** spoiler alert ** It's hard not to like a Nora Roberts book because they're well-written and usually have a good story. However, this one just didn't hit the mark with me. Fiona Bristow is a woman with a haunted past who now runs a training and obedience school for dogs. Simon Doyle is an artist with an unruly puppy. Of course they would meet and fall into a complicated relationship that neither of them wanted and Fiona's past would come back to complicate matters further. I expected all of that to be included and it was. What bothers me is what was left out of this story. I felt like we got almost no information on Simon outside of a mention of his relationship with a pop star and that he has rage issues. Also, his surly attitude throughout the novel bothered me a lot because we never got any rational reason for him to be grumpy. Was there something in his past that made him closed off to sharing his space and life with someone else or is that just a guy thing that we're supposed to assume? Another disappointment was the suspense element with RSKII. I admit, I didn't expect him to go after the reporter. But once that happened, it felt like everything was tied up in a neat little bow in about 5 pages. No muss, no fuss. Fiona was never really in any danger and the whole woods scene felt like a quick wrap-up on a half-hearted novel. I almost wondered at one point if this was a sequel and the back stories of all these characters were already explained. Or maybe there's a sequel coming from this to tell us if Jaws ever succeeded in becoming a S&R dog, if RSKII got his fame, what happened to the tree stump sink and if Simon ever smiled. All-in-all not the caliber of novel I've come to expect from Nora Roberts.