Lindsay Fox & Nathan Fisher (The Fox & Fisher Detective Agency)

Created by C.J. Carmichael

This romance series (part of Harlequin’s Super Romance line) revolves around the Manhattan-based Fox & Fisher Detective Agency, and the never-ending search for love among its various employees, up to and including its receptionist.

The agency was founded by former NYPD detective LINDSAY FOX after she left the department, largely due to the unceasing friction between her and her partner.

So imagine her surprise when that very man, NATHAN FISHER, shows up, answering her “Investigator Wanted” ad. And double that when she discovers that after tentatively hiring him, she detects “an undeniable and delicious chemistry spark(ing) beneath their differences.”

Got it? Needless to say, there’s plenty of heartache spoken here, plenty of push-and-pull, and plenty of tug-and-pull, as Lindsay and her new hire work an unusual case in the series debut, Perfect Partners? (2009).

Of course, true love eventually triumphs, so the 2010 sequel The P.I. Contest gives us a whole new two-to-tangle, when Kate Cooper, also ex-NYPD precinct, and Jay Savage, a gifted but amateur investigator, both apply for a position at the ever-expanding Fox & Fisher Detective Agency. There’s an instant attraction, but there’s only one job available, and — as they tell us in the club, “There’s more on the line than a simple career change. In this contest, they’re playing for the heart.”

Uh-huh.

Perhaps realizing the need for a new angle, beyond rival detectives falling in love, the author’s third and final book in the series, Receptionist Undercover (2010), finds the firm’s receptionist Nadine Kimble looking for love.

And, oh yes, a spot on the agency’s roster of investigators. But to do that, she takes on a client, without letting anyone at work know. Or letting the client, hunky Patrick O’Neil, in on the fact she’s not actually a detective.