In a county built on beauty and privilege, one runaway girl exposes the rot beneath the redwoods—and two women learn how dangerous the truth can be.

A runaway girl, a yellow hearse, and a buried secret... Welcome to the dark side of Marin County.

Marin County is famous for its affluent pleasures and the beauty of its beaches, mountains, and redwood forests. But in Time and Trouble, something far more sinister stirs beneath the surface.

A teenaged runaway, a yellow hearse, an insurance scam, a heart-shaped talisman, a baby’s skeleton in a meadow, and something ugly and odd going on in a Sausalito houseboat—all converge to provide the first—and nearly last—case for Billie August, the newest hire of seasoned P.I. Emma Howe.

Billie, a single parent with no practical job skills, desperately needs the job. Emma, whose gruff personality has driven away more assistants than she can count, hires the inexperienced young woman out of her own desperation. The two are an unlikely and antagonistic pair—but both are about to learn that appearances, in and out of crime and investigation, can be dangerously deceiving.