A Buried Midlife

Somebody's kept a Bridgeport warehouse suspiciously spotless for fifteen years.

Mel Bracewell reads a person's worst moment off anything they've touched, and she's never once trusted a crime scene this clean. This time it means headaches, dead ends, and a cat named Biscuit sitting on the evidence until somebody photographs it properly. It also means the swept floors and wiped-clean locks are hiding the same secret that killed her partner's ghost fifteen years ago, before anyone thought to ask the right questions.

Aaron's partner, Charlie, has to relive the worst night of his afterlife to hand them a name. Mel has to keep her whole team alive long enough to use it, after somebody cuts a brake line and breaks into an evidence room to make the message clear: stop looking, or else.

Fifteen years of careful, patient cover-up just ran into one investigator who doesn't know how to leave anything alone. Can Mel close a case that's been open since before she ever touched her first cold object—before the man behind it decides she's the next thing that needs cleaning up?