Salvage Rights Deed: A Cozy Mystery

Old Town's Maritime Museum smells like lemon polish and curated history—spotlights, donor smiles, and a brand-new exhibit: "e;Bellwind Wreck—Artifacts & Aftermath."e; Maren Cole is only there because her girlfriend, Simone, is catering. She's determined to be normal, eat a canapé, and go home.Then visiting provenance specialist Dr. Lila Pomeroy pulls Maren aside with a problem that isn't "e;museum drama."e; It's legal. Buried in the provenance packet is a copy of a document that shouldn't exist in a donor-facing folder: SALVAGE RIGHTS—ADDENDUM, referencing rights granted after the wreck through trustee language that smells like money trying to live forever.Before Lila can get clean access to the museum's intake files, she's crushed in the restricted collections area—while staff insist it was an accident. But Maren sees what her boatyard instincts can't ignore: the rolling-stack hardware wasn't simply old. It was handled.Detective Jonah Pike arrives, calls it what it is, and follows the only thing more dangerous than gossip: paper. Hidden inside an exhibit plinth, Jonah's team finds a taped envelope—containing the deed addendum Lila died for.Now Maren has to do what Salvage Bay hates most: keep a record that can't be "e;curated"e; away. Because if this deed addendum exists, it means the wreck didn't just leave artifacts behind.It left beneficiaries.