Crime Does Not Pay #100

Private eye Chip Gardner finds himself drawn into a tangled case when a psychiatrist's troubled patient, Francine Belville, comes seeking help for her crippling nervousness—only to have the doctor's rowdy son and his party guests throw the appointment into chaos. As Gardner investigates the strange web of tensions between the doctor, his rebellious son, and the increasingly desperate woman, he uncovers angles that go far deeper than simple family dysfunction. With an assist from his partner Wendy, Gardner works to untangle two murders hidden within the case's murky details.

When a head injury leaves Mr. Kalter unable to smell anything, his stepdaughter Anna sees an opportunity—and a way to solve her problems. Desperate to raise money for her boyfriend Eddie, who's fleeing the police, Anna hatches a scheme to make her stepfather's death look accidental, banking on his missing sense of smell to keep him unaware of deadly danger. "The Smell of Death" is a cruel twist on fate, where Anna's gamble with human life sets in motion consequences she may not have foreseen.

Mac Ragin is a lifer obsessed with avenging himself on Lieutenant King, the cop who sent him up—and when he orchestrates a daring prison escape, he sets one final, desperate plan in motion. A woman he trusts promises to finish what he started, but as she finds herself drawn to King's charm and ambition, her loyalty to Mac is tested in a way neither of them expected. "Mission: Murder!" explores the cost of revenge when the people caught in its path have their own reasons to hesitate.

A treasure-hunting yacht forced into port by storm warnings becomes the scene of a locked-cabin murder when Rex Gotha is found dead—and Detective Harrison must sort through a crew of suspects and would-be imposters to find out who pulled the trigger. With a private operative arriving under false pretenses, a beachcomber, a jilted singer, and an unpaid creditor all circling the ship with axes to grind, the real killer could be anyone. Can you solve the mystery before the culprit slips away?