Silent Rescue

To find her daughter, she must trust a handsome stranger

Since her brother’s tragic death, Maryse LePrieur has been in hiding. Left to care for her niece as her own, Maryse heeded his cryptic wish: that they run fast...and far. But Maryse discovers far wasn’t quite far enough when she wakes up one morning to find her beloved daughter missing. Frantic, she enlists the assistance of an unexpected ally...

When he spots a beautiful woman being forced through the streets at gunpoint, Detective Brooks Small acts quickly. But helping Maryse brings passions and unexpected connections to the surface and elevates this mission from professional to personal. Brooks soon realizes love between mother and daughter isn’t the only kind of relationship at stake.

She ran her hands over the corded muscles without shame, then lifted her gaze to meet his.

He was smiling, and his eyes had darkened to the color of maple syrup. The warmth she found there held her, stilling her completely.

“Hey there,” he said.

“Hi.”

“You’re beautiful up there, you know.”

“Likewise. Well. Down there. And you know. Handsome.”

He chuckled and reached up to touch her cheek. “I’ve got an idea. How about a bit little more of that quid pro quo.”

She frowned. “You want to save my life again?”

He laughed again, then tugged on the bottom of her shirt. “Nope. Yellow looks good on you, but I feel like we should even the playing field.”

“Oh.” Pushing through a renewed shyness, Maryse used both hands to pull off the top.

“Better?”

Brooks’s eyes traveled over every inch of exposed skin before he answered. “You have no idea.”

“I have some idea.” She gave him an equally thorough onceover, then bent to kiss him once more.

* * *

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Dear Reader,

Silent Rescue is a book that started with a single, imagined scene. A man watches a woman from afar. She’s hurrying through the streets, her concerns and goals unknown. The woman is focused. Driven. But where is she going, and why? Is her pace the result of fear? Distress? Determination? All three? Or is the man just projecting his own worries onto the woman? Maybe he is. But then he sees the flash of a gun, and he knows his gut instinct is correct...

This is how Maryse and Brooks came to be. It’s how I started to get to know them both. I discovered what a smart, dedicated mother Maryse would be. I learned that she would do anything for her daughter’s safety—even risk her life and trust a man she’d just met. This one scene taught me that Brooks would have a gruff exterior but a caring heart. It showed me how his experience as a detective would mix with that kindness and help him go out of his way to rescue a child he’d never even seen. It made me want to tell their complete story. So I did.

Happy reading,

Melinda Di Lorenzo

Silent Rescue

Melinda Di Lorenzo

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Amazon bestselling author MELINDA DI LORENZO writes in her spare time—at soccer practices, when she should be doing laundry and in place of sleep. She lives on the beautiful west coast of British Columbia, Canada, with her handsome husband and her noisy kids. When she’s not writing, she can be found curled up with (someone else’s) good book.

To all the moms and dads out there who would lay everything on the line for their kids

Contents

Cover

Back Cover Text

Introduction

Dear Reader

Title Page

About the Author

Dedication

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Extract

Copyright

Prologue

Six Years Ago

Maryse glanced down at her watch and cursed her inability to move quickly. Two minutes more, and she would miss the bus that would take her to the spot where she’d promised to meet her brother, Jean-Paul. Not that she was excited about whatever he had to say. Probably a request for more money or to tell her he’d been fired from his latest job. He was always in some kind of trouble—of the illegal variety, half the time—and Maryse was always the one to bail him out.

She hated the fact that he’d even talked her into coming from Seattle to Las Vegas for the week in the first place. Two days had gone by and she’d only seen him once. When he picked her up from the airport.

“Brother-sister bonding, my foot,” she muttered.

She snapped up her purse from the counter, then pushed open the door. As always, the desert heat hit her like a slap in the face. The air was painfully dry. Maryse could already feel her hair wanting to bounce from its gentle waves to thick curls. She wished she’d thought to tie it back.

No time now.

With a sigh, she turned the spare key in the lock, securing her brother’s basement suite. Then she paused as a soft mewl drew her attention to the bushes to the side of the doorstep. She peered over. A large cardboard box sat in the shade of the prickly foliage. Had someone left a kitten out there? Annoyed, Maryse shook her head, then moved closer. Her brother wouldn’t be thrilled if she brought some flea-ridden beast into his place, but she couldn’t leave the poor thing outside. Even at ten in the morning, it was sweltering.