The Automaton’s Aria: A Curious Antiquities Mystery, #4

A killer symphony. A snowbound opera house. A romance they can no longer hide.

Horologist Clara Pendelton and Syndicate risk assessor Jonas Vance are finally crossing the line. But while their passionate midnight rendezvous offer a temporary escape from the lethal nature of their jobs, Clara is terrified of the vulnerability required to truly surrender to the man who wants all of her.

When they are assigned to a secluded Viennese opera house to evaluate the Orpheus Engine**—a priceless 18th-century musical automaton—the exhibition is brutally cut short. The eccentric Maestro is found dead inside a hermetically sealed acoustic tuning vault. The only thing in the room with him? The automaton, playing a haunting, endless aria.**

Trapped in the Palais d'Harmonie by a violent blizzard, Clara must decipher how a killer weaponized the mechanical musical gears into an infrasound trap without ever stepping foot inside the room. But as plunging temperatures and sabotaged generators turn the estate into a frozen tomb, the killer sets their sights on the Syndicate operatives.

To survive a crushing mechanical trap beneath the orchestra pit, Clara must drop her carefully constructed defenses and trust Jonas completely. In a world of lethal clockwork and calculated risks, their greatest danger might just be falling in love.