Soldier of Fortune

(containing “Tom,” “Drew” and “Jobe”)

Nora

Dream’s End

Champagne Girl

Friends and Lovers

The Wedding in White

AVAILABLE JULY 2011

Heather’s Song

Snow Kisses

To Love and Cherish

Long, Tall and Tempted

(containing “Redbird,” “Paper Husband” and “Christmas Cowboy”)

The Australian

Darling Enemy

Trilby

AVAILABLE AUGUST 2011

Sweet Enemy

Soldier of Fortune

The Tender Stranger

Enamored

After the Music

The Patient Nurse

AVAILABLE SEPTEMBER 2011

The Case of the Mesmerizing Boss

The Case of the Confirmed Bachelor

The Case of the Missing Secretary

September Morning

Diamond Girl

Eye of the Tiger

Table of Contents

Chapter One (#uec21f252-d1be-57d0-8cd8-23b875a791ff)

Chapter Two (#u3ec09e6d-0e77-5891-b0c5-f59ca77cf61d)

Chapter Three (#u79753765-5983-5d87-b606-7e4745ba029c)

Chapter Four (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter One

Gabby was worried about J.D. It wasn’t anything she could put her finger on exactly. He still roared around the office, slamming things down on his desk when he couldn’t find notes or reminders he’d scribbled on envelopes or old business cards. He glared at Gabby when she didn’t bring his coffee on the stroke of nine o’clock. And there were the usual missing files, for which she was to blame of course, and the incessant phone calls that interrupted his concentration. There was still the heavy scowl on his broad face, and the angry glitter in his brown eyes. But that morning he’d been pacing around outside his office, smoking like a furnace. And that was unusual. Because J.D. had given up smoking years before, even before she had come to work for the law firm of Brettman and Dice.

She still couldn’t figure out what had set him off. She’d put a long-distance call through to him earlier, one that sounded like it came from overseas. The caller had sounded suspiciously like Roberto, his sister Martina’s husband, from Sicily. Soon afterward, there had been a flurry of outgoing calls. Now it was silent, except for the soft sounds the computer made as Gabby finished the last letter J.D. had dictated.

She propped her chin on her hands and stared at the door with curious green eyes. Her long, dark hair was piled high on her head, to keep it out of her way when she worked, and loose strands of it curled softly around her face, giving her an even more elfin look than usual. She was wearing a green dress that flattered her graceful curves. But J.D. wouldn’t notice her if she walked through the office naked. He’d said when he hired her that he’d robbed the cradle. And he hadn’t smiled when he said it. Although she was twenty-three now, he still made the most frustrating remarks about her extreme youth. She wondered wickedly what J.D. would say if she applied for Medicare in his name. Nobody knew how old he was. Probably somewhere around forty; those hard lines in his face hadn’t come from nowhere.

He was one of the most famous criminal lawyers in Chicago. He made waves. He ground up hostile witnesses like so much sausage meat. But before his entry into the profession five years earlier, nothing was known about him. He’d worked as a laborer by day and attended law school by night. He’d worked his way up the ladder quickly and efficiently with the help of a devastating intelligence that seemed to feed on challenge.

He had no family except for a married sister in Palermo, Sicily, and no close friends. He allowed no one to really know him. Not his associate Richard Dice, not Gabby. He lived alone and mostly worked alone, except for the few times when he needed some information that only a woman could get, or when he had to have Gabby along as a cover. She’d gone with him to meet accused killers in warehouses at midnight and down to the waterfront in the wee hours of the morning to meet a ship carrying a potential witness.

It was an exciting life, and thank God her mother back in Lytle, Texas, didn’t know exactly how exciting it was. Gabby had come to Chicago when she was twenty; she’d had to fight for days to get her mother to agree to the wild idea, to let her work for a distant cousin. The distant cousin had died quite suddenly and, simultaneously, she’d seen J.D.’s job posting for an executive assistant. When she applied, it had taken J.D. only five minutes to hire her. That had been two years earlier, and she’d never regretted the impulse that had led her to his office.

Just working for him was something of a feather in Gabby’s cap. The other assistants in the building were forever pumping her for information about her attractive and famous boss. But Gabby was as secretive as he was. It was why she’d lasted so long as his assistant. He trusted her as he trusted no one else.

She was a paralegal now, having taken night courses at a local college to earn the title. She did far more than just type letters and run off copies on the copier. She practically ran the office. She also did legwork for her boss, and frequently traveled with him when the job warranted it.

While she was brooding, the door opened suddenly. J.D. came through it like a locomotive, so vibrant and superbly masculine that she imagined most men would step aside for him out of pure instinct. His partner, Richard Dice, was on his heels, raging as he followed.