Lucia Laws

Where Mercy Died Lucia Laws

In February 1874, a neighbor found Mercy Buckley beaten and dead near the woods on her uncles' property in Halifax, Massachusetts. In the house, authorities found the bludgeoned bodies of Simeon and Thomas Sturtevant. A trail of money and clues led to their nephew, Willie Sturtevant, who would ultimately hang for the crime. Valerie Thomas was born and raised in New York City, so when her parents uproot her and her younger brother for the rural charm of Halifax, Massachusetts, she is not thrilled. On her first day of school, Val learns that she and her family have moved into the infamous Sturtevant murder house, and worse, it's haunted! Soon, Val and her brother hear voices and begin to see the specter of a woman . . . a woman who says she wants justice. Compelled by the specter, Val joins up with Sturtevant descendant William Michael Johnson Sturtevant III to investigate the secrets of the house. As they dig, they find that nothing about the murders is as it seems, and an innocent man may have hung. Further, Val finds clues in the house that reveal secrets and mysterious deaths in her own family. Worse, while one force wants the truth to come out, someone else has never wanted the truth to be known . . . and isn't about to let it out now.