Malicious Intent — Janet Y. Martel

Howard Lowry has problems: Joan, his ex-wife with whom he wishes to reconcile, is 'seeing someone;' Jess, his fourteen-year old daughter, is interested in a boy who's too old for her; and to top it off, he lives with an aunt and his ninety-four-year-old grandmother who both see him as a ten-year-old boy. It doesn't matter to any of them that only months ago Howard Lowry was a decorated lieutenant in the Major Crimes Unit of the Fall River Police Department. Nor does it matter that he retired from the job he loves because of these women. But he doesn't have time to worry about these things. In his first case as a private investigator, Lowry is hired to untangle the baffling mystery of who is trying to kill Ann Crowley-and why. The leads are scarce and suspects are few as the 'pranks' become increasingly more serious-from a defacing scratch on her new car, to 'failing' brakes, to a mugging at the mall. It is clear to Lowry that someone is after Ann Crowley with Malicious Intent as the attacks continue, even after someone is murdered.