Dedicated To Deirdre. Anne Marie Winston
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“Would you mind if I came by tomorrow?” Letter to Reader Title Page About the Author Dedication Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Chapter Nine Chapter Ten Epilogue Copyright
“Would you mind if I came by tomorrow?”
Ronan asked Deirdre.
Yes, I mind! But she felt trapped by the little voice inside that reminded her it would be rude to refuse. Ronan was looking at her, his eyes the color of tiger-eye topaz alive with interest. “All right,” Deirdre said before she could think too much more about it.
Ronan nodded. “I’ll come by tomorrow, then.” He took her hand in his to say goodbye.
Driving home a few minutes later, Deirdre was a mass of churning anxiety. Why was she letting him into her home? She didn’t want to look at a man, let alone think about one.
Without warning, the memory of his big hand taking hers returned. The man radiated warmth. And she hadn’t been warm in a very long time....
Dear Reader,
Happy Valentine’s Day! And what better way to celebrate Cupid’s reign than by reading six brand-new Desire novels...? Putting us in the mood for sensuous love is this February’s MAN OF THE MONTH, with wonderful Dixie Browning offering us the final title in her THE LAWLESS HEIRS miniseries in A Knight in Rusty Armor. This alpha-male hero knows just what to do when faced with a sultry damsel in distress!
Continue to follow the popular Fortune family’s romances in the Desire series FORTUNE’S CHILDREN: THE BRIDES. The newest installment, Society Bride by Elizabeth Bevarly, features a spirited debutante who runs away from a business-deal marriage...into the arms of the rugged rancher of her dreams.
Ever-talented Anne Marie Winston delivers the second story in her BUTLER COUNTY BRIDES, with a single mom opening her home and heart to a seductive acquaintance, in Dedicated to Deirdre. Then a modern-day cowboy renounces his footloose ways for love in The Outlaw Jesse James, the final title in Cindy Gerard’s OUTLAW HEARTS miniseries; while a child’s heartwarming wish for a father is granted in Raye Morgan’s Secret Dad. And with Little Miss Innocent? Lori Foster proves that opposites do attract.
This Valentine’s Day, Silhouette Desire’s little red books sizzle with compelling romance and make the perfect gift for the contemporary woman—you! So treat yourself to all six!
Enjoy!
Joan Marlow Golan
Senior Editor, Silhouette Desire
Please address questions and book requests to:
Silhouette Reader Service U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269 Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3
Dedicated to Deirdre
Anne Marie Winston
ANNE MARIE WINSTON
has believed in happy endings all her life. Having the opportunity to share them with her readers gives her great joy. Anne Marie enjoys figure skating and working in the gardens of her south-central Pennsylvania home.
For Nora
Who has great taste in shoes, champagne and pals (!) And who excels at midnight readings.
One
“Lee! Don’t pull—”
Too late. Deirdre Patten’s oldest son used every ounce of his wiry five-year-old strength to tug a box of sugared cereal from the very bottom of an enormous stack of the breakfast foods in the grocery store. With an experienced eye born of many brushes with disaster, she instantly calculated that she was too far away to grab her son. Her heart lurched as the entire stack tilted and began to slide slowly forward. Visions of the grievous injury a huge stack of boxes could do to a little boy flashed across her mind as she dashed forward, and in the same instant, the entire array of cereal boxes crashed to the floor right in front of her.
“Lee! Honey, where are you?” Frantically she kicked aside boxes, then dropped to her knees looking for a little arm or leg beneath the avalanche. “Lee? Lee!”
“Hi, Mommy!”
Her heart began to beat again when she heard the chirpy little voice. She paused in the middle of her frantic shoveling and looked around. On the other side of the aisle, Lee was waving to her. He stood beside a stranger, a man with dark chestnut hair, a man who had Lee’s wrist in a firm grasp.
“Baby, are you all right?” She leaped over the boxes and knelt beside her son, running her hands over him. Nothing looked broken. “How many times have I told you—”
“The man saved me, Mom.” Lee was pointing up, and she realized the man who had released her son’s wrist must have pulled him out of the way of the boxes.
She sat back on her heels with a weary smile. “Thank you so much. This one and his little brother keep me...on my...toes.” Her voice drained away to nothing as she recognized the man looking down at her.
“Hello...Mrs. Patten, I believe?”
The voice was the same, deep and slightly rough, with a lazy drawl to the words that made a woman’s toes curl. She’d noticed that the night of the office Christmas party in Baltimore, Maryland, three years ago even though she’d been so upset with her husband she could barely see straight.
Slowly she got to her feet, keeping her hands on her son’s shoulders in front of her. “Hello.”
He extended a large, tanned hand. “Ronan Sullivan. We’ve met before.”
She flushed, a nod her only acknowledgment as she reached out to shake his hand. “Deirdre is my first name, but my friends call me Dee. This is Lee and my other son, in the cart, is Tommy.” She barely touched his fingers before drawing back quickly. His hand was warm and firm, and the brief moment when her hand was in his produced an unsettling instant of awareness