Carole Mortimer - The One And Only

Cover Page

Excerpt “We have unfinished business.” The only unfinished business she was aware they had was the time she had spent in his arms—and she certainly had no intention of finishing that! “I don’t think so.” Joy shook her head. What did Marcus Ballantyne think she was? Did he really believe she was a woman who had a string of lovers? And did he want to be one of them? “I want you, Joy.” Marcus spoke almost angrily. “I’ve tried to put you out of my mind, but it just isn’t possible. I want you. And I intend to have you. Exclusively,” he added grimly. Joy stared up at him. He didn’t want to be one of her lovers, he wanted to be the one— and the only one!

About The Author CAROLE MORTIMER is the youngest of three children and grew up in a small English village with her parents and two brothers. She still loves nothing better than going “home” to visit her family. She has three very active sons, four cats, and a dog, which doesn’t leave her a lot of time for hobbies! She has written almost one hundred romance novels for Harlequin.

Title Page The One and Only Carole Mortimer www.millsandboon.co.uk

Dedication Peter— Eternity

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Copyright

The only unfinished business she was aware they had was the time she had spent in his arms—and she certainly had no intention of finishing that! “I don’t think so.” Joy shook her head. What did Marcus Ballantyne think she was? Did he really believe she was a woman who had a string of lovers? And did he want to be one of them?

“I want you, Joy.” Marcus spoke almost angrily. “I’ve tried to put you out of my mind, but it just isn’t possible. I want you. And I intend to have you. Exclusively,” he added grimly.

Joy stared up at him. He didn’t want to be one of her lovers, he wanted to be the one— and the only one!

CAROLE MORTIMERis the youngest of three children and grew up in a small English village with her parents and two brothers. She still loves nothing better than going “home” to visit her family. She has three very active sons, four cats, and a dog, which doesn’t leave her a lot of time for hobbies! She has written almost one hundred romance novels for Harlequin.

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Peter—

Eternity

WHAT a bore!

God, how had she ever got herself into this? She hadn’t—Casey had got her into it. As usual. It was typical of Casey: he had been getting her into one scrape or another all their lives.

But this time he had excelled himself.

It had all sounded so simple when he had explained it to her a couple of weeks ago. She should have known then—nothing was ever simple where Casey was concerned.

First prize in a Valentine competition. A week’s stay in a luxurious hotel, plus a show and supper on Valentine’s night with a television star.

‘It sounds marvellous, Casey,’ Joy had told him distractedly when he called round for dinner with her one evening.

‘Bad day at the library?’ Casey had quirked curious brows at her, blue eyes alight with mischief. Again, as usual.

How could anyone have a ‘bad day’ working in a library? And yet, as Casey very well knew, too many of Joy’s working days were fraught with tension. Still, beggars couldn’t be choosers—and she needed the job. Even with all its problems.

Her grimace in Casey’s direction, as he had leant so casually against one of the kitchen units as he watched her prepare their meal, had told its own story.

‘You should have left months ago—sorry.’ Casey had held his hands up apologetically as Joy glared up at him warningly. ‘I know I promised after— well, after, that I wouldn’t say I told you so—’

‘And you’ve done nothing but since!’ she had snapped, her eyes sparkling deeply green.

‘Only because you will insist on sticking it out there, putting yourself through unnecessary grief, wasting your love on someone who…Well, this competition is just what you need to cheer you up.’ He had hastily changed the subject as he saw the light of battle in Joy’s eyes.

At five feet two she might be a foot shorter than he was, but he knew that, if he pushed too much, the temper that matched her red hair would surely surface. It might take time, but it did surface.

‘Cheer me up?’ She frowned as she realised what he had said. ‘What does it have to do with me?’

‘Well, I can hardly go on this week’s holiday, to the show and then supper, so I naturally thought you might like to go instead of me. And—’

‘Just stop there, Casey,’ Joy interrupted drily, abandoning the dinner for a moment, sensing that she needed to give the whole of her attention to what Casey was saying—otherwise she could, as she had many times in the past, find herself in a situation she would rather not be in.

The two of them were cousins but, because both sets of their parents had been working, they had spent most school holidays together, staying at their mutual grandparents’ house, and had grown up more like brother and sister. And Joy had spent most of that time getting Casey out of the scrapes he had managed to get himself into, or ones he had embroiled her in. Life without Casey, she had decided long ago, would be a lot lonelier, but it would also be a lot more trouble-free. And she sensed one of Casey’s impending scrapes…!

‘Why can’t you go on the holiday, Casey?’ She looked at him searchingly, not fooled for a moment by the innocent expression on his boyishly handsome face. With his dark curly hair, laughing blue eyes and rakishly handsome face, Casey had a look of uncomplicated innocence—but Joy knew, from experience, that it was just a look. ‘And to the show and supper afterwards? I would have thought it would have been just up your street to go and wallow in the lap of luxury, to go out for the evening with some beautifully ravishing television star, on Valentine’s night, of all nights. You—’

“The television star is Danny Eames, Joy,’ Casey cut in drily.

‘Danny Eames?’ she repeated frowningly. ‘But Danny Eames is a—’

‘Man,’ her cousin finished impatiently. ‘Of course he’s a man!’

A rather attractive one too, as Joy recalled. He was the actor appearing regularly in a popular detective programme on Friday evenings. ‘How on earth did you manage to win an evening out with a man?’ Joy decided she had either missed something in the earlier conversation, or Casey was keeping something back. And, knowing Casey as she did, she thought she knew which one it was!

He looked more than a little irritated now. ‘Well, if you must know…’

‘Oh, I think I must.’ She nodded derisively.

‘I entered a competition in one of those women’s magazines Lisa is always reading. And I won the damned thing!’ he added disgustedly.

Lisa was Casey’s steady girlfriend of the last year, if the word ‘steady’ could be applied to the stormy relationship they both seemed to enjoy.

‘I told her the damned things were all a con, that no one ever actually won anything in them,’ Casey continued disgruntledly as Joy stared at him.

‘And then you won.’ Joy’s lips twiched as she made an effort to hold back her humour. ‘First prize!’

‘Yes!’ he bit out impatiently. ‘And the people who ran the competition assumed Casey Simms was a woman—’

‘Well, they would—when the prize was Valentine’s night out with a handsome hunk!’ Joy knew she wasn’t going to be able to contain her laughter much longer—the humour of the situation was just too much.

He glared at her. ‘Don’t rub it in!’

She chewed on her top lip to stop the throaty laughter from erupting. ‘And just where are you and Danny supposed to be having this intimate dinner for two?’ Casey had really done it this time. But then, he had never done anything by halves.

‘In London,’ he snapped. ‘But we aren’t— you and he are!’ Casey looked at her challengingly.

She shook her head, repressed laughter making her eyes appear an even deeper green than usual. ‘I don’t think so.’

‘I can’t go!’ her cousin wailed.

‘Well, obviously not,’ Joy conceded, openly smiling now. ‘But Lisa could—’

‘No way!’ Casey instantly protested. ‘Do you think I’m stupid enough to let my girlfriend go out for the evening, especially that evening, with a lech like Danny Eames is reputed to be?’

Joy raised auburn brows, brows much darker than the long fiery-coloured hair she wore confined when at work, but preferred to leave loose about her shoulders at other times. ‘But it’s all right to send your favourite cousin out for the evening with him?’ she derided drily.

‘My only cousin,’ he corrected distractedly. ‘And my favourite one, of course,’ he added at her openly mocking expression. ‘I’m going to look so stupid if it ever comes out that I entered a competition in a women’s magazine—’

‘Maybe you should have thought of that earlier,’ she pointed out reasonably.

‘Joy, you know I would do the same for you if the positions were reversed,’ he persisted wheedlingly.

‘The answer is no, Casey,’ she told him dismissively.

‘Oh, please, Joy.’ He looked at her pleadingly.

Joy knew that look only too well—and the trouble it could get her into. ‘I said no, Casey,’ she repeated firmly.

Which was why she was here now, pretending to be Casey Simms for the week!

The hotel was as luxurious as Casey had promised it would be, and she had enjoyed the little she had seen of London since her arrival yesterday. But Danny Eames, far from being the interesting individual Casey had persuaded her he would be, was one of the most boring people, male or female, she had ever met in her life!

Lisa had lent her a dress to wear for the evening; in fact, Lisa had provided most of the clothes Joy had brought with her, after looking through Joy’s wardrobe and declaring its contents were much too librarianish. Joy’s protests of that being exactly what she was had been met with little sympathy, let alone understanding. And with Casey as well as Lisa to argue against, each of them as incorrigible as the other, Joy hadn’t stood a chance, and had arrived at the hotel yesterday with two suitcases full of Lisa’s expensively flamboyant clothing. As a model, Lisa often managed to buy her clothes cheaper than she might otherwise have done, and she usually chose the clothes that would most get her noticed.

As with the dress Joy was wearing this evening. It was unlike anything she had ever worn, or dreamt of wearing, in her life before. She had to admit that the green shimmering material made her eyes appear even deeper in colour, and her hair glowed fieryred as it fell loosely to just below her shoulders. But the dress also clung to the slender length of her body, finishing abruptly several inches above her shapely knees. But of the evening gowns Lisa had provided, this was the least revealing—the black one was backless, and the red one virtually frontless!