Dog Days of Karma — Jada Ryker

Tempers flare as the owners of the Carr-Maah Consulting Agency clash and their ideologies collide. Practical Celeste embraces technology, logic, and order. Esoteric Ericka wields a fountain pen filled with blood, writes mysterious messages on disturbingly skin-like parchment, and burns the icky paper in an ancient brazier to find answers in the smoke. Celeste retaliates with a fire extinguisher and a lecture on fire codes. The women call a cease-fire when an elderly woman storms the office. The stranger demands help in finding her missing grandson. She also claims that someone tried to kill her on her way to the agency. Celeste explains that Carr-Maah is a human resources consulting company, not a detective agency. Celeste grits her teeth when Ericka overrules her, forcing her to take the old lady's missing person case. Celeste is convinced the old woman lied about the murder attempt in order to elicit sympathy and help. She's dead wrong. She doesn't get the chance to apologize. The killer rectifies the earlier error, brutally murdering Constance as she leaves the agency. Several hundred miles away, Jose is a restaurant manager and former agency employee. He helped Sonora escape her abusive husband by giving her a job and an apartment. After she unexpectedly flees, Jose finds a hefty online reward for a lost dog. The posting shows Sonora in the photograph with the missing dog. Jose follows Sonora's trail back to his hometown and the Carr-Maah Consulting Agency. Celeste, Ericka, and Jose, assisted by Hobart, the mysterious homeless man forced by Ericka to become the agency's office manager, investigate Constance's murder and Sonora's disappearance. The clues lead them to a surfeit of viable suspects. With a voice heated by the South African sun, Christoph Metre is the charismatic head of the rival consulting agency. Obsessed with the exotic Ericka, Christoph appears with his entourage in unexpected places, including the murder scene. Lovesick Mrs. Grant, in a one-sided relationship with Mr. Crispie, hated it when Constance offered the spry widower lemonade with a Twist. Dr. Britta Spartan, head of the domestic violence shelter, writhes around Hobart like a predatory boa constrictor around a juicy mouse. If Celeste and her friends can't solve the mystery in time, they'll be the next victims.