At the beginning of each month I go to the Harlequin website and read the blurbs for all new releases. Occasionally I find one or two that intrigue me, but rarely do I end up buying them. Well, this time I picked up the book that I found the most interesting and I just may have found a new author to follow.

MacKinley “Mac” Taylor is a police detective. His specialty is forensics and he heads up the crime scene investigation division. Working late one night, he catches one of his employees, Jeff, in the lab destroying evidence. Before he can stop it, Jeff causes an explosion in the lab, not only destroying evidence but robbing Mac of his sight.

Six weeks later Mac is home from the hospital, recuperating and basically wallowing in self pity. His mother and her best friend Barbara lure Barbara’s daughter, Julia, a registered nurse, over for a visit. Using guilt tactics, the women get Julia to agree to take care of Mac for twenty-four hours. Julia agrees, but not for the reasons the mothers think. When Julia was fifteen a boy invited her to a party for a dog fight (i.e. when a group of boys dare each other to bring the ugliest date to a gathering; the boy with the homeliest date wins money). Julia wised up and left early, but the boy tried to claim his prize in another way by forcing himself on her. Mac, then a college student, found them, rescued Julia, and took her home. Now’s her chance to repay him for that heroic act so many years ago, but first she has to reach through the walls he’s built around himself.

Mac knows he’s being a class-A jerk, but he can’t help himself. It’s terrifying to be lost in his own home, unable to do basic things like crossing the living room or to identify who’s standing in the room. He lashes out at everyone around him as he feels his independence slipping away. Soon he’s given no choice when two internal affairs detectives show up on his doorstep. In Jeff’s last moments he mentioned being threatened. Soon Mac realizes Jeff was being blackmailed, and whoever did it is trying to pin the blame on Mac. In desperate need of a pair of eyes to solve the mystery, he reluctantly lets Julia help him and starts to fall in love with her. But as far as Julia’s concerned, is it really love or just misguided gratitude?

It’s the characters that make this book. Mac spends nearly as much time beating himself about his attitude as others do pointing it out. Miller makes his disability realistic. Mac can’t suddenly take care of himself and there are detailed descriptions of what he endures without his sense of direction, depth perception, and many other, little things the sighted take for granted. When he suddenly is forced to get past his self-pity he uses his other senses to gather information for his analytical mind that allows him to function and to see, in a way, his surroundings.

Julia is a good foil for him. Unlike Mac, who only recently had a taste of self-doubt, Julia has always lacked self-confidence. She looks in the mirror and sees a fifteen year old girl with freckles, frizzy hair, braces, and built like a linebacker. The men in her life have only reinforced this notion. So when Mac starts calling her beautiful and making a play for her she thinks it’s misguided lust and gratitude. Miller keeps the description of Julia’s looks to only what Mac can sense without his sight, like her silky hair, her scent, and her inner beauty. These are things people usually come to love after they’ve known a person a while and are past the initial impression stage. While readers don’t know what Julia looks like as an adult, we learn to picture her as Mac does. It’s touching to see him discover her and try to convince her that what he feels is real.

The only real drawback is the mystery. The villain was pretty standard and I could figure it out pretty quickly. Then there’s the fact that, with as much respect and support and family Mac has in the police department, it’s amazing anyone was able to convince someone he was guilty of wrongdoing for even a minute, so the bounds of credibility are stretched thin.

Overall though, I enjoyed this story and have already started to find copies of the first two books in Miller’s Taylor Clan series. It is not necessary to have read those books to enjoy this one, though. The focus is firmly on Julia and Mac.