The Bad Wife By Jacqueline Seewald

by Sandra Murphy

The good news is Kim Reynolds is in love with police officer, Mike Garnder. He loves her too as do his two daughters. His ex-wife moved out of town and except for an occasional phone call, is out of the picture.

The bad news is, she comes back to see her girls, or so she says. Her acting career isn’t going anywhere for the moment so she thinks a bit of surgery will enhance things enough to get her jobs again. For that kind of surgery, you need money and she doesn’t have any. What she does have though, are her copies of the divorce papers—unsigned after all this time. It seems Mike signed his copies and never checked to see if she followed through.

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Kim refuses to see Mike while Evelyn is staying at the house, supposedly to be with their daughters. One girl is glad she’s back and maybe even hoping they’ll get back together. The other knows that won’t happen and SAYS that their mom will just up and leave again.

Mike is a teller of bad jokes. When he meets Kim at the grocery store, he tries one or two but they fall flat. It just hurts too much for Kim to see Mike and not be able to be with him. Frustrated, Mike says maybe he should just go home and shoot his wife so she’ll be out of the way once and for all. The poor stock boy who overhears him say it is bound to remember so when Evelyn is found dead, it’s a sure bet Mike will be a prime suspect.

He didn’t want Evelyn there, was betrayed by her continued refusal to sign the divorce papers, doesn’t like her influence on the girls and only wants to marry Kim. Any one of the reasons makes him a good bet for the killer.

Image source: Perfect Crime Books

Kim knows him though and is sure he’s innocent. In every scene it's apparent that Kim loves Mike and his kids, but is torn up because the divorce was never finalized.

Evelyn didn’t have any friends—she used people too often for that to happen. Mike isn’t allowed near the investigation since it’s his family so Kim tries to find out more about Evelyn herself. It’s hard to say if the murder happened because of old wrongs or current problems as Evelyn wasn’t above blackmailing those nearest and dearest to her or at least nearest and dearest to her bank account.

There are other suspects. Evelyn slept with husbands other than her own, a man followed her to town from Hollywood and basically, she was a mooch. If only Kim can narrow the prospects down to one…

The Drowning Pool and Truth Sleuth are two of the previous books in this series.

Sandra Murphy lives in the shadow of the arch, in the land of blues, booze and shoes—St Louis, Missouri. While writing magazine articles to support her mystery book habit, she secretly polishes two mystery books of her own, hoping, someday, they will see the light of Barnes and Noble. You can also find several of Sandra's short stories on UnTreed Reads including Bananas Foster.