Santa's Seven-Day Baby Tutorial

JUST FOR CHRISTMAS?

Pretty, proper Anna Miller has all the makings of a respectable Amish housewife. But the outside world has always beckoned. So when a handsome FBI agent needs help caring for his infant twin nephews right before Christmas, Anna jumps at the opportunity. Maybe she can finally discover where she truly belongs.

Special agent Colt Asher lives for his job. So he’s surprised when an unexpected week as a hands-on uncle fills his life with meaning. Of course, it helps that the babies’ gorgeous nanny is unlike any woman the love-’em-and-leave-’em lone wolf has ever known. But Anna’s rumspringa might lead her straight back to her village. Or, if Colt lets her, Anna might just be his Christmas wish come true...

“Colt?”

“Hmm?” he asked, sitting down at her desk chair.

“I have something to tell you.”

“Okay.” He stood up, and she could tell he was bracing himself.

“I want to say this in the cold light of day. When we’re just standing around, living our lives, going about our business. Not during a romantic moment, like a kiss you’ll say was a mistake afterward.”

He stared at her, waiting.

“I’m going to use the computer in the parlor. But before I go, I want you to know that I’m in love with you. I want to be with you. That is all.”

“Oh, that’s all?” he said, quirking a smile that faded. He closed his eyes. “Forget I said that. You caught me off guard.”

“In a bad way?”

“There’s really only one way to catch someone off guard,” he said.

Ouch. She tried for a neutral expression. “Right. Well, now you know how I feel. I said it. It’s out there.” She headed to the door. “I don’t expect you to say anything now, Colt. I just wanted you to know.” She could feel her cheeks flaming. “Okay, so…bye.”

She quickly opened the door and ran out, her heart pounding.

* * *

Hurley’s Homestyle Kitchen: There’s nothing more delicious than falling in love…

Santa’s Seven-Day Baby Tutorial

Meg Maxwell

www.millsandboon.co.uk

MEG MAXWELL lives on the coast of Maine with her teenage son, their beagle and their black-and-white cat. When she’s not writing, Meg is either reading, at the movies or thinking up new story ideas on her favourite little beach (even in winter) just minutes from her house. Interesting fact: Meg Maxwell is a pseudonym for author Melissa Senate, whose women’s fiction titles have been published in over twenty-five countries.

Dedicated with appreciation to my readers.

Thank you.

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

Title Page

About the Author

Dedication

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

Epilogue

Extract

Copyright

Chapter One

FBI agent Colt Asher’s new mission: infiltrate an Amish village and recoup a stolen black-and-white guinea pig named Sparkles.

What Colt should be doing right now was planning his vacation, some much-needed R & R, maybe on the Gulf of Mexico or a trip to New Orleans for some beignets and good bourbon. Or he could dust off his passport and take off for France. Italy. Germany. Practice his Spanish in Madrid. Instead, late in the afternoon on the day before his two-week vacation would start, his boss, Harlan Holtzman, had called Colt into his office with a special request.

Yesterday, Harlan had taken his eight-year-old niece out to lunch for her birthday in their hometown, Grass Creek, a suburb of Houston, where the FBI office was located. On the way to the pizzeria, the girl had spotted a black-and-white guinea pig in the window of the pet shop and wistfully said her birthday and Christmas wish combined was to have that guinea pig for her very own and she’d name it Sparkles and take good care of it. Harlan, the old softy, planned to surprise the girl. So this afternoon he’d gone back to the pet shop and bought the critter and a bunch of whatever guinea pigs needed, like a cage and wood shavings and hidey tunnels. He then set down Sparkles in his new cage on the curb near his pickup while he went back in the store to collect the huge bag of shavings and guinea-pig pellets. A clerk had then talked his ear off about proper care of the critter and got him to add a book called Caring for Your New Guinea Pig to the bundle.

“A twenty-four-dollar Christmas present ended up costing me over one hundred and fifty bucks!” Harlan muttered.

Bigger problem: when Harlan finally came out to the truck with the shavings and pellets and book, Sparkles and his cage were gone. A guinea-pig thief in Grass Creek? Most unusual. The boss asked around, and one woman reported that she did see an Amish girl with red pigtails take the cage off the curb and put it in her buggy sometime before it moved on, but the woman hadn’t realized she was witnessing a theft. According to her statement: I mean, the Amish don’t steal, right?

Apparently, they did. Or this one girl did, anyway.

What wasn’t unusual was seeing Amish folks in Grass Creek. The Amish community was about ten minutes away from the large town with its bustling center, where Amish folks had a very popular indoor market to sell their baked goods, wares and handcrafted furniture. Though Colt lived fifteen minutes away in Houston, he’d gone to the Amish market for all the tables in his condo, and last spring, when he wanted to buy two cribs for his then pregnant-with-twins sister, he wouldn’t have shopped anywhere else. The craftsmanship was impeccable. Colt also never passed the stall with the Amish-baked lemon scones and sourdough bread without buying enough to stuff his freezer. There were always several Amish buggies around Grass Creek every day. He’d never been to the Amish community itself. But if there was one thing Colt knew from ten years as an FBI agent, it was that anyone, even an Amish girl with red braids and a bonnet, was capable of anything. Colt had arrested men who looked like bad guys in action movies and he’d arrested the most angelic-looking women who you’d never suspect of a thing.