Böcker i Sebastian St. Cyr Mystery-serien

Fifth in the critically acclaimed mystery series. London 1812. When the controversial reform-minded Bishop of London is found bludgeoned to death in an ancient crypt beside the corpse of an unidentified man murdered decades before, Sebastian St. Cyr, Viscount Devlin, reluctantly agrees to investigate. As his search for the killer leads him from the back alleys of Smithfield to the power corridors of Whitehall, Sebastian must confront the well-guarded secrets of his own family's past-and a devastating truth that could ultimately force him to question who-and what-he really is.Watch a Video

On a sunny day in July 1815, thirty-eight-year-old Laura, Lady McInnis, takes her sixteen-year-old daughter, Emma, and her young niece and nephew, fifteen-year-old Arabella and thirteen-year-old Percy, on an outing to Richmond Park. But when Arabella and Percy go off to pick flowers, tragedy strikes. Shots echo across the park. Two young gentlemen investigate and find Lady McKinsey and her daughter dead.

Sebastian St. Cyr, Viscount Devlin, has spent years unraveling his family’s tragic history. But the secrets of his past will come to light in this gripping new historical mystery from the USA Today bestselling author of What the Devil Knows. March, 1815. The Bourbon King Louis XVIII has been restored to the throne of France, Napoleon is in exile on the isle of Elba, and Sebastian St. Cyr, Viscount Devlin, and his wife, Hero, have traveled to Paris in hopes of tracing his long-lost mother, Sophie, the errant Countess of Hendon. But his search ends in tragedy when he comes upon the dying Countess in the wasteland at the tip of the Île de la Cité. Stabbed—apparently with a stiletto—and thrown from the bastions of the island’s ancient stone bridge, Sophie dies without naming her murderer. Sophie had been living in Paris under an assumed name as the mistress of Maréchal Alexandre McClellan, the scion of a noble Scottish Jacobite family that took refuge in France after the Forty-Five Rebellion. Once one of Napoleon’s most trusted and successful generals, McClellan has now sworn allegiance to the Bourbons and is serving in the delegation negotiating on behalf of France at the Congress of Vienna. It doesn’t take Sebastian long to realize that the French authorities have no interest in involving themselves in the murder of a notorious Englishwoman at such a delicate time. And so, grieving and shattered by his mother’s death, Sebastian takes it upon himself to hunt down her killer. But what he learns will not only shock him but could upend a hard-won world peace.

In this mystery in the Sebastian St. Cyr series, the aristocratic investigator is drawn into a sordid world of greed, desperation, and the occult when the husband of his former lover is accused of murder. Regency England, September 1812: After a long night spent dealing with the tragic death of a former military comrade, a heart-sick Sebastian learns of a new calamity: Russell Yates, the dashing, one-time privateer who married Kat Boleyn a year ago, has been found standing over the corpse of Benjamin Eisler, a wealthy gem dealer. Yates insists he is innocent, but he will surely hang unless Sebastian can unmask the real killer.For the sake of Kat, the woman he once loved and lost, Sebastian plunges into a treacherous circle of intrigue. Although Eisler's clients included the Prince Regent and the Emperor Napoleon, he was a despicable man with many enemies and a number of dangerous, well-kept secrets-including a passion for arcane texts and black magic. Central to the case is a magnificent blue diamond, believed to have once formed part of the French crown jewels, which disappeared on the night of Eisler's death. As Sebastian traces the diamond's ownership, he uncovers links that implicate an eccentric, powerful financier named Hope and stretch back into the darkest days of the French Revolution.When the killer grows ever more desperate and vicious, Sebastian finds his new marriage to Hero tested by the shadows of his first love, especially when he begins to suspect that Kat is keeping secrets of her own. And as matters rise to a crisis, Sebastian must face a bitter truth-that he has been less than open with the fearless woman who is now his wife.

Regency England, January 1813: The mutilated body of a young French doctor found in an alley beside a mysterious, badly injured woman entangles Sebastian in the deadly riddle of the "Lost Dauphin,” the boy prince who disappeared during the darkest days of the French Revolution. Thrust into dangerous conflict with the Dauphin's sister—the imperious, ruthless daughter of Marie Antoinette—Sebastian finds his self-control shattered when he recognizes the injured woman as Alexi Sauvage, a figure from his own past associated with an act of wartime brutality and betrayal that nearly destroyed him. With the murderer striking ever closer, Sebastian fears for the lives of his pregnant wife, Hero, and their soon-to-be-born child. And when he realizes the key to their survival may lie in the hands of an old enemy, he must finally face the truth about his own guilt in an incident he has found too terrible to consider....