The Parenti Marriage: The Reluctant Surrender
International Bestseller Penny Jordan’s PARENTI DYNASTY books – together at last!THE RELUCTANT SURRENDERPaul Parenti has hired Giselle Freeman as she’s the best in thebusiness, but he sees and wants the fiery passion below her Arctic façade! He is the only man who challenges Giselle’s steel defences and, working together, their sexual attraction is at boiling point…THE DUTIFUL WIFEWhen his cousin is killed, Saul Parenti must ascend the Arrezian throne. The newly married couple’s dreams must change. But scars from Giselle’s past leave their marriage in crisis: because her royal duty is to produce an heir…
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PENNY JORDAN is one of Mills & Boonâs most popular authors. Sadly Penny died from cancer on 31st December 2011, aged sixty-five. She leaves an outstanding legacy, having sold over a hundred million books around the world. She wrote a total of a hundred and eighty-seven novels for Mills & Boon, including the phenomenally successful A Perfect Family, To Love, Honour & Betray, The PerfectSinner and Power Play, which hit the Sunday Times and New York Times bestseller lists. Loved for her distinctive voice, her success was in part because she continually broke boundaries and evolved her writing to keep up with readersâ changing tastes. Publishers Weekly said about Jordan, âWomen everywhere will find pieces of themselves in Jordanâs charactersâ and this perhaps explains her enduring appeal.
Although Penny was born in Preston, Lancashire, and spent her childhood there, she moved to Cheshire as a teenager and continued to live there for the rest of her life. Following the death of her husband she moved to the small traditional Cheshire market town on which she based her much-loved Crighton books.
Penny was a member and supporter of the Romantic Novelistsâ Association and the Romance Writers of Americaâtwo organisations dedicated to providing support for both published and yet-to-be published authors. Her significant contribution to womenâs fiction was recognised in 2011, when the Romantic Novelistsâ Association presented Penny with a Lifetime Achievement Award.
Table of Contents
The Reluctant Surrender
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Epilogue
The Dutiful Wife
AS SHE turned into the underground car park, shared by the architectural practice she worked for with several other businesses in the same modern block, Giselle saw a car reversing from one of the precious spaces. Quickly she turned the wheel of her small company car against the arrows, driving up an exit lane, her brain and body automatically focusing on getting to the empty space before anyone else spotted it. She only realised as she swung round the end of the exit lane and up to the space that an imposing, expensive, polished sports car, with an equally imposing, expensive and polished, far too harshly good-looking man at its wheel, was stationary just down from the space. He had obviously been waiting for the spaceâs occupant to leave.
He looked at her, his expression one of arrogance mingled with open male disbelief. For a second she hesitated, her resolve almost failing, but then she saw how his glance moved deliberately from her face to her body, as though she was a piece of merchandise he was looking over and then rejecting, and a spurt of pure female fury had her turning into the spot for which he had been waiting.
She could see the cold savagery of the look he was giving her, and lip-read the words, What the hellâ? as they were formed by the sensually chiselled hard male mouth as she swept past him, her whole body shaking, her hands damp with perspiration as she clung to the wheel.
It wasnât just because his arrogance had infuriated her that she was doing this. This morning sheâd received an unexpected call asking her to get to the office early, to be present after the senior partnersâ meeting. She could not afford to be late; necessity overruled and squashed the guilt she would normally have felt at her lack of good road manners. Then he had given her that lookâthat assured, arrogant, hateful glance at her bodyâthat had said so clearly exactly what kind of man he was: predatory, callous, completely fixated on his own desires and needs.
Her need for the parking space was far greater than his, Giselle told herself. She had to be in the officeâfifteen minutes ago. He, on the other hand, looked the sort who normally had a driver to attend to such mundane things as parking his car.
Inside the car, she started to change her driving shoes for her office heels. The sound of an engine revving furiously made her exhale in relief. He had obviously driven awayâat high speed and in high dudgeon, no doubt.
Having moved his car a few yards, to let another vehicle pass him, Saul Parenti stared with furious disbelief at the thief who had just taken his parking spot. The fact that this deed had been commited by a woman added insult to injury. Saul had the blood of generations of powerful men running through his veinsâmen in control, in authority, absolute rulersâand right now that blood was running very hot and fast indeed. Saul would never have described himself as a misogynist, far from itâhe liked women. He liked them a lot. But generally speaking the place where he liked them most was in his bedânot in a parking spot for which he had been waiting with a patience that went against his nature.
