Nathan Kelly's plan was to serve his last tour in the Middle East, and then join his brothers in their private KGI operations, an elite group who contract with the government and private sector, taking on dangerous jobs. But his plan gets screwed up when he gets captured in Afghanistan. Stuck in a dark cave, tortured, naked, and starved, he is not sure how much longer he can survive. But then he hears a voice in his head. At first he thinks he is crazy, but the voice is persistent.

It turns out to be the voice of Shea, who lives back in the States. Shea and her sister Grace have a special gift. They can use telepathy to communicate with people — not specific people, it seems, just random people. Shea can take away someone's pain as well, and Grace can do one step better by healing them. But their special powers bring much danger to them. A year ago, their parents were murdered, while Shea and Grace narrowly escaped. Now they are being hunted by people who want to abuse their ability and most likely do worse things to them. They have separated and don't keep in contact, to stay more hidden.

When Shea hears Nathan's torture sessions, she immediately does everything she can to help take away his pain so he can endure and survive. She anonymously clues his brothers in to where he is being held, so he can be rescued. Once she is secure in knowing he is safe, she stops contact with him, as she continues her own battle to survive. But Nathan is not going to forget that voice in his head, and when Shea ends up being hunted again, she calls out for help.

Whispers in the Dark by Maya Banks is the first I've read of this series, but I think it does pretty well as a stand-alone. It has a strong beginning, as we watch Nathan truly suffer at the hands of his captors. While I'm not a fan of a supernatural twist being thrown into an otherwise straight-forward romantic suspense series, Shea's telepathic abilities didn't annoy me too much. I did find it odd that throughout the book, she communicates only with Nathan and a few other people. She can't control to whom she speaks with, but it also made it sound as though she would have had others trying to talk to her in her head.

But as I said, the beginning is really good. Once Nathan escapes and the story jumps ahead six months to where he is more physically recovered, comes the time where he meets physically with Shea. Here is where the story started to go downhill for me. The romance didn't work for me at all. I get that they have this bond because of the trauma they suffered while he was kidnapped and then later when she was kidnapped, but they meet face to face and pretty much fall in love instantly. They have sex and it's perfect, Nathan is perfect, Shea is perfect, everything is perfect. Well, except that they forget to use a condom several times. But otherwise, everything is just … perfect. It got annoying and their relationship just turned out … corny. Too mushy, too goody-goody, not appealing to me.

I also questioned how Shea could have this mind-blowing, romantic sex (more than once) with Nathan while her beloved sister, the person she cares about most in the world, is missing, possibly kidnapped by the evil bad guys. Shea didn't seem the type to be all smiles and joyful in bed, while the one person in her life who has always been there for her could be in danger.

Whispers in the Dark turned out to be OK for me. The suspense part gets a high grade, but with a lackluster romance, it was more of a disappointing read.

Rating: C-