The Untamed Heart
Tomboy Willie Thorne Had The Face Of An Angel Despite the fact that she could outdrink and outshoot most of the men in the Colorado Territory.And Sloan Devlin was damned if she wasn't the closest thing to Paradise he'd seen in a long time. Wilhelmina Thorne knew it was only a matter of time before Sloan Devlin solved them mystery that had stolen her childhood dreams. But before that happened, she intended to make one very adult dream come true… !
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Table of Contents
Sloan rose from the bed and started toward her
Willie thought she’d never seen a more dangerouslooking man. He stopped just inches from her.
She stared at the ridges of his belly and the line of dark hair tapering into the top of his pants.
“Go,” he rumbled, “or I’ll do something we’ll both regret. And there won’t be any taking it back. Only guilt and confusion and heartache. That’s the only promise you’ll get from me.”
He reached around her for the door handle and tugged it wide. She felt the heat of his arm as it stirred the air over her skin.
“Run,” he bit out. “Run before I make you disreputable as hell.”
And she did. For the first time in her life, Willie fled from a man…!
Dear Reader,
Kit Gardner has written seven terrific historicals for Harlequin, but many of our readers also know her for her equally exciting historicals from Dell written as Kit Garland. This month’s story, The Untamed Heart, a Western with a twist, has a refined English hero who happens to be an earl, and a feisty, ranch hand heroine who can do anything a man can do, only better. Don’t miss the sparks as these two opposites fight their very strong mutual attraction.
This month also brings us a new concept for Harlequin Historicals, our first in-line short-story collection, The Knights of Christmas. Three of our award-winning authors, Suzanne Barclay, Margaret Moore and Deborah Simmons, have joined forces to create a Medieval Christmas anthology that is sure to spread cheer all year long. Author Susan Amarillas’s new book, Wild Card, is the story of a lady gambler who is hiding in a remote Wyoming town, terrified that the local sheriff will discover she’s wanted for murder in Texas. And talented newcomer Lyn Stone is back with The Arrangement, a unique and touching story about a young female gossip columnist who sets out to expose a notorious composer and winds up first agreeing to marry him, then falling in love with him.
Whatever your tastes in reading, we hope you enjoy all four books, available wherever Harlequin Historicals are sold.
Sincerely,
Tracy Farrell
Senior Editor
Please address questions and book requests to:
Harlequin Reader Service
U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269
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KIT GARDNER
at one time in her life masqueraded as an accountant. These days she considers herself a writer and a mother. When she’s not pounding furiously on her computer keyboard, she now can be found on her knees in her perennial gardens, bellowing on the sidelines of a soccer field or blubbering over anything Jane Austen. She’s an eternal enthusiast for all things English but has been known to spend entire Sunday mornings watching reruns of “The Wild, Wild West.” She lives with her husband, three sons and a golden retriever near Chicago. She loves to hear from readers. Write to P.O. Box 510, Plainfield, IL 60544.
Nebraska
April 1880
Sloan Devlin, fifth Earl of Worthingham, held four kings and an ace. The smooth-handed gentleman seated to his right slid his entire pile of bills and coin into the center of the table, raising the stakes well above four thousand.
“I call, tenderfoot,” the man drawled. Beneath the brim of his low-crowned black hat, his mouth twisted into a grin that would have sent any well-seeing female to the floor in a faint. “Lay them on the table, gents.”
Across the table two railroad businessmen with bulging bellies and whiskey-ruddied cheeks tossed their cards onto the table. The one who called himself Hyde rolled his cigar from one corner of his mouth to the other and glanced from the black-hatted man to Sloan. The other, Strobridge, gulped from his glass and glanced nervously around the otherwise deserted railcar. Over the tops of their brown bowlers a barren wash of gold whizzed past beyond the windows. The car’s wooden floor vibrated beneath Sloan’s shoes, each clickety-clack of the rails registering the locomotive’s westward trek across the prairie.
The gentleman cheat, who’d neglected to mention his name, stared at Sloan. The man had resorted to deceit as though he’d done it countless times before. But a gambler down on his luck was never too hard to recognize. Sloan had known several in his thirty-five years, men who utilized their quick hands to stack the deck or deal crookedly, fluttering the cards up like a flock of quail and neatly assembling them as they wished. A man had no chance against those fellows, unless luck played her hand, and Sloan had always found luck at the gaming table. Elsewhere—well, that was another thing altogether.
At first glance Sloan had registered the gambler’s babysmooth hands, and the finely made, high-heeled French leather boot he crossed over one knee. Maybe only a few years younger than Sloan, he’d been graced with the good looks and bold manner that marked him as part of the dashing American West Sloan had traveled from England to discover. His skin and hair were of the same sun-burnished hue as the landscape beyond the windows. He wore his fresh-from-the-tailor’s-iron linen and broadcloth with an elegance common to the men who occupied London’s most fashionable gaming houses, and yet his eyes remained wary as if he’d seen enough to expect the worst of people.
