Clover Covered Corpse: A Texas Flower Farmer Cozy Mystery by Jackie Layton | Character Guest Post

I’m Emma Fair Justice, and I live in Lutz, Texas. I’m a widow, and my daughter graduated from high school early, and she earned a college scholarship. I’m now an empty nester, but I adopted a stray puppy, so the house isn’t completely empty and depressing.

Some might call me a dreamer, and they’re probably right. I’ve been a pharmacy technician, but I always dreamed of being a flower farmer. Working in my gardens brings me much joy. I slowly began to transform my very large backyard into gardens. I studied and planned for a few years. When my daughter headed off to college, I left my stable job and began my flower farm.

I’m interested in protecting the environment, and I compost. I’m mostly a vegetarian, but I love barbecue. I refuse to give it up, and we have a lot of great barbecue restaurants in Texas. I live on the edge of downtown, and I’m able to walk or ride my bike lots of places. For my business, I bought a used truck, and I call it Ms. Daisy. I mostly drive Miss Daisy to buy supplies for my farm or to deliver flowers.

I can’t imagine living anywhere else than Lutz. I became a widow at a young age, and the people in Lutz have always been kind and helpful to me and my daughter, Abby. My best friend, Sophie Becker, owns the local bakery on the town square. She’s also single, and we’ve been good friends for years. We’ve bonded over being female business owners. I’m closer to Sophie than I am my biological sister.

When I worked at the pharmacy, I saw people all day long. My daughter was involved in sports all her life, so I spent time with other parents at games and practices. Working as a flower farmer has been a solitary endeavor so far. Our local florist closed her shop while recovering from surgery, and I made deliveries to local businesses. I enjoyed visiting with people who placed orders. My biggest social activity is working at the local farmers market on Saturdays.

A month ago, while making deliveries, I found a friend. Dead. It shook me to my core, but I’m a problem solver. I wanted justice for my friend, and I wasn’t sure if our local police department was equipped to solve a murder case. As far as I knew, we’d never had a murder. So, I helped the local police by using some of the same skills I used to start my new business. I had to determine what flowers to plant and when to plant them. In the murder investigation, I needed to determine what the motives might have been and who were credible suspects.

More recently, another citizen of Lutz was murdered. I’ll use these same skills to help solve this new murder. People trust me and share information with me that they don’t always want to tell the police.

There’s a new man in town, Jake Hunter. He’s retired military and has applied to work at the police department. He was in the military, and he trained at the police academy. Until he can get hired, he’s working at the local coffee shop and helps with construction. At first, I thought he was a big flirt, but over time, I’ve grown to respect Jake. He pitched in to help me solve the first murder, and if I know Jake, he’ll want to help me solve the second murder in Lutz.

If you’re curious, you can follow along with my sleuthing adventures in Weeding Out Lies and Clover Covered Corpse.