Description
For fans of Roisín O'Donnell's Nesting, an intense, suspenseful story of a young mother's fight to save herself after the man she thought was her white knight turns out to be just as dangerous as the man he helped her escape. After twenty-one-year-old Emily Miller flees her ex-husband, Lee, with the exterminator she hired to kill hornets in her backyard, she finally feels safe. Jake Clayton offers Emily and her daughter a beautiful place to live where neither Lee nor her mother, who wants custody of Jenna, can find them. Unlike Lee, Jake has a steady job, doesn't drink (she's never met a man who doesn't), and doesn't hit. And he doesn't think Emily is too much--too mouthy (Lee), too large (her mother), too extra.
Isolated in a cabin in the Santa Cruz mountains with only a three-year-old for company, Emily distracts herself from the liquor cabinet and from worrying that Lee will track her down by planning a surprise for Jake: a reunion with the sisters he hasn't seen since foster care. But the deeper she digs into Jake's past, the less he seems like the man she trusts--and when she learns Lee has disappeared, she suspects Jake could have done . . . something. But that's ridiculous, right? Sure, Jake is bossy about where she goes and who she sees. Sure, he has a temper. But murder? That's just her being dramatic--like Lee and her mother always say she is.
Right?
Author: Catherine Marshall-Smith
Publisher: She Writes Press
Published: 07/21/2026
Pages: 360
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 1.10lbs
Size: 8.40h x 5.50w x 1.10d
ISBN13: 9798896363460
BISAC Categories:
- Fiction | Thrillers | Domestic
- Fiction | Thrillers | Suspense
- Fiction | Women
About the Author
Catherine Marshall-Smith published her debut novel, American Family, in 2016. She is a founder of Café Writers Online, a weekly interactive forum for discussion led by experts on the craft of writing and publishing. She holds a bachelor's degree from UC Berkeley in English literature, a teaching credential from San Jose State University, and a Writing Credential from UCLA, where she was nominated for the James Kirkwood Award for excellence in the writing of fiction. A former English teacher, she lives with her husband in the San Francisco Bay Area.