Veena’s review of Toxic Game (Ghostwalkers, Book 15) by Christine Feehan
Paranormal Romance published by Berkley 12 Mar 19
I remember when Ms. Feehan first released this series, and I, like many of her readers, was enthralled by the power of her imagination. Now fifteen books later, clearly there have been lots of ups and downs as she has stretched her imagination to create different types of Ghostwalkers and the women who are fated to be the one for them. The one thing that seems to have stayed constant is the flower names for the girls taken out of orphanages who lead a hard life, chemically modified until they meet the one warrior who is their perfect complement. I know there is an end game here somewhere, but my imagination has failed me to what it is. But, in the meantime, settle in and get ready for a new ride.
Draden and his Ghostwalker team are parachuted into the Indonesian jungles to rescue fellow teammates from a deadly situation. As they leave the site, Draden is hit with a dart that is infected with a deadly virus. He remains behind and begins hunting for the teams in the jungle who are testing this virus. Soon he finds he’s not alone and stumbles upon Shylah, who is in the jungle on a complementary mission. It also turns out that Shylah is his perfectly engineered genetic mate.
As the secrets of the lab in the jungle unfold, Shylah shares her dreams and hopes with Draden. With the backup from their team, they race to find the antidote and keep themselves alive not only from the human predators but also from the enemy that is battling their immune systems.
There is a beautiful scene when Draden recreates Shylah’s perfect wedding in the jungle with the help of his team. Of course, they are Ghostwalkers and this is a romance novel from the pen of Ms. Feehan, so clearly our protagonists are going to survive to live a long, happy life in the jungles of Louisiana where the team currently resides. Along the way, however, the author ratchets up the suspense and serves up a lot of bad guys to give the story a nice edge that makes it worth reading.
Grade: B
Summary:
On a rescue mission in the heart of the Indonesian jungle, Dr. Draden Freeman and his GhostWalker team need to extract the wounded as quickly as possible—or risk spreading a deadly virus unleashed by a terrorist cell. When Draden gets infected, he forces his team to leave him behind. He won’t risk exposing anyone else. He intends to find the ones responsible and go out in a blaze of glory….
Shylah Cosmos’s mission is to track the virus and remain unseen. Her enhanced senses tell her that the gorgeous man eradicating the terrorists one by one is a GhostWalker—and his lethal precision takes her breath away. When he’s hit by a lucky shot, she can’t stop herself from stepping in, not knowing that by saving his life she’s exposed herself to the virus.
There’s no telling how much time Draden and Shylah have left. Racing to find a cure, they quickly realize that they’ve found their perfect partner just in time to lose everything. But even as the virus threatens to consume their bodies, they’ve never felt more alive.
