Suspicion of Malice

Description

Gail Connor and Anthony Quintana make a combustible mix on many levels. Passionately attracted to each other on a personal level, they are equally passionate defenders of their clients even when their interests don’t always work in tandem. Set all this against the sultry background of a Miami that is riddled with crime and corruption, drowning in drugs, illegal immigrants and shady deals, simmering with a melting-pot clash of cultures and you have a recipe for highly entertaining, hotly explosive crime and justice. In the fifth title in the Suspicion series, SUSPICION OF MALICE, Gail and Anthony have recently broken up and find themselves on opposite sides of a tangled case when his teenage daughter comes to her to defend her boyfriend in a capital murder case. Gail takes the case, expecting to have easy access to a reluctant but nonetheless available exonerating witness—until she meets her witness’s lawyer, Anthony Quintana. The personal and professional passions run high with a young man’s life on the line and conflict of interest in the air.

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Bobby Gonzales, a promising young dancer with the Miami ballet, is the only suspect in the murder of Roger Cresswell, whose family has been building yachts for wealthy Floridians for two decades. Bobby is also the secret boyfriend of Angela Quintana, whose father Anthony, a successful criminal attorney, is having trouble letting go of the two main women in his life: his daughter and his former fiancée, Gail Connor. Angela asks Gail to help her clear Bobby; Gail is torn, knowing her participation will bring her face to face with the man she still loves.

Roger is the second Cresswell to die violently; his sister, a talented artist who was the wife of Anthony Quintana's client, took her life at the height of her fame. Those facts seem like more than coincidence to Gail, whose efforts to unravel the family secrets that seem to be at the core of the Cresswell deaths are complicated by her fondness for Angela, her belief in Bobby's innocence, and a surprising secret of her own.

Suspicion of Malice is as much a love story as a murder mystery, but Parker invests her plot with enough stylish touches to keep the momentum going. She excels at characterization--Gail's emotional depths and conflicted feelings are well explicated, Anthony's old-world machismo and modern vulnerabilities sympathetically portrayed, and the secondary players, especially Gail's mother and Anthony's grandfather, clearly and convincingly drawn. As in previous outings (Suspicion of Deceit, Suspicion of Betrayal), Parker has used the sexual tension between Gail and Anthony as they collaborate in crime-solving to good effect; how the events in their relationship that drive this thriller to its violent conclusion will affect their professional as well as personal affairs awaits a future installment. --Jane Adams

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Suspicion of Guilt

Description

Gail Connor and Anthony Quintana make a combustible mix on many levels. Passionately attracted to each other on a personal level, they are equally passionate defenders of their clients even when their interests don’t always work in tandem. Set all this against the sultry background of a Miami that is riddled with crime and corruption, drowning in drugs, illegal immigrants and shady deals, simmering with a melting-pot clash of cultures and you have a recipe for highly entertaining, hotly explosive crime and justice. In the second title in the Suspicion series, SUSPICION OF GUILT, Gail has the biggest case of her life, a career-maker and a guarantee that a partnership will soon be hers, until she discovers that a suspected forgery is only the top layer of a cover-up for brutal murder and a step into deep conspiracy and deadly risk.

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Suspicion of Vengeance

Description

Gail Connor and Anthony Quintana make a combustible mix on many levels. Passionately attracted to each other on a personal level, they are equally passionate defenders of their clients even when their interests don’t always work in tandem. Set all this against the sultry background of a Miami that is riddled with crime and corruption, drowning in drugs, illegal immigrants and shady deals, simmering with a melting-pot clash of cultures and you have a recipe for highly entertaining, hotly explosive crime and justice. In the sixth title in the Suspicion series, SUSPICION OF VENGEANCE, Gail Connor takes on a hot-potato of a case when new evidence comes to light and she agrees to guide the appeal of a man convicted years ago of a brutal murder. The transcripts show that he was wrongfully convicted but they offer no indication of the further crimes that will be committed to leave the verdict intact.

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In this latest entry in Barbara Parker's series featuring lawyers Gail Connor and Anthony Quintana, Gail gets guilt-tripped by an old family retainer into taking on a case everyone else warns her is not winnable, including her boyfriend, criminal attorney Anthony. But Gail, whose legal practice is primarily civil, nevertheless agrees to represent death-row inmate Kenny Ray Clark, scheduled to die by lethal injection in less than a month. Before she's even read the trial transcript, Gail is convinced Kenny Ray didn't stab Amber Dodson to death. Once she does read it, she's even more certain that he was done in by shoddy police work and poor lawyering, if nothing else.

Gail's no slouch at doing some guilt-tripping herself. She tells her besotted sweetheart that if he really loved her he'd help with Kenny Ray's appeal, and she's not above a little sexual teasing to make her point. Anthony agrees to help, which is lucky since Gail seesaws wildly from being confident she can keep Kenny from his date with the executioner to dissolving in tears when she's certain she can't.

The real culprit is clear from the outset--it's up to Gail and Anthony to get the goods on him. Most of the heat in this thriller comes from the couple's occasional clinches and the steamy Florida weather. Anthony Quintana, Gail's complex, sexy, Cuban-American boyfriend, gets a bit more ink than usual in this outing. That will delight fans who find him as fascinating as Connor. Unfortunately, freeing an innocent man from a date with the death chamber doesn't allow enough time for Anthony to carry out his plan to accompany his ailing grandfather back to the island of his birth; fans of the series will have to wait for the next book to find out what happens when he does. --Jane Adams

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The Dark of Day

Description

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Suspicion of Betrayal

Description

Gail Connor and Anthony Quintana make a combustible mix on many levels. Passionately attracted to each other on a personal level, they are equally passionate defenders of their clients even when their interests don’t always work in tandem. Set all this against the sultry background of a Miami that is riddled with crime and corruption, drowning in drugs, illegal immigrants and shady deals, simmering with a melting-pot clash of cultures and you have a recipe for highly entertaining, hotly explosive crime and justice. In the fourth title in the Suspicion series, SUSPICION OF BETRAYAL, Gail Connor thinks she has achieved all her life goals with a successful career, a perfect home and an ideal man until an anonymous and threatening phone call, obscene letters and threats to her eleven-year-old daughter threaten the very foundations of her life and begin to reveal the secrets of her past.

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Suspicion of Innocence

Description

Gail Connor and Anthony Quintana make a combustible mix on many levels. Passionately attracted to each other on a personal level, they are equally passionate defenders of their clients even when their interests don’t always work in tandem. Set all this against the sultry background of a Miami that is riddled with crime and corruption, drowning in drugs, illegal immigrants and shady deals, simmering with a melting-pot clash of cultures and you have a recipe for highly entertaining, hotly explosive crime and justice. In the first title in the Suspicion series, SUSPICION OF INNOCENCE, Gail Connor is a fast-rising attorney in a major law firm, about to make partner—until her life is derailed by the discovery of her sister’s murdered body and the quick revelation that Gail is the prime suspect. Gail must fight for her life as she gets a first-hand look at the dark underside of the legal system.

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