Shadows at Midnight (Berkley Sensation) [Mass Market Paperback]

Claire Day wanted an adventure and she found one as a spook or a Defense Intelligence Agency analyst. She finds herself working at the US Embassy in Laka, Africa on Thanksgiving Day. And things are about to go from adventurous to very dangerous.

Marine Gunnery Sergeant Daniel Weston has finally made it to Laka, after briefly being introduced to Claire a year before. From the first glance he knew, absolutely knew, he had to be with her. And now, they have both made it to the same place, and they are under siege. The Red Army, a very chaotic out of control mob is flooding the streets and Dan has whisked Claire into Post One, the safest room at the Embassy. Claire has no idea Dan has been doing everything possible to be relocated to be with her. As they sit, minute after minute, hearing the horrible guns go off in the street, the tension is so strong Dan can barely believe he actually has Claire with him. Waiting out the gunfire eventually leads to a kiss. But as fate has a funny way of screwing with people's lives - that kiss is short lived.

The Embassy is bombed. Claire is thrown into a coma for three months. Dan receives information that she is dead, and has to deal with his own physical recovery. Devastated, Dan leaves the Marines and opens his own private security firm in Washington, DC. Meanwhile, Claire moves to Florida, where her father recently passed away. She is absolutely alone, and in bad shape. Awful nightmares, the Post Traumatic Stress is in full gear - she deals with panic attacks, nausea, is very weak and worst of all, has absolutely no memories of the bombing. When she happens to catch the name of Dan Weston on the news, his name jars her memory. She realizes he was at the Embassy at the same time she was. She is desperate to piece together those missing memories and in an act of spontaneity, books a flight to Washington DC. Fate is about to bring Claire back to Dan. But they will soon find out, the bombing may have not been a random attack, and Dan is going to have to pull out the big guns to keep Claire safe.

All I have to say about Shadows at Midnight is WOW!! Okay, maybe I have a few more words to use. This is the first book I have read by Elizabeth Jennings (aka Lisa Marie Rice.) I was blown away by the dynamics between these two characters. Dan is so alpha, so lethal, so obsessed by Claire and Elizabeth Jennings writes his internal dialogue of his struggle so well. In just a few pages she takes us from a Dan who is so excited to have finally found Claire in Africa, to a heart rendering kiss, and then suddenly thrusts us to a Dan that has lost his love for a year - a devastating year. And then finally we get a Dan that has another chance - although with a Claire that is physically and mentally in a bad place.

We get such a contrast with the hero and heroine. Dan is the overpowering, extremely muscular, just overwhelming presence. And Claire, post bombing is a shell of a human. Can barely eat, can barely be around people. But Dan always knows exactly what she needs. As he tells himself, he is the "Big Man." He is there for all her needs. He allows Claire to feel human again. To feel safe.

His internal struggle to not throw the frail Claire on the floor and take her is amusing, as many mentions of his "steel rod" swelling to massive proportions is written. Dan had been celibate for the year while he thought Claire was dead, and oh boy is he ready for some action. While we don't necessarily get an abundance of hot sex scenes, the sexual tension, is written so well, I didn't need the sex.

Elizabeth Jennings also does a great job with the suspense in this book. The action scenes were nail biting and fit in perfectly with the over sensitized romance. The villain in this book is bad news, and holds nothing back to get to Claire.

If you take a step back, the romance is over the top - Dan's obsessive feelings towards Claire are really over the top - but damn it, I loved it. I honestly had the best time reading this book. I loved every word and every page and I am totally going to hunt down her other books (in both pen names) because I think I just found a new favorite author.

Rating: 4.5/5

The fast paced plot and likeable characters, make this story a pleasure to read. The character of Dan is the essence of the typical Rice's intense alpha male that include his obsession for the protagonist Cleare. The heroin is described as a beautiful woman, with the additional bonus that she still has all her neurons working and will not loose them during the story. The love story that unfolds in Shadows at Midnight was very touching, and I felt a real connection to the characters, like I had known them already. The intrigue is well balanced with the romance part and the steamy sex scenes are not interminable and repetitive. Elizabeth Jennings aka Lisa Marie Rice is definitely one of my best discoveries so far!

Claire Day and Dan Weston work together at the American Embassy in Laka, Dan is a Marine and Claire is a DIA. And on that fateful day, Dan promises to keep her safe and they share their first kiss, then the embassy gets bombed. Fast forward to a year later, and Dan having survived, thinks that Claire is dead.

Claire on the other hand had been recovering all this time, she is still wounded and suffers from PTSD and amnesia. She thinks that Dan is just a figment of her imagination- a man she has dreamed up to make her feel safe in her dreams. But when she sees him on the news after he helped save a family from a fire, Claire is shocked to realize that the man of her dreams is not a fantasy but real, and this makes her happy and scared at the same time. So on an impulse and because she wants to see for herself that he is real, Claire buys a ticket and goes to visit him. Dan has opened his own business and it is successful. And they meet again... and when Dan realizes that someone is trying to kill Claire, he goes all out to protect her and help her to solve the mystery of who wants her dead and why.

This story features a sexy/strong hero and a likable/vulnerable heroine, however the storyline had some plot holes. And I felt that Claire and Dan's first intimacy came too fast. I also felt that the author was pushing too hard to make Claire seem super smart, and that wasn't needed- it came off as a little contrived.

But in the end, I really liked how Dan was a goner for Claire from the beginning and so protective (he was her shield and rock), and I really liked how Claire seemed to draw her strength from Dan. Overall this was a good read.