Jule Mcbride - A Way With Women

Macon became utterly still. Only his breath moved, teasing her ears as he leaned nearer. “What if I don’t want to?”

Gazing up at him, she suddenly couldn’t pull her eyes from his mouth. A kiss would mean so little to him, she thought, craving a taste. He had a way with women; he dispensed those kisses all the time. Maybe if she had just a taste of him, she could finally forget him. Forget his lovemaking…

His voice was mesmerizing. “What if I want to stay?”

“You always did do exactly what you wanted….”

“Then I sure as hell shouldn’t stop now,” he drawled roughly, brushing his body against hers, the taut sweep of his hips coming with a rustle of denim. She hadn’t known he was aroused, but she felt it now. He was so hard and hot and thick that her knees nearly buckled.

A moment later his mouth crushed hers and he parted her lips with the slow thrust of his tongue. Wrapping his arms tightly around her waist, he steadied her as he kicked the storm door, shutting out the summer sunlight.

He started for the bedroom and Harper was lost….

Dear Reader,

After writing many Harlequin American Romance novels, and stories for other Harlequin series, it’s been pure fun to approach my thirtieth book by shifting gears and trying some especially spicier, steamier stories, so I hope you’ll enjoy this, as well as my upcoming BIG APPLE BACHELORS trilogy for Temptation.

Usually when I daydream about mail-order men, I think of gorgeous guys arriving from far-off foreign lands with the sole intention of sweeping me off my feet and pleasuring me senseless, but this time the fantasy got a little more complex.

When sexy rancher Macon McCann receives no responses from his mail-order-bride ad, he’s stunned to discover that the local postmistress, his ex-lover whom he’s been avoiding for years, has actually been opening his mail and writing women back, telling them not to come to Texas because he’s such a bad catch!

I hope you will be amused by the shenanigans that follow, especially watching a woman get repeatedly swept off her feet and pleasured senseless by somebody she keeps swearing she can’t stand. Of course, she really loves Macon, and I hope you will, too.

Happy reading,

Jule McBride

HARLEQUIN TEMPTATION

761—A BABY FOR THE BOSS

HARLEQUIN AMERICAN ROMANCE

733—AKA: MARRIAGE

753—SMOOCHIN’ SANTA

757—SANTA SLEPT OVER

849—SECRET BABY SPENCER

A Way with Women

Jule McBride

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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For Birgit Davis-Todd, whose patient nurturing of writers has produced years of Temptations: whole worlds, new loves, teary laughter and sweet emotion, so many hours of delight and pleasure. As both a reader and writer, thanks.

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Epilogue

“MACON MCCANN’S STILL advertising for a bride? Some things simply shouldn’t be allowed,” Harper Moody said under her breath. Shrugging out of a navy postal uniform blazer, she rolled up the sleeves of a standard-issue white blouse, raked her shoulder-length ash hair into a ponytail and secured it with a string tie the U.S. government had meant for use around her neck. Ponytail in place, she sipped the scalding coffee she’d bought at Go-Mart and glanced over as her sole customer, Lois Potts from Potts Feed and Seed, paced between padded Jiffy bags and dusty express envelopes, trying to decide between the John Wayne commemorative stamps or the City Flag series.

Lois was the last person Harper wanted to deal with, of course, since she and Lois had a history. Fortunately, the other woman was occupied, so Harper stared down again, first at a box of pink stationary she’d gotten when she bought the coffee, then at Texas Men magazine. “I really can’t believe they let Macon advertise for a bride,” she mumbled. “The fine print assures they screen these guys.”

Her fog-blue eyes drifted down the full-body photo of the man who’d fathered her teenage son. One hundred percent pure rich rancher stud, announced the caption. “Macon would come up with a line like that,” she whispered, rolling her eyes and feeling distressed by her physical response to him.

Well, what female wouldn’t react?

Muscles tested the shoulder seams of a denim shirt Macon wore unsnapped, exposing tangled chest hairs the color of sunlit wheat. His broad chest slimmed to narrow hips and slightly bowed legs whose long strides were usually headed in the opposite direction from Harper. Boot-cut jeans flared over his polished boots, and Macon was clutching a Stetson against his chest, smiling ruefully as if to say every female answering the ad had already broken his heart.

“Angel’s hair on the very devil,” she pronounced with annoyance. The honey-colored waves framing Macon’s broad, inviting face called to her fingertips to test their silky texture.

Well, she assured herself, placing her steaming coffee cup on the postal scale, Macon just looked like any other dumb cowboy—except for his eyes. As sharp as spurs, they were aware and intense, their color the aged amber of the house ale he’d been enjoying every Saturday night at Big Grisly’s Grill since he’d come back to town.

The wayward drift of her eyes ventured below a turquoise-studded belt, landing on jeans as soft as kid gloves. Just like a good love story, the fit was loose enough to leave room for imagination, but revealing enough to assure a woman of a happy ending. Glancing away, Harper realized she could recall plenty about Macon that no camera could capture. “Yeah, me—and every other female in Pine Hills,” she huffed. Nevertheless, Macon’s hands—the same lean-fingered bronzed hands that clutched the Stetson over his heart—had left their imprints on Harper, and once a woman knew certain things about a man, there was no turning back. She knew plenty, too. Including that Macon had fathered a son he didn’t know about. My son, Cordy.

Harper steadied herself by taking another careful sip of scalding coffee. Years ago, she’d done the right thing in not telling Macon about Cordy, but now she’d come to fear something terrible might happen to her. Bruce’s death two years ago proved unexpected, horrible things did happen. What if, after she was gone, Cordy needed to know the truth for some reason? What if he became ill and needed a bone marrow transplant or a blood transfusion or he had a car wreck or…?

She pushed down the fear that had gnawed at her ever since Bruce died and thought, Damn you, Bruce, we were supposed to get old together! You weren’t supposed to die! No more than Macon McCann was supposed to settle down in Pine Hills with a woman he was meeting through the U.S. mail.

Macon had become a successful contractor in Houston. Why would he come home now? And why was he advertising for a wife in Texas Men magazine when he had ample opportunities to date?