Mary Mcbride - Moonglow, Texas

How could it be, when she found herself suddenly so happy here?

“What are you grinning at?” Dan was staring at her, his head tilted quizzically to one side.

“Was I?” She sipped her lemonade, using the glass to hide the smile she couldn’t suppress. You’d have thought she was in Manhattan, about to dine on rack of lamb with a gorgeous investment broker, rather than in Moonglow and about to eat hot dogs with an itinerant handyman.

No. Not just a handyman. Dan. In some strange way, she felt as if she’d known him forever.

It wasn’t like her at all to become so mesmerized, so infatuated, by a man so quickly. Use your head. Slow down, she told herself. Stop, for heaven’s sake.

Only, Molly wasn’t listening. At least, not to her head.

Dear Reader,

The excitement continues in Intimate Moments. First of all, this month brings the emotional and exciting conclusion of A YEAR OF LOVING DANGEROUSLY. In Familiar Stranger, Sharon Sala presents the final confrontation with the archvillain known as Simon—and you’ll finally find out who he really is. You’ll also be there as Jonah revisits the woman he’s never forgotten and decides it’s finally time to make some important changes in his life.

Also this month, welcome back Candace Camp to the Intimate Moments lineup. Formerly known as Kristin James, this multitalented author offers a Hard-Headed Texan who lives in A LITTLE TOWN IN TEXAS, which will enthrall readers everywhere. Paula Detmer Riggs returns with Daddy with a Badge, another installment in her popular MATERNITY ROW miniseries—and next month she’s back with Born a Hero, the lead book in our new Intimate Moments continuity, FIRSTBORN SONS. Complete the month with Moonglow, Texas, by Mary McBride, Linda Castillo’s Cops and…Lovers? and new author Susan Vaughan’s debut book, Dangerous Attraction.

By the way, don’t forget to check out our Silhouette Makes You a Star contest on the back of every book.

We hope to see you next month, too, when not only will FIRSTBORN SONS be making its bow, but we’ll also be bringing you a brand-new TALL, DARK AND DANGEROUS title from award-winning Suzanne Brockmann. For now…enjoy!

Leslie J. Wainger

Executive Senior Editor

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For Anna Greve Sadler—

Oh, Annie! If we only knew then what we know now.

When it comes to writing romance, historical or contemporary, Mary McBride is a natural. What else would anyone expect from someone whose parents met on a blind date on Valentine’s Day, and who met her own husband—whose middle name just happens to be Valentine!—on February 14, as well?

She lives in St. Louis, Missouri, with her husband and two sons. Mary loves to hear from readers. You can write to her c/o P.O. Box 411202, St. Louis, MO 63141, or contact her online at www.eHarlequin.com.

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Epilogue

“Are you sure you’re a deputy U.S. marshal, Shackelford?”

Tom Keifer, a deputy marshal himself, just one week out of basic training in Georgia, had begun to think he’d taken a wrong turn off Highway T, or that maybe there were two Dan Shackelfords in this backwater county in South Texas. The man standing before him right now didn’t look like any government agent he’d ever seen.

Knowing Dan Shackelford was on extended medical leave, Keifer had somehow expected to find him in a dim back bedroom of a shady little convalescent home, where the injured deputy would be sitting in a wheelchair reading—a serious, thin and rather pale man in leather slippers and pressed pajamas.

That hadn’t been the case.

The address Keifer was given turned out to be a defunct trailer park, and Shackelford looked like a bum, wearing ripped jeans and last week’s whiskers and leaning one arm on the door frame of his dented trailer while his free hand curved around the long brown neck of a bottle of beer. Lunch, no doubt, Keifer thought with some disgust. Judging from the roadmaps of his eyes, he’d probably had the same thing for breakfast.

The young deputy eased a finger under his tight, damp, button-down collar even as he viewed the man’s sleeveless T-shirt with pure disdain.

“Daniel L. Shackelford?” he asked again irritably, actually hoping this derelict would tell him he had the wrong man and point him down the road to the home of a competent, clean-shaven deputy. “Can you confirm your mother’s maiden name?”

“Liggett.” He raised the beer bottle, took a long wet swig, then aimed a deliberate, almost affable belch in Keifer’s direction. “Do you want to see my badge and my secret decoder ring, Junior?”

The young man took a half step back, not bothering to disguise his disapproval. He had the right man, much to his disappointment. “I don’t think that will be necessary.”

“Great.” Shackelford grinned sloppily and leaned a little farther out the door. “Then how ’bout a beer?”

“WITSEC’s been compromised,” Keifer blurted out.

“What?”

“I said WITSEC’s been compromised,” he repeated. “You know. Witness Security?”

“I know what the hell it is.” Shackelford’s expression hovered somewhere between a bleary-eyed Who gives a rip? and a grim-lipped Go on. Tell me more.

“Unidentified hackers broke into the system over the weekend. There’s no telling who or what they were looking for, if anything, and no way to know if they found it. But the Marshals Service has put nearly seven thousand people under protection since the seventies, and they’re all in jeopardy now.”

The man in the doorway let out a low whistle, blinked inscrutably, then took another long pull from his bottle.

“So, headquarters is bringing in every available deputy,” Keifer continued, “in addition to postponing vacations and retirements, and they’re terminating all medical and personal leaves as of today.” He stiffened his shoulders. “Yours included.”

Shackelford hissed an expletive.

“Here.” Keifer shoved a manila envelope through the opening of the trailer’s screen door. “All the information you need is in there.”

Having performed his assignment, the young deputy was eager to leave, to get away from this obvious loser and get on with his own future heroics in the line of duty. He had only contempt for a burned-out, washed-up rummy like Shackelford. The guy had probably never been any good at the job, anyway.

“Any questions?”

“Just one,” Shackelford drawled.

“Yes?”

“Did you say yes, you did want a beer, or no, you didn’t?”