Imagine spending your first sixteen years following a carefully planned regimen designed by a controlling woman who happens to be your mother. We're not talking about a caring devoted mom. No this is a woman who carefully orchestrated her life and is now poised to do the same for or should we say to her daughter. But Elizabeth reaches the point where she wants to be like girls her age, have friends, go shopping and maybe have a boyfriend. You know be normal. Pretty tall order for a girl genius lacking social skills and no prospects for attaining them. In Elizabeth's first attempt to rebel against her mother's domination events spiral out of control and forever change the course of her life.

As a witness to a brutal double murder she is placed in a protected environment which turns out to be a death trap and Elizabeth narrowly escapes. She has virtually no place to go since her mother has just about abandoned her. Luckily Elizabeth has her intelligence and resourcefulness to rely on and as unimaginable as it may seem she manages to establish the means to support her, keep her identity hidden and develop skills needed to exact revenge on those that killed her friends and protectors.

Now twelve years later as one of her many alter egos Elizabeth Finch settled in the Ozarks under the name of Abigail Lowery, bought a house and set it up as a fortress. Everything she learned about security systems and computers helped her design a place where she feels safe. And along with her dog Bert, Abigail has established a routine driven life. Strange if you consider that was what she hated most about her life under her mother's roof - the routine. The Ozarks was a small artist's town where everyone knew everyone and the locals were curious about this reclusive young woman but Abigail was used to keeping people at arm's length - that is until she met Chief Brooks Gleason. He was determined to get to know this fascinating extremely smart woman whose habit of being so literal always made him smile. The cop in him knew there was a story behind her reclusiveness. The more time they spent together the more he saw a frightened woman who kept herself barricaded. And as hard as Abigail fought against developing any relationship and feelings for Brooks there was a part of her that still longed for someone to love her.

The sheriff made her feel things and long for things that seemed impossible. As long as she was in hiding from the killers there was no hope. But Brooks opened her eyes and heart to the possibility of loving someone and being truly loved in return. Surely that was worth risking everything for.

Fans of Nora Roberts are in for a treat with this page turner. I was hooked from page one and the suspense and angst held on till the bitter end. Roberts infused her characters with equal measures of insecurity and guts making THE WITNESS a tangibly real experience.