Description: Margaritas, mayhem, and murder. Too bad her only defense is a cocktail umbrella.
After some of Karina Cardinal's recent adventures--her lover Mike Finnegan would call them scrapes, jams, or pickles--she's more than ready to blow this DC pop stand for a short girls' trip to Mexico. Until Jillian's roller skate wreck blows their plan out of the water. With Jilly injured and Mike working, her fellow lobbyist Rodrigo volunteers to share some sun, sand, and margaritas in Cancun. It's tough to relax, though, knowing what's in her suitcase. A package she promised to hand off to Mrs. Thundermuffin in Mexico. Mrs. T's evasive maneuvers around Karina's questions wave more red flags than a bullfighter, leaving Karina no choice but to take a peek. Okay, so it's not a kilo of something illegal. It's an Egyptian death mask that turns out to be a magnet for crooks, conmen, kidnappers, and outright killers. When the situation explodes into chaos, Karina and Rodrigo are lucky to have friends in the right place--at their backs. But they're in one hell of a jam. And they could be going home in something tackier than a souvenir t-shirt--more like a body bag.Brief description: Ellen Butler is the internationally bestselling author of the Karina Cardinal mystery series. Her experiences working on Capitol Hill and at a medical association in Washington DC inspired the mystery-action series. Multiple books in the series have hit #1 on Amazon bestseller lists in the US and abroad. Book critics call the Karina Cardinal mysteries "intelligent escapism" and "unputdownable adventures that will take readers on an electrifying yet light-hearted and humorous journey." Butler is also the author of the award-winning historical suspense novel The Brass Compass. The Brass Compass has won multiple awards for historical fiction, including a 2022 Speak Up Talk Radio Firebird Book Award, a 2018 IndieReader Discovery Award, and a 2019 Readers' Favorite Silver Medal. Ellen is also the author of the award-winning Love, California Style romance series. "Sexy, sassy, with a side of funny," the Love, California Style series is for those who enjoy Hallmark Hall of Fame-type romances. She won The Romance Reviews Readers' Choice Award in 2015 for her novel Planning for Love.