"A wonderful story!"
This story started out with a bang and believe me,
it didn't stop through the whole book! I really wasn't
sure how I would like a story about a convicted murderer
and a prison guard but Brenda Novak knows how to hook a
reader and drag her right to the finish! Gabrielle Hadley has left her husband and moved
from Phoenix to Florence, Arizona. She gets a job as a
prison guard but realizes that there's some corruption
going on when three inmates jump one inmate and start
beating him up and none of the guards stop it. She goes in
to break up the fight and notices some of the other guards
seem to be perpetrating the fight. Later Gabrielle tells her superior, Sergeant
Hanson, that she is going to make sure Randall Tucker, the
inmate who was beaten, is okay. She goes to his cell and
doctors him. He tries not to care but he sees that she's
not like most people and even though she's afraid of him,
she really does care that he is hurt. Because Gabby won't let it go, Sergeant Hanson and
his uncle, Warden Crumb decide to transfer Tucker to
another prison. They tell Gabby she has to ride along with
Officer Eckland to transfer the prisoner. On the way they
have a car accident and Tucker escapes into the desert with
Gabby on his trail. In the three days she is with Tucker,
she realizes that he's not the killer that everybody thinks
he is. She also realizes that while he tries to act tough,
he's really not. All he wants is his life back before his
wife was murdered. He also wants to find out who murdered
his wife and set him up. There was lots of tension and angst in this book
but in a good way. I found myself pulling for Tucker and
Gabby all the way. I never guessed who the real villain
was either. What a big surprise the ending was for me! I
eagerly look forward to Brenda Novak's next book!
Reviewed by Kathy Boswell
Posted February 18, 2003
Taking the Heat, where the captor becomes the
captive. . .
Twenty-eight-year-old divorcee Gabrielle Hadley
wants
nothing more than to gain some closure on her past and
establish a productive life for her and her baby daughter.
But when she witnesses a brutal beating at the prison
where she works, spurred on by her superior officer and
fellow guards, her conscience demands she step in. And
that's when she gets to know a man who is far from the
murderer others claim him to be.
SummaryThe small town of Florence, Arizona, is known for one
thing—its prison. Gabrielle Hadley is in Florence
for personal reasons though, she's seeking the mother who
abandoned her more than two decades ago. In order to
support herself and her two-year-old daughter, Gabrielle
is working as a prison guard—just about the only job
available in this bleak desert town.
Randall Tucker is a prisoner at Florence, convicted of
murdering his wife. He has one goal: to survive until he
can prove his innocence—and reclaim his seven-year-
old son, Landon, now living in foster care.
In the prison's atmosphere of tension and corruption,
Gabrielle discovers that Randal Tucker is far from the
murderer he's said to be. When he escapes during a prison
transfer, she follows him into the unforgiving desert. To
protect her job, her own integrity—or him? But the
guard becomes the prisoner's captive...and more. It's a
relationship that's not supposed to exist and yet it might
save them both.
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