Harper Allen - Desperado Lawman

Tess paused and glanced at the grim-faced man secured by his own handcuffs. The man was hard angles of bone and solid muscle, but his crystalline-gray eyes were soft—even beautiful.

“Connor.” His interjection was brusque. “Drop the agent part, lady, since the fact that I’m FBI doesn’t seem to mean much to you. And yeah, we’re in a motel room, but not for any of the reasons a man and woman usually come to a place like this.”

She felt faint heat touch her cheeks. Turning her back, she rummaged through her purse. “You sound disappointed, Agent Connor. Although I doubt you have much social life at all. The job’s your life. You probably live in a one-bedroom apartment and you’ve never bothered buying more than a bed and maybe a couch. Did I miss anything?”

“Just that I always carry a spare key for my handcuffs.” Spinning around in shock, she saw crystal-gray eyes looking coldly down on her. “Aside from that, I’d say you were dead on, lady. Seeing as you know me so well, this shouldn’t be a surprise.”

Even as Tess’s lips parted in a gasp, Connor’s mouth came down hard on hers.

Dear Harlequin Intrigue Reader,

We have a superb lineup of outstanding romantic suspense this month starting with another round of QUANTUM MEN from Amanda Stevens. A Silent Storm is brewing in Texas and it’s about to break….

More great series continue with Harper Allen’s MEN OF THE DOUBLE B RANCH trilogy. A Desperado Lawman has his hands full with a spitfire who is every bit his match. As well, B.J. Daniels adds the second installment to her CASCADES CONCEALED miniseries with Day of Reckoning.

In Secret Witness by Jessica Andersen, a woman finds herself caught between a rock—a killer threatening her child—and a hard place—the detective in charge of the case. What will happen when she has to make the most inconceivable choice any woman can make?

Launching this month is a new promotion we are calling COWBOY COPS. Need I say more? Look for Behind the Shield by veteran Harlequin Intrigue author Sheryl Lynn. And newcomer, Rosemary Heim, contributes to DEAD BOLT with Memory Reload.

Enjoy!

Sincerely,

Denise O’Sullivan

Senior Editor

Harlequin Intrigue

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Harper Allen lives in the country in the middle of a hundred acres of maple trees with her husband, Wayne, six cats, four dogs—and a very nervous cockatiel at the bottom of the food chain. For excitement she and Wayne drive to the nearest village and buy jumbo bags of pet food. She believes in love at first sight because it happened to her.

Tess Smith—On the run with a child witness, reporter Tess can’t allow FBI Agent Virgil Connor to take Joey back into custody—not when someone in the Agency is a traitor. But hijacking Connor at gunpoint wasn’t the plan….

Virgil Connor—Even if Tess Smith is right about Joey, he can’t let them stay on the run forever. But can he protect them from an unknown enemy?

Joey Begand—“I see monsters.” That’s what nine-year-old Joey’s been saying since he witnessed a murder. The only adult who believes him is Tess, but can she keep him safe from a killer?

Del Hawkins—The tough ex-marine runs a boot camp ranch for bad boys—like Connor once was. But his own past holds a dark secret that could put Tess and young Joey in danger.

Paula Geddes—Connor’s partner, she’s already risked her life once to keep witness Joey Begand safe.

John McLeish—Connor wants him for murder. Del remembers him as a hero. Tess wonders if they’re both right.

Arne Jansen—The FBI Area Director has no choice but to put out a shoot-to-kill order on now fugitives Agent Connor and Tess.

Alice Tahe—The Navajo matriarch sees evil threatening the Double B Ranch and Joey.

To T.:

Tell the others the circle is unbroken, buddy.

Prologue

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

Epilogue

When the night-light in his room suddenly went off, Joey Begand knew the killer had done something to the electricity.

He sat up fast in the dark. Swinging his sneaker-clad feet out from the covers, he reached for the duffel bag he’d stashed under the bed the day he’d been brought here, just as if he had been waiting for this moment all along. He had been. He’d even tried to warn the agents guarding him that calling this place a safe house was stupid since it was an apartment, not a house, and hiding here wasn’t going to keep him safe at all.

But that was the trouble with being nine years old. Grown-ups thought you didn’t know a thing.

He was going to have to get out of here. Then he was going to have to find the one person in the world he figured could protect him.

She’d snuck onto a top-secret government base and watched an alien autopsy. She’d tracked Bigfoot and even taken a picture of him—kind of a blurry one, but that was because if she’d gotten any closer Bigfoot would have smelled her scent and torn her apart. She’d hunted down a whole colony of vampires living in the mountains just north of Albuquerque, and if it hadn’t been for the crucifix she always wore around her neck she never would have been heard of again.

Tess Smith, star reporter for the National Eye-Opener, wasn’t like most other grown-ups, Joey told himself shakily. Tess Smith believed in monsters. She went up against them every day—went up against them and whipped their ugly monster butts.

Keeping a little kid safe from the monster who was trying to kill him would be a piece of cake for Tess Smith, nine-year-old federal witness Joey Begand thought desperately as he heard the muffled thud of the first body falling somewhere in the darkened safe house….

FBI Special Agent Virgil Connor pushed open the door of the all-night diner just outside of Roswell, New Mexico.

“Coffee?”

To hell with the heat, caffeine had become a food group over the past few hours, Connor told himself as the waitress plunked a mug in front of him and he slid into a booth adjacent to one occupied by a brunette with a grubby hellion. The waitress plunked a mug in front of him. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the hellion staring at him through an uncut swath of straight, black hair. He lifted his menu, blocking the kid’s view.

For two solid days he’d made the rounds of truck stops and diners like this one. The grunt work had just paid off.

The kid was Joey Begand. Connor had no idea who the woman was, but kidnapping a child who just happened to be a federal witness wasn’t the only charge she was facing. He could think of a dozen others, starting with accessory to murder. Breaking the news of Bill Danzig’s death to the slain agent’s wife two nights ago had been the worst moment of his career.

“Keep the ketchup on your side of the plate and stop playing with those fries.” The husky-voiced command came from the brunette. “We can’t stay here all night, you know.”