âIâve Seen You In The Morning, Claire,â
Nick rallied quickly. âLots of times, if youâll recall.â
âMore than a decade ago,â Claire hastened to add.
âYeah, and you look even better now than you did then.â
âOh, right,â Claire remarked. But she couldnât stop the warm fizzle of heat that wandered through her entire body at his words, at his look. Gee, waking up every morning to have a man like that give you a look like that⦠Well, it was certainly something a woman could get used to, Claire thought.
Of course, she shouldnât get used to it.
She couldnât get used to it.
She wouldnât get used to it.
Dear Reader,
Please join us in celebrating Silhouetteâs 20th anniversary in 2000! We promise to deliverâall yearâpassionate, powerful, provocative love stories from your favorite Desire authors!
This January, look for bestselling author Leanne Banksâs first MAN OF THE MONTH with Her Forever Man. Watch sparks fly when irresistibly rugged ranch owner Brock Logan comes face-to-face with his new partner, the fiery Felicity Chambeau, in the first book of Leanneâs brand-new miniseries LONE STAR FAMILIES: THE LOGANS.
Desire is pleased to continue the Silhouette cross-line continuity ROYALLY WED with The Pregnant Princess by favorite author Anne Marie Winston. After a night of torrid passion with a stranger, a beautiful princess ends up pregnantâ¦and seeks out the father of her child.
Elizabeth Bevarly returns to Desire with her immensely popular miniseries FROM HERE TO MATERNITY with Dr. Mommy, about a couple reunited by a baby left on a doorstep. Hard Lovinâ Man, another of Peggy Morelandâs TEXAS BRIDES, captures the intensity of falling in love when a cowgirl gives her heart to a sweet-talkinâ, hard-lovinâ hunk. Cathleen Galitz delivers a compelling marriage-of-convenience tale in The Cowboy Takes a Bride, in the series THE BRIDAL BID. And Sheri WhiteFeather offers another provocative Native American hero in Skyler Hawk: Lone Brave.
Help us celebrate 20 years of great romantic fiction from Silhouette by indulging yourself with all six delectably sensual Desire titles each and every month during this special year!
Enjoy!
Joan Marlow Golan
Senior Editor, Silhouette Desire
For David,
Slayer of icky bugs, Finder of lost computer files, Stay-at-home dad, Perfect husband.
Thanks, Sweetie.
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 friendâs thirty-five-foot sailboat across the Bermuda Triangle. Her dream is to one day have her own sailboat, a beautifully renovated older-model forty-two-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 sheâs getting some firsthand experience with motherhood, as wellâshe and her husband have a five-year-old son, Eli.
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Epilogue
Dick Clark had just announced that there was less than five minutes left to this New Yearâs Rockinâ Eve when Dr. Claire Wainwright heard the chime of her front doorbell erupt downstairs. Ignoring the interruptionâdoubtless it was just some New Yearâs reveler playing a joke, because heaven knew she wasnât expecting anyoneâshe noted that Dick, as always, looked suave and cheerful and eternally young. And she tried not to dwell on the fact that she herself feltâ¦well, not. Not suave. Not cheerful. Not eternally young.
Au contraire, Claire.
When the doorbell chimed again, she exhaled an errant sigh and waited to see if maybe, possibly, perchance, hopefully, she had only imagined the doleful, lonely sounds of that single, solitary dingdong. Becauseâspeaking of doleful and lonelyâshe had just settled into bed with a flute of flat-going champagne, had just opened the latest issue of JAMA to an article about C-sections and had just gotten as comfortable as she was likely to be in this lifetime. Andâspeaking of single and solitaryâshe was home alone. On New Yearâs Eve. Again.
Of courseâspeaking of dingdongâshe could have accepted that one offer of a New Yearâs Eve date that she had received, but nooooâ¦
Claire still wasnât sure what had possessed her to turn down Evan Duranâs invitation to spend the evening with him at his cottage in Cape May. It would have been a lovely, lovely event, she told herself now. Snowy moonlight on the ocean, a fire crackling merrily in the hearth, lobster and pâté and champagne every bit as good as what sheâd bought for her own solitary celebration.
Of course, the evening would have inevitably stretched into the night, she thought further. And, of course, Evan would have been there, too. Which, now that she thought about it, was doubtless why she had declined his offer.