Book Review: Wake to Darkness by Maggie Shayne

Wake to Darkness
Author: Maggie Shayne
Series: A Brown and DeLuca Novel
Publication: Harlequin MIRA (November 26, 2013)

Description: Stranded with a murderer…

Rachel de Luca's uncanny sense of perception is the key to her success as a self-help celebrity. Even before she regained her sight, she had a gift for seeing people's most carefully hidden secrets. But the secret she shares with Detective Mason Brown is one she has promised to keep. As for Mason, he sees Rachel more clearly than she'd like to admit.

After a single night of adrenaline-fueled passion, they have agreed to keep their distance—until a string of murders brings them together again. Mason thinks that he can protect everyone he loves, including Rachel, by taking them to a winter hideaway, but danger follows them up the mountain.

As guests disappear from the snowbound resort, the race to find the murderer intensifies. Rachel knows she's a target. Will acknowledging her feelings for Mason destroy her—or save them both and stop a killer?

My Thoughts: WAKE TO DARKNESS was an excellent romantic suspense title. Rachel is getting used to being able to see after twenty years of blindness. Mason is getting used to the idea that his brother Eric was a serial killer who committed suicide - a fact that Mason covered up to protect his widow and two young sons. Rachel is no longer seeing visions through the serial killer's corneas of murders being committed. Life should be good.

Unfortunately someone is killing other people who received donations of Eric's other organs. After Rachel is attacked, Mason decides to get her, her niece and her dog out of town. Once Mason's sister-in-law is attacked, Mason decides to send her and her boys along with Rachel to an isolated resort. But the killer has followed them.

This house takes place in the days leading up to Christmas. Since they are at a ski resort in an isolated area things get a lot more complicated when a blizzard moves in stranding all of them at a resort with a murderer also in residence.

The story was filled with tension the built up as the story progressed. It was also filled with romantic tension as Mason and Rachel feel each other out about their relationship. I liked the realistic characters in this one. I could easily understand how Jeremy and Josh were stressed about the loss of their father even though they didn't know that he was a serial killer.

I was completely surprised by the identity of the villain but, after learning who it was, could look back and see hints. Fans of romantic suspense will enjoy this tension-filled story.

Favorite Quote:

If you asked me, "trust" and "seventeen" should never be uttered in the same sentence if there was a boyfriend involved. Teenaged girls loved harder than any other species. Teenage love was apocalyptic. Wild horses couldn't stop it.

I received this book from Amazon Vine. You can buy your copy here.