Author: cynthiahamilton
Appearances can be deceiving. And in Southern California, where the sun shines almost every day and make-believe has its own industry, it¿s hard to tell what is real and what is merely illusion. Two inquiries come to MDPI on the same day that seem like fairly straight-forward missing person cases. But it doesn¿t take long to discover there¿s nothing ordinary about the disappearance of two … beautiful sisters from Minnesota and an estranged heiress who has never touched her eight-figure fortune.While Madeline¿s partner, Mike Delaney, heads down to Los Angeles to search for his cousin¿s vanished girlfriend and her sister,…
Two dead husbands. Accident, suicide or murder?Life in beautiful Santa Barbara County will never be the same for two grieving widows. One is serving a lengthy sentence for the bizarre tractor death of her much older, land-rich husband. The other is convinced her husband’s death was no suicide.During Madeline’s four-month convalescence, Steven Ridley—her jailbird ex—manages to get parole on the … get parole on the pretext of retraining inmates for their reentry into society. He has the audacity to enlist Mike’s help to find out if inmate Lindsay Bartholomew had been set up to take the fall for her husband’s…
From the Author of SPOUSE TRAP and A HIGH PRICE TO PAYAppearances can be deceiving. And in Southern California, where the sun shines almost every day and make-believe has its own industry, it’s hard to tell what is real and what is merely illusion. Two inquiries come to MDPI on the same day that seem like fairly straight-forward missing person cases. But it doesn’t take long to discover there’s … discover there’s nothing ordinary about the disappearance of two beautiful sisters from Minnesota and an estranged heiress who has never touched her eight-figure fortune.While Madeline’s partner, Mike Delaney, heads down…
Do some people fall in love more often than others? Opposites attract, but can they ever hold? Are some people incapable of learning from their mistakes? These questions haunt journalist Allison Tyler-Wilcox after meeting Jake Sorenson at his sister’s wedding. Despite his seven divorces, Jake considers himself uncommonly lucky at love. Baffled by his sanguine attitude—and his offhand suggestion … attitude—and his offhand suggestion that she could be the next Mrs. Sorenson—Allison talks her editor into letting her explore the compulsion some people have when it comes to saying “I do”. As soon as she arrives at Jake’s 1,500-acre ranch…
NOT YOUR ORDINARY LOVE TRIANGLE…Frank’s Coffee Shop on Manhattan’s Lower East Side becomes a safe haven for Tobias Jordan, a paparazzi-phobic 90s rock star, drawn to the obscurity of the dingy hole-in-the-wall, and Philip Glessner, a disgraced architect, who ducks inside to elude a posse of blood-thirsty reporters. What keeps both coming back is their waitress, Priscilla Vanderpool, who becomes … who becomes an improbable paragon of virtue to the shell-shocked Philip, and an unwitting muse to gifted and jaded Tobias. But neither man sees her as she really is: a philosophical hard-luck case with a quick wit and a…
A WRITER TURNS DETECTIVE TO LEARN WHAT HER MOTHER’S LIFE HAD BEEN LIKE BEFORE ALZHEIMER’S STOLE HER MEMORIES. A TRUE STORY OF FORGIVENESS AND HEALING.As fiercely independent Ruth struggles to stay self-reliant at the age of 86, each day brings her closer to an event that will alter her life forever. While her author daughter shifts through Ruth’s possessions prior to her move into a skilled … skilled nursing facility, she discovers a previously unseen photo from 1949 and realizes how little she knows of her mother’s life. As Alzheimer’s continues to warp Ruth’s once sharp mind, she can no…
Madeline’s dual professions as event coordinator and private investigator cross paths during the most lavish affair of her career–a weekend-long fortieth birthday extravaganza for the wife of a famous film director. A simple background check after the disappearance of precious family jewels quickly turns into a murder investigation, and before Madeline and Mike can put the pieces together, … another body turns up. As the Santa Barbara police and sheriff’s departments search for clues, the Mad Dog P.I.’s use their own methods to untangle the crimes, discovering some unsavory truths behind the glittering façade of their clients. Adding to Madeline’s…
Imagine you have the perfect life: money, position, influence, an enviable marriage. Then you awake in a hotel room – alone, unclothed, a splitting headache, and no idea how you got there. Welcome to Madeline’s world…Madeline Ridley had all she’d ever dreamed of: a handsome, successful husband, a place at the top of Santa Barbara society, every luxury money could buy. In all respects, her world … respects, her world was perfect…until one horrible night when everything unraveled.When Steven Ridley comes home in the middle of a weekday and throws a sheaf of damning photos at her, Madeline’s comfortable world…