Diana Palmer - Renegade

“A handsome rancher-tycoon and his shy, sheltered stepsister fall in love in Palmer’s latest romantic melodrama (after Fearless) that’s long on humid heat.”

—Publishers Weekly on Heartless

“Palmer’s talent for character development and ability to fuse heartwarming romance with nail-biting suspense shine in Outsider.”

—Booklist

“A gentle escape mixed with real-life menace for fans of Palmer’s more than 100 novels.”

—Publishers Weekly on Night Fever

“The ever popular and prolific Palmer has penned another sure hit.”

—Booklist on Before Sunrise

“Nobody does it better.”

—New York Times bestselling author Linda Howard

“Palmer knows how to make the sparks fly…heartwarming.”

—Publishers Weekly on Renegade

“Sensual and suspenseful.”

—Booklist on Lawless

“Diana Palmer is a mesmerizing storyteller who captures the essence of what a romance should be.”

—Affaire de Coeur

“Nobody tops Diana Palmer when it comes to delivering pure, undiluted romance. I love her stories.”

—New York Times bestselling author Jayne Ann Krentz

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

IT WAS A LAZY MONDAY MORNING. Not much was going on at the Jacobsville, Texas, Police Department. Three patrol officers were fixing coffee at the small refreshment table in the main lobby. A sheriff’s deputy had stopped by to drop off a warrant. A local citizen was writing out a statement against a perpetrator who’d just been brought in by one of the patrol officers. The secretary who usually sat at reception was missing.

“That’s it. That is it! I don’t have to work here. There are jobs going right now at the Save-A-Lot grocery store, and I am going right over to put in my application!”

Heads turned at the unfamiliar sound of the police chief’s secretary yelling at the top of her lungs. There was a quick muffled reply, and then the sound of some thing metallic hitting the floor. Hard.

A furious, spiky-haired teenaged girl in a short skirt and deep-cut blouse sprinkled with glitter came stalking down the hall, eyes flashing fire, long earrings jangling like alarms. Men in uniforms moved quickly aside. She went to her desk, picked up her overstuffed purse, and started for the front door.

A tall, darkly handsome man in the chief’s uniform came down the hall just as she reached the door. His hair and clothes were liberally covered with coffee grounds, pieces of discarded tape, and two sticky Post-it notes, while a tissue was stuck to the top of a big, highly polished black shoe. There was another Post-it clinging to the long black ponytail at his nape.

“Was it something I said?” Cash Grier wondered aloud.

The teenager, whose lipstick was black, like her fingernail polish, groaned under her breath and stalked out the glass door, shutting it furiously behind her.

The uniformed officers tried valiantly not to laugh. Many sounded as if they’d just developed bad coughs. The man filling out the statement almost choked with mirth.

Cash glared at them. “Go ahead. Laugh. I can get another secretary anytime I want one!”

Judd Dunn, his assistant chief, was lounging against the counter, his black eyes twinkling. “That was the second one since you were appointed chief.”

“She worked in a grocery store before she came here,” Cash muttered, removing sticky things and coffee grounds from his immaculate uniform. “She only got this job because her uncle, Ben Brady, is the acting mayor and he said I’d never get funding for those new bulletproof vests I need if she didn’t get hired.” He sighed angrily. “He’s shady, that man. He wouldn’t be the acting mayor if Jack Herman hadn’t had a heart attack and stepped down. I have to put up with Brady until next May when we get a special election to choose Herman’s successor.”

Judd listened without comment as a scowling Cash continued ranting. “The city election won’t come too soon to suit me,” Cash snapped. “Brady’s giving me fits about making drug cases, and he won’t listen to any ideas about improvements in our department. They say Eddie Cane’s going to run for mayor against him.”

“He was the best mayor we ever had and I think he’ll win,” Judd said.

“More’s the pity we have to wait until May to vote Brady out.” Cash winced as he pulled the sticky note from his ponytail. “If he suggests a new secretary to replace that last one, I’m resigning.”

“You’ll have to find somebody to replace her, and quick, before he finds you a new candidate,” Judd ventured. “If you can get anybody sane to work for you.”

“I’ll put an ad in the paper, and women will trample us applying for the opportunity just to be in the same room with me!” Cash said.

“Maybe you should just take some time off and calm down,” Judd recommended. “The Christmas holidays are coming up.” He stared at Cash intently. “You could take a trip.”

Cash lifted an eyebrow. “I took one last month, with you, to that premiere in New York.”

“Tippy said you could come back whenever you liked,” Judd pointed out with a wicked grin, referring to the model-turned-actress Tippy Moore, the “Georgia Firefly” of modeling fame. “Her young brother liked you. He’ll probably be home from military school on holiday.”

Cash was reluctant to take the trip. The model had really gotten to him once he realized that she wasn’t the vain, vampy woman he’d first thought. Her vulnerabilities appealed to him in ways her blatant flirting hadn’t.

“I guess I could phone and ask her if she meant the invitation,” he said.

“Good man,” Judd said, clapping him on the shoulder. “You can get on the next flight out, and I can sit at your desk and be acting chief!”

Cash was getting suspicious. “This wouldn’t have anything to do with that squad car that you keep trying to talk me into? There’s a city council meeting next week…”

“They’ll postpone it for the holidays,” Judd assured him. “I would never try to talk the city council into a squad car you don’t really want. Honest.”

Cash didn’t trust that gleaming smile. Judd was like him. He rarely smiled unless he was up to something or in a temper.

“Much less hire a secretary before you get back,” Judd added, not meeting Cash’s eyes.

“Oh, that’s it,” Cash said at once. “That’s it. You’ve got somebody in mind. You’re going to stick me with some retired woman colonel from the army or another conspiracy theorist like the secretary we had when my cousin Chet Blake was chief?”

“I don’t know any out-of-work mercenaries,” Judd said innocently.

“Or any ex-colonels?”

He shrugged. “Maybe one or two. Eb Scott has a cousin…”

“No!”

“You haven’t met her…”

“I’m not going to meet her! I’m the chief. See this?” He pointed at his badge. “I fight crime. I do not fight old women!”

“She’s not old. Exactly.”