Board to Death — C.J. Connor

In a trendy Salt Lake City, Utah, neighborhood, Ben Rosencrantz's board game shop has become a community hotspot for players of all ages -- and for killer collectors.

Back in his hometown of Sugar House, running his family's board game shop and café, Ben Rosencrantz just can't seem to get his life to pass go, much less collect $200. Once he was a happily married English professor in Seattle. Now he's a divorced caregiver, looking after his ill father and a Chihuahua named Beans while still figuring out the rules of retail management. At least the town has become more LGBTQ+ friendly than when Ben was a teenager -- and that flower shop owner, Ezra McCaslin, enjoys flirting with him.
 
But despite his usual clientele of gamers, Ben is barely earning enough to keep the store running and stay on top of his father's medical bills. Then a local toy and game collector named Clive offers him a winning strategy -- to purchase a turn-of-the-twentieth-century edition of The Landlord's Game, the realty and taxation game that inspired Monopoly, at a tenth of the rare edition's true value. Suspicious of Clive's shady, low-priced deal, Ben turns the offer down.
 
Then Clive turns up dead at the front door of Ben's shop and a backpack full of $100 bills appears on his doorstep. Now Ben is the #1 suspect in Clive's death, and unless he and Ezra can prove his innocence and find the real killer, he'll go to jail for murder -- and no amount of double dice rolls will set him free . . .