The last thing Lev Prakenskii remembered was being lost in the swirling currents of the ocean and getting sucked deeper into the nothingness of a freezing black eddy off the coastal town of Sea Haven. Just as quickly, just a miraculously, he was saved—pulled ashore by a beautiful stranger. But Lev has no memory of who he is—or why he seems to possess the violent instincts of a trained killer. All he knows is that he fears for his life, and for the life of his unexpected savior.Her name is Rikki, a sea~urchin diver in Sea Haven. She has always felt an affinity for the ocean, and for the seductive pull of the tides. And now she feels drawn in the same way to the enigmatic man she rescued. But soon they will be bound by something even stronger, and their tantalizing secrets will engulf them both in a whirlpool of dizzying passion and inescapable danger.
After reading this book, I was in awe. What an amazing book! I enjoyed it thoroughly.
This book continues where Hidden Currents ended, kind of. Rikki is alone at sea, every one else in town is at the weddings of the Drake Sisters. This gives her the perfect opportunity to harvest her secret found of sea-urchins in a dangerous place, near the underseas abyss. The place has always given her the creeps, but the harvest is very good.
She has already filled a few nets and is eating lunch when a huge wave rolls upon her, and throws her overboard again. Luckily, she had just put on her breather again, so she won’t drown. Then she sees someone else being tossed around by the turbulence, and being thrown against the reef. She rescues the man, sharing her oxygen with him, and some how getting the both of them safe on board. She brings him back to life with CPR, and he repays her by putting a knife to her throat! But Rikki is different from other women, other people, she isn’t the least bit afraid. She is furious! She just saved him, she is the captain of this boat, and she is in charge!
Lev doesn’t know what happened to him. Why is that woman not afraid of him? She cannot fight him and win! He has an arsenal strapped to his body. But his concussion has made him lose his memory, he doesn’t know who he is, or what he is. Which of the 10 names he knows is his own? And then he tells her more than he should.
Rikki doesn’t like being touched, but somehow, this stranger doesn’t bother her much. He doesn’t want to go to a hospital, he knows he is in danger but now why of by whom. With some strange logic Rikki takes him home. She, who doesn’t even like having her sisters in her house, brings a stranger home, in her bed! Her sanctuary. She is not the nurturing kind, she is a loner.
She is also a water elemental, she can command water to aid her, the rain to fall, the waves to play with her. She is also autistic, and sensory dysfunctional. She cannot stand fluorescent lights and loud sounds. She has her own routines to do everything, and when they are interrupted, or when she is distracted by a drop of water of a pattern of something, she will sink in her own world. She only eats peanut butter, although her sisters try to make her eat healthier things, like broccoli. She has a lovely dinner service, but never uses it.
And now this man, this stranger, will want to eat normal food, he will use her dishes, her bathroom. He will disrupt her life! But somehow she just cannot throw him out of her house.
Lev turns out to be Ilja’s brother (of course), and he is tired of killing, of being an assassin. He is strangely drawn to Rikki, to her eyes, they kind of ground him. He doesn’t know why. He himself is also highly paranormally gifted. So he wants to start a new life, and for that, he has to make his former bosses and his enemies believe he died in the boating accident.
The strange wave that sank the yacht he was on, attracted a lot of attention. From scientist, but also from the media. And unfortunately, some tv channel caught Rikki on film. Ever since she was 13, and her parents died in a house fire, she has been haunted by fires. Two foster homes burned down, her fiancée died a few years ago. And she is almost sure she some how started those fires. But Lev doesn’t believe it for a second. She is a water elemental, she cannot cope with fire, is afraid of it, doesn’t even use it. It turns out, Rikki has a stalker, a fire elemental, determined to kill her with fire.
And to protect her, Lev agrees to bring in the local sheriff, to help catch this killer. The sheriff who also happens to be a brother in law to his own brother, so they are kind of family. As one of Rikki’s sisters-of-the-heart is an aunt to the Drake Sisters.
I loved this book, and I cannot wait for the other books in this series, as all of Rikki’s adopted sisters-of-the-heart are intriguing. I want to know what happened to all of them, and have them find their own man. Perhaps all brothers to Lev and Ilja?
After reading this book, I was also extremely curious, what is a sea-urchin? So I googled, and found this page with pictures. And found them beautiful and strange.
http://www.google.nl/images?hl=nl&q=sea+urchin&um=1&ie=UTF-8&source=univ&ei=RB5bTJ2lCsyMOPfv0LQP&sa=X&oi=image_result_group&ct=title&resnum=4&ved=0CEcQsAQwAw
But I still didn’t know what they are. Plant or animal. So, I googled some more and found out this on the all-knowing Wikipedia:
Sea urchins or urchins are small, spiny, globular animals which, with their close kin, such as sand dollars, constitute the class Echinoidea of the echinoderm phylum. They inhabit all oceans. Their shell, or "test", is round and spiny, typically from 3 to 10 centimetres (1.2 to 3.9 in) across. Common colors include black and dull shades of green, olive, brown, purple, and red. They move slowly, feeding mostly on algae. Sea otters, wolf eels, and other predators feed on them. Humans harvest them and serve their gonads as a delicacy.
Hmm, new question. What are gonads? So I googled again, and found the answer I really didn’t want to know. I don’t think I will try those any day soon, however much I love trying out unknown foods …
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