Jo Davis, Hidden Fire

Hidden Fire

Jo Davis

Signet, Dec 2009, $6.99

ISBN: 9780451228659

Station Five firefighter Julian Salvatore knows he is in love with beautiful attorney Grace McKenna, but she ignores his efforts to start dating even as he knows he is being a pest. He just refuses to accept negatives from her.

However, Julian becomes concerned for Grace's safety when he learns she represents the person who molested him as a child. He voices his fears to her but she blows away his trepidations. However, she reconsiders his warning when he is injured in a hit and run that seemed deliberate at a time someone is abducting and killing people. As he heals, they team up to investigate who the culprit is as they each believe the driver is the deadly kidnapper.

The latest Firefighters of Station Five (see Under Fire) is a fast-paced romantic suspense thriller starring a hero with issues forged by his childhood molestation that comes back to haunt him as the client of his beloved and the lawyer he loves who has her own issues with doubt re commitment. Julian's issues with his cronies especially his Captain make him seem genuine as does Grace's indecisiveness even as she overdoes the changing of her mind to the point of irritatingly sending the reader yelling at her to stay the course. Although the villain is a caricature over the top of the station house, fans will enjoy the latest escapades of the Station Five firefighters.

Harriet Klausner