Laurie Paige - When I Dream Of You

It was a mystery, part of the larger one he was trying to solve—about his father and her mother, her grandfather and his grandmother.

Danger swirled around him like a fatal cloud of poison. But Megan didn’t taste like poison; she tasted like honey, sweet and tempting.

He touched her and felt flames leap, part of him suddenly aching for things he couldn’t name. He felt a tremor run through her, and he shuddered, lost to reason, as desire flamed higher for this woman, this lovely enemy who made him forget the past and ignore the future.

“It’s hell,” he heard himself say, “this wanting.”

“Yes, I know,” Megan answered feverishly. “To find this now, with you…”

“The enemy,” he whispered, finishing the unthinkable thought.

Dear Reader,

International bestselling author Diana Palmer needs no introduction. Widely known for her sensual and emotional storytelling, and with more than forty million copies of her books in print, she is one of the genre’s most treasured authors. And this month, Special Edition is proud to bring you the exciting conclusion to her SOLDIERS OF FORTUNE series. The Last Mercenary is the thrilling tale of a mercenary hero risking it all for love. Between the covers is the passion and adventure you’ve come to expect from Diana Palmer!

Speaking of passion and adventure, don’t miss To Catch a Thief by Sherryl Woods in which trouble—in the form of attorney Rafe O’Donnell—follows Gina Petrillo home for her high school reunion and sparks fly…. Things are hotter than the Hatfields and McCoys in Laurie Paige’s When I Dream of You—when heat turns to passion between two families that have been feuding for three generations!

Is a heroine’s love strong enough to heal a hero scarred inside and out? Find out in Another Man’s Children by Christine Flynn. And when an interior designer pretends to be a millionaire’s lover, will Her Secret Affair lead to a public proposal? Don’t miss An Abundance of Babies by Marie Ferrarella—in which double the babies and double the love could be just what an estranged couple needs to bring them back together.

This is the last month to enter our Silhouette Makes You a Star contest, so be sure to look inside for details. And as always, enjoy these fantastic stories celebrating life, love and family.

Best,

Karen Taylor Richman

Senior Editor

www.millsandboon.co.uk

To my family (both in-laws and out-laws)

for help with “best-laid plans.” See you at the reunion!

says, “In the interest of authenticity, most writers will try anything…once.” Along with her writing adventures, Laurie has been a NASA engineer, a past president of the Romance Writers of America, a mother and a grandmother. She was twice a Romance Writers of America RITA finalist for Best Traditional Romance and has won awards from Romantic Times Magazine for Best Silhouette Special Edition and Best Silhouette. Recently resettled in Northern California, Laurie is looking forward to what-ever experiences her next novel will send her on.

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

M egan Windom kept the smile on her face as she and her partner dipped and swayed to the rhythm of the first waltz of the wedding reception. Tears pressed close to the surface and she didn’t know why. It was a happy occasion—the wedding of her cousin, Shannon, who was also her best friend, to Rory Daniels, another lifelong friend.

Turning her head, she quickly slid her gaze past her partner’s angular, unsmiling face. Kyle Herriot, her enemy, son of the man who had caused her mother’s death, met her brief look without a flicker of emotion in his eyes.

The fact that Kyle’s father had also died in the sailing accident didn’t mitigate the mystery of why Bunny Windom had been on his yacht or how and why she’d been knocked unconscious so that she hadn’t had a chance to survive when the boat went down.

Sighing, Megan admitted that wasn’t the only mystery in her life. At twenty-six, she had no memory of her first eleven years. It was as if her life had started the day of her mother’s funeral.

That terrible day she recalled in vivid detail. The tears. The flowers. The overcast sky with lightning and thunder rumbling among the peaks of the Wind River Mountains. The terror and uncertainty as she watched them lower her mother into the ground—

“Bear up,” Kyle advised. “The mandatory waltz of the maid of honor and best man will be over in another minute. It can’t come soon enough for me, either.”

He had a wonderful voice, husky and deep and resonant, like twilight and campfire smoke, like distant mountains and the wind through the cottonwoods. A lover’s voice—warm and honey-smooth, with an undercurrent of intimacy shaded into the masculine tones.

But none of that was for her, because she was his enemy, too. Like the Hatfields and the McCoys, their families had been hostile even before the boating incident.

“I beg your pardon?” she said as if she had no idea what he meant. Her tone was calm, not at all in sync with the haunting melancholy inside her.

His lips curled up ever so little at the corners in a knowing smile filled with the acid sting of disdain. “Being forced into my arms appears to be your idea of hell. You’ve sighed three times in the last minute.”

“You overestimate your influence,” she informed him with cool regard. “My sighs have nothing to do with you, only with…life.”

She hated the hesitant note as she searched for a word that sounded innocuous, yet meaningful enough to account for her uncharacteristic moodiness.

Her enemy studied her, his thoughts unreadable in the depths of his gray eyes. A year ahead of her in high school, he’d treated her as if she hardly existed on the occasions they couldn’t avoid each other, such as the Honor Society meetings. Kyle Herriot, football captain, had been vice president, then president when she’d been the treasurer.

Smart. Athletic. All-around hero.

A shiver raced through her, a sinister warning of something she couldn’t name.

Tonight he was incredibly handsome in a white dinner jacket and black pants, a boutonniere of pink-edged golden roses attached to the lapel. His black hair gleamed in the multiple lights of the candles spaced about the patio and rolling lawn.

June in Wind River, Wyoming, was unpredictable, but Mother Nature had chosen to be kind this year, so that the wedding reception could be outdoors rather than in the formal dining hall, cleared for the occasion. The night sky was star-spangled, the air crisp but warm enough for Megan to wear only a silk shawl draped over her long evening gown of golden silk.

Around them, other couples took to the floor, urged by the bride, who called out happy greetings to friends and family members as she danced with her new husband.

The tension eased from Megan’s shoulders as skin-prickling stares shifted to other couples. A Windom in the arms of a Herriot was news in this part of the world.

Kyle led her in an intricate step. He was a wonderful dancer, as firm and decisive as a professional. Once he’d found out she could follow him easily, he’d surprised her with his skill. How odd, to know they clicked effortlessly on the dance floor when their chance meetings were filled with silent accusations and distrust.

Inhaling deeply, she caught the scent of his cologne and the clean smell of balsam shampoo and soap mixed with pine and cedar from the mountains. The aroma of the light floral perfume she wore wafted around them, too.

Confusing sensations swept through her. She was surrounded, surfeited by it all—the evening, the first stars, the beauty of the wedding, the happiness of the bride and groom, the complex emotions of the day coupled with the memories she couldn’t erase and those she couldn’t recall—

“Easy,” the velvet-smooth voice murmured in her ear.

Kyle caught her close as her feet stopped moving, causing them to stumble. She thanked him and tried, really tried, to smile, but her lips trembled with the effort.

“What troubles you?” he asked.

Surprised by the question, she answered honestly. “My father sat out here and cried the night of my mother’s funeral. That was in June, too. Fifteen years ago.”

The words tumbled out, startling her. She hadn’t been consciously aware of them in her mind.

Kyle’s expression hardened, but he said nothing.

“My room is up there.” She nodded toward the window overlooking the patio. “I sat on the window seat and watched him, each of us alone and hurting, but I didn’t go to him. I couldn’t; it was too frightening, listening to my father weep. I’ve always regretted that.”

“You were a child, what, nine, ten?” His tone was rough, not exactly sympathetic, but not hostile toward that child, either.

“Eleven. I’d just turned eleven in May.”

A week ago she’d looked at the pictures of her eleventh birthday party. Cake. Ice cream. Friends. Her face lit with joy as she prepared to blow out the candles. A little over three weeks before her mother would go down in a sailing yacht belonging to this man’s father.

“He should have comforted you.”

“No.” She understood her father’s grief, the depth of it, the terrible, terrible pain of loss. He’d loved Bunny Windom with all his heart and soul. She was sure of it.

Her partner said nothing else.

The dance ended in a grand flourish. Kyle swept her into a graceful dip, then twirled her around three times, stopping on the last beat of the music.

“Thank you. That was lovely,” she automatically said.

His lips curled at the corners. “My pleasure.”

After escorting her to the table where the wedding party had been seated, he deftly removed the bride from her new husband’s arm and guided her onto the cleared dancing area. Shannon, looking as radiant as a dewdrop in sunlight, laughed as he executed a dramatic tango step with her.

The musicians immediately took up the tempo. Everyone stopped and watched the couple.

“Every woman’s dream—a man who can dance really well,” Kate, Megan’s other cousin, remarked, taking the seat next to her husband.

“Hey, I didn’t think I was too bad,” Jess complained with good-natured complacency.

Jess was Megan’s uncle, a virtual stranger who’d showed up last summer looking for clues to his sister’s death. Bunny had lost track of her young brother—her stepfather had been a drifter—after she married and had always worried about his well-being.

“Well, for a cop with a limp, you’re okay,” Kate conceded, her blue eyes—the envy of every woman in the county—sparkling with love and humor.

A vise clamped around Megan’s heart as she listened to the teasing between two of the people she loved best in the world. She really was emotional today.

Why? Because she was the only one left of the three cousins who hadn’t found her true love? Was she so petty as to be envious of their happiness?

No. She really was pleased that Kate and now Shannon had found their soul mates. She approved of their husbands, Jess Fargo and Rory Daniels. She adored Jess’s son from his first marriage and the couple’s recently adopted daughter.