Shattered
Nine years ago Kate Grayhawk Pendelton walked into Wyatt Shaw's life–and out of it the next morning. Now Wyatt's back–and has the power to shatter Kate's future with the man she loves.By reputation, Wyatt Shaw is a brutal killer who always gets what he wants. And he wants Kate and her twin eight-year-old sons.Texas Ranger Jack McKinley is hot on Wyatt Shaw's trail. The presumed heir to the D'Amato crime syndicate is threatening to steal the woman he loves.Holly McKinley is fighting to keep Jack from leaving her for another woman. Now the secret she's kept for over twenty years may save their son's life, and cost her the only man she's ever loved.
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Praise for the novels Joan Johnston
“Johnston’s characters struggle against seriously deranged foes and face seemingly insurmountable obstacles to true love.”
—Booklist
“Johnston warms your heart and tickles your fancy.”
—New York Daily News
“Complex and suspenseful.”
—RT Book Reviews on A Stranger’s Game
“Johnston rivets the reader.”
—Bookreporter.com
“Timely subject matter, strong plotting, and a quick pace.”
—RT Book Reviews on Outcast
“Romance devotees will find Johnston lively and well-written, and her characters perfectly enchanting.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Joan Johnston continually gives us everything we want…a story that you wish would never end, and lots of tension and sensuality.”
—RT Book Reviews
“Joan Johnston [creates] unforgettable subplots and characters who make every fine thread weave into a touching tapestry.”
—Affaire de Coeur
“A guaranteed good read.”
—New York Times bestselling author Heather Graham
Great editors are a precious gift.
This book is dedicated to my editor, Linda McFall.
Contents
Prologue
“What else have you lied about?”
Kate Grayhawk Pendleton wished she could simply walk away from the imposing older woman dressed in a black St. John knit suit and Chanel tuxedo heels standing across from her. Unfortunately, she was still bedridden after waking a week before from a fourmonth-long coma.
She readjusted the pillows behind her on the hospital bed, then tugged awkwardly at her cotton hospital gown. She needed time to decide how she was going to answer the angry question posed by her mother-in-law, Texas governor and presidential hopeful Ann Wade Pendleton.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Kate said warily.
“I’m asking who you bedded down with after you married my son. I’m asking who got you pregnant, because it sure as hell wasn’t J.D.”
“What makes you say such a thing?” Kate replied. “Lucky and Chance—”
“Are somebody else’s brats. Don’t bother lying. While you were in that coma, Lucky injured himself on a broken window and needed a transfusion. The twins’ blood type proves they aren’t my son’s children.”
Kate blanched. She’d kept her secret for nine long years. She hadn’t told a single soul that her eightyear-old twin sons, Lucky and Chance, had been conceived with a man who was not her husband.
“If I’m going to get myself chosen by the party as the next Republican presidential nominee, I need to know what bats might come flying out of the belfry,” Ann Wade said, her voice as sharp and cold as ice. “I can’t afford to have some cretin come forward in the middle of my campaign and name himself as the father of my grandsons.”
Kate realized that Ann Wade wasn’t upset that she’d cheated on her husband. Wasn’t even upset that her grandsons possessed none of her blood. What had made Ann Wade so furious was the fear that Kate’s misstep might interfere with her political career.
Kate felt sick to her stomach.
She’d allied herself with the Pendleton family as a nineteen-year-old, still wincing from the stunning rejection she’d received from the man she really loved, Texas Ranger Jack McKinley. When Jack had married his high school sweetheart, J.D.’s admiration had been a balm for her wounded soul.
She’d looked at J.D. Pendleton with stars in her eyes. What she’d seen was a University of Texas football hero with wavy blond hair and striking blue eyes.
She hadn’t known J.D. was a man without honor, a spoiled child of privilege, who would cheat on her within a month of their wedding. Hadn’t known she was marrying a man who would fake his own death, desert his military post and flee to South America after blackmailing his own mother.
Kate pictured the twins’ biological father in her mind’s eye, a tall, rangy man with silver-streaked black hair and steel-gray eyes. Remembered exactly how and why she’d gone to bed with him.
She felt her face flush anew with the hurt and humiliation she’d felt on that long-ago night when she’d caught her husband in their hotel room with another woman in flagrante delicto and he’d told her, “Get the fuck out! Can’t you see I’m busy?”
In a daze, her chest aching, she’d taken the elevator downstairs to the bar at the Austin, Texas, Four Seasons. She’d walked up to a perfect stranger, taken his large hand in hers and said, “Come with me.” She’d led him to the registration desk and said, “We need a room.”
He’d supplied his black American Express card and took the key card the pretty desk clerk handed him. As they’d walked away he’d asked, “Are you sure you want to do this?”
