Autumn 1908 finds Caroline Fremont Jones and her partner in love and work, Michael Kossoff, traveling incognito, riding the rails from San Francisco to Boston. The railroad hired the sleuthing couple to investigate a series of accidents. But before they can solve the mystery, they become victims of the worst mishap yet when their train blows up near Salt Lake City. Was it a callous act of vandalism-or something even more sinister? Michael isn't about to let his injuries slow down his search for answers...or for Fremont, who has not been seen since the accident-dead or alive.Fortunately, the badly injured Fremont was rescued from the train's wreckage. But her unlikely savior, the leader of a breakaway Mormon sect, has hidden her away in his remote wilderness community. It seems that Melancthon Pratt has big plans for Fremont...not the least of which is for her to become his sixth wife. Now Fremont's only hope is that her genius for artifice will help her devise an...

Caroline Fremont Jones revels in her return to San Francisco, where a new city rises from the ruins of the 1906 earthquake. Even more rewarding is her business partnership and rekindled love with ex-spymaster Michael Archer Kossoff. But their private investigation agency is barely off the ground when Fremont's new friend, lovely but quirky Frances McFadden, becomes their first client--and it's a most troubling case.The adventurous but skeptical Fremont, lured by Frances to a séance, sees her companion fall into a disturbing trance. Despite the opposition of her powerful, controlling husband, Frances is determined to develop her budding psychic ability. Soon she confides to Fremont that a restless spirit from San Francisco's legendary past has entrusted her with a mission.But when one of the city's female mediums is murdered, and then another, Fremont's reservations turn to dread. Who has killed these women who wield their own power in the metaphysical...

Forced to leave San Francisco after the devastating earthquake of 1906, Fremont (née Caroline) Jones follows her heart to the bohemian beach community of Carmel-by-the-Sea. She is eager to be reunited with her elusive suitor, retired spymaster Michael Archer, but finds him mysteriously metamorphosed into Misha--otherwise occupied and decidedly unavailable for sleuthing. But the irrepressible Fremont Jones has her pride, and determined to restart her typewriting business part-time, she signs on as temporary keeper of the Point Pinos Lighthouse.She has barely settled in to her watch when a velvet-clad corpse washes in on the tide--and Fremont is off on a new and ultimately life-threatening quest. Starting with the free-spirited artists of Carmel, she searches for clues to the identity of the dead woman and uncovers a community filled with intrigue, violence, and plenty of motives for murder. When Fremont is attacked and robbed, her lighthouse torched, and the...

Five years ago Caroline Fremont Jones fled the proper world of her native Boston for the independent life of a California private detective. But now, in the winter of 1909, she is grief-stricken to learn of her father's grave illness. Still hampered by half-healed injuries from her last adventure -- but buoyed by her ever-deepening affection for her partner in love and work, Michael Kossoff -- Fremont leaves sunny San Francisco for the ice-edged air and handsome mansions of Beacon Street.Her visit has scarcely begun when her father, suffering from a malady not even his doctor can diagnose, takes a turn for the better ... only to die suddenly in the middle of the night. Fremont is certain her odious stepmother, Augusta, somehow caused her father's death. But how? And did she have an accomplice? Michael questions Fremont's suspicions ... until an exotic piece of evidence and a second, violent death trigger an investigation that draws upon childhood...