Elizabeth Bevarly - Father Of The Brat

Cover Page

Excerpt Carver’s Head Was Spinning. Standing at his front door was a beautiful woman who said she was a social worker. And clutching her by the hand was a twelve-year-old girl who looked jarringly familiar. “Who are you?” he asked. “Maddy Garrett,” she replied matter of factly. “This is Rachel Stillman.” “Rachel…Stillman?” “Daughter of Abigail Stillman,” she said, as if that would explain everything. “I don’t know anyone named Abigail Stillman.” The bright smile Maddy had been wearing fell. “Hasn’t anyone contacted you about this?” she asked. “About what?” Carver mumbled. “About the child Abigail Stillman has—er—left behind. According to the birth certificate, you’re the girl’s father.” “Ex-excuse me?” he stammered. “I’m what?” “Congratulations, Mr. Venner,” Maddy said dryly. “It’s a girl.” FROM HERE TO PATERNITY: These three men weren’t expecting to become parents—and fatherhood isn’t the only thing the stork delivered!

Dear Reader Dear Reader, Can you believe that for the next three months we’ll be celebrating the publication of the 1000th Silhouette Desire? That’s quite a milestone! The festivities begin this month with six books by some of your longtime favorites and exciting new names in romance. We’ll continue into next month, May, with the actual publication of Book #1000—by Diana Palmer—and then we’ll keep the fun going into June. There’s just so much going on that I can’t put it all into one letter. You’ll just have to keep reading! This month we have an absolutely terrific lineup, beginning with Saddle Up, a MAN OF THE MONTH by Mary Lynn Baxter. There’s also The Groom, I Presume? — the latest in Annette Broadrick’s DAUGHTERS OF TEXAS miniseries. Father of the Brat launches the new FROM HERE TO PATERNITY miniseries by Elizabeth Bevarly, and Forgotten Vows by Modean Moon is the first of three books about what happens on THE WEDDING NIGHT. Lass Small brings us her very own delightful sense of humor in A Stranger in Texas. And our DEBUT AUTHOR this month is Anne Eames with Two Weddings and a Bride. And next month, as promised, Book #1000, a MAN OF THE MONTH, Man of Ice by Diana Palmer! Lucia Macro, Senior Editor Please address questions and book requests to: Silhouette Reader Service U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269 Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3

Title Page Father Of The Brat Elizabeth Bevarly www.millsandboon.co.uk

Dedication With much love, for Dorothy and Harold Stucker (aka Aunt Dot and Uncle Washie). You’re the best second set of parents a kid could have.

About The Author ELIZABETH BEVARLY is an honors graduate of the University of Louisville and achieved her dream of writing full-time before she even turned thirty! At heart, she is also an avid voyager who once helped navigate a friend’s thirtyfive-foot sailboat across the Bermuda Triangle. “I really love to travel,” says this self-avowed beach bum. “To me, it’s the best education a person can give to herself.” Her dream is to one day have her own sailboat, a beautifully renovated older-model fortytwo-footer, and to enjoy the freedom and tranquillity seafaring can bring. Elizabeth likes to think she has a lot in common with the characters she creates, people who know love and life go hand in hand. And she’s getting some firsthand experience with maternity as well—she and her husband recently welcomed their firstborn baby, a son.

Dear Reader Dear Reader, When I first discovered I was going to be included in Celebration 1000, I experienced an immediate flashback to college, when I was living in my parents’ basement, reading my very first Silhouette Desire. I had received it after responding to a Silhouette ad in Cosmopolitan magazine (I was very cosmopolitan in college, you see), and after reading the last page of the novel, I thought, “Wow, where have these books been all my life?” I was in my final year of earning a B.A. in English, Yet nothing I had studied came close to leaving me with the sense of contentment that I received from that single red book. I started reading every Desire I could get my hands on. And eventually, because I had always wanted to be a novelist, romance was what came out when I sat down to write my first book. It amazes me still to realize that I’m now responsible for creating the kind of books that provided me with so much for so long—romance, adventure, escape…and those wonderful happy endings that even a degree in English couldn’t stop making me crave. I’m so delighted to be included in Celebration 1000. I’m not sure I can adequately describe what it means to be keeping literary company with the novelists I’ve always admired, to be and writing for a publisher and a line of books I’ve always loved—-to be a part of the festivities surrounding the publication of the 1000th Desire… Somehow, it fills me with a sense of completion and satisfaction that I haven’t found anywhere else. For years, Silhouette Desire has brought me unrivaled reading pleasure. Now the folks at Silhouette provide me with unrivaled writing pleasure, too. And I can only hope you enjoy reading my books as much as I enjoy writing them. Very best wishes, Elizabeth Bevarly

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Nine

Ten

Eleven

Twelve

Copyright

Standing at his front door was a beautiful woman who said she was a social worker. And clutching her by the hand was a twelve-year-old girl who looked jarringly familiar.

“Who are you?” he asked.

“Maddy Garrett,” she replied matter of factly. “This is Rachel Stillman.”

“Rachel…Stillman?”

“Daughter of Abigail Stillman,” she said, as if that would explain everything.

“I don’t know anyone named Abigail Stillman.”

The bright smile Maddy had been wearing fell. “Hasn’t anyone contacted you about this?” she asked.

“About what?” Carver mumbled.

“About the child Abigail Stillman has—er—left behind. According to the birth certificate, you’re the girl’s father.”

“Ex-excuse me?” he stammered. “I’m what?”

“Congratulations, Mr. Venner,” Maddy said dryly. “It’s a girl.”

FROM HERE TO PATERNITY: These three men weren’t expecting to become parents—and fatherhood isn’t the only thing the stork delivered!

Can you believe that for the next three months we’ll be celebrating the publication of the 1000th Silhouette Desire? That’s quite a milestone! The festivities begin this month with six books by some of your longtime favorites and exciting new names in romance.

We’ll continue into next month, May, with the actual publication of Book #1000—by Diana Palmer—and then we’ll keep the fun going into June. There’s just so much going on that I can’t put it all into one letter. You’ll just have to keep reading!

This month we have an absolutely terrific lineup, beginning with Saddle Up, a MAN OF THE MONTH by Mary Lynn Baxter. There’s also The Groom, I Presume? — the latest in Annette Broadrick’s DAUGHTERS OF TEXAS miniseries. Father of the Brat launches the new FROM HERE TO PATERNITY miniseries by Elizabeth Bevarly, and Forgotten Vows by Modean Moon is the first of three books about what happens on THE WEDDING NIGHT. Lass Small brings us her very own delightful sense of humor in A Stranger in Texas. And our DEBUT AUTHOR this month is Anne Eames with Two Weddings and a Bride.