BAIT

Veteran romance/crime bestseller Robards (Beachcomber ; Whispers at Midnight ) delivers another hold-your-breath drama, this time starring FBI agent Sam McCabe and advertising executive Maddie Fitzgerald. The sardonic hunk and the honey-eyed businesswoman are thrown together when Maddie becomes the latest target of a serial killer that Sam and his tubby assistant, E. P. Wynne, have been chasing for weeks, with no success. The body count already stands at six, but Maddie has neither the time nor the inclination to play bait for McCabe's booby trap to catch the killer. She needs the time to win the Brehmer's Dog Chow account (worth $10 million) lest her fledgling St. Louis ad agency go under before the end of the year. (And she has a secret past that she's determined not to share with anyone.) Soon enough, however, McCabe and his team are conducting a surveillance op from within her apartment, and that's when the suspense and romance really start to heat up. Though Robards's amorous prose is breathy as always ("His hand was warm and dry, big, long-fingered"; "Oh, god, he had dimples"), her pacing is excellent, and regular infusions of humor keep the story bouncing along between trysts and attacks. This one is sure to please fans. Agent, Robert Gottlieb at Trident Media. (July)