Deaths of Jocasta

The cops blow it off, another Black transgender woman who surprised a customer with what was under the dress—bad luck she was pushed out of the car and then hit by another vehicle. But Micky Knight witnessed it, crossing the street at the right—or wrong—time, only yards away from what didn’t look at all like an accident to her. The woman was dressed more like a librarian than a sex worker. It’s not her case, she was just walking home from a local bar. No ID was found on the victim, and the only clue is an appointment card with cryptic initials, CJ at CC. Micky has a good idea what they mean—Cordelia James at CrescentCare, a local health clinic that sees many transgender clients. Cordelia, a doctor and her ex. Micky doesn’t want to get involved, but there will be no justice if she doesn’t. As she investigates, she uncovers a family in turmoil and ugly secrets—ones people will kill for.

A woman wants to find her missing sister. That should be easy for an experienced PI like Micky Knight. Until the woman—or someone who looks like her—ends up in the morgue. Micky finds herself in a tangled mess, not knowing who the real victim is, or how her name keeps coming up in places it shouldn’t. Like newly minted Realtor Karen Holloway’s house sale papers, as the contact for another missing buyer, one who looks a lot like Micky’s client. The same woman? The sister?

Micky has to uncover what the game is and who’s playing. Because the stakes are murder.

Micky Knight reluctantly takes on two cases, one for money, one for pity. The first is a trawl though archives to solve a century old murder, for an arrogant grandson who thinks riches should absolve his family of any sins. The other, to answer a mother’s anguish as she tries to understand her daughter’s suicide. Micky sees no happy ending to either case; the dusty pages of history aren’t going to give up their secrets after holding them for so long. And even if she finds answers for the mother’s questions, nothing will bring her daughter back. But as Micky discovers, the past is never past and a young girl can lead a complicated, even dangerous, life. The secrets, both past and present, are meant to remain hidden—only the first murder is hard. The rest come easy.

Michele "Micky" Knight, a New Orleans PI, meets an out-of-town team of investigators who are working a human trafficking case. They want someone local to show them around. It sounds easy, and a woman with smiling green eyes is asking. But it stays easy only if Micky stops asking questionsand she's never been good at that. What starts out as a tourist tour of the underside of New Orleans turns into a risky game of cat and mouse, and twists even further as Micky is caught between the good guys and the bad guys, each willing to do whatever it takesincluding getting rid of an inconvenient PIto achieve their ends. Who can she trust? And who's trying to kill her?

The eighth Micky Knight mystery.

First, do no harm. But as New Orleans PI Micky Knight discovers, not every health care provider follows that dictum. She stumbles into a tangle of the true believers to the criminally callous, who use the suffering of others for their twisted ends. In a city slowly rebuilding after Katrina, one of the most devastated areas is health care, and the gaps in service are wide enough for the snake oil salesmenand the snakes themselvesto crawl through.

The seventh Micky Knight mystery.

It's just one more body in one more destroyed house. In New Orleans, after Katrina, there are thousands of destroyed houses and hundreds of body yet to be found. Can one more matter? It does to Micky Knight as she takes on the search to find out who the woman was and why she might have died there. But is Micky searching for justice or just doing anything to avoid confronting the ways Katrina destroyed everything that had tied her to New Orleans?

Micky's investigation leads to a tangle of greed and deceit that stretches back generations. Someone is using the destruction wrought by the flooding to finish what was started a hundred years ago. To stop them Micky will have to risk not just her life, but any chance to reconnect with Cordelia and rebuild the life she had before Katrina. But if she doesn't stop them, a young teen whose only crime was wanting to help the destroyed city, will be the next body left in an abandoned house.

The sixth book in the Micky Knight mystery series.