Private Lives

Elizabeth Walker has spent most of the past three decades trying to forget the loss of her mother and father, a lonely childhood spent in a series of foster homes and the two baby sisters she hasn't seen in twenty-five years. She values her privacy above everything, and has built a wall around herself that few people have ever climbed.

But when her best friend, Gina, risks losing her young daughter to an impersonal court system–the same system that failed Elizabeth many years ago–she vows to fight back. But Elizabeth needs help. She needs the kind of help that a family can give, and she needs Ryan Paxton, the brilliant attorney whose tragic family history is intertwined with her own.

As the custody battle turns to something more dangerous–and more deadly–Elizabeth comes face-to-face with a past she has tried to forget and a future she wants to embrace.

About the author

USA Today best-seller Karen Young has written twenty-four novels and several novellas. She has won many honours as an author and is best known for her sensitive portrayals of social problems affecting the lives of contemporary women and has written books dealing with teen pregnancy, foster care, alcoholism, infidelity and domestic abuse. "My novels deal with the concept of the evolved woman–women who are able to look their personal demons in the eye and solve their problems…and also enjoy a satisfying, loving relationship." She, too, has evolved as an author, moving from the traditional Silhouette romance to longer, more sophisticated Superromances to contemporary women's fiction and then mystery/thrillers. Whatever the "category," she feels comfortable writing books that women want to read. Karen Young currently resides in a suburb of Houston, Texas.