When counselor Patience Price loses her HR position with the FBI due to downsizing, she returns to her hometown of Pony Island to set up a practice of her own. The normally quiet small town soon seems to erupt with crime, danger, and violence with a very reluctant Patience thrust into the center of it all. Her ex-boyfriend’s mother insists Patience can get her son out of trouble, mistakenly believing Patience had a very different job with the FBI! Soon enough, however, the FBI really is in town in the form of darkly dangerous and desirable Sebastian, a former coworker of Patience. And that’s when the trouble boils over in earnest.

I’ve lost count of the number of books I have read by Julie Anne Lindsey. This new-to-me and recently refreshed trilogy reminds me of the stories that first provided my introduction to the author–the Geek Girl Mysteries. Slightly more serious than a true “cozy” mystery, but enormously enjoyable. Patience and Sebastian have a crackling chemistry, and I was glued to the page, forced to put the book down only when absolutely unavoidable. More, please!