Trouble in Store by Carol Cox is her apparently standalone western historical romantic suspense, set in Ohio and Arizona during the 1880s, starring a plucky former governess and her erstwhile business rival, both of whom are convinced that they've inherited the same mercantile store from its deceased owner, which to be honest sounds like it should be the setup for some kind of hilariously zany intra-soon-to-be-couple rivalry humour thing, if it weren't for the pesky murders that apparently take place instead to provide the needed tension that automagically brings the two together and erases all their former mutual antagonism, free courtesy of Christian publisher Baker's Bethany House imprint.
Currently free, probably just for one day @
B&N,
Amazon UK (slated to drop in the
main store after midnight Pacific Time),
Kobo &
iTunes &
Google Play (all available to Canadians), and
Christian Book (ADE-DRM ePub available worldwide), and may possibly be addable later to your library @
BookShout† (online reading & app download; they've been kind of sporadic about getting Baker freebies lately).
Description
Historical Suspense and Romance in the Wild West
Fired from her most recent governess position, Melanie Ross must embrace her last resort: the Arizona mercantile she inherited from her cousin. But Caleb Nelson is positive he inherited the mercantile, and he's not about to let some obstinate woman with newfangled ideas mess up all he's worked for. He's determined to get Melanie married off as soon as possible, and luckily there are plenty of single men in town quite interested in taking her off his hands.
The problem is, Caleb soon realizes he doesn't want her to marry up with any of them. He's drawn to Melanie more every day, and he has to admit some of her ideas for the store unexpectedly offer positive results.
But someone doesn't want the store to succeed, and what used to be just threatening words has escalated into deliberate destruction and lurkers in the night. When a body shows up on the mercantile steps--and the man obviously didn't die from natural causes--things really get dangerous. Can Melanie and Caleb's business--and romance--survive the trouble that's about to come their way?
† I like how their category for this just says "Christian Christian Christian". It's like seeing those Brady Bunch parodies of "Marcia,
Marcia,
Marcia…"