Synopsis:
Under normal circumstances, private detective Desiree Shapiro would never accept a job from an organized crime boss. However, Desiree is curious in spite of herself, Vito de Silva won't take no for an answer...and the amount he offers to pay her is very, very nice.
A friend of de Silva's was murdered, and de Silva wants to find out who did it and doesn't trust the cops to do as thorough an investigation as he would like. De Silva swears to Desiree that he will let the law punish whoever is found to be the murderer. De Silva had been helping his friend rise in politics, but it doesn't seem like anyone killed him for that reason. Desiree and Lou, her partner from the local police, investigate a lot of different possibilities, including a drug deal gone bad or jealousy on the part of one of de Silva's people, but nothing seems to pan out. Desiree can't shake her suspicion that the up-and-coming politician's beautiful wife had something to do with his murder.
Review:
I had never read or listened to one of Selma Eichler's books before, and I hadn't realized that this was book 7 in her Desiree Shapiro series. However, I thought it stood well enough on its own. Eichler established fairly early on that Desiree, short and a bit overweight (not that too big of a deal is made of this), was not what people usually pictured when they thought of private detectives. Also, Desiree is a widow and is dating Al, a guy who is nice and comfortable, but, from Desiree's perspective, not much besides.
