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Overview: Michael began writing mystery and sci-fi novels some years ago while working full time, first at a cutlery manufacturing plant and then at a hospital.
The latest, full length book, “Gabe & Cory’s Momentous Misadventure” was published in January 2023, and naturally it features Gabriel Henri Bergeron, CPA and amateur sleuth, but it also brings Gabe’s boyfriend, Special Agent Cory Poirier, center stage. Cory shares the story-telling duties with Gabe
In previous stories, Gabe never set out to find the evil doers but was drawn in…sometimes much against his will. This time Cory asks him to help with one of his Art Crime Team cases. It doesn’t go quite as either of them had planned.
As in previous books Gabe investigates while trying to keep his job at Garst, Bauer & Hartmann, a moderately reputable accounting firm in Philadelphia and visiting with his great-aunt, Florence Barnes, who has an Victorian pile of a house near Snow Hill, MD., on the Delmarva Peninsula (composed of Delaware and counties of Maryland and Virginia). Aunt Flo and her comrade/friend, Ezmeralda Gutierrez, have a bit of history of their own, which they have been extremely reluctant to share with Gabe.
Genre: Fiction > Mystery/Thriller
The Detective with Dishpan Hands (#13)
The vintage Pontiac Firebird had left the road and plunged into the Pocomoke River. He had found the car the previous day…with the body still inside…and done his duty by reporting it. He was, of course, totally blameless.
Trooper Hall of the Maryland State Police was standing stoic and stolid and solid. A tall, slender Hispanic lady was talking at Hall and did not seem overly pleased with the trooper or the Universe.
She was wearing charcoal slacks and a lighter gray blouse buttoned to the throat; it had long, slightly-poofy sleeves and a Mandarin collar. Her shoes were black with low heels.
She was studying Gabe Bergeron. She had dark eyes that might be pretty when they were slightly less focused. She had thick masses of curly black hair tied back.
He had gone jogging expecting the car to be gone today, but it was not, and what appeared to his experienced eye to be forensic techs were crawling over the car and the whole area. They were snapping photos of the skid marks.
He had already given a statement to Trooper Hall, and the Dark Lady allowed him jog past. She did not stop, arrest, or abuse him in any way. She had a shiny badge clipped to her belt.
He returned to Aunt Flo’s B&B and made breakfast for the guests, aka the ravening horde. He did this in Ezmeralda’s kitchen. With her full knowledge and consent. This remarkable dispensation had been granted him due to the fact that Ezmeralda’s brother, Ignacio, was in a hospital in Houston after suffering a heart attack, and she was at his bedside.
Aunt Flo was staring at him as he washed dishes.
He said, “I’m fairly certain it wasn’t an accident.” Aunt Flo nodded. “They had a forensic team going over the car, and there was a plainclothes detective on the scene with Trooper Hall dancing attendance.”
“And is there any reason they might suspect you, Gabriel?”
“None! Absolutely none, Aunt Flo.”
Well, he had known Ray, the driver, and they hadn’t been buddies or chums. And it might be the case that Ray had punched him in the face, or tried to, but that had been seventeen years earlier.
So if there was anything hinky about Ray’s death…the slightest little thing…the police would be coming to see him. Yesterday’s questioning would be but prologue.
He was elbow deep in soapy water when he heard the vehicles in the parking lot.
The Dark Lady was coming to call.
The Face That Launched a 1000 Scams (#14)
The creature looked like a middle-aged woman with dark eyes and long, rusty-black hair. Her oval face had rosy cheeks, kohl rimmed eyes, and red lips that curled down at the corners.
She was wearing a white summer dress and outfitted with red shoes and an enormous, red purse. She was proportioned very like a buxom, well-fed woman too. The pearl earrings were a nice touch, but they couldn’t make up for the coldest, darkest set of eyes he’d yet encountered.
She bared the fangs which had been carefully hidden behind her red lips until now. “Of course, you know Samantha Warrington, Mr. Bergeron!”
Well, they weren’t exactly fangs but close enough. He shook his head. “I have never heard that name before in my life.” He was too tired to cope. “I’m sorry, Ms. Hayes, but you’re obviously not looking for accounting services, and that is all that I can offer you…”
She dug a phone out of the red bag and found a photo. “See! This is Samantha and her vicious husband, Per Isak Sparre!”
His drooping eyes may have opened wide. There might have been some slight pupil dilation and eyebrow arching, but he said nothing. Well, inside his head, a bunch of synapses screamed, “Angelica Amici Butler!” But his exterior was the very image of blithe unconcern. Mostly.
Ms. Hayes smiled. This smile was the first human expression she’d managed since she’d traipsed into Garst Accounting. “Where is she? She’s my daughter, Mr. Bergeron, and I’m sick with worry about her.”
But he hadn’t been able to give her a location; mostly because he had no idea where her “daughter” might be. He had been hoped that he’d never see the rapturously beautiful Angelica again after she’d disappeared, leaving her husband, Will Butler, his high school classmate, to cope with prison on his own. And he was clinging desperately to that hope.
But then Detective Vonda Golczewski summoned him to a crime scene where the body of Ms. Millie Biggs was lying under a sheet. Millie Biggs had his address and phone number in her purse, but he could truthfully tell Vonda that he’d never seen poor Millie before.
Close upon Millie’s misfortune, he became aware that a very large individual who resembled a less genial King Kong was stalking him. Said individual might have tortured and murdered Millie and her companion?
He felt sure all this was all the fault of Angelica. Somehow?
Gabe & Cory’s Momentous Misadventure (#15)
Special Agent Cory Poirier was out of the loop, but something was up. Matt, his FBI partner, said, “Danielle wants you now. Ice queen. Fifty degrees Kelvin.”
Danielle Elkins was the boss of the FBI’s Art Crime Team. She didn’t tell him to sit, and she didn’t look up at him but continued reading, her face pale and frozen.
Ten years earlier, six paintings belonging to a Brandon Petrou had been stolen from the Blackthorn Museum where they had been on loan. One of the burglars had been caught, but the paintings had never been recovered. The investigation by a senior agent, Harris Eastman, had gone nowhere. But now one of the paintings had turned up at an auction house in New York, and he had persuaded Matt to go with him to check it out.
Danielle looked up at him. “I don’t remember assigning you to review the Petrou case, Poirier.”
“No Ma’am, but I wanted to see the painting for myself. I was given some legwork for Eastman in the original investigation.”
She went back to reading and then looked up again. “Have you been talking to former Special Agent Eastman, Poirier?” Eastman had retired six years ago? He shook his head. “Don’t share this news with him. Is that clear, Poirier?” He nodded. She smiled her frostiest, ice queen smile. “Gabe came to mind. I was wondering if this might be the case to let him consult on? But it’s your decision, of course.”
He wasn’t sure why he was freaked out by Gabe working with him, but Gabe had asked, and who knew if Danielle would ever give him another chance?
Reluctant Sherlock (#16)
Businessman Kris Thys had gone missing eleven days ago.
And his wife, young Ember Thys, was distraught enough to hire Millikan Investigations to find him. L.C. Chase, fledgling P.I., got the case and asked Gabe Bergeron, CPA, to consult. Which Gabe was loathe to do after his latest misadventure, but sturdy, studly Chase was a friend.
Ember and Kris lived out in the country in a solitary bungalow that snuggled into the landscape and had a fairy tale air about it; Hansel and Gretel without the horror elements. So far.
Ms. Ember Thys had pale blue eyes, large and limpid, and emoted innocence. And she was with child: six months along if Gabe was any judge. She seemed to know almost nothing about her husband except that Mr. Thys traveled for work and bought “widgets” in places like India and Colombia for a company which had gone off the grid at much the same time as Mr. Thys.
A rich assortment of other people began swarming around Gabe’s apartment also seeking Kris Thys. Desperately. For unspecified reasons. Some were not above offering sums of money for hints about the whereabouts of Mr. Thys.
And then the body of one of the swarmers was discovered in his lobby. Which led inexorably to the swarming of police officers and detectives and even stray federal agents of an obscure and curious origin. Gabe argued with himself that the death could have been accidental but he wasn’t convincing.
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