Roast mortem

Clare Cosi, Madame, and Blend barista Dante Silva barely escape with their lives when Caffe Lucia in Queens goes up in a bomb-activated blaze, leaving its owner, Madame's old flame Enzo Testa, badly injured. The fire marshal calls it arson. Clare, who has never met a case she could leave alone, starts asking questions of her own.

When the firebug strikes again and a firefighter dies, the investigation stops being a neighborhood curiosity. Law enforcement likes an eco-terrorist theory. Clare does not: she thinks the culprit is much closer to home, and that the fires are cover for something else entirely.

Meanwhile she is caught between her detective boyfriend Mike Quinn and his fire-captain cousin, whose long-running feud makes every firehouse door a little harder to open. Recipes and coffee tips from the Village Blend close out the book.