Penelope Warren calls her bookstore Mycroft & Co., in honor of the cat who presides there. Tough and macho, Big Mike is ready to match wit and claw with the most cunning critter. For when it comes to catching a killer, this lethal weapon is always up to scratch.

It isn't every day it rains cats and dogs in the Arizona desert. And it isn't every day that Penelope Warren and her Abyssinian alley cat, Mycroft - a.k.a. "Big Mike" - lock up their cozy bookstore, and come home to a corpse on their doorstep.

Meddlesome, mean-spirited Louise Fletcher was high on everyone's least-liked list. An expert at backstabbing, she is found with a knife between her shoulder blades and a death grip on a bright new penny. Everyone in Empty Creek has a motive, but the police are stymied. So it's up to Penelope and her felicitous feline partner to sniff out Louise's secrets, paw through her past - and pounce on a deadly Killer who seems to have nine lives.