Title: Hunting With The Wolf
Author: Romona Hilliger
Published in 2006 by Linden Bay Romances
Genre: Contemporary
ISBN: 1-905393-41-5
Other Books by : A Shadow from His Past The Lure of the Emerald Peacock
Meg Ducass is not your typical socialite, although others wish she would behave like one. Born and bred on the best side of town, her life is a series of unconventional choices. To those who would wish differently, she embodies a quiet defiance of all that she deems alien. Instead of taking up law, and joining her father's well known and successful firm in Melbourne, she chose a different path. To her family and friends' disappointment, she went out on her own, developing a career for herself in photojournalism, and gaining a name in the field. Even though she is the daughter of a wealthy and respected man, Meg has always felt the need to accomplish things for herself, on her own. Her self-esteem demands it, her creative soul craves it, and her adventurous soul needs the freedom and the variety the self-reliance brings. Her parents and friends don't understand this, and she often feels smothered by their demands and their misguided good intentions. They seem to discount her wants and needs in their constant attempts to force her to conform to their ideas of a proper life.
Then her best friend Jennifer offers a chance to get away for a while. She and her new husband, Nat are going on a camping trip, and Jennifer asks Meg to go along. A vacation to the outback will afford Meg the opportunity to gather some much needed material for a photo layout. She wants and needs the photos of the outback for a job she is hoping to land with an American company. If she could secure the job, it would prove to her family and friends just how serious she is about not bending to their wishes. She is also suffering from the breakup with her fiancé, but then it should not have been unexpected when she caught him with a flirty tour guide on a recent photo safari to Africa. Never again would she be able to trust him, nor does she want to anymore. She needed time away, she doesn't know if she still loves him or not, but she can use this opportunity to try and get herself together, and get the photos for the assignment. What she does not expect is to find out her erstwhile fiancé was after a place with her father's firm, his reason for proposing. Nor does she expect the tall dark stranger who not only captures her attention, but possibly her heart as well.
She is an attractive girl, tall, slim, with blond hair and the most incredible blue eyes Buck has seen, and he immediately feels an unwelcome attraction. This is something he cannot afford now, and as he is not in a position to even be thinking about a woman, he decides he must keep his mind on the business at hand. Buck Daniel is a man on a mission, out to seek the man who has done him a most grievous wrong, who has taken from his life something he loved, and valued above all else. The path he treads is a potentially dangerous one, and he cannot afford to be distracted. Not even a chance meeting in a campsite can lure him from his path, and it matters not a whit to his strength of purpose she may feel the same towards him. Now is not the time for such feelings, even if they were to exist. He has to find the man who murdered his wife, and though the trail is a year cold, he has hopes he can succeed where the authorities have failed.
Buck is getting ready to leave when he overhears the argument at the next table, and the young woman gets up and walks out. He senses the loneliness and the hurt, can identify with it, and finds himself not only offering her a ride back to the camping park, but also a ride with him to Brulia. What he is not expecting is his inability to leave her behind, and although he makes several attempts, his is unsuccessful. Even knowing the danger he is heading toward, she will not leave, and go back, so Buck decides to allow her to go as far as his first stop, and from there she can find transport to Darwin. He has to go on, and he will not give up the quest. After talking to her friend Jennifer, and being put through the third degree, he is taking steps, and determined to be rid of Meg at the first opportunity, but she is tenacious, and it is not going to be easy. Already she has gotten farther than he intended, and has come to the realization of the danger in his quest. He admires her pluck and her silence as they travel along. The bond between them is forming a tenuous link he is reluctant to break. He is actually feeling something other than sadness and loneliness for the first time in a long while. Her laughter and joy in the wildlife lightens his mood, and Buck has to fight to remember his purpose, to keep Meg at arms length, and far away from his heart.
Romona Hilliger is a wonderful new voice on the romance scene, and her outback Adventures bring a breath of fresh air to those who love contemporary romance. I this new release from Linden Bay Romances, Romona brings us a story of a man on a mission of vengeance, and the woman who can finally set him free from his past. In Buck Daniel, we find a man who has been disillusioned by life, who has lost his childhood sweetheart and wife to a cruel fate. Hunting down the man who took his wife's life is the only way he thinks to find peace in his soul. Megan Ducass is running away to find herself, to see what is truly important to her, and to discover what it is she really wants in her life. Does she really love the man who cheated on her so casually and whom her friend Jennifer insists wants her back? Or is she just settling for what everyone expects? These are the questions she has to answer before she can get her life back on track.
When two such disparate people meet, sparks fly and when the tough times are shared, the attraction that has sparked the unusual friendship flares into something more, surprising both Meg and Buck in its intensity. But the question remains, can one night of incredible passion be the start of something great, or is it to fizzle out as the wild heat of the bushfires of the outback dies in the rain. Hunting With The Wolf is rich with the extraordinary flavour of the Australian Outback, the starkly beautiful scenery, the richness that only one with experience can bring to such a tale. Romona has taken the time to weave the tale around her beloved Australia, and it shows. Hunting With The Wolf is a labor of love, and is full to overflowing with rich characterizations, vivid places and settings that are the heart of Australia. It a story you will read again and again. Look for Hunting With The Wolf at Linden Bay Romances, and be prepared to be swept away on a wonderful adventure!
Yours in good reading,
Rose!
Romona Hilliger Bio Interview Review Buy Romona's Linden Bay Romances Books
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