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Truly Daddy
Cara Colter
TRULY A FAMILY?What was it that made rugged mountain man Garret Boyd so irresistible to Toni Carlton? Could it be the tenderness she'd glimpsed in his blue eyes whenever he swept his orphaned niece into his strong, sheltering arms? Or was it the heat Toni saw simmering in his gaze from the moment she'd come to his cozy home?In no time Toni had put a smile in Garret's heart–and a burning need in his wounded soul. And suddenly the brooding loner knew the only way to give little Angie a family was to believe that a strong, silent daddy and his vivacious new nanny were truly meant to be….
“I don’t suppose you’re a nanny, are you?” Garret asked (#u4c22abae-d00a-52ea-bdd6-666772a9250c)Letter to Reader (#u5fd13353-efdb-54a4-9dd1-f073be1b960a)Title Page (#ub79280c8-3a3a-5125-bdeb-984af38d1984)Dedication (#u82134c97-a068-559b-9caa-7610f130440e)CARA COLTER (#u6302f088-291d-534e-a7e9-fb2360a31aac)Chapter One (#u2a3cd13c-a2b1-5274-9bc4-a9ef44feb9b0)Chapter Two (#uccc6c297-0399-5cdb-bafc-3fca3ce94449)Chapter Three (#u2f209706-476f-5d2e-a046-6763dff2bb4b)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)Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
“I don’t suppose you’re a nanny, are you?” Garret asked
A nanny? Toni thought. He must have a child—though it was difficult to imagine Garret with a baby.
He looked like the kind of man who walked alone. Like the cowboy who rode off into the sunset. Rugged. Independent.
Which was exactly the kind of woman she was. Well, maybe not the rugged part, but certainly independent. A husband wasn’t part of her immediate plans. And babies...babies were a far-off someday on her list.
Toni had just never been in love. She was beginning to suspect it was the fabric of fairy tales, that some women more imaginative than she were able to convince themselves that that ordinary guy in the suit and spectacles was really Prince Charming.
This was no Prince Charming glowering at her.
And yet she had the strangest feeling.
She was about to learn a good deal about love.
Dear Reader,
This April, Silhouette Romance showers you with six spectacular stories from six splendid authors! First, our exciting LOVING THE BOSS miniseries continues as rising star Robin Wells tells the tale of a demure accountant who turns daring to land her boss—and become mommy to The Executive’s Baby.
Prince Charming’s Return signals Myrna Mackenzie’s return to Silhouette Romance. In this modern-day fairy-tale romance. wealthy FABULOUS FATHER Gray Alexander discovers he has a son, but the proud mother of his child refuses marriage—unless love enters the equation.... Sandra Steffen’s BACHELOR GULCH miniseries is back with Wes Stryker’s Wrangled Wife! In this spirited story, a pretty stranger just passing through town can’t resist a sexy cowboy struggling to raise two orphaned tykes.
Cara Colter revisits the lineup with Truly Daddy, an emotional, heartwarming novel about a man who learns what it takes to be a father—and a husband—through the transforming love of a younger woman. When A Cowboy Comes a Courting in Christine Scott’s contribution to HE’S MY HERO!, the virginal heroine who’d sworn off sexy, stubborn, Stetson-wearing rodeo stars suddenly finds herself falling hopelessly in love. And FAMILY MATTERS showcases Patti Standard’s newest novel in which a man with a knack for fixing things sets out to make a struggling single mom and her teenage daughter His Perfect Family.
As always. I hope you enjoy this month’s offerings, and the wonderful ones still to come!
Happy reading!
Mary-Theresa Hussey
Senior Editor, Silhouette Romance
Please address questions and book requests 10:
Silhouette Reader Service
US.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325. Buffalo, NY 14269
Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3
Truly Daddy
Cara Colter
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
To Mary, Louise and Dorothy,
teachers, real-life heroines
CARA COLTER
shares ten acres in the wild Kootenay region of British Columbia with the man of her dreams, three children, two horses, a cat with no tail and a golden retriever who answers best to “bad dog.” She loves reading, writing and the woods in winter (no bears). She says life’s delights include an automatic garage door opener and the skylight over the bed that allows her to see the stars at night.
She also says, “I have not lived a neat and tidy life, and used to envy those who did. Now I see my struggles as having given me a deep appreciation of life, and of love, that I hope I succeed in passing on through the stories that I tell.”
Chapter One
“This is the greatest coup of my career,” Toni Carlton said out loud, uncaring of the busy sidewalk she moved down. It was everything she could do not to hug herself and spin around in delight, Mary Tyler Moore-style.
“Lady, I’ll coo in your ear anytime.”
She flung a mass of red curly hair over her slender shoulder and narrowed her green eyes at the speaker, a complete stranger in an expensive three-piece suit.
Tall, dark and a jerk. Weren’t weirdos supposed to wear fatigue jackets and grotesque purple toques?
He must have gotten the message because he ducked his head, tucked his expensive leather briefcase under his arm and scurried hurriedly down the sidewalk.
She decided she loved Vancouver anyway. Loved Chinatown. And especially loved Martin Ying, who had just agreed to design an exclusive line of clothing for Madame Yeltsy’s, the quality clothing chain store that she was buyer for. This was her first solo trip, but Madame Yeltsy expected great things every time. The ordinary was not good enough.
Toni stopped in her tracks and turned slowly to the display window that had caught the corner of her eye. The humble storefront gave lie to the exotic Oriental pieces in jade decorating the front window.
They were absolutely original and took her breath away. What an incredible complement they could make to the Ying line!
She burst in the door. Her eyes had to adjust to the light.
A tiny Oriental man, who looked slightly older than her, perhaps in his late twenties, stood behind the counter, so focused on what he was seeing through the jeweler’s loupe he held to his right eye that he didn’t see her at first.
He glanced up at her in surprise, then tried to put the piece away. “Closed,” he said. “Forgot sign. Closed. Out. Out.”
With Madame Yeltsy’s expectations of greatness, Tom simply could not afford to be a woman easily intimidated. Besides, she stood five foot ten in her stocking feet and could woo a man with a blink of her thick, tangled lashes if she needed to.
Closed or not closed, she wanted some of that jewelry, and especially the piece he was trying to hide. She strode across the small tiled floor, took his hand firmly and pulled it back above the counter.
“Closed,” he said weakly, but he smiled, just a trifle hopefully as his dark eyes met her green ones.
A ring clattered from his clasp, and she scooped it up before he did.
She could not help but notice he was shaking slightly. She was used to a stir of male interest following in her wake, but she’d never made anyone shake before.
“It’s beautiful,” she breathed, rolling the ring over in her hand. She stated down at the ring. Exquisitely worked in silver and jade was a dragon pattern that matched that of the necklace in the window. She could look for another hundred years and not find accessories so completely compatible with Ying’s work.
“The ring means good luck, great happiness.” the little man offered, she could not help but notice, unhappily. His eyes slid to her bare ring finger. “Husband. Babies.”
Madame Yeltsy did not approve of women who made such matters a priority.
“Oh, brother,” Toni exclaimed in a tone that would have made her mentor proud, “did you design this? I want it I want more like it. I want—”
“No, no,” he squeaked. “Not for sale.”
She glanced up at her reluctant salesman. Little beads of perspiration were standing out on his forehead. He looked like he was about to faint.
Not a reaction even she had ever caused. In fact, he seemed to be looking uneasily past her left ear and out the window. She glanced over her shoulder. The street was absolutely thronged. But suddenly, among the bustle, her gaze was attracted to stillness. Three men were standing across the street, looking over at the shop. Were they noticeable because they were so large and Caucasian in a sea of people who were smaller and golden? Or was it because there was something vaguely menacing about them?
“Take the ring,” he said softly, folding his hand over hers. “Go now.”
“I can’t take the ring. I want to buy several of them. And that necklace--”
“Go now,” he said, his voice practically a whisper. “Go.”
“You don’t understand. I need—”
“Leave card,” he said firmly, almost ferociously. “Come back later.”
The man was going to jump out of his skin at any moment, so she slipped a card from her jacket pocket and scribbled her hotel and room number on it. She laid it on the counter.
He nodded. “Go.”
She started to leave the ring.
“Take,” he ordered.
She looked at him again and could almost smell his fear. Something was very wrong here, wrong enough to pierce her elation about Ying.
“Can I help?” she asked quietly. “What’s the matter?”
But whatever the matter was, she could see her persistence was making it worse. She thanked him uneasily, feeling his urgency, turned abruptly on her heel and left.
She moved into the throng and was jostled along for several yards. There was incredible energy on this crowded street, and she wished she had thought to bring her camera with her. Maybe she could get to her hotel room and come back before the light faded.
Though Madame Yeltsy frowned on hobbies and considered them frivolous, Toni knew her own tendency toward the artsy, her love of balance and her ability to pick out pleasing images, had helped to bring her to this position in the first place.
A noise made her glance back over her shoulder. The three men who had been on the other side of the street crossed, paused and then went hurriedly into the store she had just left.
A moment later she heard shouting. One of the men came back out of the store and was scanning the crowded street.
Intuitively, she knew, without a doubt, that he was looking for her. There was a flat, cold expression on his face that filled her with foreboding. The little shop proprietor came out, firmly in the grasp of a large thug. He was wailing. His eyes searched the crowded street, and then he pointed right at her!
All three men were on the sidewalk now, staring at her with dark menace in their eyes. Still holding the storekeeper firmly captive, the thug went back into the store while the other two men started pushing through the congested street toward her.
Her reaction was one of pure panic.
Instinct told her she had just become the hunted. What had she gotten herself into now, and how was she going to get out of it?
Crazy to think she could outrun them. She had on three-inch heels and a pencil-line skirt!
She had to outthink them. Her specialty.
First, she ducked. There was no sense being six inches taller than anyone else on the street. From behind her curtain of people, she thought frantically. She had only seconds.
She was crouched beside a car. She raised herself slightly and peered in the window. A child’s car seat was strapped in the back. An abandoned teddy bear leaned drunkenly on one ear.
Not even really thinking about it, she tried the handle.
The door whispered open.
She slithered onto the back floor, bemoaning only briefly the damage to her new gray skirt. She pulled the door gently shut behind her. There was a beautiful hand-quilted blanket on the floor.
She tugged it quickly over herself.
She could hear them approaching, calling out to each other.
“She was here just a second ago, dammit!”
“Well, she’s a flippin’ amazon, so she shouldn’t be too hard to find.”
Amazon! Under different circumstances she would have taken pleasure in setting him straight on that account.
The men seemed to have stopped right outside the vehicle. Her heart racing uncontrollably, she tugged one corner of the blanket down and peered up and out.
Her heart did stop then. A man who bore an unfortunate resemblance to a giant stood on the sidewalk, inches from the vehicle window.
But it never occurred to him to look in the car.
He moved on, face set in an angry scowl, and she breathed a sigh of relief.
She would wait five minutes. In fact, she would look at her watch right now and time it, because five minutes was going to seem like an eternity. She would wait five minutes, then sit up carefully, look around and, if the coast was clear, go back to her hotel and call the police.
And tell them what?
“One thing at a time,” she instructed herself tersely. She wasn’t anywhere near a phone yet.
She had to swallow a shriek when she suddenly heard the front door tested.
They’d found her!
She put her head back under the blanket.
Click. The door opened.
Make a run for it. No, wait.
A bag came tumbling over the back seat, followed by a second one. The springs of the front seat creaked as weight settled into them. A delicious aroma filled the vehicle—of sunshine and aftershave. A smell one hundred percent male.
