Monday, February 08, 2010

Obsession Untamed by Pamela Palmer

Tighe is a Feral, one of a race of immortals known as the Therians who are filled with the spirits of one of the thirteen warrior clans. Tighe is the Tiger, and right now, his soul is split in two. A witch cloned several of the Ferals, and while all the other clones have been dealt with, Tighe's clone is far more persistent, evil and harder to catch.

Worse for Tighe is that his clone has taken to killing innocent women and children, and since he's wearing Tighe's face, that could lead to serious trouble for Tighe and the other ferals. Thankfully, no one has survived seeing the killer's face, but even if all he's doing is killing humans, Tighe needs his clone dead- if he's denied his full spirit for too long, he will die, and already, dark streaks have started appearing in his eyes. He doesn't know what they mean, but he thinks it's something bad. The only upside to this is that he can sometimes see through his clone's eyes, allowing him to see who he is killing.

Delaney Randall is an FBI agent on the trail of the DC Vampire serial killer when she confronts him over the body of his latest victim. She sees his face, and fires her gun at him, but it doesn't seem to stop him, and he nearly kills her as well before he is driven off by other agents working with her. But now, something is wrong, and she has started to see through the killer's eyes when he kills. Tighe gets a glimpse of Delaney as she deals with the horrible headaches that seeing the visions give her.

But why does Delaney suddenly have the visions and not Tighe? The ferals think that perhaps when his clone was killing her by sucking out her soul, he sccidentally breathed some of his into her when her partners shot him. In any case, it's imperative that Tighe get the ability to see visions of his clone back from Delaney, which means kidnapping her and taking it from her.

But that is harder than it looks, because Delaney has seen the face of Tighe's clone, and when she sees him, she's sure he's come back to finish killing her off. As they fight, Tighe tries to wrest the visions from her, but instead of taking them, it has the effect of *really* turning her on. The harder he tries to take the visions, the more aroused she gets- and it arouses him as well. Before he can think of anything else to do, she climaxes and passes out, leaving him aroused, horny and still not having the ability to see what his clone is up to. Lacking anything else to do, he takes her to the safe house where the rest of the ferals are waiting.

They think he should just kill her, but Tighe isn't willing to do that. Instead, he talks to Delaney, telling her he's the killer's twin brother, and about their connection through the visions. Delaney isn's sure she believes him, and mortified at the way he's caused her to lose control sexually. But when another vision comes on her, he realizes that the visions are killing her- she'll be dragged down into darkness with no way out if he can't go into her mind and reach her. Which he does, and then realizes that if he touches her forehead while she is having a vision, not only does it alleviate her pain, but he can share her vision of what his clone is doing.

But when her visions lead her to a woman who is tortured by having her arms broken, and then having her children killed in front of her, Delaney, Tighe and the Ferals race to the scene, but the clone has started a fire, burning the woman alive and imperiling another young child, a girl. But when he goes to her aid, the FBI agents that Delaney called try to arrest him, and he must flee. They shoot him, and Delaney sees him take a shot in the heart. Tighe disappears into the woods, and Delaney thinks he is dead.

She's upset, but Tighe can't leave her alive with her knowledge of him. but when his clone comes back to try and off her again, Tighe risks his life to save her from the blood loss- and she returns the favor when he goes into his feral form and can't come out again, bringing him back into sanity and human form. In exchange, he bonds her to him to allay the other ferals fears of her, but again, the clone sneaks into Feral House to steal her away, this time in the form of Lyon's mate, the Radiant. But as time passes, and Tighe comes close to losing his soul forever, can he find the woman he loves and kill the clone, regaining the missing half of his soul before it's too late? And then, can a mere human and an immortal Therian have any kind of future together?

I liked this book, but not as much as Passion Untamed. I found it less compelling and less easy to get into- maybe because it's quite clear that this is not the first book in the series, and in this one, what's missing makes readers feel like they are missing something- unlike Passion, where it doesn't quite really matter how Paenther was caught. Here, I felt like I was playing catchup all the time, and not making much headway.

I found the names less irritating and annoying this time- I guess I've gotten used to them. Although now, it was the cover that kept making me go... WTF? Tighe is supposed to be a Tiger, but the animal depicted on the cover is a mountain lion/cougar- or maybe a female lioness. The artist couldn't even figure out what a Tiger was supposed to look like? Epic Fail.

I did end up liking the story more towards the end of the book, but the beginning was something of a slog for me. I would still like to read the first book in the series, and maybe about Vhyper (because there are way too few weresnakes in romance, or even Urban Fantasy. And yes, I would recommend this book, but not as much as Passion Untamed. Recommended.

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