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Dear Reader,

I really, truly never meant to make The Mysteries of Angel Butte series more than a trilogy. But I was grabbed by a character who didn’t stay in her secondary role. Jane Vahalik intrigued me from her appearance in the first book (Bringing Maddie Home, November 2013)—a woman succeeding in a primarily male field, and, at that, a woman whose very womanly appearance contradicts her seeming toughness. What made her the woman she became? Is she really as confident as she appears? And what kind of man would have enough confidence himself to love a woman who handles a gun as well as he does, participates in dangerous raids and supervises police detectives?

I’ve found in the past that, in most books, the focus is sharpest on hero or heroine, but not both. Partly, it’s tough to balance two people trying to overcome significant emotional or life challenges—especially if, as in many of my books, there’s a suspense subplot as well. I think when I started this book, I expected Jane to be at the center. I fell in love with Clay Renner right away, though. This is a guy who fell in love, head over heels, for the first time in his life when he met Jane. But he was raised to believe in quite differing male/female roles, and assuming that he’d love a woman who was content to support him and stay home to raise their children. Only a few dates into their relationship, he blows it badly and loses Jane.

When this book opens, months later, the two of them are participating in a police raid. Jane will be one of the first officers to go in, and Clay can’t deal with it. And yet...he aches to become a man worthy of her love and trust. He has a heck of a dilemma! Meantime, I’ve undermined all Jane’s hard-won confidence by endangering her family, exposing her vulnerability when she most wants to be strong.

I hope you love these two people as much as I came to. And to understand why, well, I’m writing yet one more book set in Angel Butte, Oregon. That under-the-radar runaway-youth shelter kept calling my name. I imagined an alum whose life was saved by the shelter—a deeply wounded boy grown up to be a very controlled man who has returned to Angel Butte to protect the shelter and the people running it. Look for that to come out later in 2014.

That will be the last book! I swear. I’m pretty sure.... Really.

Good reading,

Janice Kay Johnson