Hunted (Donna Collins) Books in Order

The Hunted series begins with a bad night that should have been over in minutes. Cornish nurse Eliza Hamilton is attacked on her way home, a stranger named Roman Holbrook steps out of the dark to save her, and then he disappears before the police can ask a single question. When Roman turns up again at Eliza's door, Donna Collins turns that chance meeting into the start of a much bigger story, one built around pursuit, secrecy, and the feeling that danger has been circling long before either of them understood it.

Eliza is the anchor of the books. She starts as an ordinary working woman who wants a quiet explanation for a violent event, and instead gets pulled into Roman's hidden world. Roman is harder to read. He is protective, secretive, capable of sudden violence, and clearly carrying a past that has not finished with him. A lot of the series' energy comes from that mismatch. Eliza wants the truth. Roman wants her alive. Those goals push them together just as often as they pull them apart.

Cornwall gives the early part of the trilogy its mood. Rain, isolated roads, dark houses, and the sense that help may be too far away all make the story feel close and tense. Even when the scope widens in Resurrection and The Undoing, Collins keeps that boxed-in feeling. Somebody is always hunting. Somebody is always hiding. Time is rarely on anyone's side.

This is not a cozy mystery.

What makes Hunted stand out is the way it starts like a straight suspense story and then opens the door to something stranger. By the second book, Roman's fight is no longer just about escaping dangerous people. Questions of death, return, and broken rules move to the center of the story. Collins never forgets the chase element, though. The books keep moving like thrillers, even as they fold in darker supernatural ideas and a world that does not play by normal rules.

The relationship between Eliza and Roman is the spine that holds it all together. Neither of them is written as a polished action hero. They are battered, frightened, stubborn people trying to protect each other while also dealing with their own histories. Roman's past keeps surfacing in painful ways, and Eliza is not left standing safely on the sidelines. She has to make hard choices too, and the series is at its best when it shows how those choices change her.

If you like dark suspense with a paranormal edge, this is the lane. Expect fast pacing, cat-and-mouse pressure, a central bond built under strain, and stakes that keep climbing from book to book. The trilogy mixes romance, fear, and pursuit without losing sight of the human part of the story, which is really about two people trying to stay alive long enough to understand what has found them.