A Stitch In Crime

When a quilting competition becomes a crime scene, Emma must decode deadly secrets stitched into a prize-winning quilt. Emma Hargrove is finally feeling settled in her small-town life, running Patches & Stitches quilt shop and hosting Maple Creek's first annual Tri-County Quilting Bee Competition. With quilters from three counties gathering to showcase their finest work, Emma expects a weekend celebrating traditional crafts and community spirit. But when competition judge Jennifer Kellam is found murdered among the display quilts—strangled with quilting thread—Emma realizes someone will kill to keep their secrets hidden. The prize quilt that was meant to honor quilting heritage actually contains a sophisticated code documenting years of systematic embezzlement from charitable quilting organizations. As Emma and her quilting circle friends work to decode the financial evidence hidden in the quilt's intricate stitching patterns, they uncover a money laundering conspiracy that reaches far beyond Maple Creek. With Detective Mick Bryant coordinating with federal agents and quilters becoming targets, Emma must use all her textile expertise to expose the criminals before they destroy the evidence—and anyone who threatens to reveal their crimes. But when the investigation expands to include banking fraud and federal conspiracy charges, Emma discovers that the quilting competition was never about celebrating traditional crafts. It was a trap designed to expose financial corruption—and now she's caught in the middle of a dangerous game where the stakes are measured in millions of stolen dollars and the price of truth could be her life. Because in Maple Creek, the most dangerous patterns aren't found in quilts . . . they're woven into murder. Book 5 in The Quilting Club Mysteries.