The Guardian

by Bethany Campbell

The only rule.

Don't Get Involved. To Hawkshaw, they're words to live by He left the Secret Service because he didn't want to take care of anyone but himself. Then an old friend asks him for a favor...

The last case.

A woman and her young son need a place to hide—and someone to protect them. A stalker wants her and he'll do anything to have her ....

The wrong woman.

Hawkshaw agrees to help, but he's more than a little reluctant Kate Kanaday's not the woman he wants living in his house. Even worse, she's got him thinking about breaking his only rule ....

297 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published May 1, 1999

About the author

Sally McCluskey (aka Bethany Campbell) was born and raised in Omaha, Nebraska, as an only child. She attended college beginning as a chemistry major, after quickly switching her major to English. She obtainded a B.A. from Wayne State Teachers College, and an M.A. in English from the University of Arkansas. She met her husband, Dan Borengasser, while both were graduate students at Northern Illinois University, where she obtained a Ph.D. in English.

Sally taught and in her spare time wrote, but after marriage, the couple moved to an area where teaching jobs were scarce, and she turned to writing full time. She wrote poetry, articles, short stories, and contributed to textbooks, but finally decided to try a romance novel at the urging of her mom and aunt, both avid romance fans. To Sally’s amazement, Harlequin bought her story After the Stars Fall and published it in 1985 under the pseudonym Bethany Campbell. She has also written as Lisa Harris. She has won three Romance Writers of America (RWA) RITA Awards, three Romantic Times Reviewer Awards, a Maggie Award, and the Daphne du Maurier Award of Excellence.

She lived with her husband in northwest Arkansas. Her husband, who serves as Vice President of Ozark Film & Video Productions, also writes, and has had several short films and plays produced.

Reviews

[Anne Holly]

Solid writing, an enjoyable setting, and a good "plot", with a fine heroine and generally satisfying ending; the "hero" is appropriately grumpy and compelling, most of the time (though also a bit broken in unattractive ways in parts). The romance is not very romantic, but has other qualities that make it readable. Nevertheless, the book was seriously marred in that the heroine's child jumps off the page as a pint-sized misogynistic turd, and we see way too much of the action through his eyes. Every time we saw him, I cringed. The book would have been 3/5 without him; if you find precocious he-man woman-haters adorable, you will likely enjoy the book more than I.

[Stacie]

Kate, a widow, is on the run from a stalker. She is used to being an independent woman but her young son is also in danger. She gets help from Hawkshaw. He is a retired Secret Service agent. He is coming out of a divorce and does not want to get involved with someone else.

[Karina]

leuk en spannend deel in de boeketreeks