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Stolen Kiss With The Hollywood Starlet
Lauri Robinson
An innocent country girl… With stars in her eyes! In this Brides of the Roaring Twenties story, hot shot lawyer Walter Russell knows an innocent country girl like Shirley Burnette is going to find it tough in cut throat Hollywood. A stolen kiss with this bright young singer may be worthy of the silver screen – but Walter hates showbusiness and has sworn off starlets. He knows he should steer well clear…if only he wasn’t so compelled to help her…!
An innocent country girl...
With stars in her eyes!
In this Brides of the Roaring Twenties story, hotshot lawyer Walter Russell knows an innocent country girl like Shirley Burnette is going to find it tough in cutthroat Hollywood. A stolen kiss with this bright, young singer may be worthy of the silver screen—but Walter hates show business and has sworn off starlets. He knows he should steer well clear...if only he wasn’t so compelled to help her!
A lover of fairytales and cowboy boots, LAURI ROBINSON can’t imagine a better profession than penning happily-ever-after stories about men—and women—who pull on a pair of boots before riding off into the sunset…or kick them off for other reasons. Lauri and her husband raised three sons in their rural Minnesota home, and are now getting their just rewards by spoiling their grandchildren. Visit: laurirobinson.blogspot.com (http://www.laurirobinson.blogspot.com), facebook.com/lauri.robinsonl (http://www.facebook.com/lauri.robinsonl) or twitter.com/LauriR (http://www.twitter.com/LauriR).
Also by Lauri Robinson (#u77e00006-780c-5943-9e89-f85b9a1dd476)
The Cowboy’s Orphan Bride
Mail-Order Brides of Oak Grove
Winning the Mail-Order Bride
Western Christmas Brides
Married to Claim the Rancher’s Heir
In the Sheriff’s Protection
Diary of a War Bride
Brides of the Roaring Twenties miniseries
Baby on His Hollywood Doorstep
Stolen Kiss with the Hollywood Starlet
Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk).
Stolen Kiss with the Hollywood Starlet
Lauri Robinson
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
ISBN: 978-1-474-08936-4
STOLEN KISS WITH THE HOLLYWOOD STARLET
© 2019 Lauri Robinson
Published in Great Britain 2019
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.
By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.
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www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Note to Readers (#u77e00006-780c-5943-9e89-f85b9a1dd476)
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Text to speech
To my sister-in-law Jeannette.
An angel among the living.
Contents
Cover (#u79ae883a-dd1d-54c0-8605-e858009b08f1)
Back Cover Text (#u6dc03be0-4b26-5e3c-b0f6-76999b2f86b7)
About the Author (#ufb563546-43e8-50f3-9e35-e2557312ca5f)
Booklist (#u87d81916-72ae-5c19-9b80-842ac28f1e84)
Title Page (#u8388957a-9cb5-587e-9772-ff378227ce23)
Copyright (#uf3abee2a-28aa-54f9-baa0-146e0b2d1ee2)
Note to Readers
Dedication (#u07eb3621-14dc-5a01-a2be-14a6d9e331b7)
Chapter One (#uaaed50a0-10b4-5d00-bc57-649b3e0c0a40)
Chapter Two (#u3338077d-9320-5001-b1d5-44f7b3d472b9)
Chapter Three (#u139fa97f-8e82-527f-a63e-0319b11beeef)
Chapter Four (#u6227f3a3-10f1-5407-a86f-9e6fcc450148)
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 Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Epilogue (#litres_trial_promo)
Extract (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One (#u77e00006-780c-5943-9e89-f85b9a1dd476)
1927
Look out, Los Angeles! Shirley Burnette’s rolling into town!
Shirley giggled at her own thoughts. Could almost hear Pappy saying them.
He used to say, “Look out, Shirley’s up and at ’em,” every morning without fail.
Nose glued to the window, she was enthralled, so thrilled her own breath kept fogging up the glass. Swiping the glass clean, she felt her excitement rise higher and higher as she watched the buildings roll by.
Big ones, little ones and those in between.
Los Angeles.
Hollywood.
The place where dreams came true.
No more washing dishes. No more shucking corn. No more mucking out stalls. Nebraska was half a nation behind her, and that’s where it was going to stay.
The train whistle, a screech that could make the hair on your arms stand on end, sounded like bells straight out of heaven to her. She’d waited years to hear that sound.
Years and years.
This wasn’t just her dream, it had been her mother’s, and she had to make it come true. No matter what.
There had been times she’d wondered if that was possible, especially four years ago, when Pappy had died. That’s also when she’d focused on making it come true even harder. She’d tucked away every spare penny she’d made working for Olin Swaggert, and made sure none of the overgrown thugs he called sons didn’t get their grubby hands on it. She made sure they didn’t get their grubby hands on anything else, too.
Olin kept saying that she was bound to fall in love with one of his boys, get married and live right there on that pig farm forever.
She’d assured him that would never happen.
Never.
Ever.
A lot of lazy dewdroppers, that’s what the entire clan of Swaggert boys were, and more than once she’d wanted to throw in the towel. The only reason she hadn’t was because Olin had paid her. The Swaggerts were one of the few families who could afford to have a live-in worker.
Live-in because, thanks to some city slicker lawyer, as soon as Pappy had died, the Swaggerts got the farm. Lock, stock and barrel. The lawyer claimed Pappy had owed Olin money. Lots of it. She’d argued that, but that hadn’t done a wit of good. In the end, she’d been left with no place to live. No place to do much of anything. Olin had offered her a job—out of the goodness of his heart, that’s how he’d put it.
A heart like his didn’t have any goodness. He’d known how badly it had hurt her to see the house she’d grown up in, lived in her entire life, torn down, but that hadn’t stopped him from tearing it all down and plowing up the land.
Corn. That was all that was there now. A field of corn.
That lawyer hadn’t had a heart, either. He’d refused to listen to a word she’d had to say. So had the sheriff, who’d ordered her out of the house. It had been hard to swallow, that there was nothing left of her family. Other than memories and a dream, so with no other options, she’d taken the job with the Swaggerts and turned her focus to saving up the money to get here. To where the only thing she had left was sure to come true.
Los Angeles. The City of Angels.
It was fitting. A girl who sang like an angel should live in the City of Angels.
People had been saying for years that she sang like an angel. Pappy, of course, and other family members before they’d died, but town folks had said it, too.
Granted, the population of Roca, Nebraska, was little more than two hundred, but a couple of churches in Lincoln had paid her to sing at funerals. Donations. She’d gotten donations. Piddly ones. But money was money and every penny she’d earned had brought her one step closer to this day.
She was here to become a singer. Sing like she and Pappy used to. Sing like her mother had, years ago, when she’d been young and traveled the country. That’s how her mother and father had met. He’d heard Momma sing at a playhouse in Lincoln. Within two shakes of a cat’s tail, they were married and Momma moved to the farm.
Pappy had claimed that Momma had never regretted that because she still sang all the time. Just not on a stage. Shirley couldn’t say if that was true or not. She’d been young when her parents had died. Sometimes, late at night when it was dark and quiet, she could hear her momma singing inside her head and her heart. That’s where her singing lived, inside her, where no one could take it away from her.
