My name is Maggie MacGregor. I’m fifty-eight, divorced, recently retired, and until eight months ago, my business card read:
Maggie MacGregor, PI.
For twenty-five years, my days were filled with surveillance, interviews, cheating spouses, missing persons, and the occasional murder I definitely had not intended to stumble across.
Then I sold my agency.
Everyone told me retirement would be wonderful. Relax. Sleep late. Take up a hobby.
I tried knitting.
Four months and one unfortunate scarf later, I realized I was terrible at retirement.
I’d spent twenty-five years being the person people called when something went wrong. I noticed things. Found patterns. Asked questions. Suddenly, nobody needed me to notice anything.
So one evening, sitting alone in my Seattle home, I pulled out an old leather notebook containing a bucket list I’d started years ago.
Stand beneath Big Ben.
Explore Borough Market.
Ride the Jacobite steam train through the Scottish Highlands.
Visit a real castle.
All those things I’d promised myself I would do someday.
Apparently, someday had arrived.
I bought a ticket to the United Kingdom.
Now, I am not spontaneous. I had maps, hotel confirmations, train schedules, walking routes, and even a laminated map of the London Underground.
I was prepared.
Or so I thought.
At the airport, I opened my notebook and added one final item:
Be open to surprises.
I nearly crossed it out.
Good thing I didn’t.
On my flight to London, seated in 4C, was a distinguished silver-haired British gentleman named Ian Blackwell.
Ian was charming, observant, and remarkably vague about his occupation.
“Public service,” he told me.
“The British sort.”
As a former PI, I should have recognized trouble.
Instead, I shared his sticky toffee pudding.
Retirement had clearly affected my judgment.
Once in London, my carefully planned holiday began slipping delightfully off schedule. I got lost, discovered Little Venice, wandered through Covent Garden, drank afternoon tea, and realized something startling.
I had stopped checking my watch.
For once, I wasn’t investigating someone else’s life.
I was living mine.
Then a chance encounter with a historian landed me in a mystery involving coded recipes, old journals, buried secrets—and murder.
So much for retirement.
Even more inconveniently, Ian Blackwell had secrets of his own. Secrets involving MI6.
I’d come to Britain to check places off a bucket list. Instead, I found a mystery, rediscovered the investigator I thought I’d left behind, and began wondering whether a woman of fifty-eight might still have a few surprises ahead.
Including, perhaps, romance.
And my journey isn’t over.
When the time comes to return home, I stand in my London hotel holding my return ticket.
And tear it in half.
“Where to next?” Ian asks.
“Scotland.”
That decision carries me into my next adventure, MacGregor and the Highland Cipher (now available for purchase), where another mystery—and another piece of my bucket list—awaits.
I’ve even started a new notebook.
The Second Chance Bucket List.
Number one?
Begin again.
I think I’m finally getting rather good at it.
MACGREGOR AND THE SECRETS OF MI6
Series: A Maggie MacGregor Mystery, Book 1
Genre: Traditional Mystery
Release: September 2026
Format: Print, Digital
Purchase Link
She came to Britain to check off a bucket list. She never expected to become part of someone else’s last wish.
After years of putting everyone else first, retired American private investigator Maggie MacGregor is finally taking the trip she’s dreamed about for decades: exploring Britain’s castles, villages, and historic treasures.
The distinguished silver-haired gentleman seated in 4C wasn’t part of Maggie’s carefully planned itinerary.
Ian Blackwell is charming, quietly witty, and seems to know Britain better than any guidebook. Maggie assumes he’s simply another traveler. She has no idea he’s spent a lifetime keeping secrets for MI6.
Then celebrated historian Oliver Ashcombe is murdered, leaving behind a cryptic message meant only for Maggie.
Suddenly, her dream vacation becomes a dangerous investigation. As Maggie and Ian follow a trail of coded recipes, forgotten journals, and long-buried secrets, they discover Oliver wasn’t protecting treasure.
He was protecting history itself.
Now someone will do anything to keep the truth buried.
With danger closing in and an unexpected romance quietly unfolding, Maggie must trust the instincts she thought she’d left behind. But solving Oliver’s final mystery may mean risking her heart as well.
Because it’s never too late to begin again.
About the author
Award-winning and multiple Amazon bestselling author Greta Sinclair earned a 2026 Global Book Awards Gold Medalin the Cozy Mystery category for Murder by Meringue, following a 2025 Silver Medal for A Very Sticky Murder.
Her Darcy & Mozart Cozy Culinary Mystery series captures the heart of feel-good cozy fiction with gentle suspense, mouthwatering cuisine, light romance, humor, and unforgettable destinations. Her Hattie & Moose Cozy Mystery series brings that same warmth and wit to Nashville, blending clever mysteries with Southern charm and a lovable cast of characters. Greta creates comforting, escapist mysteries that whisk readers away while keeping them guessing.
Learn more: www.gretasinclair.com.