IN THE DARK

Another silly tale from McKinney (Gentle From the Night, 1997, etc.),again about how love can save you from the dark side. With her aunt Jacqueline missing, Alyn Blum-Jones could be the “last of the Blums” and the new heiress to the enormous Blum Toasties fortune. Jacqueline, who lived at Blumfield, her fabulous Maryland estate, with two sleazy middle-aged lovers, one bizarre housekeeper, an army of liveried workers, and a bedroom lined with Harlequin romances, is presumed dead—and dead she is, buried in the concrete of her new stable. Jacqueline’s insurance company, though, a nasty slice of corporate America, doesn’t have to pay Alyn a $20 million life-insurance policy unless her aunt’s body is found. And just to make sure that Alyn never sees a cent, the company sends troubleshooter Peter Youngblood to Blumfield to oversee their business. Youngblood, an ex-cop with a skull tattooed on his hard-muscled shoulder, has seen (and done) it all. Once an idealistic law-enforcement officer, he’s now a cold, jaded sexy guy who appears in a wardrobe of ever-changing boxer shorts and tight jeans. It’s hard for him to believe that Alyn, a sweet veterinarian from Quincy, Mass., is the innocent she appears to be. And harder still to believe she intends to give her billion-dollar inheritance to a variety of worthy charities. As Alyn and Youngblood spar and struggle with their unwanted mutual attraction, they search for Jacqueline’s killer (never truly a mystery) and for the person who murdered her two ex-lovers. Together, the couple try to find a way to save Alyn from the porn king who turns out to be the father who deserted her before she was born—and to prove Jacqueline’s death by presenting the police with her lower mandible, left by the killer in a safe-deposit box at a Chase branch in Manhattan. Way over the top and unintentionally amusing—which may be the only reasons to read it.