In Sight of the Enemy is an action-packed road romance about two people on the run in the wilderness from a pair of killers. It’s an entertaining enough read, but loses a lot of points for a thickheaded hero who’s often insufferable.

This is the fifth book in the Family Secrets: The Next Generation series, and it picks up the story right where the last one left off. Cassie Donovan has always had precognitive dreams. When she dreams that the man she loved, Dr. Shane Farhold, will be endangered on his next mission for Doctors Without Borders, she tries to warn him not to go. Shane doesn’t believe in that psychic nonsense, and he angrily breaks up with her, leaving for Afghanistan despite her warning.

Three months later he returns to Texas a different man. Scarred and wounded inside and out from his experiences overseas, he’s no longer sure exactly who he is. The one thing he does know is that he still doesn’t believe in psychics, so when he finds a note from Cassie in his mail when he returns, he’s tempted to ignore it. Instead, he can’t resist the urge to see her. He goes to her ranch, where she drops a bombshell on him: she’s pregnant with his child.

He barely has time to process Cassie’s announcement when she receives an urgent call from her twin brother (the hero of the last book) telling her there are people coming after her and she needs to get out of the house. Before he can explain, the phone goes dead, and someone begins shooting into the building. Shane and Cassie manage to escape into the nearby forest on horseback, with their pursuers close behind.

This story is very straightforward and uncomplicated, little more than two people running and running, with two more people chasing and chasing. As such, the plot’s a little thin and predictable, and occasionally feels padded to make it long enough. It’s still an entertaining read. The author’s writing is engaging and she keeps the action coming as Shane and Cassie deal with one obstacle after another on their way to a hunting cabin deep in the forest. The story moves quickly with a good amount of excitement.

Neither character is very deep, and Cassie is less developed than Shane. The author compensates by delivering a good amount of emotion in their relationship. Cassie is a sympathetic heroine, who refuses to take anything less than full acceptance of her psychic abilities from him. All her life, she has had a dream where she is murdered while her child huddles in a nearby closet. Since her dreams always come true, she knows this will be her fate. There are some poignant moments where she talks to Shane about their child’s life, all the while believing she will not be alive to see it (although most readers will be able to deduce the real explanation for her dream from the beginning.)

I would have given this book a marginal recommendation if it wasn’t for one thing: the hero. He drove me crazy. The hero who refuses to believe the psychic heroine is an obvious conflict, but it’s just not very interesting here. Shane’s grandmother was a con artist who ripped people off while claiming to have supernatural powers. This is used as the motivation for his skepticism of Cassie’s abilities, but that creates problems. In order for his skepticism to make any sense, he has to believe that Cassie is also a con artist or mentally ill. He doesn’t believe either, so his continual refusal to consider the possibility despite one instance after another where her visions save his skin begins to border on ridiculous. It feels like an artificial construct of the plot instead of something with much basis in the character. Of course, he finally comes around in the end, but his final admission of belief wasn’t nearly satisfying enough to make up for every thing that came before it. His experiences in Afghanistan are interesting, but otherwise he’s not a very likable character.

Readers who can get past the hardheaded hero might enjoy the ride. The story’s a little thin and shallow, but the action is constant and the emotional elements are effective. This is a fast and easy read, but not much more.