.

      “I’m not going to attack you,” Ren growled.

      “M-more than you already have?”

      “You’re alive, aren’t you?” he snapped. “At least for now.”

      Wrong choice of words, he realised. He was grimly aware that she was trembling now. He hated her terror and wanted to explain everything, but he didn’t dare take the time.

      “Look, I’m trying to help you. There are some nasty creatures out here after dark, not a few of them human. Trust me, sweetheart. I’m your best chance of getting out of this whole thing in one piece.” In desperation he handed her an oversized T-shirt and shorts. Anything to cover her skimpy bikini.

      When she didn’t move, he grabbed the shorts and yanked them over her hips. She flinched when he touched the bare skin at her waist.

      “If I had evil designs on you, don’t you think I’d be taking your clothes off, not putting them on?” he drawled.

       ABOUT THE AUTHOR

      Rae Anne Thayne finds inspiration in the beautiful northern Utah mountains, where she lives with her husband and three children. Her books have won numerous honours, including a RITA^® Award nomination from Romance Writers of America and a Career Achievement Award from Romantic Times BOOKreviews. RaeAnne loves to hear from readers and can be reached through her website at www.raeannethayne.com or at PO Box 6682, North Logan, UT 84341, USA.

      Dear Reader,

      Readers often ask me where I find ideas for my books. I’m afraid I have no secret stash of ideas. For High-Stakes Honeymoon, I created a sibling for a favourite character of mine, Daniel Galvez, while I was writing a previous book. I didn’t know anything about this sibling other than his name – Lorenzo “Ren” Galvez – and that he was very sexy, of course, and a scientist somewhere in Latin America.

      And then I happened to catch a few minutes of a documentary about sea turtles in Costa Rica and I knew this was where I had to plunk Ren. I had to create a heroine just right for him, and I came up with Olivia Lambert, someone funny and smart but racked with self-doubt. Olivia brings out all of Ren’s protective instincts and she also proves herself to be brave and self-reliant.

      I spent months immersing myself in the culture and the overwhelming beauty of Costa Rica. While I haven’t actually visited yet, it’s definitely on my life-list of travel destinations and I plan to go soon.

      I hope you enjoy the journey!

       RaeAnne Thayne

      High-Stakes Honeymoon

      RAEANNE THAYNE

      Chapter 1

      Paradise sucked.

      Big-time.

      Olivia Lambert sat on her damp towel, her hands clasped around her knees, watching the sun sink into the Pacific in a blaze of color. Palm fronds whispered a soft song overhead, the warm, impossibly blue ocean gently kissed the sand at her feet and a soft breeze danced across her skin.

      Behind her, the thick, lush rain forest teemed with color and noise and life—bright birds, exotic butterflies, even a monkey or two.

      As a honeymoon destination, this remote, wild corner of Costa Rica seemed perfect, especially staying in a guest villa on the estate of a reclusive billionaire. It was romantic, secluded, luxurious.

      The only trouble was, she’d left her groom behind in Texas.

      Olivia sighed, gazing out at the ripple of waves as she tried to drum up a little enthusiasm for the holiday that stretched ahead of her like the vast, undulating surface of the Pacific. She’d been here less than twenty-four hours and had nine more days to go, and at this point she was just about ready to pack up her suitcases and catch the next puddle jumper she could find back to the States.

      She was bored and lonely and just plain miserable.

      Maybe she should have invited one of her girlfriends to come along for company. Or better yet, she should have just eaten the cost of the plane tickets and stayed back in Fort Worth.

      But then she would have had to face the questions and the sympathetic—and not so sympathetic—looks and the resigned disappointment she was entirely too accustomed to seeing in her father’s eyes.

      No, this way was better. If nothing else, ten days in another country would give her a little time and distance to handle the bitter betrayal of knowing that even in this, Wallace Lambert wouldn’t stand behind her. Her father sided with his golden boy, his groomed successor, and couldn’t seem to understand why she might possibly object to her fiancé cheating on her with another woman two weeks before their wedding.

      It was apparently entirely unreasonable of her to expect a few basic courtesies—minor little things like fidelity and trust—from the man who claimed to adore her and worship the ground she walked on.

      Who knew?

      The sun slipped further into the water and she sighed again, angry at herself. So much for her promise that she wouldn’t brood about Bradley or her father.

      This was her honeymoon and she planned to enjoy herself, damn them both. She could survive nine more days in paradise, in the company of macaws and howler monkeys, iguanas and even a sloth—not to mention her host, whom she had yet to encounter.

      James Rafferty, whom she was meeting later for dinner, had built his fortune through online gambling and he had created an exclusive paradise here completely off the grid—no power except through generators, water from wells on the property. Even her cell phone didn’t work here.

      Nine days without distractions ought to be long enough for her to figure out what she was going to do with the rest of her life. She was twenty-six years old and it was high time she shoved everybody else out of the driver’s seat so she could start picking her own direction.

      Some kind of animal screamed suddenly, a high, disconcerting sound, and Olivia jumped, suddenly uneasy to realize she was alone down here on the beach.

      There were jaguars in this part of the Osa Peninsula, she had read in the guidebook. Jaguars and pumas and who knew what else. A big cat could suddenly spring out of the jungle and drag her into the trees, and no one in the world would ever know what happened to her.

      That would certainly be a fitting end to what had to be the world’s worst honeymoon.

      She shivered and quickly gathered up her things, shaking the sand out of her towel and tossing her sunglasses and paperback into her beach bag along with her cell phone that she couldn’t quite sever herself from, despite its uselessness here.

      No worries, she told herself. She seemed to remember jaguars hunted at night and it was still a half hour to full dark. Anyway, she had a hard time believing James Rafferty would allow wild predators such as that to roam free on his vast estate.

      Still, she wasn’t at all sure she could find her way back to her bungalow in the dark, and she needed to shower off the sand and sunscreen and change for dinner.

      She had waited too long to return, she quickly discovered. She would have thought the dying rays of the sun would provide enough light for her to make her way back to her bungalow, fifty yards or so from the beach up a moderate incline. But the trail moved through heavy growth, feathery ferns and flowering shrubs and thick trees with vines roped throughout.

      What had seemed lovely and exotic on her way down to the beach suddenly seemed darker, almost menacing, in the dusk.

      Something rustled in the thick undergrowth to her left. She swallowed a gasp and picked up her pace, those jaguars prowling through her head again.