Beneath Bone Lake [Mass Market Paperback]

Is there anything more chilling, more horror-filled, than a mother's fear when her child disappears?

After a year in Iraq, widow Ruby Monroe comes home to Dogwood, Texas, eager to reunite with her four-year old daughter, Zoe. The excellent salary she has earned overseas as a contract bus driver for DeserTek, a non-military sub-contractor, will allow her to complete her training as an RN and give Zoe a better life. Ruby's sister, Misty, took care of home, hearth and Zoe, allowing Ruby take the job.

Ruby gets to the Dallas airport eager for the "the heaven of Spaghetti-Os and storybooks, and Zoe's endless schemes to drag out tuck-ins." But rather than experiencing the joy of her daughter's sticky hugs and kisses, Ruby's backpack is stolen and Misty and Zoe are no-shows. Things go downhill from there.

Sam McCoy has lived the quiet life the last two years, acting as a fishing guide on Bone Lake with his only true companion a young chocolate lab named Java. His five-year probation for the felony charge of stepping over the line as a computer hacker doesn't call for an invisibility cloak, but Sam is lying low anyway. He figures he got lucky not having to serve time, and he's not taking any chances.

At least not until his neighbors go missing and his foster brother's widow, Ruby Monroe, has no one else to turn to for help.

What follows is a complex mystery, so suspenseful and action-filled, that the reader can do nothing but grab onto the pages and hang on for the ride.

Colleen Thompson's Texas adventures have a reputation for being so descriptive, so powerfully written that the setting itself becomes a living character. From the West Texas desert to the city streets of Houston, Ms. Thompson immerses the reader so completely that one is on the lookout for rattlesnakes or drug dealers. Her latest will not disappoint. The dark bayou, with its stinging insects, its monster gators, and its thick vegetation that can trap like quicksand, will have you gasping for breath and fighting against the feeling of being dragged down, down, down - Beneath Bone Lake.

After a stint in Iraq working for DeserTek as a contract bus driver, Ruby Monroe's airplane finally touches down in Dallas. Thrilled to finally be able to be with her sister and daughter, Ruby's life suddenly changes when an item is stolen from her backpack at the airport. Ruby knows first hand the high stakes consequences involved from her co-worker Carrie Ann, a woman silenced for speaking out against DeserTek, but Ruby never expected this turn of events. She returns home to find her daughter Zoe missing. Her neighbors paint a shocking picture of her sister in the days before Ruby's return home. Everyone warns her of Sam McCoy, a neighbor whose sexy physical presence could take away a woman's breath. Sam's criminal past is no secret. Desperate to find her missing daughter, Ruby must turn to Sam, especially when her own life is threatened. No one else seems to feel the urgency to rescue Zoe in quite the same way that Ruby does. Sam can't help but be attracted to Ruby, not only for her beauty but her determination and dauntless spirit in the face of danger. Helping her might endanger the very life he has worked so hard to rebuild. As Ruby and Sam race to uncover Zoe's whereabouts, the danger escalates, especially when a body is uncovered in Bone Lake, a lake which seems to call out from its depth. An unexpected turn of events will test them to their ultimate limit. Can Ruby and Sam work together or will their joining of forces expose them to even more danger? In a race against time, can they uncover all the clues before it is too late? Will Sam and Ruby's closeness forge the bonds of a deeper love or will it forever drive them apart?

Colleen Thompson's BENEATH BONE LAKE is an edgy, fast-paced work of romantic suspense that will send shivers through a reader. Just when you think the danger can't get any more thrilling, Colleen raises the intensity level several notches. Alongside the quick-paced race to identify the location of Zoe and the parties responsible for her kidnapping, a mysterious perhaps unearthly view of Bone Lake haunts the reader's imagination. As the path of clues narrows, an eerie confluence of forces expands outwards, creating mind-bending chills as the past actions of several individuals now come full circle. As corruption and dirty secrets of the past come to light during the desperate search for Zoe, the hunt forces both Sam and Ruby to look within. Forced to trust each other with their deepest secrets, they also discover their deepest desires, desires too long hidden inside. In BENEATH BONE LAKE, the romance is truly dynamic. Colleen Thompson integrates the threads of romance and suspense so seamlessly that each magnifies the effects of the other while also creating depth within her characters. Edgy romance combines with a chilling tale that ripples outwards, affecting several levels of individuals. The romance is not just a one-sided edginess in the bad boy hero himself, but rather Colleen Thompson takes it a step further. Sam's desire for Ruby leads him into an ever increasingly dangerous territory in an encounter that will shake the very foundations within him as well as put him at physical risk.

BENEATH BONE LAKE once again marks Colleen Thompson as a master of romantic suspense. Fans will discover all the elements that make her romantic suspense so exquisite, and yet also be thrilled at how she expands into new directions in her latest work. Colleen Thompson is an author who does not rest on the laurels of her past successes but rather one who delights readers anew with each new book. Quite simply, BENEATH BONE LAKE is intense, leaving a reader glued to the pages as each new clue reveals a whole new layer of suspense. Each page ramps up the level of suspense and desire until the last page. BENEATH BONE LAKE left me speechless for days. The intricate concentric and interconnecting levels of connections make this book impossible to put down and leave a suspense lover incredibly satisfied as well. Even connections seemingly unconnected on the surface come together, painting a picture of a whole network of actions and thoughts intertwined to create a portrait of the human soul. Even after the unraveling of the culprit, Colleen Thompson leaves the reader with a delightful unexpected twist. From start to finish, BENEATH BONE LAKE is a must read for romantic suspense lovers with its edge-of-the-seat suspense and its daring romance, a romance that reaches down to the very depths of the human heart.

COURTESY OF BOOK ILLUMINATIONS

Colleen Thompson excells at creating atmosphere, of finding places in Texas that become characters in the story and interact eerily with the characters--and scare the reader. Beneath Bone Lake is no exception. Ms. Thompson is an incredibly talented writer who plots a stunning thriller and creates fascinating characters. As she did in THE SALT MAIDEN, my favorite of her novels, she caught me from the begining and drew me into the story and the nightmare the heroine faced.

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