Part of Duncan Kincaid & Gemma James, book 3
First published 2005
Connor Swann's body turns up in a Thames River lock, and the discovery sends ripples through the powerful Asherton family. Police Superintendent Duncan Kincaid and Sergeant Gemma James arrive to investigate what quickly proves to be murder, not accident. The victim was married to Julia Asherton, though they had been separated for over a year while he continued living in her London flat. Connor's gambling debts and affairs with other women provide obvious motives, but the case grows more complex as old wounds reopen. Twenty years earlier, Julia's younger brother Matthew, a gifted musician, drowned in a flooded stream while she watched helplessly. Now another death by water strikes the same family. Sir Gerald and Dame Caroline Asherton, Connor's in-laws, seem oddly more devoted to their dead son-in-law than to their surviving daughter. As Kincaid and James dig deeper, they uncover layers of deception that stretch back decades. The investigation becomes personal when Kincaid finds himself attracted to the enigmatic Julia, while Gemma struggles with her own complicated feelings for her superior officer.
Genres: suspense, mystery, crime, contemporary, thriller, detective
Vibes: atmospheric, emotional, intimate, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: enemies-to-lovers, personal-investigation, unreliable-narrator
Setting: London, Thames River
Period: 20 Years Ago
304 pages · Mass Market Paperback · Avon