Description:

Honor Donovan is a shrewd businesswoman, yet she has been shut out of Donovan International by her father and four brothers. When her favorite brother Kyle vanishes, along with a fortune in stolen amber, Honor's questions are ignored by the Donovan males. Defying them, she heads to the San Juan Islands of the Pacific Northwest in search of answers. Honor needs a guide because she knows nothing about running a boat -- and she knows nothing about Jake Mallory until he answers her ad. One of the things she doesn't know is that Jake is much more than a fishing guide. Until Kyle disappeared, Jake was brokering amber deals in the Baltic for Donovan International. Honor is completely unaware of the old wars, new politics, greed, and stolen amber that have lured ruthless, high-stakes players from around the globe. Jake wants no part of the intrigue, or of a Donovan woman in his life, but he suspects the Donovans have set him up to take the fall for Kyle's treachery. The way Jake sees it, some Donovan is going to pay for his troubles, and it just may turn out to be Honor Jake and Honor cast off on a journeys moldering with distrust, betrayal, vengeance... and temptation. A hunger grows between them that is as dangerous as the secrets they keep. Alone at sea, they pursue the stubborn mystery of the Amber Room, flee from relentless enemies, and fight against trusting each other. Yet when Honor and Jake dare to confide in one another, they face a final truth: the penalty for betrayal is death; the reward is a lifetime...together. ### Amazon.com Review When her brother Kyle vanishes, along with a fortune in stolen amber, Honor Donovan settles into his cottage in the San Juan Islands of the Pacific Northwest and hires fishing guide Jake Mallory to help her search the surrounding islands for him. What Jake doesn't want Honor to know is that, until recently, he brokered amber deals for Donovan International, run by Honor's brothers, and is now suspected by them of having stolen the missing amber, along with a priceless Russian antiquity called the Amber Room. As Honor and Jake search the high seas for Kyle, dodging wily international operatives and mysterious intruders, their smoldering distrust eventually gives way to explosive passion. But there's no guarantee that they'll survive, or that they'll forgive their mutual deceptions and create a future together. Fascinating details about amber, and less fascinating descriptions of boating, lend authenticity to this contemporary romance marked by its edgy repartee, highly charged love scenes, and gorgeous geography. *--Ellen Edwards* ### From Kirkus Reviews A well-made, completely predictable and unchallenging second hardcover from Lowell (Winter Fire, 1996)--a romance that offers all the sexual tension, adventure, and squishy clich‚s that fans of the genre could possibly want. Tough Jake Mallory (Jake being this year's romance-novel nom de choice for soldiers of fortune and macho men) passes himself off as a fishing guide in order to keep tabs on Honor Donovan, a jewelry designer who's searching for her lost brother Kyle in the San Juan Islands. (Honor needs a boat to find Kyle, and she doesn't know how to pilot a boat; in fact, she hates boats, and she hates fishing.) Kyle, it seems, has disappeared from Russia with a million dollars' worth of Baltic amber and, perhaps, a priceless panel from the famous Amber Room, which had been disassembled and taken from a czar's palace by the Nazis. Jake (`Been there . . . done that . . . got the T shirt'') is a former government agent who now manages his own international investment company. Like most heroes of his ilk, he comes complete with scars, black stubble, and the requisite`clean fingernails'' (which is typical for the genre: only villains have problems with personal hygiene). Jake believes that Kyle and the Donovans, a colorful family, have framed him for the crime; Kyle's family believes that Jake has set Kyle up; and the CIA is trailing Jake and Honor to get its hands on the Amber Room, as are the Russian mafiya, a Lithuanian freedom fighter, ex-employees of the former KGB, and the Coast Guard. While he strives to clear his name, Jake teaches Honor how to drive a speedboat, catch salmon, and have good sex, which heretofore she'd always found pretty ``boring.'' Some parts of his job are, obviously, more fun than others. Much livelier than Winter Fire, and perhaps the beginning of a series. -- *Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.*