Vengeful villainess Barbra Stone
Barbra Stone (Bettina Paris) is the hidden main villainess from the 2023 Hallmark film, The Dancing Detective: A Deadly Tango, the first film of the Dancing Detective series (airdate June 2, 2023).
Barbra Stone was introduced as working at Aston International, though her backstory revealed that her real name was Barbra Travertine, and she was the daughter of the company's CFO, James Travertine. Sadly, one week prior to his retirement, James died of a heart attack, with a belief that he was overworked to death by Mark Aston, who became the new CFO. As for Barbra, she blamed Aston for her father's death, and because of the timing of his death, Barbra would not receive her father's retirement benefits.
Barbra swore revenge on Aston, with her plan including getting hired by the company, doing so under the name Barbra Stone. She enacted her revenge by poisoning Aston inside his room, with Aston's murder becoming the central case for detective Constance Bailey, who headed to Malta and ended up paired up with dance instructor Sebastian Moore, mainly due to the fact that the company was organizing a dance contest. Barbra displayed a warm demeanor in her introduction, which saw the pair suspect a number of the contest's participants, as well as Aston's wife, Mary Aston.
The pair received a photo of James with his daughter, while learning that Judy Maxwell, introduced as a maid, was actually a corporate spy. Though Judy was suspected, the film's climax saw Bailey and Sebastian recognize Barbra as James' daughter in the photo, figuring that Aston was murdered out of revenge. Barbra escaped once she was outed as Aston's killer, and after being cornered by Bailey, the evil Barbra admitted to killing Aston, accusing him of working her father to death before attacking Bailey, who overpowered and arrested the villainess.