Hey, y’all, my name’s Hadley Cooper. First, I’d like to thank Dru Ann for allowing me to introduce myself to her friends. I’m a private investigator. I don’t know if any of y’all will ever have need of a detective’s services in the Charleston, South Carolina area, but if you do, I’m your girl. You might be thinking, well why on earth would I ever need a detective? You might be surprised. Sometimes life throws you curveballs. Keep my card, just in case.

I work with a wide variety of unfortunate situations. Everything from pre-trial investigations for the defense to missing persons to marital misconduct to workers’ comp. Recently, I had a situation where two seemingly unrelated cases converged.

Case A was a workers’ comp case. One of my clients owns a company that provides domestic help to folks who need that sort of thing. Let’s call my client Patrice, because that’s so not her name. Patrice’s company is five-star. The maids even wear those black crisp dress uniforms with the little white aprons and hats. I’d never say this to Patrice, but I’m really glad I don’t have to wear that outfit to clean in. The company pays their employees well, and they get all kind of benefits—401k, health insurance, dental, et cetera. Not your typical domestic services company, is what I’m saying.

Well, one of their maids—let’s call her Brandilicious (you’ll understand why in a minute)—started having migraines. She said smells were a big trigger, and the doctor thought the fumes from the cleaners were causing the headaches. Brandilicious filed a workers’ comp claim. Weeks went by, and through a series of events, Patrice became suspicious of this whole situation. She called me, and I started surveillance immediately.

The next two afternoons, I followed Brandilicious to Big Work Fitness Factory over on Conroy Street. Anyone watching this chick work out for two hours straight would’ve thought she was maybe training for an Ironman competition or some such thing. She wore me slap out.

But the gym wasn’t the headline, oh no. Friday afternoon, Brandilicious worked out, and then she went home and took a nice long nap with her sleeping mask on. Don’t ask me how I know that. I can’t reveal my methods. But suffice to say, Brandilicious was well rested when she left at nine in a soft, comfy looking track suit.

Imagine my shock when I tailed her to the Scarlett’s Chambers and watched as she went in the employee entrance. Scarlett’s Chambers! My mother raised me to be a lady. I’ve never been inside that sort of place in my life, and I would happily have kept things that way, but duty called, and I went in through the front door. Here is all you need to know about the inside of that place: there were shiny poles, women in G-strings, mirrors, flashing neon lights, and thumping music. I felt a migraine coming on myself. Reluctantly, I sat at a table near the stage and waited to see if my subject was a dancer, a waitress, or a bartender.

I didn’t have to linger long.

By the time I’d ordered the first of my minimum two drinks—which I would not touch—the MC introduced The Lucious Brandilicious. Now who came up with that name? It’s not the one her mother gave her, I’m certain of that. But when they called it out, Patrice’s headache-suffering employee came strutting out in a long fur coat and stilettos to the tune of “Tell Me Something Good,” by Chaka Khan. It didn’t take her long to ditch that coat. And the outfit she had on underneath left nothing to the imagination. She never did bother taking that little onesie off.

Let me tell you, I was hard pressed to watch her act. I mean, I’m no prude, but… Anyway, I had to watch. I’d likely have to testify in court, because Scarlett’s Quarters doesn’t allow cameras, or people taking pictures with their phones. I’ll say this much…she’s quite the athlete, Brandilicious. Now it made sense, her spending her afternoons in the gym keeping fit because no doubt one has to maintain a certain muscle tone to do the things she was doing on that pole.

She was attracting quite the circle of admirers too. I did a double take at the sixty-ish man tossing twenties at her. And that’s where Case B came in. The man at the foot of Brandilicious’s stage was Randolph Calvin. His wife had hired me to figure out how he was spending his free time, but up until now, the wily fox had managed to give me the slip.

Scanning the room for bouncers and watchful waitresses, I surreptitiously snapped a string of photos of Randolph Calvin and The Lucious Brandilicious with my phone. Yes, I broke the rules at a strip club. My only regret was not having a hidden camera with me.

I traveled light years outside my comfort zone that day. But I wrapped up two cases.

Big Trouble on Sullivan’s Island, A Carolina Tale Book #1
Genre: Women’s Detective Fiction
Release: April 2023
Format: Print, Digital, Audio
Purchase Link

From the author of the best-selling Liz Talbot Mystery Series comes a novel about family and secrets, and the lengths we’ll go to in order to protect both.

Can this charming do-gooder carry the day?

Charleston, SC. Hadley Cooper has a big heart. So when the easygoing private investigator gets a request from a new friend to stake out her husband’s extramarital activities, she immediately begins surveillance. And when her client is discovered dead on her kitchen floor, the Southern spitfire is certain the cheater is the culprit … even though he has the perfect alibi: Hadley herself.

Flustered since she observed the cad four hours away in Greenville at the time of the murder, the determined PI desperately searches for clues to tie him to the crime. But when her ex-boyfriend, who happens to be the lead detective on the case, arrests a handy suspect, Hadley fears a guilty man is about to walk free.

Can this Palmetto State sleuth make an impossible connection to prevent a miscarriage of justice?

With dry wit and delightful dialogue, Susan M. Boyer delivers an eccentric, vegan gumshoe sure to appeal to any fan of Southern women’s fiction. With her merry band of sassy friends, Hadley Cooper is a Lowcountry detective you won’t soon forget.

Big Trouble on Sullivan’s Island is the engaging first book in the Carolina Tales series. If you like strong heroines, quirky sisterhoods, and plenty of Southern charm, then you’ll love Susan M. Boyer’s wonderful whodunit.

Read Big Trouble on Sullivan’s Island and take a trip to the lush Lowcountry today!

About the author
Susan M. Boyer is the USA Today best-selling author of twelve novels. Her debut novel, Lowcountry Boil, won the 2012 Agatha Award for Best First Novel, the Daphne du Maurier Award for Excellence in Mystery/Suspense, and garnered several other award nominations. Subsequent books have been nominated for various honors, including Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance Okra Picks, the 2016 Pat Conroy Beach Music Mystery Prize, and the 2017 Southern Book Prize in Mystery & Detective Fiction. Susan and her husband call Greenville, SC, home and spend as much time as possible on the Carolina coast.

All comments are welcomed.

Giveaway: Susan has generously offered to give away one of the books in the “Liz Talbot” series, either Kindle/Nook (open to everyone) or paperback (U.S. residents only), winner’s choice. To enter, please leave a comment below. One entry per person. The giveaway ends April 15, 2023. Good luck everyone!