Imprisoned in a false 'marriage' and trapped in Glasgow's mean streets, Kirsty Barnes and Craig Nicholson are drifting apart, held together only by their son, Bobby. Kirsty finds herself drawn more and more to David Lockhart, the young minister who cares for her deeply. But David is bound to return to China and only his love for Kirsty keeps him in Scotland. Craig, now a committed policeman, is incensed by the behaviour of his family when they fall under the influence of a rich and generous patron, and seeks solace in the arms of a street woman from the burgh's dark slums. His growing obsession with her threatens not only Kirsty, but the future of his family too...
A pseudonym used by Hugh C. Rae, initially in collaboration with Peggie Coghlan and later alone.
Hugh Crauford Rae was born on November 22, 1935 in Glasgow, Scotland, UK, son of Isobel and Robert Rae. He published his first stories aged 11 in the Robin comic, winning a cricket bat the same year in a children’s writing competition. After graduating from secondary school, he worked as an assistant in the antiquarian department of John Smith's bookshop. At work, he met her future wife, Elizabeth. Published since 1963, he started to wrote suspense novels as Hugh C. Rae, but he also used the pseudonyms of Robert Crawford, R.B. Houston, Stuart Stern (with S. Ungar) and James Albany. On 1973, his novel "The Shooting Gallery" was nominee by the Edgar Award. On 1974, he wrote the first few romance novels with Peggie Coghlan, using the popular pseudonym Jessica Stirling. However, when she retired 7 years after the first book was published, he continued writing more than 30 on his own, and also as Caroline Crosby. His female pseudonyms first became widely known in 1999, when "The Wind from the Hills" was shortlisted for Romantic Novel of the Year Award by the Romantic Novelists' Association. Widowed nine years ago, Hugh died on September 24, 2014 at the age of 78.