P.I. Daddy's Personal Mission. Beth Cornelison

      Chapter 1

      His father had been murdered—twice.

      Peter Walsh ground his back teeth together and shifted uncomfortably in the front seat of his truck. Stakeouts were tedious enough without nagging concerns over a crime that should never have happened. His father had been killed fifteen years ago—or so his family had thought. But then, just a few months ago, Mark Walsh’s body had been found in Honey Creek. All evidence pointed to murder. A recent murder.

      So where had Mark Walsh been for the last fifteen years if he was not dead? Who had known Peter’s father was still alive and hated him enough to murder him—again?

      Explaining to his son, Patrick, that Grandpa Walsh had been murdered—for real this time—had confused and upset the impressionable ten-year-old. Peter could see the strain all of the turmoil was causing Patrick. He’d become withdrawn, sullen. One more concern to keep Peter awake at night.

      Peter rubbed warmth into his cold hands. The November morning was brisker than average thanks to the cold front that had dumped several inches of snow overnight. The first signs of winter had come to Honey Creek, Montana, with a snowfall in October. But that snow had been followed by unseasonably warm weather, a tornado and then more cold air. Peter shook his head, musing over the crazy seesawing weather.

      Raising his camera with its telephoto lens to the open truck window—a necessity for a clear view despite the frigid temperatures—Peter focused on the front porch, then the barn door, of the Rigsby residence. Still no activity. Still no proof that Bill Rigsby was defrauding his insurance company with false injury claims.

      With his surveillance of Rigsby’s farm yielding little evidence to take back to his client, Peter’s thoughts returned to the numerous troubling events his family had dealt with in recent months, the most glaring being the shocking reappearance and murder of his father. Peter’s stomach rumbled, and he lifted his travel mug to sip coffee that had long ago gotten cold. Maybe he should pack it in, get some lunch and head to the hospital to visit Craig.

      When a woman stepped out on the Rigsbys’ porch to feed a pair of mutts, he lifted the camera again. He clicked a few shots, just because, as his thoughts mulled the latest hit the Walshes had taken.

      Craig Warner, the man who had been more of a father to Peter than Mark Walsh had ever been, had suffered his own mysterious attack in the last few weeks. The stomach virus Craig thought he had turned out to be arsenic poisoning. Lester Atkins, Craig’s assistant, had tried to kill the CFO of Walsh Enterprises within months of Mark Walsh’s murder. Then his sister Mary had been blatantly run off the road after visiting Damien Colton in prison. Coincidence?

      Not likely.

      Peter’s gut tightened. He smelled a conspiracy. The Walsh family, the people he cared about, were under attack. Someone in Honey Creek had viciously—

       Click-click.

      Peter froze as the pumping sound of a shotgun filtered into the open truck window.

      “Who the hell are you and what are you doin’ on my land?” a low voice growled.

      Peter turned slowly, his hands up, and stared down the barrel of a Remington 870. Silently he cursed the distracting thoughts that had allowed this armed farmer to approach his truck without Peter noticing. That kind of inattention could get him killed. An unsettling thought when the Walshes and their business associates seemed to be the target of a murderer.

      Peter took a slow breath that belied the speed of his thoughts as he analyzed the best way to diffuse this situation. “Is that a Wingmaster?”

      The armed farmer lowered the muzzle an inch or so to narrow a curious gaze on Peter. “Yeah.”

      Peter