âDo you really believe Iâm the sort of person who would plunk down a small fortune and move in next door to you a week before your wedding just to drive you nuts?â
Maddy stood up slowly, looked Joe full in the face. Pronounced every word carefully. âI loved you, Joe,â she said quietly. âBut you didnât trust me. Not enough to tell me the truth.â
Now Joe felt his temper rising, the temper he had thought had cooled long ago, to be replaced by the damning knowledge that, if he were to become rich beyond his dreamsâand he hadâhe would never be happy, complete, without Maddy by his side. He had to love her. If he didnât, he was just plain nuts to be putting himself back into a position where she could cut his knees, and heart, right out from underneath him.
And still, he couldnât help himselfâ¦.
Marrying Maddy (SR#1469)
Jessieâs Expecting (SR#1475)
Raffling Ryan (SR#1481)
Dear Reader,
Silhouetteâs 20>th anniversary celebration continues this month in Romance, with more not-to-be-missed novels that take you on the romantic journey from courtship to commitment.
First we revisit STORKVILLE, USA, where a jaded Native American rancher seems interested in His Expectant Neighbor. Donât miss this second book in the series by Susan Meier! Next, New York Times bestselling author Kasey Michaels returns to the lineup, launching her new miniseries, THE CHANDLERS REQUESTâ¦. One bride, two groomsâwho will end up Marrying Maddy? In Daddy in Dress Blues by Cathie Linz, a Marine embarks on his most terrifying missionâfatherhood!âwith the help of a pretty preschool teacher.
Then Valerie Parv whisks us to a faraway kingdom as THE CARRAMER CROWN continues. The Princessâs Proposal puts the lovely Adrienne and her American nemesis on a collision course withâ¦love. The ever-delightful Terry Essig tells the tale of a bachelor, his orphaned brood and the woman who sparks A Gleam in His Eye. Shhhâ¦. We canât give anything away, but you must learn The Librarianâs Secret Wish. Carol Grace knowsâ¦and sheâs anxious to tell you!
Next month, look for another installment of STORKVILLE, USA, and THE CHANDLERS REQUESTâ¦from New York Times bestselling author Kasey Michaels. Plus, Donna Clayton launches her newest miniseries, SINGLE DOCTOR DADS!
Happy Reading!
Mary-Theresa Hussey
Senior Editor
Marrying Maddy
Kasey Michaels
For Maryanne Colas,
for being there
a New York Times bestselling author of more than two dozen books, divides her creative time between writing contemporary romance and Regency novels. Married and the mother of four, Kaseyâs writing has garnered the Romance Writers of Americaâs Golden Medallion Award and the Romantic Times Magazineâs the Best Regency Trophy.
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
T he midafternoon sun filtered through sheer white draperies that hung at a half-dozen nearly floor-to-ceiling windows in the corner bedroom on the third floor of the Chandler mansion.
The June heat barely registered in the electronically filtered, air-conditioned atmosphere that was busily sucking dust motes out of the air as quickly as the sun could highlight them.
Dark cherry furniture, all genuine antiques, was scattered around the room; a grouping of chairs and a small, overstuffed ivory couch placed in front of the marble fireplace. A high, four-poster bed was angled into one corner and backed by a living forest of potted plants, a tall, Oriental screen tucked into the greenery.
Three crystal chandeliers hung from the high, stuccoed ceiling. There was a vanity table that definitely lived up to its name, displaying enough mirrors and pretty cut-glass bottles with expensive labels to keep Snow Whiteâs stepmama too busy to look for poison apples.
There were original oil paintings on the walls of the bedroom, even on the walls of the huge bathroom that held a marble tub that had been brought over from France forty years earlier, so enormous it probably could have been floated across the Atlantic with a three-man crew aboard.
There was a separate dressing room, a separate showering room, both a built-in sauna and a mini beauty salon. The four-in-one walk-in closetâone large section for each seasonâwas larger than most living rooms.
The remainder of the apartment, for this was only a small part of it, took up half of the third floor: a living room, formal dining room, full kitchen, a large guest bedroom and maidâs quarters.
It comprised only one half of one floor of a three-million-dollar mansion. But, hey, be it ever so humble, it was home.
Back to the bedroomâ¦dragging the eye from the huge poster bed, the fireplace mantel that had once resided in the Earl of Coventryâs summer house on the isle of Jersey, the massive chandeliersâ¦and to the trio of women gathered near the tall, three-sided mirror Madame Pompadour herself had once preened in front of before the ball.