Kara Lennox: Fortune's Twins

It’s a baby shower! You’re invited…

For Gwendolyn Tanner, soon-to-be mother of twin baby girls—the subjects of “Who’s the daddy?” speculation.

Gwendolyn is registered at The Mercantile.

If you’d like to join the pool, we’re taking bets on:

Birth Date

Birth Weight

Paternity

Call Sylvia Rutledge, owner of

The Crowning Glory Hair Salon, for more details.

Dear Reader,

What a spectacular lineup of love stories Harlequin American Romance has for you this month as we continue to celebrate our 20th anniversary. Start off with another wonderful title in Cathy Gillen Thacker’s DEVERAUX LEGACY series, Taking Over the Tycoon. Sexy millionaire Connor Templeton is used to getting whatever—whomever—he wants! But has he finally met his match in one beguiling single mother?

Next, Fortune’s Twins by Kara Lennox is the latest installment in the MILLIONAIRE, MONTANA continuity series. In this book, a night of passion leaves a “Main Street Millionaire” expecting twins—and has the whole town wondering “Who’s the daddy?” After catching a bridal bouquet and opening an heirloom hope chest, a shy virgin dreams about asking her secret crush to father the baby she yearns for, in Have Bouquet, Need Boyfriend, part of Rita Herron’s HARTWELL HOPE CHESTS series. And don’t miss Inherited: One Baby! by Laura Marie Altom, in which a handsome bachelor must convince his ex-wife to remarry him in order to keep custody of the adorable orphaned baby left in his care.

Enjoy this month’s offerings, and be sure to return each and every month to Harlequin American Romance!

Melissa Jeglinski

Associate Senior Editor

Harlequin American Romance

Fortune’s Twins

Kara Lennox

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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Texas native Kara Lennox has been an art director, typesetter, advertising copywriter, textbook editor and reporter. She’s worked in a boutique, a health club and has conducted telephone surveys. She’s been an antiques dealer and briefly ran a clipping service. But no work has made her happier than writing romance novels.

When Kara isn’t writing, she indulges in an ever-changing array of weird hobbies, from rock climbing to crystal digging. But her mind is never far from her stories. Just about anything can send her running to her computer to jot down a new idea for some future novel.

HARLEQUIN AMERICAN ROMANCE

840—VIRGIN PROMISE

856—TWIN EXPECTATIONS

871—TAME AN OLDER MAN

893—BABY BY THE BOOK

917—THE UNLAWFULLY WEDDED PRINCESS

934—VIXEN IN DISGUISE*

942—PLAIN JANE’S PLAN *

951—SASSY CINDERELLA *

974—FORTUNE’S TWINS

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

“Oh, no, not again.” Gwendolyn Tanner pulled her smoking casserole from her ancient oven, resisting the urge to let loose the worst curse she knew. This was the third dinner she’d burned this month, and it was all her oven’s fault. The thing tended to malfunction when it got cold outside. Something about the thermostat. And since it was January in Jester, Montana…

Stella Montgomery, one of Gwen’s permanent boarders at the Tanner Boardinghouse, trotted into the kitchen trailing a ball of yarn behind her, her current crochet project clutched in her hand, forgotten for the moment.

“I smell smoke,” Stella announced, sounding worried. “Is something—oh, I see.”

“This darn oven,” Gwen grumbled as she tried to peel the burned top off her macaroni, cheese and sausage casserole. She was a good cook—an excellent cook. Cooking was probably the thing she did best. But this antique of a malfunctioning oven was going to ruin her reputation, and her boarders were going to starve to death. Unfortunately, she didn’t have the money to replace the appliance. Not a lot of people stopped in Jester anymore. The economy in the small town had been in the tank for years. If not for Stella and the other two regulars, Irene Caldwell and Oggie Lewis, Gwen wouldn’t be squeaking by at all.

Still, she didn’t want to do anything else. Tanners had been running this house as a hotel or boardinghouse for more than a hundred years, and she didn’t intend for that tradition to stop with her. Truly she loved her late grandmother’s quaint Victorian house, with its turrets and cubbyholes and twisty staircases, though it was in dire need of repairs.

“I think we can salvage it,” Stella said, diving into the casserole with a fork to pick out the burned bits.

“Some of it will be edible,” Gwen agreed. “With a salad, and German chocolate cake for dessert, we should get by.” She sighed and switched on the portable TV she kept in the kitchen. It was almost seven o’clock, time for the Big Draw. Gwen and several other people in Jester pooled their money and bought a bunch of tickets for the multistate lottery. They’d been doing it for eight years, but they’d never won more than a few dollars.

Still, Gwen did it more for the thrill than anything. It was fun to fantasize about what she would do if she won millions of dollars, or even a few hundred. A dollar a week wasn’t much to pay for a fantasy.

“The jackpot’s up to forty million,” Stella said as she helped Gwen set the kitchen table. Usually they ate in the dining room, but since there would only be three of them tonight, there was no sense being formal. Irene was meeting with her book club, which was hosted by Regina Larson, the mayor’s wife.

“Mmm, forty million,” Gwen said dreamily. “Split twelve ways, but still. The first thing I’d do is buy a new stove.”

“If I became an instant millionaire, I’d get the heck out of Jester,” Stella said with a laugh, her tight blond curls vibrating. “We’ll never find husbands here, honey.”

“I don’t want a husband,” Gwen declared. “I’m happy with things just the way they are.” She’d had to remind herself of that a lot lately. Oh, sure, she’d like a husband, children, a real family. But she didn’t go out much, never went on a date. Heck, she’d grown up with most of the guys in Jester, and she had a hard time thinking of any of them in a romantic way. Some of them weren’t all that bad-looking. Sheriff Luke McNeil was a hunk, and Dev Devlin, who owned the Heartbreaker Saloon, was pretty easy on the eyes. But even if Gwen was interested, she was shy and rather plain, so none of those guys gave her a second look.