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Whatever Reilly Wants...
Maureen Child
Connor Reilly had laughed at his brother for being the first triplet to lose the "no sex for ninety days" bet. Though there were two long, tempting months ahead for him, Connor was determined to go the distance. Because not only was he a marine; he was a Reilly. For two years, Connor had been coming to Emma Jacobsen's shop, and she'd listened to him talk about this woman and that one.She'd thought their friendship was special. Until he admitted how "safe" and "comfortable" he felt around her. Well, war declared! She was going to show her "pal" just how much of a threat she could be to his winning the bet!
Dear Reader,
Thank you for choosing Silhouette Desire, where this month we have six fabulous novels for you to enjoy. We start things off with Estate Affair by Sara Orwig, the latest installment of the continuing DYNASTIES: THE ASHTONS series. In this upstairs/downstairs-themed story, the Ashtons’ maid falls for an Ashton son and all sorts of scandal follows. And in Maureen Child’s Whatever Reilly Wants…, the second title in the THREE-WAY WAGER series, a sexy marine gets an unexpected surprise when he falls for his suddenly transformed gal pal.
Susan Crosby concludes her BEHIND CLOSED DOORS series with Secrets of Paternity. The secret baby in this book just happens to be eighteen years old…. Hmm, there’s quite the story behind that revelation. The wonderful Emilie Rose presents Scandalous Passion, a sultry tale of a woman desperate to get back some steamy photos from her past lover. Of course, he has a price for returning those pictures, but it’s not money he’s after. The Sultan’s Bed, by Laura Wright, continues the tales of her sheikh heroes with an enigmatic male who is searching for his missing sister and finds a startling attraction to her lovely neighbor. And finally, what was supposed to be just an elevator ride turns into a very passionate encounter, in Blame It on the Blackout by Heidi Betts.
Sit back and enjoy all of the smart, sensual stories Silhouette Desire has to offer.
Happy reading,
Melissa Jeglinski
Senior Editor
Silhouette Desire
Whatever Reilly Wants…
Maureen Child
ISBN: 9781408942673
Whatever Reilly Wants...
© Maureen Child 2005
First Published in Great Britain in 2005
Harlequin (UK) Limited
Eton House, 18-24 Paradise Road, Richmond, Surrey TW9 1SR
All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. The text of this publication or any part thereof may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, including without limitation xerography, photocopying, recording, storage in an information retrieval system, or otherwise, without the written permission of the publisher.
This ebook is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise circulated, without the prior consent of the publisher, in any form or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
All characters in this work have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.
This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Enterprises II B.V./S.à.r.l.
® and TM are trademarks owned and used by the trademark owner and/or its licensee. Trademarks marked with ® are registered with the United Kingdom Patent Office and/or the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market and in other countries.
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
MAUREEN CHILD
is a California native who loves to travel. Every chance they get, she and her husband are taking off on another research trip. The author of more than sixty books, Maureen loves a happy ending and still swears that she has the best job in the world. She lives in Southern California with her husband, two children and a golden retriever with delusions of grandeur.
Visit her Web site at www.maureenchild.com.
For Kathleen Beaver.
Thanks for being an emergency reader,
for always being a friend
and for never getting tired of meeting me
for a latte to talk about writing!
Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
One
“One down, two to go.” Father Liam Reilly grinned at his brother, sitting alongside him, then lifted a beer in salute to the two identical men sitting opposite him in the restaurant booth.
“Don’t get your hopes up.” Connor Reilly took a sip of his own beer and nodded toward his brother Brian, the third of the Reilly triplets, sitting beside Liam. “Just because Brian couldn’t go the distance, doesn’t mean we can’t.”
“Amen,” Aidan said from beside him.
“Who said I couldn’t go the distance?” Brian demanded, reaching for a handful of tortilla chips from the basket in the middle of the table. He grinned and sat back in the booth. “I just didn’t want to go the distance. Not anymore.” He held up his left hand, and the gold wedding band caught the light and winked at all of them.
“And I’m glad for you,” Liam said, his black eyebrows lifting. “Plus, with you happily married, the odds of my winning this bet are better than ever.”
“Not a chance, Liam.” Aidan grabbed a handful of chips, too. “It’s not that I begrudge you a roof for the church…but I’m the Reilly to watch in this bet, brother.”
As his brothers talked, Connor just smiled and half listened. Once a week the Reilly brothers met for dinner at the Lighthouse Restaurant, a family place, dead center of the town of Baywater. They laughed, talked and, in general, enjoyed the camaraderie of being brothers.
But for the last month their conversations had pretty much centered around The Bet.
A great uncle, the last surviving member of a set of triplets, had left ten thousand dollars to Aidan, Brian and Connor. At first, the three of them had thought to divide the money, giving their older brother, Liam, an equal share. Then someone, and Connor was pretty sure it had been Liam, had come up with the idea of a bet—winner take all.
Since the Reilly triplets were, above all things, competitive, there’d never been any real doubt that they would accept the challenge. But Liam hadn’t made it easy. He’d insisted that as a Catholic priest, his decision to give up sex for a lifetime was something not one of his brothers could match. He dared them to be celibate for ninety days—last man standing winning the ten thousand dollars. And if all three of the triplets failed, then Liam got the money for a new roof for his church.
Connor shot his older brother a suspicious look. He had a feeling that Liam was already getting estimates from local roofers. Scowling, he took another sip of his beer and let his gaze shift to Brian. A month ago the triplets had stood together in this bet, but now one had already fallen. Brian had reconciled with his ex-wife, Tina, and, now there was just Connor and Aidan to survive the bet.
“Don’t know about you,” Aidan said, jamming his elbow into Connor’s rib cage, “but I’m avoiding all females for the duration.”
“No self-control, huh?” Liam grinned and lifted his beer for another long drink.
“You’re really enjoying this, aren’t you?” Connor glared at him.
“Damn right I am,” Liam said laughing. “Watching the three of you has always been entertaining. Just more so lately.”
“Ah,” Brian said, “the two of them. I’m out, remember?”
“Didn’t even last a month,” Aidan said with a slow, sad shake of his head.
Brian’s self-satisfied smile spoke volumes. “Never been so glad about losing a bet in my life.”
“Tina’s a peach, no doubt about it,” Connor said, just a little irritated by Brian’s “happy man” attitude. “But there’s still the matter of you in that ridiculous outfit to consider.”
Not only did the losers lose the money in this bet, but they’d agreed to ride around in the back of a convertible, wearing coconut bras and hula skirts while being driven around the base on Battle Color day…the one day of the year when every dignitary imaginable would be on the Marine base.
Brian shuddered, then manfully sucked it up and squared his shoulders. “It’ll still be worth it.”
“He’s got it bad,” Aidan muttered, and held up both index fingers in an impromptu cross, as if trying to keep Brian at a distance.
“Laugh all you want,” Brian said, leaning over the table to stare first at one brother, then the other. “But I’m the only one here having regular—and can I just add—great, sex.”
“That was cold, man.” Aidan groaned and scraped one hand over his face.
“Heartless,” Connor agreed.
Liam laughed, clapped his hands together, then rubbed his palms briskly. Black eyebrows lifting, he looked at his brothers and asked, “Either of you care to back out now? Save time?”
“Not likely,” Aidan muttered.
“That’s for damn sure.” Connor held out one hand to Aidan. “In this to the end?”
Aidan’s grip was fierce. “Or until you cave. Whichever comes first.”
“In your dreams.” Connor’d never lost a bet yet and he wasn’t about to start with this one. Of course, the stakes were higher and the bet more challenging than anything else he’d ever done, but that didn’t matter. This was about pride. And he’d be damned if he’d let Aidan beat him. Besides, “No way am I gonna be riding in that convertible with Brian.”
“I’ll save you a seat,” Brian said, grinning.
“Oh, man, I need another beer.” Aidan lifted one hand to get the waitress’s attention.
Another beer would be good. All he had to do was not look at the waitress. Connor’s gaze snapped from Aidan to Brian and finally to Liam. “This game’s far from over, you know.”
“There’s two, count ’em, two long, tempting months left,” Liam reminded him.
“Yeah, well, don’t be picking out roof shingles just yet, Father.”
Liam just smiled. “The samples are coming tomorrow.”
The next morning Connor sat in the sunlight outside Jake’s Garage and sighed heavily. South Carolina in July. Even the mornings were hot and steamy. The heat flattened a man until all he wanted to do was either escape to a beach and ocean breezes or find a nice shady tree and park himself beneath it.
Neither of which Connor was doing. He was on leave. Two weeks off and nothing to do. Hell, he didn’t even want to go anywhere. What would be the point? He couldn’t date. Couldn’t spend any time at all with a woman the way he was feeling. He was a man on the edge.
Two more months of this bet and he wasn’t sure how he was going to survive. Connor liked women. He liked the way they smelled and the way they laughed and the way they moved. He liked dancing with ’em, walking with ’em and most especially, he liked making love to ’em.
So he’d never found the one.
Who said he was looking for her?
His mother, Maggie, had been telling her sons the story of her own whirlwind courtship and marriage to their father since they were kids. They’d all heard about the lightning bolt that had hit Maggie and Sean Reilly. About how they’d shared a dance at a town picnic, fallen desperately in love and within two weeks had been married. Nine months later, Liam had arrived and just two years later, the triplets.
Maggie had long been a big believer in love at first sight and had always insisted that when the time was right, each of her sons…well, except for Liam, would be hit by a thunderbolt.
Connor had made it a point to steer clear of storms.
“Boy, you look like you could chew glass.” Emma Jacobsen, owner and manager of Jake’s Garage, took a seat on the bench beside him.
Connor smiled. Here was the one woman he could trust himself with. The one woman he’d never thought of as, well…a woman.
She wore dark-blue coveralls and a white T-shirt beneath. Her long, blond hair was pulled back into a ponytail and braided, falling to the middle of her back. She had a smudge of grease across her nose, and the cap she wore shaded her blue eyes. She’d been his friend for two years, and he could honestly say he’d never once wondered what she looked like under those coveralls.
Emma was safety.
“It’s this damn bet,” Connor muttered, and leaned his elbows on the bench back behind him, stretching out his legs and crossing them at the ankles.
“So why’d you agree to it in the first place?”
He grinned. “Turn down a challenge?”
She laughed. “What was I thinking?”
“Exactly.” He shook his head and sighed. “But it’s harder than I thought it’d be. I’m telling you, Em, I spend most of my time avoiding women like the plague. Hell, I even crossed the street yesterday when I saw a gorgeous redhead coming my way.”
“Poor baby.”
