Checkmate: Murder

Angie Deacon has a new career, co-owner of Alton Bay New Hampshire's community theater, Prince & Pauper. Her divorce is almost final and, even though her too-clingy mother has moved in, life is good once again.

Angie's new love interest, Detective Colby Jarvis has lost a bet with his fellow officers and he has to try out for a part in Angie's show Checkmate: Murder. In what Angie considers brilliant casting, he is awarded the part of a burglar. Unfortunately, during the theater's very first performance, burglar Jarvis shoots the star with his personal handgun that's somehow been switched with the theater's prop gun.

Though he is on automatic suspension, he is heavy with need to find out who switched the guns, and why anyone would use him to kill the leading man who, by day is the unassuming owner of the local nursery. Add that to the fact that his long-thought-dead father is back, and Jarvis has had his last good night's sleep for a while.