FLAT WHITE FATALITY

An Oregon coffee maven’s life is going well until it isn’t.

Sage Caplin and Harley Yamazaki, the owners of Ground Rules, have rented space to store supplies for their coffee carts while their new store is being built in a java-friendly area of Portland. The rented space houses a number of quirky neighbors, including the video game developer Grumpy Sasquatch Studio, whose co-owner Lukas Evans “Bax” Baxter is Sage’s boyfriend, who's hired her to do some part-time motion-capture work for a new game. Sage is friendly with the mixed bunch of Sasquatches, though she finds some of them difficult to deal with, especially Australian Robbie Kayle, whose pranks are consistently mean-spirited. At a Sasquatch team-building event, the participants are dressed as ducks—or, in Robbie's case, a goose—and then divided into teams that will search for clues in a scavenger hunt. Toward the end of the game, Sage’s team notices the door to her roastery standing ajar, and they find Harley standing over Robbie’s body. Det. William E. Will’s previous experience with Sage makes him less than thrilled to see her or her brother, an attorney who’s advising them. When Robbie’s sister arrives on the scene, all sorts of odd facts emerge, including the news that Robbie wasn’t really Australian. The biggest thorn in Sage’s side is her former boss Mark Jeffries, a rival coffee shop owner, who wants to buy Ground Rules from her and Harley while posting nasty comments about them on social media. Despite her problems, however, there’s no way Sage will ignore a murder that puts Bax, her friends, and herself in such danger.

Tips on coffee and a touch of romance combine in a mystery with a strong West Coast vibe.