2018 Adult Fiction Mystery - President's Book Award Winner - FAPA
New York antiquities appraiser Annalisse Drury recently lost her best friend to murder. The killer's identity may be linked to her friend's expensive missing bracelet--a 500-year-old artifact that carries an ancient curse, one that unleashes evil upon any who dare wear the jewelry created for the Persian royal family. Weeks later, Annalisse sees a matching necklace at a Manhattan gallery opening. She begs the owner to destroy the cursed piece, but her pleas fall on deaf ears--despite the unnatural death that occurs during the opening. With two victims linked to the jewelry, Annalisse is certain she must act. Desperate, Annalisse enlists the gallery owner's son to help--even though she's afraid he'll break her heart. Wealthy and devastatingly handsome, with a string of bereft women in his wake, Greek playboy Alec Zavos dismisses Annalisse's concerns--until his parents are ripped from the Zavos family yacht during their ocean voyage near Crete. Annalisse and Alec race across two oceans to save his mother, feared dead or kidnapped. When the killer changes tactics and goes after Alec behind Annalisse's back, can her plan to rescue Alec's mother save them all?
Hold on for a heart-thumping, thrilling adventure through exotic lands in this fast-moving romantic suspense by Marlene M. Bell.