Shadows in Death (In Death, #51)

by J D Robb

[EBookObsessed]

Another great investigation. I think N.R. has been holding out on us.

Lt. Eve Dallas is called to the scene of a murder in a park. Since she was out on the Town with her gorgeous billionaire husband, Roarke, he tags along to her crime scene. While Dallas is talking with the officers on scene and the witnesses, Roarke sees a familiar face in the crowd.  Lorcan Cobbe, a man from Roarke's past, a man who believes that he is Patrick Roarke's older son.  Cobbe is a man who has put his violent tendencies to use in his current employment -- assassin for hire.   Figuring out who hired this man and putting them away is the easy part for Dallas.  The problem is that now that Cobbe is in New York, he's planning to stay for his own pleasure.

Cobbe believed he was the bastard son of Patrick Roarke and he has always wanted Roarke to acknowledge him as such and to give up the name Roarke to Cobbe.   Roarke's response all those years ago was to leave Cobbe moaning on the floor.   As Roarke says at one point, if Cobbe was really Patrick Roarke's son, he was so much like the old man, that he would have openly acknowledged it. While they had a contemptuous childhood, they haven't crossed paths again in many, many years.  When Cobbe sees Roarke at the scene, he believes it is fate bringing them back together.

Eve and Roarke realize quickly that Cobbe is planning to stay in NY until he gets his personal revenge on Roarke.   Dallas fears for Roarke but Roarke insists that Cobbe would cause him more pain by going for her and Somerset first. So they are very busy trying to keep each other safe while trying to flush out Cobbe.

I generally break these stories down into two catagories;  either we are focused on the investigation or we are more focused on building the relationships between the characters. In the last few books, I think we have had less and less in the way of building the relationships. Even though we deal with Roarke's past, we really don't learn anything new.   It is just more stories about his father and his shady past.  Just about everyone who matters knows about Dallas's past, and Roarke's past (the cops playing don't ask, don't tell). Dallas and Roarke as solid in their marriage and any fights lately are just B.S. and feel like the author threw them in because they needed a fight. Dallas and Peabody are a solid team. Even Dallas and Somerset have really put away their daggers and just play snipe at each other.

That being said, since there really is no more relationship building going on, we really need solid crime stories to keep our interest and the last few have been pretty good. What I like in this one is that we really didn't have to do the tedious door to door work.  We relied on the beat cops and other members of the team doing their assignments and narrowing down information for Dallas and Peabody to put together. We can sometimes spend the first third of a book interviewing witnesses on the first murder whose information is irrelevant once another body pops up and leads the investigation down another avenue. While it is important that the case breaking lead doesn't magically fall into Dallas's lap (which it has done once or twice), we didn't have to spend large parts of the books getting information that wasn't needed. And once the cops knew that Cobbe was gunning for Roarke, they were all said "he's one of us and nobody comes after us." So the former criminal is now part of the NYPSD whether he likes it or not.

The last few books have been an improvement after the stories dipped in quality somewhere between 40 and 50. I am still enjoying this series and hopefully these last books mean that N.R. has her J.D. Robb mojo back.

Personally, I am happy to be back in the audiobook section with this series because I think Susan Ericksen does a phenomenal job with these characters.