Pie a La Murder — Melinda Wells

Della Carmichael is the owner of a cooking school in Santa Monica, California, and the star of her own cable cooking show. She knows exposure is good for ratings; she just never imagined she'd receive this kind of exposure...

Della is in the middle of Operation Pie, a bake sale contest ( to raise money for charity, when her sweetie pie, Nicholas, drops a bombshell: he has an eighteen-year-old daughter named Celeste, whom he hasn't seen since she was a baby, and she's coming to live with him.

But when Celeste -- who has some half-baked acting ambitions -- becomes embroiled with a Hollywood photographer who intends to exploit her, her father flies into a rage. When Nicholas is discovered at the scene of the man's murder, he becomes the prime suspect. It's up to Della to find the real killer, save her man, and find some way to bond with Celeste, before they all get burned.