FIRE BOUND – Christine Feehan
Sea Haven/Sisters of the Heart , Book 5
Jove Books
ISBN: 978-0-515-15611-9
Late April 2016
Romantic Suspense/Paranormal

Italy - Present Day

Thanks to the popularity of her hand-blown glass chandeliers, Lissa Piner is travelling through Europe to meet with prospective clients.  What her sisters don't know, is that Lissa isn't her real name, and her business trip is the perfect cover for Lissa's life mission: taking out the people responsible for her family's murder. After her personal work is done in Italy, Lissa plans to move on to St. Petersburg and do what is necessary to protect the women she's come to love.  Four of her sisters are either engaged to or married to a Prakenskii brother, and the men are being hunted.

When they were children, the Prakenskii brothers were forced into brutal schools by the man who murdered their parents.  The brothers were separated and trained to be lethal assassins, going along with the training in order to save each other.  Over the years five of the men have left Russia behind and are living in the northern California town of Sea Haven.  Casimir Prakenskii is happy for his brothers, and the absolutely loyalty they feel towards one another is why he's agreed to watch over Lissa as she travels in Europe.  He's working undercover as a bodyguard at the home of Don Luigi Abbracciabene, Lissa's uncle, but it doesn't take him long to figure out there is much his brothers haven't told him about Lissa.

Both Lissa and Casimir have lived a lie since childhood; Lissa to hide who she really is, and Casimir because he works undercover.  Each of them has also believed that their mission to take down the man hunting the Prakenskii brothers will lead to their deaths. Now that they've found each other, though, they've found a reason to live.  If they work together, they may be able to protect their family and survive to have a life together.

After watching each of her sisters fall in love with a Prakenskii brother, Lissa decides to run from the possibility of it happening to her in FIRE BOUND.  Her lifelong mission of getting revenge on the people who murdered her family has kept her a bit distanced from her sisters, and between that and her new mission to protect her sisters and their men, Lissa doesn't believe she'll be returning to the farm.  She's not happy when she realizes the annoying bodyguard Tomasso is actually a Prakenskii, assigned by her newest brother-in-law, Gavriil. As both Casimir and Lissa are fire elements, the two clash initially, but it's not long before their relationship turns passionate.

As the fifth book in the Sisters of the Heart series, it may be helpful to have read the books in order.  While each novel focuses on one couple, some of the storyline arcs throughout the series.  This one takes place almost completely away from Sea Haven and the family that Lissa and her sisters created, but we do get a chance to catch up with them.  An intense novel with a few surprising twists, check out FIRE BOUND.

Jennifer Bishop