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The Tycoon's Trophy Wife
Miranda Lee
Reece knew that Alanna would make the perfect trophy wife! Stunning and sophisticated, she wanted nothing more than a marriage of convenience. And that was fine by Reece!But suddenly, their comfortable life together was turned upside down when Reece discovered that his wife had a dark past. But, he realized, he wasn't prepared to lose Alanna – even if the only thing they shared was passion…
“You’re Alanna Diamond,” Reece said as he slipped off the stool and stood up. “My wife.”
His wife.
Alanna swallowed, her gaze dropping away from his handsome face as those feelings swamped her again, feelings that made her face grow hot and her skin tingle all over.
Alanna’s head spun with the intensity of her desire, every muscle in her body stretched tight as a drum.
Try to relax, he’d said.
No way was she ever going to relax whilst in his presence. She had to find some excuse to leave him. To be alone.
When a wealthy man wants a wife, he doesn’t always follow the rules!
Welcome to Miranda Lee’s stunning, sexy new trilogy—
Meet Richard, Reece and Mike, three Sydney millionaires with a mission—they all want to get married…but none wants to fall in love!
Bought: One Bride
Richard’s story:
His money can buy him anything he wants… and he wants a wife!
August 2005
# 2483
The Tycoon’s Trophy Wife
Reece’s story:
She was everything he wanted in a wife…
’til he fell in love with her!
September 2005
#2489
A Scandalous Marriage
Mike’s story:
He married her for money—her beauty was a bonus!
October 2005
#2496
Miranda Lee
The Tycoon’s Trophy Wife
ISBN: 978-1-408-94080-8
THE TYCOON’S TROPHY WIFE
© Miranda Lee 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.
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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.
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Contents
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
EPILOGUE
COMING NEXT MONTH
PROLOGUE
Sydney. September. Spring.
ALANNA hesitated at the entrance to the cemetery, dismayed to find that her stomach had begun to churn.
Just butterflies, she reassured herself, and forged on.
The churning increased by the time she stood in front of his headstone. But she remained determined to do this. To say what she had come to say. To find closure once and for all.
‘It’s been five years since I stood here,’ she said to the man buried there. ‘Five long, incredibly difficult years. I’ve come here today to tell you that you didn’t win, Darko. I have survived.
‘Time does have amazing healing powers and I finally found the will to go on, a will much stronger than I ever believed I had. I have taken my life in my hands. My hands,’ she repeated quite forcefully as those same hands gripped her handbag in front of her.
‘I’ve remarried, Darko. Yes, you heard me. I am now another man’s wife. How you must be turning in your grave to hear that,’ she bit out between clenched teeth.
‘Of course, I did not choose a love match. Would I be so foolish as to marry another man who loved me? But we like and respect each other, Reece and I. Best of all, Reece doesn’t try to own me, or control me. He trusts me and wants me to be happy. He doesn’t mind if I go out with my girlfriends. He doesn’t mind if I wear sexy clothes. He even buys them for me. He bought me the suit I have on today. It’s the kind of outfit you would have ripped off me. But Reece loves me to wear clothes like this.’
With a defiant tilt of her head, she spread her arms wide and turned around, showing off her eye-catching figure, encased that day in a cream silk suit that had a short, tight skirt and a figure hugging jacket with a deep V neckline.
‘Did I mention that my husband is a very rich, very handsome man?’ Alanna went on. ‘Very sexy, too. He might not be crazy in love with me, but he wants to make love to me almost every night. To satisfy me. Which he does. Do you hear me, Darko?’ Alanna threw at the headstone in a challenging tone, which didn’t totally mask the underlying hurt and pain that twisted at her heart.
Tears threatened but she dashed them away. The time for tears had long gone.
‘One final thing before I go,’ she continued more calmly. ‘Reece and I are going to try for a baby. Not every man is like you, Darko. Reece won’t see a child as competition. Or something else to be suspicious of. Or jealous over. Reece doesn’t have a jealous bone in his body.
‘You will say that means he doesn’t care about me. But you know what? I don’t want to ever be cared for the way you cared for me. And you’re wrong, anyway. Reece does care for me in his own way. And I care for him. He makes me feel good, something you never did for all your supposed loving.’
Alanna scooped in a deep breath before letting it out slowly, relieved to find that the churning in her stomach had finally subsided. ‘My mother said I should forgive you, that there were excuses for your behaviour. But I can’t do that. What you did was unforgivable. I am going now, Darko, and this time, I am never coming back. You are now firmly consigned to the past. And I will do my best not to think of you any more.’
CHAPTER ONE
THE organ player breaking into the wedding march signalled the bride was ready at last. She was only fifteen minutes late, Reece realised as he glanced at his gold Rolex. Long enough, however, for the groom next to him to get fidgety.
‘It’s showtime!’ Reece said, smiling over at Richard who’d gone ramrod straight at the change of music, his hands clasped tightly in front of him.
‘Have you got the rings?’ Richard whispered out of the side of his mouth.
Reece patted the right pocket of his black dinner jacket. ‘Of course. Relax, Rich,’ he said, and reached out to touch him reassuringly on the arm. ‘I’ve done this before.’
‘So has he,’ Mike muttered under his breath from the other side of Reece.
Reece’s head whipped round to throw him a reproachful glare. Mike was a good bloke at heart, but his eternal cynicism over romance and relationships could be exasperating. It was also out of place today. Blind Freddie could see that Richard and Holly were deeply in love. This would be a much better marriage than the one Richard had had with Joanna, who, quite frankly, had not been Mrs Perfect.
Reece would never forget the night she’d made a play for him, something he’d never told Richard, but which had bothered him greatly at the time.
He’d avoided Joanna after that.
When she’d been killed in a car accident a couple of years back, he’d felt very sorry for Richard. But Reece sometimes wondered if it was a case of fate being cruel to be kind.
Whatever, Richard’s first marriage was past history. Today was a new day and Reece finally felt optimistic for his best friend’s choice for his second wife.
Despite an initial concern that Holly, at twenty-six, was too young and naive for a man of Richard’s age and status—Richard was thirty-eight and the CEO of a merchant bank—Reece could now see that Holly was exactly what Richard needed after Joanna. She was a genuinely sweet, caring, loving girl. Very pretty, too.
She was going to make a lovely bride.
Reece’s eyes narrowed as he peered down to the back of the church, curious to see what the girls were wearing. But the church doors were open and the late-afternoon light was streaming in. All he could see were silhouettes.
The first bridesmaid eventually came into view, looking elegant in a long, straight red dress and carrying a bouquet of white roses. She was tall, with auburn hair, a nice enough figure and an attractive face.
Reece didn’t know her. She was a florist friend of Holly’s. In her thirties. And married, Alanna had told him last night.
Reece hoped happily so, given she was being partnered by Mike today.
Reece glanced to his left at Mike, who was looking surprisingly debonair, a far cry from his usual dishevelled self. Amazing what a haircut, a shave and a tuxedo could achieve. Most days, Mike looked as if he’d walked out of a spaghetti western. Acted like that, too. Very tough and gruff.
Strangely, some women seemed to fancy him like that. Lord knew why. Reece thought Mike’s clean-cut image today was infinitely more attractive. But what was one woman’s trash was another woman’s treasure, he supposed.
On Mike’s part, he went for any good-looking female who made the chase easy for him and who agreed with his rules, his rules being he would take her out for one reason and one reason only. Sex. There would be no real relationship. No romance. The only promise he gave was not to be a two-timer.
But when it was over—meaning when he got bored—it was over.
Mike was an obsessively compulsive computer genius with a very low boredom threshold. His last girl friend…an exotic dancer…had lasted all of a month.
