A baby in need of protection—
A killer in pursuit.
Determined to connect with her last living family member, Karissa Landon tracks down her cousin—and finds the woman murdered and her baby boy in danger. Now she’s running for both their lives, and her only hope is a former firefighter. Hunter Raines is hiding secrets, but he’ll make it his mission to protect Karissa and her infant charge…at all costs.
JILL ELIZABETH NELSON writes what she likes to read—faith-based tales of adventure seasoned with romance. Parts of the year find her and her husband on the international mission field. Other parts find them at home in rural Minnesota, surrounded by the woods and prairie and four grown children and young grandchildren. More about Jill and her books can be found at jillelizabethnelson.com or Facebook.com/jillelizabethnelson.author.
Evidence of Murder
Witness to Murder
Calculated Revenge
Legacy of Lies
Betrayal on the Border
Frame-Up
Shake Down
Rocky Mountain Sabotage
Duty to Defend
Lone Survivor
Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk
Lone Survivor
Jill Elizabeth Nelson
ISBN: 978-0-008-90085-4
LONE SURVIVOR
© 2020 Jill Elizabeth Nelson
Published in Great Britain 2020
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.
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Text to speech
“What’s going on?”
Karissa looked up at her protector.
Hunter’s bearded face had hardened into a fierce mask. “They’re burning the cabin. If anyone is alive in here, they expect us to run out where they can pick us off like tin ducks in a county fair target-shooting booth.”
Karissa sucked in a breath. “What are we going to do?”
“Not what they expect.” He tugged back a corner of the thin area rug they were squatting on, exposing a portion of a trap door.
“Of course! You have a cellar.”
Would the smoke penetrate the cellar? Or would the floorboards currently beneath her feet fall in on them, consuming them in flaming debris? Did she want to die in a hole like a rat?
Karissa met the stranger’s steel-gray gaze.
“Trust me,” he said, voice low and steady, like a rock of dependability...which didn’t match his appearance at all.
What choice did she have but to trust him?
Dear Reader,
I’m so glad you came along on this adventure with Karissa and Hunter and, of course, baby Kyle. Though everything came out well in the end for them, there were certainly sad times, scary times and hurtful times along the route. In a real sense, that’s life for all of us.
The truth is, we struggle with many problems and trials in this world. My hope and prayer for us all is that we walk in that “blessed hope” of Scripture that an eternity of joy in God’s presence awaits us. May we be able to express as Karissa did at the end of the story that death holds no terrors for us. Nor should anything this life can throw at us. The apostle Paul was adamant that nothing “shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:39).
We cling to promises like the verse above when doubts and temptations assail us and hurtful things happen. Even if we end up the last one in our family, as Karissa did, God is our heavenly family and will provide human connections to warm our hearts and lives. God is, indeed, a good, good Father.
I enjoy hearing from readers. You may contact me by email at [email protected] or look me up on my website at jillelizabethnelson.com. I am also available to contact through my Facebook page: Facebook.com/jillelizabethnelson.author.
May your trust in the Lord grow deeper and richer as you read the stories God gives His writers for Love Inspired Suspense.
Blessings always,
Jill Elizabeth Nelson
A father of the fatherless...is God in his holy habitation.
—Psalm