Fatal as a Fallen Woman

by Kathy Lynn Emerson

Murder strikes home in the second exciting story in the Diana Spaulding Mystery Series.

Diana Spaulding, crime reporter for the New York Independent Intelligencer, has just resigned her job, over the loud objections of her editor, in order to marry handsome doctor Ben Northcote. When her former boss shows up at her boarding house, she assumes he is armed with a better offer to pressure her into staying on. But, for once, headline-grabbing Horatio Foxe has real news to impart.

The Western Union news dispatch he carries informs Diana that her father has been killed. Worse, her mother, Elmira Torrence, is accused of the murder.

Estranged from her parents, Diana was not even aware of their divorce. Regardless of the rupture between them, however, she puts aside her marriage plans and boards the first train to Denver to rush to her mother’s aid.

More unpleasant surprises await her there, not the least of which is the profession her mother chose when her silver-baron husband turned her out on the street. Diana must face down every level of Denver society from madams to matrons, and confront some secrets in her own past to save the strange and unpredictable woman who gave her birth.