A lot of hard work is involved in becoming an arson investigator for the Baltimore Police Department, but Catarina "Reena" Hale believes it's worth it. There is nothing she enjoys more than the unique challenges involved in discovering the reasons someone would commit arson. The only thing that Reena doesn't like is that it is extremely tough to find a man willing to accept her crazy schedule and -danger-filled job. Now, just when it seems that she has met a man--her new next-door neighbor, carpenter Bowen Goodnight--willing to accept her for who she is and what she does, Reena begins receiving anonymous calls from someone threatening to use fire to destroy everyone Reena holds dear. Roberts effectively opens the mind of her twisted villain to readers to create suspense, but she balances these violent scenes with equally powerful scenes of love and family as Reena gets the support she needs to defeat a sociopath, whose capacity for evil knows no bounds. Blue Smoke is another of Roberts' riveting combinations of danger and romance. John Charles 

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