Muriel Jensen - Father Formula

“The very talented Muriel Jensen has a definite skill for penning heartwarming, humorous tales destined to remain favorites….”

—Romantic Times Magazine

Dear Reader,

Here we are in Dancer’s Beach again with Peg and Charlie, parents of the McKeon brothers from the original WHO’S THE DADDY? series.

Also at the beach are the new residents of Cliffside, a home on the bluff outside town. They are David Hartford, Trevyn McGinty and Bram Bishop—all recently retired from the CIA. They host a masked ball dressed as the Three Musketeers and cross paths with identical triplet sisters dressed as a Regency miss, a flapper and a Southern belle.

Seven months later one of the women is rescued from the Columbia River very pregnant and suffering from amnesia. But which of the three sisters is she? And the question everyone is asking is who’s the daddy?

I hope you enjoy finding the answer!

Best wishes,

Dear Reader,

Happy New Year! May this year bring you happiness, good health and all that you wish for. And at Harlequin American Romance, we’re hoping to provide you with a year full of heartwarming books that you won’t be able to resist.

Leading the month is The Secretary Gets Her Man by Mindy Neff, Harlequin American Romance’s spin-off to Harlequin Intrigue’s TEXAS CONFIDENTIAL continuity series. This exciting story focuses on the covert operation’s much-mentioned wallflower secretary, Penny Archer.

Muriel Jensen’s Father Formula continues her successful WHO’S THE DADDY? series about three identical sisters who cause three handsome bachelors no end of trouble when they discover one woman is about to become a mother. Next, after opening an heirloom hope chest, a bride-to-be suddenly cancels her wedding and starts having intimate dreams about a handsome stranger, in Have Gown, Need Groom. This is the first book of Rita Herron’s new miniseries THE HARTWELL HOPE CHESTS. And Debbi Rawlins tells the emotional story of a reclusive rancher who opens his home—and his heart—to a lovely single mother, in Loving a Lonesome Cowboy.

In February, look for another installment in the RETURN TO TYLER series with Prescription for Seduction by Darlene Scalera.

Wishing you happy reading,

Melissa Jeglinski

Associate Senior Editor

Harlequin American Romance

Father Formula

Muriel Jensen

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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Muriel Jensen and her husband, Ron, live in Astoria, Oregon, in an old four-square Victorian at the mouth of the Columbia River. They share their home with a golden retriever/golden Labrador mix named Amber, and five cats who moved in with them without an invitation. (Muriel insists that a plate of Friskies and a bowl of water are not an invitation!)

They also have three children and their families in their lives—a veritable crowd of the most interesting people and children. In addition, they have irreplaceable friends, wonderful neighbors and “a life they know they don’t deserve but love desperately anyway.”

HARLEQUIN AMERICAN ROMANCE

73—WINTER’S BOUNTY

119—LOVERS NEVER LOSE

176—THE MALLORY TOUCH

200—FANTASIES & MEMORIES

219—LOVE AND LAVENDER

244—THE DUCK SHACK AGREEMENT

267—STRINGS

283—SIDE BY SIDE

321—A CAROL CHRISTMAS

339—EVERYTHING

392—THE MIRACLE

414—RACING WITH THE MOON

425—VALENTINE HEARTS AND FLOWERS

464—MIDDLE OF THE RAINBOW

478—ONE AND ONE MAKES THREE

507—THE UNEXPECTED GROOM

522—NIGHT PRINCE

534—MAKE-BELIEVE MOM

549—THE WEDDING GAMBLE

569—THE COURTSHIP OF DUSTY’S DADDY

603—MOMMY ON BOARD*

606—MAKE WAY FOR MOMMY*

610—MERRY CHRISTMAS, MOMMY!*

654—THE COMEBACK MOM

669—THE PRINCE, THE LADY & THE TOWER

688—KIDS & CO.*

705—CHRISTMAS IN THE COUNTRY

737—DADDY BY DEFAULT**

742—DADDY BY DESIGN**

746—DADDY BY DESTINY**

756—GIFT-WRAPPED DAD

770—THE HUNK & THE VIRGIN

798—COUNTDOWN TO BABY

813—FOUR REASONS FOR FATHERHOOD

850—FATHER FEVER**

858—FATHER FORMULA**

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

Alexis Ames reclined on her side on her sister Athena’s bed, propped up on her elbow as she watched her fold clothing into a dark blue soft-sided bag. Athena, usually serious and sedate, placed a flowered bra and matching French-cut panties into the bag’s front pocket.

“Now, there’s something I never thought I’d see,” Alexis said, pointing to the scraps of silk and lace as they were tucked away. “How will you be able to keep a straight face while addressing the jury, knowing you’re wearing those?”

Athena blushed and laughed. “David bought them for me. And I won’t be in court this trip.”

Alexis was fascinated by her sister’s blush. Athena had changed in a score of subtle little ways since taking up with David Hartford.

Athena practiced law in Washington, D.C., a champion of the oppressed and the underdog. She’d always been the serious one of the Ames triplets, every detail of her life organized for the best and most efficient outcome.

Of course, their aunt’s sudden death in the crash of a light plane in Hawaii had changed all their lives. Athena had taken time off from her law practice, Alexis had left her art studio in Rome, and Augusta had arranged for a substitute teacher and had flown in from northern California for the reading of Aunt Sadie’s will at the Portland, Oregon, office of her attorney.

The news that Sadie had left Cliffside, her family’s home, to a mysterious beneficiary named David Hartford made all three sisters suspicious. Sadie had always promised the home to her nieces, and the will offered no explanation for the sudden change in plans.

When they’d learned that Hartford had already taken possession of Cliffside and had rented the guest house and the garage apartment to friends, Alexis and her sisters had rented a car and driven to Dancer’s Beach on the Oregon Coast. They invited themselves to a costume party the men were hosting in an attempt to discover, through clever subterfuge, what they didn’t seem to be able to uncover with straightforward questions.

Only things had backfired. The men had been dressed as the Three Musketeers, wigged and masked and of similar height and coloring. Each sister had attached herself to one of the men, the plan being that she could use whatever means she deemed fit to gather information.