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Automatic Proposal
Kelsey Roberts
ARMED AND GORGEOUSKeeping her work with Miami Confi dential secret had never been a problem for skilled agent Julia Garcia. Then Luke Young, the man she left standing at the altar after a sting operation, reappeared in her life, demanding answers. With the kidnapping of her best friend, Julia had to maintain her cover at the Weddings Your Way salon or jeopardize the case. Yet their intense chemistry, combined with Luke's probing questions, had Julia torn between commitment to her job and to her heart. But once Luke became an unknown enemy's target, Julia vowed she'd do whatever it took to keep her former fiancé safe…or die trying.
You are cordially invited to…
Honor thy pledge
to the
Miami Confidential Agency
Do you hereby swear to uphold
the law to the best of your ability…
To maintain the level of integrity of this agency
by your compassion for victims, loyalty to your
brothers and sisters and courage under fire…
To hold all information and identities
in the strictest confidence…
Or die before breaking the code?
Automatic Proposal
Kelsey Roberts
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
For Bob… Thank you for being my hero
for twenty-five years.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Kelsey Roberts has penned more than twenty novels, won numerous awards and nominations, and landed on bestseller lists, including USA TODAY and the Ingrams Top 50 List. She has been featured in the New York Times and the Washington Post, and makes frequent appearances on both radio and television. She is considered an expert on why women read and write crime fiction, as well as an excellent authority on plotting and structuring the novel.
She resides in south Florida with her family.
CAST OF CHARACTERS
Luke Young—Ex-fiancé of Julia Garcia. Owner of a construction firm, he has a difficult past.
Julia Garcia—Former FBI & DEA agent, now works as a seamstress at Weddings Your Way. Close friend of the Botero family—like a sister to Sonya.
Rachel Brennan—Runs Miami Confidential.
Carlos Botero—Multimillionaire who has a stroke while awaiting word on his kidnapped daughter, Sonya.
Sonya Botero—Being held in a jungle by kidnappers.
Juan DeLeon—Laderan politician who is about to marry Sonya, when she’s kidnapped.
Maggie DeLeon—Juan’s ex-wife in a Laderan institution.
Craig Johnson—The limo driver for the Botero family, who is involved in Sonya’s kidnapping.
AJ Taggert—Luke’s foster brother, who is in trouble with drug dealers and knows Luke’s secrets.
Tommy Anderson—Wants to avenge the murder of his father, Frank.
Betty Anderson—Abused wife of Frank and mother of AJ.
Carmen Lopez—Luke’s younger foster sister.
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
Prologue
Las Vegas, 2000
Hard to hide a gun beneath a wedding dress, Julia Garcia mused. She had a smile full of nerves as she strapped the weapon into its holster high up on her thigh, then let the bunched fabric drop to the floor. She smoothed the skirt in place. Could you tell?
Critically, she checked her image in the full-length mirror, turning this way and that. Not bad. Fortunately, the heavy cream-colored peau de soie dropped in a straight A line from the natural waist, covering a multitude of sins. And one Walther PPK.
Keeping her attention on the outline of her legs beneath the stiff silk, she walked a few steps back and forth, making sure that not even a hint of the handgun could be seen when she moved.
She made a pretty decent looking bride, she thought, meeting her own eyes in the mirror. Although this wasn’t even remotely close to how she’d imagined her wedding day, she still felt a lump of nerves clogging her throat. Not fear nerves, she told herself, more like stage fright nerves. Very appropriate, since this was all an act. Or it was supposed to be. Her heart thudded against her ribs just thinking about him. Which wasn’t part of the plan. She wasn’t supposed to have feelings for Luke. Not real ones, anyway. Julia dismissed her errant thoughts, chalking them up to stress, pressure, anything but the notion that love at first sight was real.
Luke seemed like a nice enough guy. And he was hot. Very hot.
They’d known each other for exactly one week, thanks to her assignment. Although “known” was a gross exaggeration. One couldn’t really get to know a person in seven short days. Hell, until she’d seen the application for the marriage license, she hadn’t even known his middle name.
All that was by design. Her assignment was to learn everything she could about Joe Esterhaus. Luke was collateral damage. Esterhaus was using Luke. She was using Luke. The only person who didn’t know either of those truths was Luke Young.
Julia guessed he’d be pretty pissed when he found out. Fortunately, she’d be long gone by then. She checked the time again, feeling a knot of impatience in her stomach.
“Where the hell are you guys?” she whispered. The small anteroom smelled faintly of flowers and stale perfume. Julia imagined how many real brides had stood here looking at themselves in the same full-length mirror. She guessed that they’d been filled with anticipation and a touch of fear, but most of all they’d been happy and excited about their bright new futures. Secure in the love of the men they had chosen.
Which was where her illusion shattered. My future is anything but secure, she thought, pacing for real now. Damn it. Come on, you guys, it’s hot in here, and this damn dress is starting to make me sweat. And while her weapon and harness wouldn’t show, sweat would, which would reveal her nerves. How many of those imagined brides had walked down the aisle dripping like Niagara Falls?
Stepping over to the door, she opened it a tiny crack, peering out into the chapel. Esterhaus was in the first row of chairs. On the groom’s side. He was a dapper guy in his late forties, with thick, prematurely gray hair. His shoes alone cost more than all four years of her college tuition combined. He might look like a successful entrepreneur, but Julia knew better.
She didn’t see Luke. On a personal level, she felt jilted. On a professional level, she was annoyed. This entire con required that the groom show up. “I’m losing it,” she muttered softly as she soundlessly closed the door.
Tension. Nerves coiled in every one of her muscles. Where the hell were the other agents? She was going to need backup. They knew that. They should all be sitting in those pews, dressed as wedding guests. Especially with a guy as slippery as Esterhaus.
He was normally surrounded by a half-dozen heavily armed men. But here, in the quintessentially Vegas wedding chapel, he was unguarded.
Perfect.
Just what they wanted.
Everything was in place. Everything but the groom, and the agents who were supposed to swoop in and arrest the son of a bitch seconds before she said “I do.”
If they didn’t take him now, they’d have no way of linking the drug shipment to him. The DEA needed to put Esterhaus in prison this time. Twice before, they’d been unable to make a case against the narco-trafficker. But this time, thanks to her efforts, they would finally get him off the streets. Until three hours ago, the DEA had no idea how Esterhaus was getting his product into the country. Julia’s assignment had been to get the information so that the government could find a way to shut him down.
Esterhaus was far from stupid. Three undercover agents had tried and failed to get close to him in the past. Julia had found a way to succeed where they hadn’t. That way’s name was Luke Young.
The most solid lead the DEA had was that Esterhaus used his custom home fixture business as a front for his drug trafficking operation. And that he’d been importing cocaine by the ton. But the DEA had rules to follow. Knowing what Esterhaus was doing and proving it were two different things.
So Julia had gotten close to the man by proxy.
Esterhaus had been spending a lot of time cultivating a business relationship with Luke both before and during the home improvement convention that had drawn them all to Vegas this past week.
Esterhaus had created a brilliant system. He hid his drugs in plain sight. According to what Julia had learned, Esterhaus had the drugs pressed, then encased in porcelain bathroom fixtures. All of this was cleverly and expertly done by a series of East Asian manufacturers. Then the components were run through a bunch of offshore shell corporations, making it nearly impossible for the DEA to connect the product directly back to Esterhaus.
Luke Young had unwittingly turned the tables. He had no idea about the drugs, but he was obviously a savvy businessman. His insistence that Esterhaus provide a sample of the custom fixtures before he placed a large order meant the DEA could finally get the proof they needed to put Esterhaus away for a very, very long time.
Agents were at the warehouse now, executing a search warrant. Another team was supposed to be standing by to arrest the drug lord the second they had the evidence in hand. Julia glanced at the clock again, her palms damp with nerves. If the agents didn’t show up soon, she’d have to go through with the ceremony. That was part of the arrest plan. Luke seemed like a nice enough guy, but Julia was a career agent, and she had no desire to marry anytime soon. There were a lot of things she’d do for her country, but she wasn’t sure marrying a stranger she’d known all of a week, just because her backup couldn’t get their act together in time, was one of them.
She whispered an impatient curse, feeling her stomach lurch. Part of her nervousness was normal, and due to the fact that her whole system was on high alert, as it always was before a sting. The other part was a result of trying to decide her next move should the arrest be delayed. Would she get fired if she chose not to say “I do?”
“I get married,” she grumbled. If she didn’t, she’d surely arouse the suspicions of Esterhaus. If that happened, there was no telling how long it might take for the DEA to get another foothold into the drug cartel.
“Get the lead out, guys,” she said under her breath.
But poor Luke. He really seemed like a decent guy. In another time and place, he was the kind of man she’d enjoy getting to know. Once he discovered he was nothing more than a pawn in all of this, he’d probably consign her to the depths of hell.
She drew in a deep breath to calm her pounding pulse. Again she went to the door and opened it, peering out into the small chapel. Esterhaus was still seated in place. Only now, Luke was at the altar.
Seeing him standing there in a dark tux caused her breath to catch in her throat. She hadn’t been jilted after all. He epitomized the cliché of tall, dark and handsome.
Julia was five foot six in her stocking feet, yet Luke towered over her by about ten inches. His shoulders were broad, his muscled body tapering down to a trim waist. He was very tanned, a testament to the fact that he was a hands-on kind of construction boss. Julia couldn’t see his eyes, but she didn’t need to—they were branded on her brain. Deep, rich brown, the color of Cuban coffee; rimmed in dark, inky lashes the same shade as his slightly too long hair.
Julia suffered another pang of guilt. Intellectually, she knew using Luke was the means to a righteous end. Emotionally, and she blamed this on the wedding dress, she didn’t want Luke to get hurt. It wasn’t like they’d professed their undying love for one another, right? This was just a job.
She adjusted the gown, tugging the strapless silk bodice to a more modest position. She smiled wryly. Stupid time for her Catholic school upbringing to rear its ugly head. Maybe it wasn’t her nun-induced sense of propriety. Maybe it was just that she didn’t want her fellow agents bursting through the door and getting an eyeful of her breasts.
If she had an hour and a sewing machine, she could alter the dress. Some people knitted to relax. She sewed, and she was damn good. Maybe an inch of lace across the bodice; she could take it from the hem, no problem.
What was she thinking about sewing for? Where the hell were those agents? She rolled her eyes at the idiotic turn of her thoughts.
She jumped when someone rapped gently on the door.
“We’re ready!” she heard the wedding assistant call.
Julia sucked in a breath and let it out slowly. Depending on nothing more than hope that the agents found what they needed fast—like, before she turned into Julia Young—she grabbed up the pale pink roses tied with a satin ribbon, and reached for the door.
“Here Comes the Bride” was piped in through the speakers embedded in the ceiling as Julia began a slow walk down the aisle with her gun strapped to her thigh. She was ready.
She looked nervous. Terrified, actually. Luke shifted his weight from foot to foot and battled the strong urge to yank at the tight collar cinched around his throat.
Even looking as if she was walking into the path of an oncoming train, Julia was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. She was dark and exotic, inspiring all sorts of fantasies he felt certain were inappropriate in a church. Well, church was a stretch. The Chapel of Love was more like a matrimonial weigh station.
What in the hell am I doing? Luke wondered for the umpteenth time that day.
This wasn’t like him. He didn’t do things on a whim. He was not an impulsive kind of guy. Every decision, no matter how small, was approached with care and deliberation. A lesson well-learned by the age of seventeen.
But life’s lessons and pretty much every other rational thought zinged right out of his brain within seconds of laying eyes on his approaching bride.
She was close enough now for him to catch the scent of her perfume. Something unexpectedly floral. Sunlight glinted off the sheen of her dress. Well, it wasn’t a dress so much as it was a whisper of fabric outlining her shapely top half and hiding the just as shapely lower half in a mile of cream-colored material.
That was just one of the things he admired about his future wife. She had a woman’s body. Full and sexy as hell. Just seeing a hint of her deep cleavage sent his mind back into the gutter. He wasn’t alone, either. Luke noticed that his about-to-be new supplier had his eyes glued on Julia.
