So after a bit of a break to re-read some Jane Yellowrock, I’ve come back around to Jennifer Estep’s Elemental Assassin Series. I started up again with book 6, By a Thread. This one picks up just a few weeks after Gin, a.k.a. – the Spider, killed the infamous Mab Monroe. Now there’s a power vacuum in Ashland and, oh yeah, every two bit thug is gunning for her. Whether it’s because of a bounty or to prove how tough they are, there isn’t a day going by where Gin isn’t killing a couple people just to survive.

Frankly, she’s getting tired of it and her foster brother, Finnegan Lane, talks her into a vacation with him, her sister Bria Coolidge and lover Owen Grayson. Bria talks them to Blue Marsh, which is where she grew up. Bria is anxious to catch up with her best friend/may as well be her sister Callie. Gin is more than a little jealous, mostly because she’s afraid that she’s going to lose Bria to moral indignation. See, Bria is a cop, and an honest one as well. This is a rarity in Ashland and the only other honest cop Gin met, Donovan Caine, broke her heart and left both her and the city.

So Gin tries her damndest to play stupid tourist and to enjoy Callie’s presence. It doesn’t always work, and she gets more than a little snarky from time to time with her fellow restaurateur. Bria’s less than pleased but the jealousy takes a back seat to trying to protect Callie as it becomes apparent that she’s in real danger from Blue Marsh’s version of Mab Monroe, Randall Dekes a vamp with a taste for elemental blood.

To make matters worse, cop Donovan Caine turns up as Callie’s fiancee. He still has a stick up his ass about Gin’s profession, and refuses her help when she offers. In the end, Gin decides to help anyway because Dekes made the stupid mistake of trying to get her and Bria killed in their own hotel room.

Of course, things don’t quite go to Gin’s plan. Usually she takes her time, feels things out and plans, plans, plans. But she’s in something of a hurry and wants to use Dekes’ upcoming press conference as an opportunity to strongly dissuade him from his course of action against Callie. Dekes almost kills Gin, but she gets away and luckily gets healed by Jo-Jo, whom Finn and Owen made sure to bring with them.

Thinking that the Spider is dead, Dekes kidnaps Callie, forcing Donovan to work with Gin and the others – much to their chagrin. In the end, Gin kills the bad guy (with the help of his own wife) and rescues the girl (in this case, girls). It wasn’t much of a vacation, but something important happened for Gin. She finally and firmly told Donovan to shove it when he said he still wanted her, wanted to be with her. Which kinda makes him even shittier in my estimation because he has a frickin’ fiancee! He’s ready to drop Callie like a hot rock because at the moment, he wants Gin? What an asshole.

Gin, however, is perfectly content and in love with Owen and leaves the old temptation of Donovan Caine behind. The only part I didn’t really like about this was Callie thanking Gin for letting Donovan Caine go. WTF? I think Callie could do a hell of a lot better than someone who clearly wants her to be a “good” Gin Blanco. Despite this little rankling of my feminist spirit, the book itself was quite good. Rating: A.