Catching a kidnapper takes teamwork

…and a St. Bernard.

Alanna Morgan was raised in remote Alaska by a couple who called themselves her parents, not kidnappers.

A jailbreak brings her face-to-face with the past she wants to escape and on a collision course with the woman who stole her childhood. Alanna can’t let other helpless victims be abducted and sets out with Chance, a therapy St. Bernard, by her side.

But Desparre rookie police officer Peter Robak has other plans for the civilian investigator. Together, in the mountain wilderness in frigid temperatures, criminals aren’t the only threat they face.

A wary alliance and a rescue dog will have to be enough to keep them alive and to catch a desperate fugitive.

Titles in the K-9 Alaska series include – K-9 Defense – Alaska Mountain Rescue –  K-9 Cold Case – K-9 Hideout –

Title:  Alaska Mountain Rescue
Series:  K-9 Alaska #2
Author:  Elizabeth Heiter
Genre:  Romantic Suspense
Publication Date:  January 1, 2021
Rating:  4.5 stars

We return to the K-9 Alaska series with Alaska Mountain Rescue which takes place (story timing) about five years after Kensie rescued her kidnapped sister, Alanna, and changed the lives of all the children who had been kidnapped by the Altier couple over the years.  Only this time, Alanna is searching for the woman she called Mom for so many years, Darcy Altier after she escaped custody while at her husband’s funeral and it looks like she’s up to her old habits of kidnapping a child she feels is truly meant to be hers.  Alanna believes she can help the police find her and the child because she’s convinced she knows where Darcy is headed… home to Alaska.

Unfortunately, her offer of help is looked at with suspicion and the possibility that Alanna is, in fact, helping Darcy.  Left with no choice, and the strong belief that she’s right, plus the additional confidence in herself that she could talk Darcy into giving the child back and returning to prison she begins her own search.  Alanna will set out on her own to find a part of her past that her family really wants her to leave in the past.  But that past also contains her memories of people who loved her, siblings who were also torn from the family they’d become a part of, and guilt that she is the cause of so much damage to people she cares about – whether it’s logical to do so or not.  She didn’t expect the rookie police officer with an attitude of mistrust to follow her… or play such an important role in her life.

Alaska Mountain Rescue was a fascinating story in itself but also gave me a different way of looking at the survivors of child kidnapping who have been held a very, very long time.  I think most people would agree that when we learn of children who had been kidnapped years earlier being reunited with their families once again we don’t consider the fact that these children sometimes did have a family that they were being torn away from.  I know that sounds illogical but consider if a child was kidnapped at two years old and lived with one couple and other siblings for their entire life up until say twelve… those people are the only family that child remembers, in spite of the fact that there is another family who has been searching and grieving for years.  It’s such a mixed bag of emotions, isn’t it?  Joy and anger, finding one family and losing another.

Peter and Alanna’s romance is very much a slow burn and even on the very back burner for the main focus of Alaska Mountain Rescue is on the search for a kidnapper and the return of children so they do not suffer the fate that Alanna and her siblings did.  Slowly, Peter will lose his initial mistrust of the woman who is coming to mean so much to him… but first, there are choices to be made, and not all of them will turn out as intended.

I was completely drawn in and wrapped up in this story.  There is danger, not always expected or where we think we will be finding it, a sense of family betrayal, a few unexpected twists, watching Alanna deal with the present but her past as well, and of course… one adorable St. Bernard, Chance.  This pup won my heart early on and he just keeps getting better as the story continues.  If you haven’t started the K-9 Alaska series yet, I would recommend it to any reader who loves a good story with plenty of suspense, danger, and romance.

I own a Kindle edition of Alaska Mountain Rescue.

Available in paperback or for your favorite e-reader, mine is the Kindle.