Heartbreak Bay

The engrossing fifth entry in Thriller Award finalist Caine’s Stillhouse Lake series (after 2020’s Bitter Falls) finds Tennessee PI Gwen Proctor living happily with flight instructor Sam Cade, who has recently adopted her two children by her late ex-husband, Melvin Royal, a serial killer. Gwen and her kids have been forced to live in perpetual fear, since people troll and even threaten her because they believe her guilty of acting as Melvin’s accomplice, even though she was acquitted of the charge. One night, Gwen’s police detective friend, Kez Claremont, is called to the scene of a car submerged in a pond with drowned twin baby girls inside. Kez asks Gwen for her unofficial help in exploring how the twins’ mother allowed this tragedy to happen. Was the mother abducted and needs saving, or is she perhaps criminally responsible for the girls’ deaths? The tension rises as the case becomes entwined with increased threats to Gwen and her family, and the two fully fleshed out leads wind up in a grim battle with a sadistic killer. Caine’s fascinating portrait of a psychopath will keep psychological thrillers fans turning the pages. Agent: Lucienne Diver, Knight Agency. (Mar.)