Anne Woodard - Dead Aim

Rick shifted just enough to pull her close for a kiss. If felt good. It felt right and real. Maggie was sweet to taste and warm to touch.

He had just enough sense to let Maggie go before he couldn’t let her go at all. Stiffly, he straightened in his seat. She straightened, too, putting distance between them. She didn’t look angry. Just…dazed.

“I’ve been wanting to do that for a while,” he said.

“So have I.”

That caught him by surprise.

“But it’s not going to happen again. Distractions like that can cost a life. We’d best get going,” she said. She looked at him as if daring him to protest. Rick couldn’t help noticing that her fingers were trembling.

“Right.” He shoved the gearshift into Drive.

He was half a mile down the road before he thought to ask where it was they were going.

Dear Reader,

Once again, Silhouette Intimate Moments has a month’s worth of fabulous reading for you. Start by picking up Wanted, the second in Ruth Langan’s suspenseful DEVIL’S COVE miniseries. This small town is full of secrets, and this top-selling author knows how to keep readers turning the pages.

We have more terrific miniseries. Kathleen Creighton continues STARRS OF THE WEST with An Order of Protection, featuring a protective hero every reader will want to have on her side. In Joint Forces, Catherine Mann continues WINGMEN WARRIORS with Tag’s long-awaited story. Seems Tag and his wife are also awaiting something: the unexpected arrival of another child. Carla Cassidy takes us back to CHEROKEE CORNERS in Manhunt. There’s a serial killer on the loose, and only the heroine’s visions can help catch him—but will she be in time to save the hero? Against the Wall is the next SPECIAL OPS title from Lyn Stone, a welcome addition to the line when she’s not also writing for Harlequin Historicals. Finally, you knew her as Anne Avery, also in Harlequin Historicals, but now she’s Anne Woodard, and in Dead Aim she proves she knows just what contemporary readers want.

Enjoy them all—and come back next month, when Silhouette Intimate Moments brings you even more of the best and most exciting romance reading around.

Yours,

Leslie J. Wainger

Executive Editor

www.millsandboon.co.uk

After much wandering, Anne Woodard recently put down roots in Hawaii. With writing, cutting back a garden that won’t stop growing and breaking up doggie squabbles because the Todd Man stole everyone’s bones, she keeps busy. But not so busy that she can’t explore the beauties of her new home state, including the local beaches! Readers can contact Anne at annewoodard1@earthlink.net.

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

The sign swinging from the wrought-iron rack over the door said Cuppa Joe’s in bright red letters. The painted placard propped in the window read, Coffee, Pastries, Homemade Sandwiches. Come On In!

The coffee shop was in the heart of the restored downtown of Fenton, Colorado, where a pedestrian mall had replaced the formerly traffic-choked street. The Victorian-style streetlamps were lit, making the fallen leaves glint amber and coppery red as they skittered across the mall in the cold autumn breeze. Light from the shop poured through the windows and into the street in a welcoming wash of gold.

But despite the inviting setting, the muscles in Rick Dornier’s shoulders tensed.

His sister’s college roommate, Grace Navarre, had sent him here. It seemed an unlikely place to find news of his missing sister, but he was running out of options.

Grace had been more interested in the joint she’d rolled than in Tina’s disappearance. The last time she’d seen Tina, Grace had said Tina had been with some “hottie” at the Good Times bar. Grace seemed to think the existence of the hottie explained it all.

It didn’t explain anything.

Serious, shy, hardworking Tina, whose only wild moment in her entire life, so far as he knew, had been moving in with someone like Grace, had been gone almost eight days before her roommate had mentioned the fact to a neighbor. Fortunately, the neighbor had had the good sense to notify the Grayson College police.

The campus cops had called his mother when they failed to turn up any trace of his sister. When even the local police drew a blank, his mother had put aside her own long-held resentments and called him.

Rick hadn’t even stopped to unload his truck after his latest venture into the Montana backcountry. He told his boss he was taking whatever leave he’d accumulated, arranged for a colleague to cover his classes at the university, then driven all night to reach the small town of Fenton in the mountains west of Denver, which was home to Grayson College.

Tina was in her final year at the exclusive, private college. She expected to graduate summa cum laude next spring and had already been offered a full fellowship to pursue graduate studies in art history at Stanford University. From what he knew of her, the last thing she would have done is disappear for a week of wild sex with a stranger.

But then, he didn’t know his own sister very well at all. Their parents, at war with each other since long before their divorce over eighteen years ago, had seen to that.

Although Rick had spent most of the day talking to the local police, the campus cops and all of Tina’s professors he could find, he hadn’t been able to find any leads. The few friends and classmates he’d been able to track down had been as casual as Grace about Tina’s absence—college students were so accustomed to fellow students’ irregular hours that they hadn’t worried when they didn’t see her around.

Tina had vanished without raising so much as a ripple in Grayson’s small pond.

When Rick had pressed Grace for more information, all she would say was, “Ask Maggie.”

She meant Maggie Mann, manager of the Cuppa Joe’s, a woman, according to Grace, who knew everyone.

Rick just hoped she did. He was running out of options.

The inside of Cuppa Joe’s was as funky as the name, an eclectic mix of chromed modern lights and solid turn-of-the-century oak tables and chairs that somehow fit well together. This early in the evening, about half of the tables were occupied, but any conversation was covered by the mellow jazz floating from hidden speakers. A college guy with a buzz cut and a T-shirt with the Grayson College logo on it was working the espresso machine with cheerful efficiency.

There was no sign of anyone named Maggie behind the counter.

“Can’t decide?” The deep, feminine voice came from behind him.

Rick turned and blinked.

She wasn’t beautiful, but she was the kind of woman that made a man’s blood stir just to look at her—tall, slender, with full breasts, a narrow waist and long, shapely legs that fantasies were made of. Her hair was a casual tangle of short-cropped brown curls that made his fingers itch to touch them. Her nose would never grace Vogue’s cover. Her chin was too square, her mouth too wide and her eyes set too far apart under surprisingly dark, thick brows. And yet there was an appealing warmth in those dark eyes and an irresistible smile on that too-wide mouth that managed somehow to look just right on her face.