Working Stiff

Sofie's getting her feet under her as a PI and business is booming. So much so that she's hired her (formerly) layabout cousin and a one-time petty criminal as "boys of all work." Okay, so her reputation's become, well, complicated-everyone in Astoria, Queens, knows that from time to time she shoots one of her own clients-but on the whole, she's getting a lot more respect than when she was best known for leaving her groom at the altar.

In fact, Sofie's just landed her first big criminal case-one so big that it's on the news nearly every night. A young man from not quite the wrong side of the tracks has been accused of murdering his beautiful, wealthy girlfriend. His alibi's a mess and his attitude's worse. But his sister believes he's innocent, and soon, so does Sofie. Now she just has to prove it-or find the real killer.

If only she didn't have a host of distractions: a body disappears from her aunt Sotiria's funeral home (it's only a week before Halloween, so this might be a prank, or it might have something to do with the dead man's mysterious life). Sofie sees her Dino keeping company with her sister Efi (are they flirting? how dare he? how dare she?); and Jake Porter returns, somehow connected to the missing body and, as always, making Sofie go weak in the knees. And since Dino's otherwise occupied. . . .

Meanwhile, young Johnny is facing a life sentence. And Sofie Metropolis, budding PI, is his only hope.