Undercover Groom

Kate Fortune’s Journal Entry Letter to Reader Title Page Dedication Acknowledgments MERLINE LOVELACE FORTUNE’S Children Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Chapter Nine Chapter Ten Chapter Eleven Chapter Twelve Copyright

Kate Fortune’s Journal Entry

My poor, dear Chloe! I had had a feeling all was not well in paradise. Why was I the only one who wasn’t surprised when she took off before the big day?

Don’t get me wrong—I still think Mason Chandler would make my grand-niece a perfect husband. You know the expression that things happen for a reason? Perhaps Chloe’s amnesia is really a blessing in disguise. Now they have a chance for a fresh start.

There’s just one thing nagging at me. What was it exactly that caused these two lovebirds to split up?

Don’t miss the exciting conclusion of

Fortune’s Children: The Brides!

Will Chloe and Mason ever say “I do”?

Dear Reader,

Why not sit back and relax this summer with Silhouette Desire? As always, our six June Desire books feature strong heroes and spirited heroines who come together in a highly passionate, emotionally powerful and provocative read.

Anne McAllister kicks off June with a wonderful new MAN OF THE MONTH title, The Stardust Cowboy. Strong, silent Riley Stratton brings hope and love into the life of a single mother.

The fabulous miniseries FORTUNE’S CHILDREN: THE BRIDES concludes with Undercover Groom by Merline Lovelace, in which a sexy secret agent rescues an amnesiac runaway bride. And Silhouette Books has more Fortunes to come, starting this August with a new twelve-book continuity series, THE FORTUNES OF TEXAS.

Meanwhile, Alexandra Sellers continues her exotic SONS OF THE DESERT series with Beloved Sheikh, in which a to-die-for sheikh rescues an American beauty-in-jeopardy. One Small Secret by Meagan McKinney is a reunion romance with a surprise for a former summer flame. Popular Joan Elliott Pickart begins her new miniseries, THE BACHELOR BET, with Taming Tall, Dark Brandon. And there’s a pretend marriage between an Alpha male hero and blue-blooded heroine in Suzanne Simms’s The Willful Wife.

So hit the beach this summer with any of these sensuous Silhouette Desire titles...or take all six along!

Enjoy!

Joan Marlow Golan

Senior Editor, Silhouette Desire

Please address questions and book requests to:

Silhouette Reader Service

U S. 3010 Walden Ave, P.O Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269

Canadian PO. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont L2A 5X3

Undercover Groom

Merline Lovelace

www.millsandboon.co.uk

This is for Mary and Inga and Paula and Audrey and all

the other wonderful readers who enjoy romances as

much as I do. Thanks for your letters, your friendship

and your words of encouragement!

Special thanks and acknowledgment are given to

Merline Lovelace for her contribution to the

Fortune’s Children miniseries.

MERLINE LOVELACE

spent twenty-three exciting years as an air force officer, serving tours at the Pentagon and at bases all over the world, before she began a new career as a novelist. When she’s not tied to her keyboard, she and her own handsome hero, Al, enjoy traveling, golf and long, lively dinners with friends and family.

Look for her next book, A Man of His Word, the second in the MEN OF THE BAR H miniseries, coming from Silhouette Intimate Moments in July 1999.

Merline enjoys hearing from readers and can be reached at P.O. Box 892717, Oklahoma City, OK 73189.

FORTUNE’S Children

Meet the Fortunes—three generations of a family with a legacy of wealth, influence and power. As they gather for a host of weddings, shocking family secrets are revealed...and passionate new romances are ignited.

CHLOE FORTUNE: The young debutante thought she’d outwitted her overly protective, matchmaking relatives by getting engaged to her brother’s best friend. Only problem—she’d fallen in love with her pretend groom. And Chloe’s all set to end the masquerade, but it looks like the groom’s been keeping his own secrets!

MASON CHANDLER: This powerful CEO wants to settle down with the only woman he’s ever loved. But suddenly his double life catches up with him, threatening his one chance at happiness...

KATE FORTUNE: This family matriarch knows from female intuition and a lifetime of matchmaking that Chloe and Mason’s nuptials won’t be the last of the Fortune family weddings!

One

“Wait, Miss Fortune. I’ll announce you.”

Chloe Fortune aimed a smile over her shoulder at the trim, gray-haired executive assistant who hurried out of the copy center, her arms laden with a stack of documents.

“Never mind, Amy. I called Mr. Chandler earlier and told him I’d drop by sometime this afternoon.”

“But he’s got someone in his office. . . .”

The older woman’s protest trailed off as Chloe waved a crimson-tipped hand and sailed through the elegantly furnished reception area. Chloe had made enough visits to her fiancé’s twentieth-floor office suite to know she always had immediate access.

A dazzling view of the Minneapolis skyline drenched in late September sunshine filled the floor-to-ceiling windows on her right. Chloe didn’t allow the spectacular view to distract her; it had taken her most of the morning to work up the courage for this visit. She had to do it now, before she lost her nerve.

This time she wouldn’t wimp out.

This time she’d wait until Mason Chandler got rid of his visitor, then she’d either sweep everything off his burled mahogany desk and make wild, uninhibited love to him on its polished surface or—She gulped. Or she’d hand him back the four-carat emerald-cut solitaire he’d slipped on her ring finger last January.

Last January! She paused with her hand on the brass door latch, thinking of her unconventional engagement. She couldn’t quite believe that she and Mase had been engaged for almost nine months. Or that they’d shared only a few casual kisses in all that time.

Okay, so maybe their self-imposed restraint had been part of the ground rules she’d laid down when she proposed to Mase. After all, she was the one who’d come up with the idea of a phony engagement in the first place. At the time it had seemed like the perfect answer to her dilemma.

She’d just returned to Minneapolis after two years in Paris, bringing home with her a degree in art history, a slightly bruised heart and a seriously dented ego. The degree she’d earned from the Paris Institute of Art. The damaged heart and ego she owed to handsome tennis star, Andre Couvier, who, she’d discovered, had loved the prospect of getting his hands on a chunk of her father’s millions far more than he’d loved her. The last thing Chloe wanted when she got back to the States was to rush into another disastrous romance.

Unfortunately, she hadn’t been able to convince her overly solicitous father that she was more interested in translating her degree into a viable marketing tool than in socializing. Emmet Fortune had exerted the kind of constant, loving pressure that only a father can, urging her to cut back on her long hours at the Fortune Corporation headquarters, to go out more, to enjoy her youth.

So-o-o-o...in desperation, Chloe had proposed to Mase.

The deal was simple. He would run cover for her with her father. In return, she’d take over the marketing campaign for Chandler Industries’ latest twin-engine jet prototype. Since the VP for Marketing had just been caught with his hand in Mase’s executive till, Chloe’s offer had been deliberate, calculated and timely. Once he’d recovered from his initial surprise, Mase had agreed to her scheme readily enough.

She’d been sure he would. She’d known Mase Chandler off and on for most of her life—first as her older brother Mac’s friend and then as an occasional escort. Unlike her fiercely overprotective father and older brother, however, Mase didn’t take her personal ambitions lightly. Nor had he ever patronized her. He understood her need to prove she was as capable as any of her Fortune cousins. So she’d worked up the marketing campaign, and he’d agreed to act as her fiancé.

Their phony engagement had worked perfectly . . . at first. The match had certainly thrilled her father, who liked and respected Mase. It also allowed Chloe to devote every ounce of energy to learning the intricacies of the marketing and advertising worlds from the ground up. And Mase made the perfect fiancé. Easy, undemanding, relaxing to be with. Whenever he wasn’t jetting off on one of his extended business trips, he and Chloe enjoyed each other’s company at dinner and the theater.

She wasn’t quite sure when or how the engagement had taken on a life of its own. She hadn’t expected the diamond Mase slid onto her finger the night they announced their engagement to his family. Nor had she planned on giving in to her father’s pressure to set a wedding date. That had sort of...happened. Before she knew it, she’d been roped into discussing gowns and menus and flowers with Mollie Shaw McGuire, the wedding planner who’d become such a close friend of the Fortune family.

Even worse, the pretend bride had somehow fallen hopelessly in love with her phony groom.

Looking back, Chloe couldn’t pinpoint the exact moment it happened, couldn’t pick a morning when she suddenly woke up and realized that she wanted her fake engagement to end in a real wedding. She only knew that she missed Mase when he was gone. That the hand he planted in the small of her back to guide her to a table burned right through whatever she was wearing. That she ached to peel off his hand-tailored suit, unknot his tie, unbutton his shirt and plant hot, greedy kisses all over his naked chest.

All of which she fully intended to do today.

If she didn’t lose her nerve!

They couldn’t continue the deception any longer. Mollie wanted to send the wedding invitations to the printers. Her father was already talking about endowing a chair at his alma mater to ensure his grandchildren got a quality education. Chloe either had to call the engagement off...or convince Mase to toss out their original ground rules and make wild, reckless love to her.

He wanted to. For all his deliberate restraint, Chloe sensed the desire he so carefully kept in check. She’d tried to hint that she was ready—more than ready!—for him to unleash it. This time, she vowed, she’d do more than just hint.

Dragging in a deep, steadying breath, Chloe pushed down the brass latch. The heavy oak door slid open noiselessly. She’d taken only a single step when the sound of a husky contralto floated across the luxurious office suite.

“Come on, Mase. You love what we do together. Surely you’re not going to give it up just because you’re engaged?”

The intimacy in the dark-as-chocolate voice brought Chloe up short. That...and the sight of a stunning brunette nestled comfortably between her fiancé’s thighs.

Mase was leaning against the front edge of his desk. Beneath his neat black hair, his tanned face wore a smile that ripped at Chloe’s heart. His hands rested on the brunette’s waist, while hers played with his tie. The same silk tie that Chloe had envisioned slowly unknotting just seconds ago!

Her fingers balled into fists. She struggled for breath as a wave of raw emotion crashed over her and Mase replied in his rich, easy baritone, “No, I’m not giving it up because I’m engaged. I told you my reasons.”

“None of which will matter when the fireworks start,” his companion purred, tickling the underside of his jaw with the tie ends. “You’re hooked, just like I am. You crave the thrill, the excitement, of our little games.”

His smile tipped into a wry grin. “I don’t think you can call what we do a game, Pam. We’ve taken it too close to the edge too many times.”

“And that’s what makes it so wonderful. What makes us so damned good together. You don’t want to give it up, Mase. You know you don’t. Besides, I need you. No one plays it harder or faster or rougher than you do.”

Chloe choked. She didn’t want to hear any more. She certainly didn’t need to see any more. Now she understood why Mase hadn’t taken her up on her subtle hints about morphing their pretend relationship into a real one. Only a fool would want to tie himself to idiotic, naive Chloe, who had traveled all the way to Paris to lose her virginity at the ripe old age of twenty-four, when he could play hard and fast and rough with this...this person.

Misery and a fury she had no right to feel coursed through her. She must have made some movement, some sudden jerk, because the brunette flicked a quick look over Mase’s shoulder.

Her brown eyes locked on the woman frozen in the door, then filled with an expression that hovered between recognition, amusement and—damn her!—triumph. The message was immediate, unmistakable, woman to woman.

He’s mine. He put an engagement ring on your finger, lady, but we both know he’s mine.

Chloe’s nails dug into her palms. Her chin shot up at the exact moment Mase twisted around and spotted her.

Another man might have stammered or flushed with embarrassment at being caught in such intimacy by his-supposed fiancée. Not Mase. Not calm, controlled, always-in-command Mase.

“I’m sorry, Chloe. I didn’t know you were here.”

“Obviously not.”

Unruffled, he moved his visitor to one side and straightened. “Please, come in. I’d like you to meet Pam Hawkins. She’s a business associate of mine.”

He didn’t blush. Didn’t even blink. Chloe had to admire his aplomb, even as she fought the hurt and fury tearing through her. She had no right to feel this awful jealousy, she reminded herself fiercely. Mase hadn’t made her any promises. He’d helped her out when she asked him to, that’s all. He was a friend. Only a friend.

The realization made her even more miserable. To compensate, she hiked her chin up another notch.

“I’m sorry I disturbed you.”

“You didn’t.” He strolled over to usher her into the office, as cool as she was flushed. “We’ve finished our business.”

His hand went to the small of her back in a touch so natural, so casually polite that Chloe’s teeth ground together. Involuntarily she jerked away from his hand.

“You’re finished?” she echoed. “Strange. From where I’m standing, it looked as though you were just getting started.”

The tinge of red that crept into his cheeks gave her some satisfaction. Not much, but some.

“I’ll talk to you another time,” she said icily. “When you’re not quite so busy.”

With a regal nod to the brunette, she spun around and retraced her steps through the anteroom.

Mase caught up to her as she jabbed at the elevator button, blinking furiously to clear her eyes of a ridiculous sting of tears.

“I’m sorry you walked in on that. It’s not what it looks like—” He broke off, his mouth twisting in disgust. “I can’t believe I just said that.”

Chloe couldn’t, either. She started to point out acidly that every man ever caught cheating on his wife or girlfriend used the same, hackneyed line, but caught herself just in time. She wasn’t Mase’s girlfriend. Not really. And she certainly wasn’t his wife.

“You don’t have to explain anything. Not anymore. Not that you ever did.” She stabbed the button again, trying for a coherency that eluded her. “Oh, hell, I’m making a mess of this. Look, I just came by to—to tell you that you’re off the hook.”

“What?”

Forcing a deep breath into her lungs, Chloe turned to face him. “It’s time to end our charade. Mollie called this morning, begging me to okay the final proof of the invitations. I put her off, but it’s not fair to stall her any longer. Or keep you dangling like this.”

“I’m willing to dangle as long as you want.”

She pasted what she sincerely hoped was a smile on her face. “Really? You weren’t dangling a few moments ago. You were practically wrapped around what was her name?”

“Pam,” he muttered. “Pam Hawkins.” He hesitated, choosing his words with obvious care. “Look, Chloe, my business with Pam is...complicated.”

“Funny, it didn’t sound complicated.”

His gray eyes narrowed, and he shot her a look so swift and sharp and un-Maselike that Chloe blinked.

“What exactly did you hear?”

“Not much,” she admitted on a long, gusting sigh. “Only enough to make me thoroughly ashamed of the fact that I’ve used you.”

“I accepted your proposal with my eyes open. You didn’t use me.”

“Yes, I did, and I’m sorry, Mase. Honestly. I know you assured me that our so-called engagement wouldn’t impinge on your private life, but I shouldn’t have presumed—I should have realized—I guess I just didn’t think things through,” she finished miserably.

The elevator door pinged open. Grabbing at the escape it offered, Chloe stepped inside and jabbed the Down button. Mase’s hand shot out, catching the door as it started to close.

“We need to talk about this.”

“We will. Call me, okay? We’ll work out the details of our big breakup.” The words left a bitter taste in her mouth. Good grief, what did it take for her to learn her lesson? First she’d let the handsome, debonair Andre con her. Now she’d conned herself into thinking... into hoping...

“No,” she said, recanting her offer to talk. “We don’t have to work out anything. I shouldn’t have risked our friendship by wrapping it in deceit. No more lies, Mase. No more pretense. As of this moment, you’re a free man. Officially, finally and irrevocably.”

His response was a short, pithy curse, something Chloe wasn’t at all used to hearing from him. She blinked in surprise as he stepped inside the elevator, caging her against the back wall.

“I’m not letting you walk away until we talk this through.”

A spurt of temper sliced through her hurt. Her eyes flashed a warning. “Back off, mister.”

“Dammit, Chloe...”

“I can’t talk about it now. I don’t want to talk about it now.”

For a moment she thought he might force the issue. Suddenly, ridiculously, she felt a frisson of alarm. Not fear, exactly. She couldn’t fear Mase if she tried. Yet this man looked almost like a stranger. To her infinite relief, he stepped back.

“All right. We’ll talk tonight. After the party at your uncle’s house.”

Finally the door whirred shut. Chloe slumped against the paneled wall, her eyes shut, with Mase’s image blazed on her eyelids. Tall. Dark-haired. Broad-shouldered. Square-jawed. Smiling down at Pamela Hawkins, who liked it hard and fast and rough.

A shiver of revulsion rippled through Chloe, followed immediately by one of pure, undiluted envy. Mase Chandler certainly hadn’t tried anything hard and fast and rough with her. Face it. He hadn’t tried anything at all. It shattered her to discover that steady, solid Mase possessed a dark side to his character she hadn’t even suspected. It shattered her even more to realize that she still wanted him. Desperately.

The elevator zipped downward. With every flashing floor number, Chloe berated herself. How could she be such a fool? When would she learn that she couldn’t trust her judgment where men were concerned?

Jaw tight, Mase watched the elevator indicator flash floor after floor. His instincts told him to go after Chloe, to work through this mess before she did something stupid, like announce to her father or brothers or the rest of the Fortune clan that they’d called off their supposedly fake engagement.

Chloe didn’t know it, but their engagement had been real from the moment Mase had accepted her ridiculous proposal. For him, anyway Oh, he’d played by her rules. Kept his hands off her, despite the hunger that had grown in him with every passing day. A hunger that sent him to bed at night hard and aching and determined to finesse his skittish fiancée to the altar.

Now she’d bolted.

He should go after her. Mase knew he should. But the image of her angry, confused face held him back. She said she needed time. Okay. He’d give her time. Until tonight. Then they’d end this charade the way he’d planned to end it all along. With Chloe in his arms and in his bed.

In the meantime, Pam was waiting for him. Blowing out a long breath, Mase raked a hand through his hair. How the hell was he going to explain his convoluted relationship with Pam to Chloe? He couldn’t even explain it to himself.

One-time lover? Sometime partner? Friend?

Who was he kidding? The ties that bound them went deeper than that. He and Pam had shared too many hours of danger, too many nights of boredom to qualify as mere friends. He’d have to think of something to tell Chloe, something that didn’t violate the absolute security he had sworn to maintain. He couldn’t explain about his secret life, the life he’d decided to give up. He couldn’t take the same risks, disappear for the same extended periods, as a married man that he did while single. It wouldn’t be fair to her... or their marriage.

His mouth twisted. What had she just said? That it was stupid to wrap their friendship in lies and deceit? He wondered what she’d say if she knew they were his stock-in-trade. Or had been until he’d decided to marry her and end his forays into the seamy underworld known as clandestine operations. With a last, frustrated glance at the elevator indicator, Mase spun around and headed back to his office.

Pam had made herself comfortable in the high-backed executive chair behind his desk, her long legs crossed and a rueful smile in her brown eyes.

“Sorry if I made things awkward for you with your fiancée, Mase. Did you soothe her ruffled feathers?”

“I will,” he replied with more assurance than he felt at that particular moment. Forcing his thoughts from Chloe to the woman regarding him with cool amusement, he cut back to the reason for her unexpected visit.

“Tell me again why you think Dexter Greene is looking for me?”

Raising a well-manicured hand, Pam ticked off the bare facts she’d related when she’d first arrived less than a half hour ago.

“One, you brought in his son. Two, said son was found dead in his prison cell last month. Three, we sent an operative to the funeral and four, our agent hung around long enough to believe that Dexter Greene’s vow of vengeance is more than the ranting of a grief-crazed parent. The father’s dangerous, Mase. We knew that when we went in to extract his son.”

Frowning, Mase jingled the coins in his pocket. Fractured images of a long, deadly chase flickered through his mind. He could almost hear the pop of gunfire. Taste the coppery residue of fear as he’d slogged through miles of sucking swamp with the gun-running, hate-mongering murderer slung unconscious across his back and Pam panting at his side.

It didn’t matter that Greene’s son was a conscienceless bastard. Or that he’d not only supplied stolen weapons to the hate-mongers who’d opened fire on a church full of Asian immigrants, but had planned and participated in the massacre himself. As fanatical about America for Americans as the others in his tight little enclave, the elder Greene no doubt approved of his son’s actions.

How the hell had Dexter Greene connected the scruffy, bearded thug who’d snatched his son with the CEO of Chandler Industries?

When he put the question to Pam, she shrugged. “We don’t know how he made the initial connection. We do know that someone logged on to the computer in the library in Greene’s hometown and initiated inquiries about Mason Chandler. We answered the queries with the standard cover information, of course, and sent an operative in to nose around. When he got there, Greene had dropped off the face of the earth.”