A Bertha Brannon Mystery

County Judge Bertha Brannon's life blows up when her partner of twelve years, police sergeant Toni Matulis, the love of her life, is killed during a domestic violence call gone bad. Bertha is still trying to accept what's happened when she gets the first of several threatening phone calls. This is followed by one dangerous incident after the next, one dead body after the last. The police are no help, so Bertha starts her own investigation and learns that Toni was working on a case that no one wanted her to solve, a case of corruption that goes all the way to the top.

Bertha Brannon is a lawyer who takes care of her grandmother and is usually broke because the work she often takes is pro bono or sliding scale for the domestic violence shelter or the public defender for juvenile cases. She has eighteen months of sobriety from a cocaine addiction. Late Friday afternoon, she's looking forward to a long and peaceful weekend, when a woman comes into her office who wants to retain her for a murder she hasn't yet committed. Bertha needs the rent money. Thus begins a living roller-coaster ride that includes betrayal, arson, and murder. While making trips back to the drug-using haunts, Bertha meets a police woman who wants her, but she's not sure for what. Is it just sex or is there something more?

Prequel to Widow
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