Just Jennifer

Web of Deceit by Katherine Howell

When EMTs Jane and Alex arrive at the scene of a single vehicle accident, the driver appears unharmed but is very agitated saying someone is after him and just Jane and Alex being near him is dangerous for them.  They manage to get him to the hospital from where he disappears before he has a chance to be evaluated.  Later that same day, Jane and Alex are called to a train station where a man is dead under a train, the man who Jane and Alex coaxed out of the car just hours earlier.  Detective Ella Marconi isn’t sure whether Marko Meixner fell onto the tracks during the melee after a smoke bomb, whether he jumped or if he was pushed on purpose.  In spite of his paranoid behavior earlier in the day, or perhaps because of it, Jane doubts suicide and Ella agrees; as she investigates Marko’s life, especially in the past few months, Ella uncovers some very strange clues and behaviors that don’t quite add up to murder but make her convinced that Marko’s death was anything but suicide.  While Ella, without the full support of her superiors, continues to investigate Marko’s death, single-father Alex’s teenage daughter disappears into the night, a disappearance that forces startling revelations.  The twisty plot is enough to keep reader’s engaged, but the relationship problems Ella and Jane are working through, along with Alex’s troubles, add layers to both the plot and characters making for an enjoyable read with several surprises along the way.