by Darcey Bell
First published 2018
Stephanie agrees to pick up five-year-old Nicky from school when his mother Emily asks for help. The two women have grown close since meeting in their Connecticut suburb. Stephanie is a widowed mommy blogger raising her son Miles. Emily works as a PR executive in Manhattan and seems to have everything together. When Emily fails to return that evening, Stephanie grows worried. Emily never answers her phone or responds to texts. The police dismiss Stephanie's concerns, but she knows Emily would never abandon Nicky. Stephanie turns to her blog readers for assistance and offers support to Emily's husband Sean. Then shocking news arrives: Emily is dead. What seemed like a simple disappearance becomes something far more complicated. Stephanie discovers that her friendship with Emily was built on lies. Nothing about Emily's life was what it appeared to be. As Stephanie digs deeper into the truth, she uncovers secrets that put her own safety at risk. The favor that started everything was just the beginning of a web of deception involving love, betrayal, and murder.
Genres: mystery, crime, contemporary, thriller
Vibes: dark, fast-paced, suspenseful
Tropes: unreliable-narrator, web-of-deception
Setting: Connecticut
Period: 21st-century
298 pages · Paperback · Harper
Content warnings: murder