Mistress for a Month

“I’m willing to part with them.”

The wind howled. Amelia lifted her wine glass, and the pinot grigio slipped down her throat like cool silk.

“Then I see no reason why we can’t wrap up this negotiation tonight,” he said.

“I don’t think so,” she replied.

“My family wants this property,” he said. “Very much. The price has always been negotiable. You say you’ll sell. So what will it take to make you a happy seller?”

“You,” she said, staring at the flagstones like a shy schoolgirl instead of a wanton seductress. “For a month.”

Dear Reader,

When I began this book, I thought, wouldn’t it be fun to inherit a vineyard in Provence and meet a handsome French comte who wants both the vineyard and me? Amelia, my heroine, comes from a family of women who are taught from birth to marry well. She’s a rebel. The book begins with her breaking up with a longtime boyfriend who didn’t value her. Of course, it’s she who doesn’t really value herself. When her favorite aunt dies and leaves her a vineyard, she goes to France. Who should show up to claim it but an incredibly sexy man who has ancient rights to it himself.

After a night with him, he made her feel so desirable she wants him to teach her about love. She makes him an offer—if you make me your mistress for a month, I’ll sell you the vineyard.'

This novel is about self-doubt and fantasy and adventure. It’s about a woman who meets a man who’s wealthy but who’s lost his soul. Because of love and commitment both become much more than they ever imagined possible.

Enjoy.

Ann Major

lives in Texas with her husband of many years and is the mother of three grown children. She has a master’s degree from Texas A&M at Kingsville, Texas, and is a former English teacher. She is a founding board member of the Romance Writers of America and a frequent speaker at writers’ groups.

Ann loves to write; she considers her ability to do so a gift. Her hobbies include hiking in the mountains, sailing, ocean kayaking, traveling and playing the piano. But most of all she enjoys her family.

To my aunt, Patricia Carson Major, because she’s

so much fun and she adores all things French. Unfortunately, she never married a French comte. At least, not yet.

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

North Shore

Oahu, Hawaii

Wild, zany Aunt Tate dead?

Amelia flipped her cell phone shut. Then her grip tightened on her steering wheel as she rounded a curve of green mountain, and the tall hotels of Waikiki vanished in her rearview mirror. Why couldn’t her mother ever just answer the phone?

Amy punched in her mother’s number once more, and again it rang and rang.

After Aunt Tate’s horrid French attorney had told her her aunt had died, Amy had stopped listening for a second or two. The next thing she’d caught was, “She left you everything.”

Everything should have included only Château Serene and the vineyard in Provence where Amy had once shared sparkling summers with Aunt Tate and her haughty comte, but her aunt had not quite finished the process of donating her extremely valuable Matisse to a French museum before her death. She’d left a letter to Amy in her will stating her intentions regarding the painting, but technically the Matisse was hers, as well.

“I’m afraid the property is in a pitiable state of neglect. Luckily for you the young comte is ready to make you a generous offer. Naturally he would like to buy the painting back, as well. Surely it belongs on the wall in the home of the family who’s owned it for nearly a century.”

“The comte’s family disliked my aunt. I’m not sure I want to sell to him!”

“But, mademoiselle, the château belonged to his family for nearly eight hundred years.”

“Well, apparently everything belongs to me now. Goodbye!”

She’d immediately called Nan, her best friend, who’d been in a sulk because she hadn’t gotten to go on a retreat on Molokai with her sister Liz and had asked her to cover for her at Vintage, her resale shop, during the sale today. Then she’d tried to call her mother to tell her about Tate and to ask her if she’d work at Vintage so that she could fly to France to check on the château and vineyard.

Imagining her customers lined up outside Vintage, Amy pressed the accelerator, speeding through the mountains and then along the rugged coastline where waves exploded against the rocks. The shop didn’t matter. Nothing mattered. Life was short. She wanted Fletcher, her longtime boyfriend. She wanted his arms around her. That was why she was driving as fast as she could to his beach house on the North Shore.

Aunt Tate was gone. On a day like this there should be a rogue wave hurtling toward the Hawaiian Islands or an earthquake about to topple the hotels in Waikiki.

Despite the wind pounding the hood of her Toyota and streaming past her windows, the North Shore of Oahu with its lush, green mountains and wide, white beaches and ocean was beautiful.