. But there’s no doubt in his mind
that waitress-by-day, artist-by-night Rain is his mate. And the urge to be near
her, to protect her, to
have
her, is intoxicating. Don’t miss
Sworn
to the Wolf
by Lauren Dane.
Speaking of erotic, check out the beautiful cover on Kira A.
Gold’s
The Dirty Secret
, and while you’re there, peek inside the covers
to find out what happens when an architect with a dirty mouth and a secretive,
sensual painter are thrown together and challenged to decorate a house. The real
challenge is figuring out how to complete the project while taking every
opportunity to discover what’s under each other’s clothes—and behind one
another’s personal walls.
This month’s mystery offering comes from Julie Anne Lindsey.
In
A Geek Girl’s Guide to Arsenic
, the resident geek girl puts her high IQ
to work uncovering the killer when a man is poisoned at Ye Ole Madrigal Craft
Faire. Don’t miss the previous title in this series,
A Geek Girl’s Guide to Murder
.
Pick up one (or all) of these new releases this month and let
us help you solve your book crisis. Giving Readers Their Next Good Book Fix can
become our new imprint motto!
Coming next month: a sexy and captivating (literally) romance
from Amber Bardan,
Vengeful Love: Deception
with its continuation of Gregory and Scarlett’s story, and a
new author makes her debut!
As always, here’s wishing you a wonderful month of books you
love, remember and recommend.
Happy reading!
Angela James
Editorial Director, Carina Press
Dedication
For Danny, who always made me smile.
Chapter One
“Isn’t fall the best?” Grandma swigged the dregs of her steaming wassail and sighed. “Fall is my favorite season and not just because our sales skyrocket. There’s excitement in the air. Don’t you think?”
I raised a skeptical eyebrow and nodded magnanimously to passersby from my place behind Guinevere’s Golden Beauty booth.
A line of eager faces joined the mass around our display case. Their cheeks were as red as living kewpie dolls in the brisk autumn air. They sampled lip balms and hand creams with more enthusiasm than I could muster over skin care and eventually handed fistfuls of cash to Grandma.
She winked. “The sales don’t hurt.”
Guinevere’s Golden Beauty products were available decades before holistic, herbal, all-natural supplies were
en vogue
, but when the trend hit, Grandma became a millionaire. Since I was the Chief Information Officer for Grandma’s company, her success didn’t hurt my bank account either. Grandma loved hand selling the way she had with Grandpa before he died, so we were still a staple at the summer Renaissance Faire. And from September through November we peddled our goods at the local fairgrounds, known seasonally as Ye Ole Madrigal Craft Faire.
It was a family business and I loved being with my family, but I preferred technology, which was why I also worked as the IT Manager in the gated community where I lived. Guinevere’s Golden Beauty was Grandma’s baby. I had yet to discover mine.
“Uh-huh.” I cast a weary gaze at the horde headed our way. To hear Grandma and the media tell it, holiday shopping was fun. Commercial images captured best friends and couples, arm in arm, sporting openmouthed smiles and jaunting along fully decorated, uncrowded streets. Wherever those pictures were taken, it wasn’t Earth. There were still two weeks until Thanksgiving, and I couldn’t find parking within six blocks of anything. Of course, none of that affected Grandma. She made our Christmas gifts. If not for work and the Craft Faire, I’d happily hibernate from Halloween through New Year’s.
Grandma bagged another gift set and stuffed a receipt inside. Giddy in her element, she passed the package to its new owner and turned to me. “Have you spoken with Petal at Earth Hugger?”
“Briefly.” Petal was the aging hippie daughter of Earth Hugger’s founder. Together, they’d offered us shelf space in eleven Earth Hugger retail locations. The space was voraciously coveted and about to be ours. Petal and I were hammering out the terms. “She’s finishing the marketing plan and meeting with her team to finalize our proposal package.”
Grandma startled. “What do you mean by
proposal
? They proposed. We accepted. The warehouse is shipping quadruple numbers next quarter. My living room looks like a big box store. No take-backs! I shook that Earth Hugger’s hand!”
“Whoa.” I fetched my most reassuring smile. “Everything’s fine.
Proposal
is the word they’ll use until the contracts are signed. We’re right on track, and we don’t want to sign until Earth Hugger assures us fair amounts of marketing and visibility. We bring a lot to the table here, too. They need to do their share to make the deal worthwhile. They have to announce and celebrate the inclusion of our products in those locations or it won’t even matter they’re there. No one will know. No one will buy. The products will be returned unsold.”
“Now who’s worked up?” She relaxed against the counter. “All right. Fine. Stay on her.”
“I am.”
“I’ve always dreamed of seeing my products in stores.”
We’d taken Guinevere’s Golden Beauty products from the Faire circuit to online sensation, expanded to catalogue ordering and eventually landed a 6:00 a.m. spot on a shopping channel, but we weren’t on store shelves yet. “It’ll happen. I’m holding out for the treatment your products deserve. If she can get a solid plan together for that, I’ll bring the contract to your house myself.”
Earth Hugger was a globally recognized and respected maker of holistic beauty products. Their projected growth was astounding. Guinevere’s Golden Beauty couldn’t touch their kind of scalability. Grandma still kept half her recipes in a lockbox under the bed, and our corporate office doubled as her solarium. We needed this deal with Earth Hugger to fulfill Grandma’s dream. Her products on store shelves.
Another bus unloaded shoppers and fall foliage spectators outside the gates fifty yards away.
Grandma snapped into action, loading her arms with free samples and literature about our company. “Fine. Use the lawyers. Call the accountant. Whatever you need, but let’s sign those papers soon.” She hustled through the booth’s exit, headed for the fresh crowd.
Her trust was both endearing and terrifying.
I stacked handmade oatmeal and cranberry soaps on the counter, crunching through a mini pile of crimson leaves. The heavy fall skirt of my Queen Guinevere costume was brown at the hem after trudging halfway across creation, from the worst parking spot imaginable to the replica castle gates.
The crowd around our booth was three people deep. A smile danced across my lips. These dedicated consumers could buy our products at Earth Hugger soon. No need to wait for the Ren Faire or Craft Faire. They wouldn’t have to order online. We’d make enough money to build proper offices within three years.
Grandma led another throng of smiling women in my direction. I discarded the empty soap box and pulled in a cleansing breath, preparing for the incomers.
My twin sister, Bree, popped into view, towing her husband, Tom, to the front of the crowd.
Air whooshed from my lungs. So much for my Zen.
She vibrated with enthusiasm, per her usual. A twenty-nine-year-old cheerleader without pompoms. “Are you busy? I’ve got someone I want you to meet. His name is Adam Clayton and he works at the brothel.”
Bree and I once shared a womb and currently our looks, aside from that we had nothing in common. Bree thought sex ran the world, and she and Tom were up to their elbows in everyone’s personal business, conducting research for a grant on human sexuality. Being single made me a target for their nonsense. Sex definitely didn’t run my world. I was complete on my own. Like a cat.
She tapped the display case between us and gasped. “Let’s go. Come on. He’s there now.” Her determined expression opened to a wide smile. “Are you thinking about sex?” She pulled a tiny notebook and pen from her corset.
“No.” I straightened my stance. “I’m thinking of getting a cat.”
She and Tom exchanged looks. His understated pirate costume was perfect, definitely more Dread Pirate Roberts than Jack Sparrow.
Bree popped her hip. “Is this about Nate? Are you two finally getting together? Where is he anyway?”
“We aren’t dating. It’s not like that with us.” Nathan Green was a six-foot intellectual and former boxer with ginger hair, green eyes and the heart of a teddy bear. Also, my best friend. We’d never been romantically involved, but I couldn’t imagine life without him. Best not to ruin that with romance.
The excitement in her eyes dimmed. “Of course not. Well, where is he? Isn’t he usually at your side by now?”
“He’s on his way.”
She rolled her eyes. “Then you still have time to meet Adam.”
“No.”
Bree hacked an ugly noise. “Mia! Come on.”
“Sorry. I have to stay here and help Grandma until Mom and Dad get back.” I raised my palms in the universal out-of-my-control motion and shrugged.
Grandma’s long gray braid swung against her backside. “Quit chitchatting and sell something.”
Bree beamed. “Exactly.”
I narrowed my eyes on her. “I’m not meeting a man who works at a brothel.”
She sucked air, ready to implode. Bree had left the family booth to work at the brothel until her research was finished and she felt guilty for abandoning us, as if she was the hinge pin in our operation. “Merry Maidens is a theater company. You act as if it’s an actual brothel.” Her eyes slid shut, and I imagined her counting to ten the way Dad taught us so we wouldn’t pull out one another’s hair. “Outside the Faire, Adam’s a highly successful CPA and a real Renaissance man. He’s educated. He has dual bachelor degrees in finance and history. His graduate work was mostly accounting, but he’s a dedicated historian. He’s perfect for you. Just meet him. Please?”
“An accountant? He sounds exciting.” I waved and smiled to passersby, feigning indifference. Protests were futile with Bree. Avoidance worked well, as long as I could keep it up. Where the heck was Nate when I needed interference?
Bree wrinkled her brows in an expression just short of pity. “They can’t all be US Marshals, you know.”
I grabbed a stack of flyers and coupons and walked the interior of our booth, nodding and offering samples to shoppers. Most important, leaving Bree and Tom stuck in the crowd.
“Hey.” Grandma’s pointy elbow dug into my ribs as I passed. “Don’t mind her. She means well.”
“I know, but geez.” Bree had spent her life parenting me, based on the fact she was two minutes older and therefore infinitely wiser and more mature. After having her daughter, Gwen, last year, the maternal instinct had doubled. When I’d arrived stag to Gwen’s first birthday party, Bree nearly lost it. I thought being single was a life choice. Bree thought it was a mental illness.
Grandma motioned to another empty display. “We need more Buxom Beauty.”
“I’m on it.” I set the stack of flyers and coupons on the counter and opened a stock box.
She patted my arm. “It’s showtime.”
Grandma waded through the throngs and climbed onto a chair out front of the booth to tout the benefits of our natural products. “Greetings!” The crowd moved in her direction, providing me with a fresh blast of oxygen. Grandma belonged onstage. She had that in common with Bree.
Cheers and clashes erupted from the jousting match across the field. I tipped my head back and inhaled. A brisk autumn breeze whipped the peppery scent of fall mums up my nose.
“Good day, milady.”
I clutched my collarbone. “Marry!”
John Francis, the Faire painter, smiled coyly from his place across the counter. He shook a foam cup with paint-speckled fingers before tossing it in the waste bin several feet away. His outfit was straight out of a
Three Musketeers
movie, fitting his sassy personality. “Pardon me for saying, but ye do look lovely. That shade of green suits ye well.”
“Thank you, sir. Would you care to try some hand cream? A painter’s hands must get quite worn.”
“Aye. They do.”
I opened the sample bottle of Healer’s Hand Cream and squeezed a dollop into his palm. “This will soften your calluses and work the paint loose in those rough crevices, all while making your skin as smooth as a baby’s bottom.”
He cocked a brow and worked the cream into his skin. “You make all these products yourself or do the elves help?” He motioned over my shoulder.
I turned, half expecting a group of rennies in elf costumes. There was only a line of small white-haired women. “No. No elves. Most of the products are made in a factory now, but they’re all Lady Mary’s secret recipes. Grandma’s been perfecting these all her life.” I nodded to the energetic septuagenarian teetering enthusiastically on a chair outside the booth.
He barked a laugh and wrung his hands. “Nice. She floats like an angel.” The inflection of his voice wavered and a bead of sweat formed at his temple.
“Are you feeling okay?”
A camera crew traipsed across the jousting field, ridiculously out of place in the carefully designed Renaissance village.
John scoffed. “I know the local news has to cover local stories, but there should be a limit for preserving the integrity of the Faire. Why not visit and write a nice piece on the event instead of bringing a half dozen schmucks with lighting screens and boom mics? These are Renaissance times, for crying out loud.”
I laughed. “You seem to have slipped from England to Jersey, sire.”
He nodded in good humor, raising his eyes to mine. “You caught me. What can I say? It’s easy to let my guard down in the presence of beauty.”
My cheeks burned, stupidly. John was a relentless flirt with at least ten years on me. If I wasn’t careful, Bree would spring from the ground and marry us for conversing. I checked over one shoulder. She and Tom were gone, hopefully not to retrieve Adam the accountant. “I’d better get back to work.”
He cleared his throat and stroked his forehead. “I do understand, but first, may I trouble ye for a glass of water?” He rubbed his lips with freshly lotioned hands. A fresh line of perspiration appeared at his graying hairline.
I scanned the area behind me, thankful for his change in tone. “No water, but we have wassail brewing for the even. I’m afraid it’s warm. The cold cider has been consumed.”
He dragged a wrist over his brows. “Aye. That’ll do.”
“Of course.” I ladled a small cup of warm wassail from the crock on our handy-dandy, five-hundred-BTU camp stove and passed it over the counter to him. The tangy sting of cider and clove bit the air. “Mmm.”
My parents appeared in the distance, swinging interlaced fingers between them. Their matching gypsy costumes were nearly as old as Bree and me.
“Hey,” I called as they drew nearer. “Where’ve you been?”
Their smiles were bright and their hair ruffled.
“Drinking rum punch and necking beyond the privies again?”
Mom blushed and Dad grinned.
Their Ren Faire behavior used to bother me, but they deserved happiness. As a retired teacher and cop who’d survived raising Bree and me, they’d earned some lightly liquored canoodling. We couldn’t all be cats.
Grandma finished her spiel on Guinevere’s Golden Beauty products and the crowd applauded.
Mom’s smile waffled. “I’d better help Mom off that chair before she falls.”
Dad swatted her backside as she passed and turned sparkling blue eyes on me. “How’s it going, darling?”
“Bree tried to set me up with a man from the brothel.”
Dad rolled his eyes and turned to John. He enjoyed the idea of me dating even less than I did. “How’s it going, John?”
John dotted his cheeks and neck with a handkerchief. He’d unbuttoned the front of his jacket and his cuffs. “Not too bad.” He rubbed his eyes as if to clear them.