STALKED

An escaped murderer stalks the woman who helped put him away.

A sudden, violent storm causes a police car to flounder helplessly—an ill wind if there ever was one. Before the storm subsides, two cops are dead, and the convict/monster they were escorting back to prison has escaped, consumed with the quest for vengeance. The woman who tipped off the cops, enabling them to capture and jail him, must be made to pay in a way commensurate with his “ten years in hell.” Her punishment will be painful, he promises himself; deliciously slow, and erotically satisfying. His target is Serena Dial, currently a private eye in Duluth. More importantly, she’s the lover of Lt. Jonathan Stride, Duluth’s chief of detectives (Stripped, 2006, etc.), who already has an overload on his plate. Maggie Sorenson, Stride’s longtime colleague, is the prime suspect in the fatal shooting of her unfaithful husband. So Stride must confront a pair of scary cases in which the only two women who really matter to him are central figures. Few readers will be surprised when the cases connect.

Not much that’s fresh here, and the endless stretches of expository dialogue don’t help.