CHAPTER ONE
The farmhouse door was ajar, a jagged slice of blackness cutting through the snow-bright day.
Jo Harris froze behind the wheel of her truck, her breath fogging the glass. Garvin McDaniels was a stickler for order. Doors shut, paths shoveled, lights on when the sun went down. But now, the front steps were buried under a fresh layer of snow, untouched, the house eerily dark.
Something wasn’t right.
She climbed out, her boots crunching on the driveway as the cold bit through her coat. The air was unnervingly still, thick with the kind of silence that makes you question every sound you didn’t hear.
Garvin wasn’t just Jo’s landlord. Lately, she and her sister had been softening him up with casseroles,hoping he’d sell them the cottage. But it wasn’t only that—Jo liked him. He was lonely, and their talks had become something she looked forward to. Which made the open door and eerie silence all the more unsettling.
Jo’s hand hovered near the holstered weapon on her hip as she grabbed the casserole dish from the passenger seat.
Her pulse kicked up as she climbed the snow-covered steps, her eyes fixed on that gaping door.
“Garvin?” she called, her voice cutting the stillness like a blade.
No answer.
Jo’s grip tightened on the dish as she nudged the door open wider and stepped into the shadows.
The smell slammed into her—sharp, metallic, and unmistakable.
Blood.
Inside, the farmhouse was a wreck. Chairs overturned, glass scattered across the floor like glittering shards. Jo’s pulse quickened as her eyes tracked the dark stain smeared across the hardwood. A path of destruction led to the living room. To the body.
Garvin McDaniels lay in the middle of it, sprawled across the floor, eyes wide open. Cold. Lifeless.
Jo’s stomach dropped. “Garvin!” Hervoice cracked in the silence as she rushed forward. She didn’t even realize she’d tossed the casserole onto the table.
She dropped to her knees next to him, pressing her fingers to his neck, searching for a pulse. His skin was like ice. The faint metallic scent in the air confirmed what her mind was trying to deny.
No pulse. No life.
Jo pulled back, trying to steady her breath, her hand trembling. It wasn’t the first body she’d seen in her career. But Garvin... Garvin was supposed to be alive. He didn’t deserve this kind of death.
She fumbled for her phone, hands still shaking. “Reese,” she managed when the receptionist picked up. “Garvin’s dead. I found him here, at his house. Send the team. Fast.”
Reese’s voice crackled with shock. “Jo? Are you okay? What happened?”
Jo swallowed hard, her gaze flicking to the bloodstain spreading beneath Garvin. “It’s bad. It looks like... murder.”
“I’m sending everyone. Ambulance and the team are on their way. Stay put.”
“Okay.” Jo hung up and exhaled, the air thick and tainted with blood. Her fingers curled into fists as she fought for control. She should be handling this better.She was trained for this. But this... This was different.
Her mind raced, trying to piece together the scene, to make sense of the chaos. Garvin had been reluctant to sell the cottage at first. But after months of coaxing, he’d seemed to come around. Just last week, he’d told her he was almost ready to sign.
Now, he was dead. Why?
A knot tightened in her chest. Did his death have something to do with the property? Jo glanced at the open door, the wind blowing in snow that melted on the blood-streaked floor.
She needed answers.
The distant wail of sirens cut through the silence, snapping Jo back to the present. Her pulse steadied. Time to get to work.
She scanned the room again, this time with the sharp focus of a cop at a crime scene. The overturned chair near the table. A broken lamp. Glass scattered like stars across the hardwood. Every object out of place told part of a story, and Jo was determined to piece it together.