Innocent as Sin
by Elizabeth Lowell
Published by William Morro
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Reviewed by Kathy Perschmann
Lowell is back with another great thrilling romance, with the St. Kilda Consulting team assisting.
Rand McCree is a painter, living in the Pacific Northwest; Kayla Shaw is a private banker, an outdoorsy type living in Phoenix. Shaw had been given the huge new account of Andre Bertone’s, a ruthless, obscenely wealthy and mysterious man with a beautiful and socially ambitious wife, Elena.
Bertone has Kayla Shaw in a tough position. He asks her to deposit a check for $20 million, no questions asked. When she tries to explain banking laws to him, he counters with the information that he is the buyer of her family ranch—for over the market value, and it will look like a bribe—so she’s guilty already.
Dismayed, she turns to her boss, Steve Foley, for help, and he tells her he’ll take care of it. When she next looks at the account, it has more money, and she panics. She attends a museum fundraiser at the Bertone estate, a timed landscape painting contest, which McCree attends. McCree saves her when she is stalked by a killer at the party, and Kayla decides she has to trust him, and they flee together. McCree explains he is working for St. Kilda Consulting, and that they are after Bertone and his money, earned through arms sales. He also has a very personal reason for wanting Bertone dead: he murdered Rand’s twin brother.
Over the course of the next few days Kayla and Rand find their lives turned upside down. For the first time in years Rand has allowed himself to care about someone. Kayla has to learn to trust these fascinating strangers from St. Kilda, and her powerful feelings for Rand.
Bertone wants Kayla, preferably dead, and St. Kilda wants Bertone’s money returned to the African nations it decimated by fomenting war. Who will win?
Author’s Web site: http://www.ElizabethLowell.com