Not all booby traps are created equal.

To be fair, the mechanics behind the first accident high in the hills of Hidden Creek couldn’t be considered a proper booby trap. It was simply a shrewd trap disguised as an accident.

On the night a woman tumbled down the floating circular staircase, had someone deliberately damaged the penultimate step in an act of malice? At close inspection, the welded steel edge was ruptured just enough to split apart under the weight of the petite woman who had placed the ball of her foot on the red oak tread of the step.

Or was it shoddy construction by the Secret Staircase Construction crew, as the victim’s husband claimed? While doctors fought to save his wife’s life, he couldn’t be found in the hospital’s waiting room. He was busy talking to his lawyers, finding out how quickly they could draw up the paperwork to sue the small family-owned business who’d designed, built, and installed the winding staircase.

There were also whispers that the woman may have been helped on her way down with a push. Anyone who knew her husband wouldn’t have been surprised to learn that was the case. Yes, he was superficially charming. But in his unguarded moments, you could see the ruthlessness that simmered just below the surface, waiting to erupt. Conveniently, he wasn’t at home when the “accident” occurred. The woman now lay in a coma, so even if she knew what had caused her fall, it wasn’t as if she could reveal what had happened.

But the second booby trap?

That was the one nobody saw coming.

The one resulting in murder.

The one not a soul could deny was both intentional and devious.

The one that threatened to destroy Tempest Raj’s life—before it gave her the last piece of the puzzle she needed to solve the mystery that had defined her entire adult life.