Larry Murtagh's Missing-Ear Case

A detective who's been swindled. A dead broker in the snow. And a case that keeps getting more tangled by the hour.

Larry Murtagh doesn't trust pretty women, Wall Street men, or coincidences—and this case has all three in abundance.

When a respected New York broker turns up shot dead in a fashionable square after midnight, the evidence points straight at his bitter rival. But Larry has been around long enough to know that the obvious answer is almost never the right one. Someone lured both men into that snowstorm. Someone fired from the shadows. And someone is using a pair of warring brokers as pawns in a much darker game.

Now Larry finds himself caught between a calculating young heiress who wants him to play to her tune, a vengeful bucket-shop swindler he'd love to see behind bars, and a mysterious watcher who disappeared the moment the shot rang out.

As the truth twists further from where it began, Larry fights to stay ahead of a conspiracy built on forged letters, false identities, and one very telling missing ear. Because in this city, the deadliest crimes aren't committed in dark alleys—they're engineered in parlors, with silk gloves and silver smiles.

Can Larry crack the case before the real killer buries the evidence—and everyone who knows the truth along with it?