Face Down Beneath the Eleanor Cross — Kathy Lynn Emerson

Nothing is as it seems when would-be widow Susanna, Lady Appleton, finds her official period of mourning interrupted by a cryptic message from her supposedly dead spouse. Shockingly, Robert is alive--but not for long...

Neither late nor lamented by his wife, Sir Robert Appleton summons a stunned Susanna to a furtive London meeting. Yet instead of a reluctantly anticipated marital reunion, the renowned herbalist finds her poisoned husband gasping his last breaths beneath the Eleanor Cross. Vowing to bring his killer to justice, Susanna embarks on a daring winter journey across the frigid English countryside. She swiftly discovers that there is no shortage of those who bore animosity toward Robert--most of them female. But which of the wealthy, wayward knight's mistresses is a murderess? His widow is determined to find out, aware that the gallows now awaits the most likely suspect: Susanna herself...