Valerie Parv - Booties And The Beast

The embers of her passion died, leaving her drained. Why hadn’t she stopped him before he found out the truth? The answer was as blinding as the joy he had made her feel. Until he knew everything, she had no chance of a future with him. Against all reason, she yearned for one.

“Joel isn’t my baby.”

His cold tone sliced to her heart. “Obviously not. So who does he belong to?”

She took a deep breath to subdue the anguish threatening to consume her. “You,” she said softly. “You’re Joel’s father, Sam.”

Dear Reader,

As senior editor for the Silhouette Romance line, I’m lucky enough to get first peek at the stories we offer you each month. Each editor searches for stories with an emotional impact, that make us laugh or cry or feel tenderness and hope for a loving future. And we do this with you, the reader, in mind. We hope you continue to enjoy the variety each month as we take you from first love to forever….

Susan Meier’s wonderful story of a hardworking single mom and the man who sweeps her off her feet is Cinderella and the CEO. In The Boss’s Baby Mistake, Raye Morgan tells of a heroine who accidentally gets inseminated with her new boss’s child! The fantasy stays alive with Carol Grace’s Fit for a Sheik as a wedding planner’s new client is more than she bargained for….

Valerie Parv always creates a strong alpha hero. In Booties and the Beast, Sam’s the strong yet tender man. Julianna Morris’s lighthearted yet emotional story Meeting Megan Again reunites two people who only seem mismatched. And finally Carolyn Greene’s An Eligible Bachelor has a very special secondary character—along with a delightful hero and heroine!

Happy reading!

Mary-Theresa Hussey

Senior Editor

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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For my sisters Maureen and Leigh, with love

Books by Valerie Parv

Silhouette Romance

The Leopard Tree #507

The Billionaire’s Baby Chase #1270

Baby Wishes and Bachelor Kisses #1313

*The Monarch’s Son #1459

*The Prince’s Bride-To-Be #1465

*The Princess’s Proposal #1471

Booties and the Beast #1501

lives and breathes romance and has even written a guide to being romantic, crediting her cartoonist husband of nearly thirty years as her inspiration. As a former buffalo and crocodile hunter in Australia’s Northern Territory, he’s ready-made hero material, she says.

When not writing her novels and nonfiction books, or speaking about romance on Australian radio and television, Valerie enjoys dollhouses, being a Star Trek fan and playing with food (in cooking, that is). Valerie agrees with actor Nichelle Nichols, who said, “The difference between fantasy and fact is that fantasy simply hasn’t happened yet.”

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Epilogue

Now that Haley Glen was actually standing at the gates of Sam Winton’s mansion she wasn’t sure she could go through with her plan. Everything in her wanted to grab him by the throat and not let go until he admitted that he was the father of her sister’s baby boy.

Joel was six months old now and Ellen had been gone for five of those months, but this was Haley’s first chance to get near the man. She hadn’t anticipated being gripped by a wave of last-minute nerves that threatened to paralyze her.

She reminded herself that it had taken all her powers of persuasion to get her friend, Miranda Holt, to send her to this interview. If she chickened out now, she would be letting her friend down as well as Ellen and the baby, so she had no choice but to see it through.

If it killed her.

On a heavy sigh, she reached for the intercom button and took out some of her frustration by punching it savagely and holding it down longer than was polite. From somewhere in the grounds of the mansion, she heard the howl of what sounded like a very large dog.

Moments later an angry voice boomed through the speaker, “No need to ram it through the fence. State your name and business.”

She bit back a suggestion of her own about where he could ram the intercom and said as sweetly as she could, “I’m Haley Glen from the HomeBody Agency to see Sam Winton about your house sitter.” She was gambling that the voice belonged to Sam himself but something in his tone made her think she was right.

She was. “I’m Winton. What’s wrong with Miranda?”

Miranda was the owner of the HomeBody Agency. Normally she would see a client as important as Sam herself and Winton was obviously well aware of it. “She’s tied up with…” As her annoyance grew, Haley swallowed the rest of her apology for Miranda’s absence. “Do you think we could discuss this face-to-face, Mr. Winton? Or would you rather conduct the entire meeting by intercom?”

A buzz like a swarm of angry bees drowned out his reply as the tall, iron gates swung gracefully inward. Haley got back into her car and drove through. As soon as she had cleared the gates they closed behind her. Common sense told her they were triggered by some kind of sensor mechanism, but she felt an uncomfortable sensation of prison doors clanging shut.

She pulled up outside the imposing Federation-style house and got out but was stopped by a blur of movement she caught out of the corner of her eye. The owner of the Baskerville howl came tearing around the side of the house, churning gravel under its floor mop feet. Haley barely had time to scramble back into the car and pull the door shut, before a dog the size of a small pony threw itself at the window. Her heart pounded as she stared down a throat rimmed by teeth that would have done a shark proud.

“Down, Dougal. Heel.”

The command was given with all the authority of a major general, so Haley wasn’t surprised when the dog bolted away from her car window as if shot. Had the command been directed at her, she would probably have obeyed it, too. She shivered and wondered if it was from reaction to the sudden appearance of the dog—or its master.

Haley was relieved when the dog settled itself meekly at the heels of the man waiting at the foot of the front steps. It was Sam Winton himself, she saw, recognizing him from the photograph on his books. Except that her first sight of him in the flesh destroyed most of her preconceptions in one go.

She didn’t know what she had expected the children’s writer to look like, but it wasn’t this vibrant man who exuded energy the way high-voltage wires hum with power. His skin was burnished with healthy color, and his hair was as black as baby Joel’s only a lot thicker. It curled almost to his collar, it was in a style that reminded her of medieval knights in old movies, though instead of armor this knight was poised in an ivory polo shirt and chinos as black as his hair.