Talia Dane was an empath in New York City, working in Strange Days Occult Bookstore, where she hid in the office behind "warded" walls to protect her from the barrage of emotions she felt when wandering around the city. She had no boyfriend and kept to herself. Then one day Finn O'Brien, a detective with the NYPD, came in to the store looking for a missing blonde, Maria Sands. Talia had an instant physical connection with Finn, which was unusual, because most men overlooked her in favor of her blonde bombshell friend Cassidy. Oddly, Talia did not sense Finn's emotions. The missing Maria Sands turned out to be an acquaintance of Cassidy's, plus they looked just alike. Cassidy and Maria hung out at the same places, though Cassidy didn't have much information to give Finn except that she'd seen Maria weeks ago, listening to a bar band.

Some weeks later, a wave of negative feelings struck Talia, and she came out of the office looking for the source, only to find her friend Cassidy going on about the attractive man she had nicknamed Yummy, whom she was meeting at a club later that evening. Because of the bad feelings she had received from him, Talia begged her not to go, and later went looking for Cassidy, happening into Detective O'Brien at O'Malley's Bar. He escorted her to the station where her radar detected a teenaged junkie about to attack Finn. The junkie was handcuffed and sent to a hospital, then a crowd interrupted Finn's plan to ask her out.

The next morning, Talia was waked up by a wave of terror--Cassidy's terror. The police department wouldn't do anything about it until Cassidy had been missing for twenty-four hours. And after twenty-four hours, plus two weeks, Finn was on the case. Finn was receptive to any kind of help, even help from a flaky empath he was really attracted to, especially since yet another girl was missing--this time the Mayor's niece. So Talia gave herself a make-over to become similar to the kind of girl the stalker seemed interested in, and somehow found herself a consultant with the team working on the case.

Arianna Hart's DARK HEAT is a Mystery/Thriller Paranormal Romance. Watching the inevitable relationship blossom between opposites--sensitive Talia and the hard-boiled Finn--is entertaining and then, there's the mystery to be solved as well. Talia has to handle the skeptics who don't believe in her, and then we get to watch them turn into believers. A good summer read.

Reviewed By: Allie B
© July 2004