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Corpse And Robbers
A Male Housekeeper Mystery
by Stephen Kaminski
Corpse and Robbers: A Male Housekeeper Mystery
Cozy Mystery
2nd in Series
Setting – A small town in Michigan
Cozy Cat Press (April 16, 2022)
Paperback : 234 pages
ISBN-10 : 1952579457
ISBN-13 : 978-1952579455
Digital Cozy Cat Press (May 13, 2022)
ASIN : B0B1BD759B
Paul Bearer & Sons has two memorial services on the schedule, but three dead bodies. When Rusted Bonnet’s funeral home becomes the site of a murder, Cam Reddick finds himself as a prime suspect. To distance himself from the allegations, Cam must untangle a host of clever cons and mini mysteries, from corpse robbing to a fine art scam to a modern-day treasure hunt. Cam soon discovers that Paul Bearer’s more closely resembles a con artists’ colony than a funeral home. With help from his ex-wife and mother, Cam ultimately unearths the most devious and deadly ploy of all.
Corpse and Robbers in the second installment of Stephen Kaminski’s Male Housekeeper Mystery series.
Kaminski also pens the Damon Lassard Dabbling Detective Mysteries. He is the recipient of the Murder & Mayhem Award for Best Classic Cozy, multiple Reader Views Literary Awards, and was a Chanticleer Media CLUE Award finalist.
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Enjoy this peek inside:
Between a ski slope nose and equine teeth, Nigel Bitter hadn’t been bestowed with any maker’s benevolence in the looks department. Cam had located Nigel’s address in the online White Pages and simply knocked on his door, not expecting him to be home on a Monday afternoon. But to his surprise, a man answered.
Wearing a leopard print bathrobe and fuzzy slippers, Nigel introduced himself and invited Cam inside not even knowing who he was. Ten minutes later, Cam was enjoying hot mulled cider—wassail as Nigel called it—in a kitchen close to the size of Emma’s first grade classroom. After asking Cam about himself, Nigel—a self-proclaimed “speed trader” on every market from the Americas to Asia—had launched into an exegesis on the finer points of commodities, not that Cam had inquired. Apparently, sugarcane futures had gone haywire that morning.
“So how do I not know you?” Nigel finally asked.
“I grew up here,” Cam said, “but I moved away for a while. Have you lived in Rusted Bonnet long?”
Nigel, who appeared a number of years older than Cam, said, “For about five years. I burned out in New York. Investment banking. So, I chucked the lifestyle and went in for this old farm house to be close to my mother after she moved into an assisted living facility.” He sipped wassail from a ceramic mug. “Would you like a scone? I bake them myself.”
Cam accepted and Nigel added a dollop of clotted cream on a small China plate alongside a pair of scones. He handed the offering to Cam.
“Thank you,” Cam said and bit into a scone. The flavor of currants tickled his tongue. “This is phenomenal.”
“Black currant is one of my favorites. I make a good savory one with Gruyere, too.”
“It was a shame about your mother. I happened to be cleaning Paul Bearer’s while she was there.” He described Peachy Kleen.
“So, are you here soliciting business?”
“No. I actually wanted to ask you about your mother’s necklace.”
The top of Nigel’s robe had loosened, presenting a mat of dark hair plastering his chest. “How did you know about that?” He blinked rapidly.
A nervous tic? “I think the whole village knows it was stolen on the night Samir Orucov was murdered,” Cam said. “And that it turned up in a recycling bin. Plus, my ex-wife’s a police officer.”
Nigel’s eyes drooped at the mention of an ex-wife. After a heartbeat, he asked, “What did you want to know?”
Cam weighed his options. He didn’t dare ask Nigel if he had stripped the ruby from his dead mother’s neck. Instead, he said, “I have a friend who works at an auction house in Chicago. I was wondering if you plan to sell it.”
Nigel swirled a demitasse spoon in the glass jar of clotted cream. “The thought never crossed my mind.”
Was he telling the truth? “I’d love to see it,” Cam tried.
Nigel touched the tiny spoon to his tongue. “I thought you said you saw my mother while she was at the funeral home.”
This man is no fool. “I did,” Cam said. “I’m sorry, I really should be going.”
Nigel held up a hand. His fingernails were surprisingly dirty. “No, stop. That was rude of me. Mother’s necklace isn’t here. She wanted to be buried with it, but, of course, that didn’t happen. So once the police retrieved it, I did the next best thing. I gave it to my aunts to share.”
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About Stephen Kaminski
Stephen Kaminski is the author of two cozy mystery series: The Male Housekeeper Mysteries and the Damon Lassard Dabbling Detective series, both published by Cozy Cat Press.
“Corpse & Robbers” (2022) is the latest of Kaminski’s Male Housekeeper Mysteries. The first installment of the series, “An Au Pair to Remember,” was penned in 2019.
Each of Kaminski’s Damon Lassard books — “It Takes Two to Strangle” (2012), “Don’t Cry Over Killed Milk” (2013), and “Murder, She Floats” (2014) — was awarded the Reader Views Literary Award for the Mid-Atlantic Region, and Don’t Cry Over Killed Milk was named Best Classic Cozy in the 2014 Murder & Mayhem Awards and was a 2013 Chanticleer Media CLUE Award Finalist.
Stephen is a graduate of Johns Hopkins University and Harvard Law School and currently serves as the chief executive officer of a national energy association. He lives with his 120 lb Swissie, Siberian forest cat, rescue kitty, and a gaggle of occasionally tolerable but always loveable humans in Bethesda, MD.
Purchase Link – Amazon
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