Eileen Wilks - Midnight Promises

Annie froze. “You just took off, leaving that stupid note. ‘When you come to your senses, you can join me.’ You’re supposed to be so good with women, Jack. Did you really think that was going to make me fly off to the ends of the earth to be with you?”

“You’re not like other women. You’re Annie.” Annie, his friend, who had stood beside him in a gaudy little wedding chapel and promised to be with him forever….

“I wasn’t expecting to leave the country practically the minute I got married! I wasn’t expecting to get married at all! Then you got that call. Everything happened too fast.”

“Look, Annie, we’ve got to get some things settled….”

“You want a divorce….”

“Divorce? I’m not here to ask you for a divorce. I’m here to claim the wedding night we never had.”

Dear Reader,

Happy New Year! Silhouette Intimate Moments is starting the year off with a bang—not to mention six great books. Why not begin with the latest of THE PROTECTORS, Beverly Barton’s miniseries about men no woman can resist? In Murdock’s Last Stand, a well-muscled mercenary meets his match in a woman who suddenly has him thinking of forever.

Alicia Scott returns with Marrying Mike… Again, an intense reunion story featuring a couple who are both police officers with old hurts to heal before their happy ending. Try Terese Ramin’s A Drive-By Wedding when you’re in the mood for suspense, an undercover agent hero, an irresistible child and a carjacked heroine who ends up glad to go along for the ride. Already known for her compelling storytelling abilities, Eileen Wilks lives up to her reputation with Midnight Promises, a marriage-of-convenience story unlike any other you’ve ever read. Virginia Kantra brings you the next of the irresistible MacNeills in The Comeback of Con MacNeill, and Kate Stevenson returns after a long time away, with Witness…and Wife?

All six books live up to Intimate Moments’ reputation for excitement and passion mixed together in just the right proportions, so I hope you enjoy them all.

Yours,

Leslie J. Wainger

Executive Senior Editor

www.millsandboon.co.uk

This book is for Bill and Martin, who serve the best

Key lime pie in the world.

Thanks for sharing Denver with me—

live long and prosper!

is a fifth-generation Texan. Her great-great-grandmother came to Texas in a covered wagon shortly after the end of the Civil War—excuse us, the War Between the States. But she’s not a full-blooded Texan. Right after another war, her Texan father fell for a Yankee woman. This obviously mismatched pair proceeded to travel to nine cities in three countries in the first twenty years of their marriage, raising two kids and innumerable dogs and cats along the way. For the next twenty years they stayed put, back home in Texas again—and still together.

Eileen figures her professional career matches her nomadic upbringing, since she’s tried everything from drafting to a brief stint as a ranch hand—raising two children and any number of cats and dogs along the way. Not until she started writing did she “stay put,” because that’s when she knew she’d come home. Readers can write to her at P.O. Box 4612, Midland, TX 79704-4612.

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

“Did you hear the news, dear? Jack Merriman is in town.”

Annie didn’t actually sway. Her head went light and dizzy and the attic’s dusty air got stuck in her lungs, keeping her from drawing a breath, but her body didn’t move. That was fortunate, since only half of her was in the attic. The other half was in Mrs. Perez’s garage, with her size-five work boots planted on the highest rung of the stepladder.

“Jack is back?” she managed to say as soon as her lungs started working again. “Are you sure?”

Annie couldn’t see Mrs. Perez, who had been determined to stay in the garage while Annie worked so she could steady the stepladder with all ninety-five pounds of her aging body. It was an unnecessary caution. The ladder was sturdy, and Annie had a head for heights.

At least, normally she had a head for heights.

“Oh, yes,” the older woman said. “I heard it directly from Ida Hoffman when I went to the grocery store this morning.”

Ida had been the Merrimans’ housekeeper for thirty years. “It must be true, then.”

“He showed up yesterday afternoon without a word of warning. Ida said she nearly fell over when she opened the door and there he stood, grinning at her.”

“That sounds like Jack. Unpredictable.” Annie was pleased with herself. She didn’t sound angry or upset or afraid, though she felt all of that and more. How typical of Jack to show up without a word to her! “I’ll bet Ida was surprised.”

“That’s an understatement. She was thrilled, of course. She always did have a soft spot for that rascal.”

So what else was new? Women always liked Jack—all women, all ages.

“Ida was so excited about having Jack home. She’s looking forward to cooking for him. With that big old house standing empty ever since Sybil Merriman’s death, she hasn’t had much to do.”

Annie agreed without really listening, her attention trapped between the past and the present. She frowned at the dust motes sifting lazily down the band of sunshine admitted by the attic window. Jack was a lot like those dust motes—always in motion. Even when everything was smooth and peaceful, he couldn’t be still, couldn’t stay in one place. One little puff of wind and he was gone.

He’d proved that, hadn’t he? A little over two months ago, when he left her.

She wasn’t here to contemplate past follies, she reminded herself, and trained the beam from her high-powered torch on the wiring she’d just finished redoing. It looked fine. The damned beam was trembling, though. So was Annie’s hand. She scowled and shut the torch off. “All done here,” she said, and started down the ladder.

“I appreciate you coming out to fix this so promptly.” Annie’s former teacher held the ladder for her until Annie had her feet once more on the ground. “Give me a moment to find my checkbook, and I’ll pay you for your time. Though I still don’t understand why you’re doing handyman work instead of teaching.”

“Mrs. P—”

“Never mind.” She patted Annie’s shoulder. “I promised not to nag, and I won’t.”

While Mrs. Perez went in search of her checkbook, Annie made out her bill on the kitchen table. She was determined not to let herself start brooding over past mistakes or her current lack of direction. She’d done too much of that already. After years of working determinedly toward one goal, taking step after difficult step along the path she’d set for herself—a path she had chosen in part because of the woman whose wiring she had just fixed—it had been more than upsetting to learn she’d been wrong about her life’s work. It had shaken her world.

Which was how she’d ended up making the second big mistake of her life.