THE WOMAN LEFT BEHIND
Series: Misted Pines #4
Genre: Thriller Romance
Author: Kristen Ashley
Release Date: April 15, 2025
The Woman Left Behind, an all-new, beautifully-crafted, compelling second-chance, thriller romance and the fourth book in the Misted Pines Series from New York Times bestselling author Kristen Ashley is live now!
There are two dead bodies in Idaho, and the gun used to kill them has been traced back to a sixteen-year-old robbery in Misted Pines.
Sheriff Harry Moran has a broken heart and a stack of case files on his desk that the corrupt sheriff who came before him might have bungled.
Or he may have framed innocent people.
The first case Harry dives into, the woman left behind lives just a block away from his office.
When Lillian Rainier opens the door to the sheriff, Harry, who’s been a dead man walking since his wife died, comes back to life.
As for Lillian, she’s had a crush on Harry for forever, Harry showing at her door, and how he is when he does only makes her fall deeper.
As Harry and his team dive into these suspicious cases, Harry and Lillian have to figure out what to do with all they feel for each other, how hard it hits them, and how deep it goes.
But as a voice from the past becomes a witness in the present, and Harry and his crew dig deeper, they sense something sinister happened years ago. As they weave together the threads of a cold case, they realize how messy it is.
Worse, the man behind the mess is desperately cleaning it up …
And no one in Misted Pines is safe.
I would love this man until my dying breath.
Prepare to judge me when I tell you that this was my first book in this series. I’m a die hard KA fan, so how this series skated under my radar is beyond me and I will rectifying it immediately by going back and reading the first three. However, I can also confirm that this book can be easily enjoyed as a standalone.
I’m so sorry you have to go through this with me.”
“Lilly,” he said sharply. At his tone, he felt her head move and her gaze on him through the dark. When he got the last, he stated, “I feel like the luckiest man on the planet that I get to be here for you while you go through this.”
This is a small town romantic suspense and while the romance was wonderful, it was secondary to the suspense plot of the cold case Harry is working on. I loved the way that the author effortlessly wove the romance into the plot without it overwhelming or taking away from the suspense. The connection between Harry and Lilly felt organic and developed realistically over time, considering that Harry is investigating a cold case that is so connected to Lilly.
Another thing I have to call out is how well Kristen handled Harry being a widower. So often you read characters who lost a spouse and villainizes them to make it easier for the character to move on. Not Harry. Harry loved his wife and he mourned her for years. He doesn’t discount what she gave him for the short time they were together but most importantly, Lilly doesn’t feel like a fill in or secondary prize. He fell hard for her but it took time and he didn’t rush it. I loved his maturity and sweet and protective nature.
I loved her. I married her. I was destroyed when I lost her. But that was years ago and something you need to know. I’m stubborn.”
Her eyes got big at this admission, and she mumbled, “Um… okay.”
“Being stubborn,” he went on, “I held on to her loss longer than I should.” He gave her a squeeze and warned, “I’m not over her, Lillian. I’ll never be over her. She’ll always be in my heart. But, not so recently, a friend told me Winnie would be pissed as shit I stopped living when she did. He was right. It took me until meeting you to understand how right he was.”
Harry has taken over as Sheriff and the legacy of the previous sheriff’s corruption still follows him, particularly with the recent cold case of a robbery and the finding of two dead bodies which seems to be linked. And they also seem to be linked to a woman who the entire town seems to know but has flown under his radar. But the minute he meets Lilly, he knows that she is so much more than just a victim of a crime. She’s a woman he wants in his life and who deserves answers which he will do everything in his power to get her.
I do wish that I knew the themes this book deals with because parental loss is a trigger for me having lost my dad a few months ago this was particularly difficult for me to read. I enjoyed it but it was an emotional read for me and took me a bit longer to finish because I had to pace myself. The pacing, the development, the secondary characters were all fantastic. While I didn’t expect a cold case to be wrapped up with a perfect bow at the end, I do wish we got a bit more answers, but it was still highly satisfying so I can’t complain.
If you’re looking for a small town suspense with a beautiful romance and the most swoon sheriff hero, look no further. Prepare to fall and fall hard for the sheriff.
For more information on Kristen Ashley, visit: https://www.kristenashley.net/
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