ARC Review: What You Want to See by Kristen Lepionka

What You Want to See
Author: Kristen Lepionka
Series: Roxanne Weary (Book 2)
Publication: Minotaur Books (May 1, 2018)

Description: The thrilling follow up to The Last Place You Look, starring troubled and determined private investigator, Roxane Weary.

Marin Strasser has a secret. Her fiancé thinks her secret is that she’s having an affair, and he hires P.I. Roxane Weary to prove it.Then, just days into the case, Marin is shot to death on a side street in an apparent mugging. But soon enough the police begin to focus on Roxane's client for Marin’s death, so she starts to dig deeper into Marin’s life―discovering that the elegant woman she’s been following has a past and a half, including two previous marriages, an adult son fresh out of prison, and a criminal record of her own. The trail leads to a crew of con artists, an ugly real estate scam that defrauds unsuspecting elderly homeowners out of their property, and the suspicious accident of a wealthy older woman who lives just down the street from where Marin was killed.

With Roxane’s client facing a murder indictment, the scammers hit close to home to force Roxane to drop the case, and it becomes clear that the stakes are as high as the secrets run deep.

My Thoughts: Roxane Weary's next case should be an easy one: follow her client's fiance to see if she is having an affair. Things get more complicated when the fiance is found shot to death on the street after having an argument with Roxane's employer. Worst yet, her employer's gun is missing and it might be the murder weapon.

Roxane has to clear her client. As she begins to dig into Marin Strasser's background more questions than answers are found. She says she's an interior decorator but her business card has only a phone number and an email address and tracking down previous clients seems to show that she was stealing from them. And it looks like she has scammed her fiance Arthur Ungless out of $75,000 for "wedding plans." Digging deeper leads to a previous marriage where she also tried some scams and left angry heirs behind.

Roxane also uncovers some illegal activity going on at Arthur's printing business. Apparently an employee had decided to branch out by making illegal IDs, driver's licenses, and passports. This brought the business to the attention of a local criminal which resulted in the death of the criminal's daughter and which brings Roxane to the criminal's attention.

Throw in Marin's son who is just out of prison and eager to find another scam and you have plots and twists all over the place. Roxane has scaled back her alcohol use in this one but she is also really lonely. Her relationship with Tom, one of her father's proteges, has changed since he's found a new girlfriend and her relationship with a former girlfriend is also in a precarious situation. The girlfriend is trying to contact Roxane but Roxane isn't sure if she wants to get involved with her again.

I enjoyed the twists and turns in this mystery. Fans of the first book won't want to miss this one.

Favorite Quote:

I wouldn't have described myself as a workaholic, not exactly. Just a person with an obsessive need to resolve the things that I got paid to resolve. "I'm pretty boring," I said. "When I have a case, all I do is work. When I don't have a case, I mostly just sleep."

I received this one in exchange for an honest review from NetGalley. You can buy your copy here.