Calculated in Death

In Death, Book #36

By J.D.  Robb

ISBN# 9780399158827

Author’s Website:  http://www.jdrobb.com/

Brought to you by OBS reviewer Heidi

*Beware of Spoilers*

The New York premiere of The Icove Agenda, the movie based on one of Eve and Peabody’s cases, is fast approaching.  Peabody is excited to get glammed up and walk the red carpet, but Eve would be happy to skip the event entirely!

However, she quickly gets a distraction in the form of a new murder investigation.  Married mother of two, Marta Dickenson left work, but never made it home.  She was found outside a building eight blocks away, her belongings and even her coat stolen.  On the surface it looks like a mugging gone wrong, but Eve isn’t buying it.  And when she finds the victim’s blood inside the nearby apartment and blue carpet fibers on her body, she gets her proof!  Now it’s up to Eve and Peabody to figure out who would have wanted to kill her.  And, to add another wrinkle to the case Marta is the sister-in-law of one of the judges Eve has worked with.  A judge that is willing to help her by gaining warrants or anything else she needs to get justice!

But when someone tries to take out Eve and Peabody, the duo have to up their game and set the trap at the very event they’re being honored at, the movie premiere!

I thought this was a good read and quite the improvement over the previous installment, Delusion in Death.  There was still some confusion with all the suspects being so similar, especially when Eve would switch from using their last name to first name and back again.  But it got easier to follow as the book progressed.

There was some emotion in this book, Marta’s husband about broke my heart with his reaction to the news of his wife’s murder.  I couldn’t even imagine the pain he was in.

There was some fun teasing between Eve and Roarke, as usual, and some steamy scenes as well.

“She broke off a piece of bacon and offered it to the cat who sat staring holes through her.

“For him, this is makeup sex. That’s all you get,” she said when Galahad inhaled the bacon then affectionately butted his head against her calf.

“Just FYI, if you let another man rub up against you, and I sniff it out, you won’t be able to buy me off with bacon.” He handed her the syrup pitcher so she could drown her French toast.

“So noted.”

I also found the scene where they used Peabody as bait to be quite entertaining, including Ian’s reaction!

This was a good read in the In Death series and the end of this book left me smiling like an idiot and tied everything up nicely.