Married To A Stranger

“Oh, God. What have we done?” Hope gasped.

Tristan would have been amused at the panic rounding her violet eyes if he hadn’t been wondering the same thing himself.

He rarely acted impulsively. He trusted his instincts, which seldom failed him. But this time his instincts had fully deserted him.

All because of this virginal, violet-eyed temptress.

“What have we done?” he repeated.

The irony burned. A week ago he’d started out thinking he’d like to taste Hope Leoni’s soft-looking lips. That was all.

He hadn’t gotten a kiss. He hadn’t “gotten” anything that everybody in town seemed to think he’d been “getting.”

No, he hadn’t gotten a kiss.…

He’d gotten a wife!

Dear Reader,

During the warm days of July, what better way to kick back and enjoy the best of summer reading than with six stellar stories from Special Edition as we continue to celebrate Silhouette’s 20th Anniversary all year long!

With The Pint-Sized Secret, Sherryl Woods continues to delight her readers with another winning installment of her popular miniseries AND BABY MAKES THREE: THE DELACOURTS OF TEXAS. Reader favorite Lindsay McKenna starts her new miniseries, MORGAN’S MERCENARIES: MAVERICK HEARTS, with Man of Passion, her fiftieth book. A stolen identity leads to true love in Patricia Thayer’s compelling Whose Baby Is This? And a marriage of convenience proves to be anything but in rising star Allison Leigh’s Married to a Stranger in her MEN OF THE DOUBLE-C RANCH miniseries. Rounding off the month is celebrated author Pat Warren’s Doctor and the Debutante, where the healthy dose of romance is just what the physician ordered, while for the heroine in Beth Henderson’s Maternal Instincts, a baby-sitting assignment turns into a practice run for motherhood—and marriage.

Hope you enjoy this book and the other unforgettable stories Special Edition is happy to bring you this month!

All the best,

Karen Taylor Richman,

Senior Editor

Married to a Stranger

Allison Leigh

www.millsandboon.co.uk

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For my daughters.

Live your dreams.

Books by Allison Leigh

Silhouette Special Edition

*Stay… #1170

*The Rancher and the Redhead #1212

*A Wedding for Maggie #1241

*A Child for Christmas #1290

Millionaire’s Instant Baby #1312

*Married to a Stranger #1336

ALLISON LEIGH

started early by writing a Halloween play that her grade-school class performed for her school. Since then, though her tastes have changed, her love for reading has not. And her writing appetite simply grows more voracious by the day.

Born in Southern California, she has lived in eight different cities in four different states. She has been, at one time or another, a cosmetologist, a computer programmer and an administrative assistant.

Allison and her husband currently make their home in Arizona, where their time is thoroughly filled with two very active daughters, full-time jobs, pets, church, family and friends. In order to give herself the precious writing time she craves, she burns a lot of midnight oil.

A great believer in the power of love—her parents still hold hands—she cannot imagine anything more exciting to write about than the miracle of two hearts coming together.

Contents

Prologue

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

Chapter Fifteen

Epilogue

Prologue

All he’d wanted was a kiss. A simple kiss.

So how on God’s green earth had his life gotten so out of control in just one week over something so simple?

Tris rolled his head against the cushioned seat and looked across the aisle of the custom-fitted jet. Hope was still asleep. She certainly had no head for alcohol.

His jaw was so tight it ached. He had earned himself a doozy of a headache, too. But he knew it wasn’t from champagne, or whiskey or anything even remotely alcoholic. He’d barely choked down the few toasts they’d had at the reception—half a glass of champagne wasn’t anywhere near enough to set this pain in his head to throbbing.

No, his headache had begun a little over a week ago, he knew. Brought on strictly by himself.

He shoved his fingers through his hair and closed his eyes. But the sight of the woman stretched out on the long seat across from him was firmly burned into his brain.

Hope’s toffee-colored hair had fallen loose at some point on the drive to the airport. When he’d carried her onto the private jet, the long, thick waves had clung to his shirt, flowed over his arm and streamed behind them in the night breeze. Now, they lay tangled and gleaming over her shoulders, off the couch, nearly touching the carpeted floor.

He’d slipped off her narrow-heeled shoes and set them on the floor beside her. Her dress—so obviously an antique that he knew women who’d have given their eyeteeth for the ankle-length garment—had worked its way up her shapely calves. With one knee drawn upward, the fabric pulled in a taut stretch of beige-tinted lace over the back of her thighs and her derriere.

She was a total innocent, and lying there, so soundly asleep, she was temptation personified.

Temptation. That’s what had gotten them into this mess in the first place. Tris should have known better than to flirt with temptation. God knows she didn’t have enough experience to fight the blistering sparks between them.

But he was experienced. And older. And he should have known better. His heart might not be programmed for love and happily-ever-after, but he was on a first-name basis with the desires of the flesh.

Tris could feel the plane banking. There was no point in looking out the little oval windows. It was pitch-dark out there. Dark above, dark below, dark all around.

Even this luxurious main cabin of the plane was dark, except for one small lamp burning near him. It cast enough glow to highlight the lace dress and glossy hair of the woman across from him.

He wasn’t sure how long he sat there, legs sprawled out before him, his chin resting on his steepled fingers. It could have been one hour or three. But finally, Hope sighed deeply and shifted. Her hand tumbled off the cushion and grazed the carpet. The light glinted on the platinum rings—one plain and one studded with a trio of excruciatingly perfect diamonds—circling her ring finger.

The rings he had put there.

She turned her head and pushed her thick hair out of her eyes. She blinked drowsily and he figured her vision was probably blurry, because her eyeglasses were sitting on the round side table beside his seat.

Comprehension slowly dawned in her eyes. He waited, knowing just when that memory clicked into place, because she breathed in sharply and yanked her feet off the cushion to sit up.

“Where are we?” Hope pressed a trembling hand to her head.

“More than halfway to Paris.”

Her shoulders seemed to sag. “I drank too much,” she murmured. “I’ve never—Oh, God. What have we done?”

Tris would have been amused at the panic rounding her violet eyes if he hadn’t been wondering the same thing. He rarely acted impulsively. And even his actions over the last few days had been fairly deliberate. He trusted his instincts, listened to his gut because it rarely failed him.

But now, sitting here in this private jet equipped with every comfort known to man, from a whirlpool tub and a down-covered bed, to a fully equipped kitchen, to an array of computerized equipment that could run a small country if need be, his instincts had fully deserted him.

All because of this violet-eyed temptress.

“What have we done?” he repeated. He’d taken the easiest path of solving her problem. “We’ve stopped the gossip about us, effectively removing any reason for you to lose your teaching job.”

That’s all they’d done.

The irony burned. He’d started out thinking he’d like to taste her soft-looking lips. That was all.

He still hadn’t kissed her. Not really. That quick, off-centered glancing of lips earlier that day didn’t count.

He hadn’t gotten a kiss. He hadn’t “gotten” anything that everybody in town and beyond seemed to think he’d been “getting.” It was almost laughable.

Tris picked up her eyeglasses and leaned forward, handing them to her. But in the end, nothing about this situation was laughable.

Particularly the fact that the young woman slipping the gold-rimmed glasses on her nose had—less than twelve hours ago, stood where he’d long ago vowed never to stand—in front of a minister, promising to “love, honor and cherish.”

He hadn’t gotten a kiss.

He’d gotten a wife.

Chapter One

Eight days earlier.

“I think that’s plenty, darlin’. If you don’t mind.” Hope Leoni blinked, dragged her eyes from the deep blue gaze of the man sitting at the counter across from her. And realized she was pouring coffee all across the counter.

Well, not precisely across the counter. But it was overflowing the thick white coffee cup, the utilitarian saucer beneath it, quickly pooling around the base. Worse, it flowed into a rich brown river that ran straight to the edge of the counter and into the smoky gray sweater the man wore, creating a large spot where he’d been leaning against the counter edge. Now he sat back with a muffled comment.

Her cheeks burned and she hastily set down the glass coffee carafe and grabbed a cloth from behind the counter, mopping up her mess. “I’m so sorry.” She mopped, sopped, wiped and tried not to stare when, with a spare movement, he yanked the sweater over his head and tossed it onto the stool beside him. She dragged her attention from the plain white T-shirt that remained, hugging his broad shoulders, only to realize she was equally distracted by the thick gold hair that tumbled over his forehead. “I don’t know what I was thinking—”

He, the man…the blond god with a face that could make angels weep…put one hand over hers, stopping her motions. “No sweat, darlin’.”

She didn’t know which made her blood flow faster until it zipped along her veins with a fevered frenzy—the touch of his hand atop hers, or the casual endearment murmured in his low voice. The schoolgirl fantasies in which he’d been the star seemed as recent as yesterday. “I, uh, I’m not usually so clumsy. I can’t believe I—”

“Hey.” His long, long fingers encircled hers. Slid around her hand, beneath it; square, warm palm meeting hers. Warm. Dry. Hard.

Every sound faded—the dog that had been barking half the morning from where it was tied up outside the sheriff’s office a few doors down, the tractor mower that somebody was running over at the high school, the music from the radio on the shelf in the corner.

All of that faded. She could hear her pulse, thundering in her ears. Could hear her breath, slowly easing past her lips. She could hear the soft chink of his gold wristwatch as it bumped the counter beneath their hands.

“Relax,” he said in that voice that hypnotized. “Nobody’s going to fire you over a little spilled coffee. Certainly not Ruby, who’s got a heart bigger than Wyoming.”

At the mention of Ruby, owner of Ruby’s Café and, more importantly, Hope’s grandmother, some of Hope’s scattered senses returned. She tugged her hand, relieved and disappointed all at once when their hands separated. She picked up the damp cloth, rubbing her palm against the wet, rough, terry cloth. “I’m well aware of Gram’s generosity.”

“Gram?”

Hope pulled her gaze from his mouth. From the way it tilted at the corner when he spoke as if he were perpetually amused. “Ah…Ruby. You know…she’s my grandmother. I’m Hope. Hope…Leoni.”

He nodded, giving her the impression that he was absorbing every nonsensical syllable she uttered. Which was, of course, ridiculous.

Men who looked like this man didn’t hang on every syllable of the very ordinary Hope Leoni. Only he was nodding, his eyes thoughtful. “That’s right,” he said. “Ruby did have a little granddaughter she was raising.”

“I didn’t think you’d remember that.” Again, she forced herself to look beyond the mesmerizing way his lips shaped his words—to take in the thick, burnished blond hair, the sapphire-colored eyes that even dark circles beneath couldn’t dim, the sharply angled jaw. The astounding width of his shoulders. “You, um, don’t visit Weaver very often.” Hope felt her cheeks heat all over again.

When he’d moved away from Wyoming, she truly had been Ruby’s “little” granddaughter. But that hadn’t kept her or any other girl growing up in Weaver from developing a crush on the Wyoming boy who’d made good.

“Well, I’m here now and it’s nice to meet you, officially, Hope Leoni. Tristan Clay.” He shifted and stuck out his hand, obviously waiting.

Hope swallowed, placing her hand in his. She was almost prepared for the jolt, but still her breath audibly caught and her cheeks burned. “You, too, Mr—ah, Clay.”

His smile widened gently but there was something daunting about his impossibly steady gaze, so intensely blue among thick lashes that were surprisingly dark for someone so blond and golden. “Tristan’ll do.”

She swallowed, far too aware that he still held her hand engulfed in his much larger one. “I suppose you’re here for your father’s wedding. The whole town is buzzing with excitement.”

Finally, finally, his lashes lowered. His thumb brushed across the back of her hand. “This town buzzes with excitement when the lone traffic signal turns red. Do you work here all the time, Hope?”

She knew she should pull away her hand. But his thumb made that gentle little swirl again and she couldn’t bring herself to move. “Yes,” she breathed. “No. I mean, I work here during the summer. When school starts, I’ll—”

His expression didn’t change. “School?”

“I teach at the elementary school. Kindergarten through third.”

“Lucky kids. Married? Engaged? Going steady?”

She swallowed, nearly choking. “No.”

Again that smooth, gentle swirl against her hand, the faint tilt at the corner of his mouth. “Why not?”

Her fingers curved. She tugged again and had the impression that he wanted to smile when she pushed her hands into the front pockets of her pink waitress uniform. “No particular reason,” she answered, hoping that her trembling nerves didn’t show in her voice as badly as she suspected. Except she’d have to be asked on a date again before she could worry about marriage proposals. “You?” His smile widened a bit, and he shook his head. Her cheeks flamed hotly. Of course, in a town as small as Weaver, news would have spread like wildfire if he had settled down with one woman.

He was Tristan Clay, the youngest of the Clay brothers of the enormous Double-C cattle ranch located some twenty miles away from town. He was rich, golden-beautiful and successful even without his family’s holdings, which were reportedly the largest in the state. He’d developed some type of software when he’d been younger than she was now that had revolutionized the industry. Had dated famous women, danced in Europe with princesses and slept in the White House.

When Hope had been in school, every girl in town had dreamed of capturing the interest of Tristan Clay on his rare visits to his family’s ranch. It didn’t matter that he was grown and gone and the schoolgirls were just that—girls. The articles about him in the newspapers or magazines years ago had been clipped, savored in scrapbooks or tacked up on bedroom walls.

Hope had so envied her friend, Jolie, who had been allowed to pin up her favorite articles about her latest heartthrob. Gram had refused to let Hope attach anything to her bedroom walls other than a landscape or a print of the Last Supper. As if by doing so she’d be able to prevent Hope from turning into the wild child her sister Justine had been.

But Gram hadn’t known about the clipping Hope had had inside her geometry book. The one of Tristan, when he’d made the papers about some high-tech espionage he’d foiled. His appearances in the news had dwindled to nothing over the last six or seven years—a fact that had roused its own share of curiosity—but Hope knew, to her everlasting embarrassment, that her private hoard of clippings were still packed away somewhere in her closet.

And now, here he sat, across the counter from where she stood, with his intense blue gaze steady on her face as if there was no place else in the world he wanted to be.

Ridiculous, of course. Tristan Clay was just killing time until he headed out to his family’s place.

Yet, he was here in her grandmother’s café, wearing blue jeans that were washed soft and nearly white. The dark gray crew-neck sweater he’d worn had looked like cashmere. But he’d dumped it on the stool with no regard for the coffee soaking it. And if she wasn’t mistaken, there’d even been a small hole in one of the cuffs that had been pushed halfway up his golden-brown, sinewy forearms.

For a self-professed computer geek, his body looked both lean and hard. Her cheeks heated once again at her wayward thoughts. Since when did she speculate on the hardness of a man’s body? Not since you were a silly teenager, mooning over an article clipping about a man completely out of your league.

Now her ears were burning, too. She swiped a loose strand of hair away from her cheek, nudged up the nose piece of her glasses and made a production of looking at the round clock high on the wall at the end of the counter.

It was three-thirty and the café was supposed to close at two every day until it reopened at six. But Hope had left the front and back doors propped open to take advantage of the lovely June afternoon while she prepared for the supper crowd.

It wasn’t the first summer she’d spent working in her grandmother’s café. It wasn’t likely to be the last. But come the fall, Hope would begin her second year of teaching at Weaver Elementary and her mind had been filled with plans of that. And the relief of it, because she’d known the vote of the three-person school board to keep the school open at all had been terribly close.

She’d come out of the kitchen, her head filled with school projects and ideas, only to find Tristan sitting at one of the counter stools. His arms had been folded across the shining surface, his wide shoulders hunched tiredly. She’d begun telling him they were closed, but he’d looked up and Hope had been lost in the intensity of his eyes.

Tristan had been gone from the area for so long that he probably didn’t remember that Ruby’s Café closed after lunch. Yet telling him that was quite possibly the last thing on this earth that she’d wanted to do.

She now cast around for something intelligent to say. But could only think of the same topic she’d brought up earlier. “So, you’re here for your father’s wedding next Saturday?”

He nodded and shifted on the stool, finally blinking his eyes and glancing away. But only for a moment. One moment when she could breathe normally, and then he looked at her again, and she simply forgot how. She nudged at her slipping glasses, then pushed her hands into her pockets once more. “I’ve met Gloria Day.” She felt the tips of her ears go hot at the way the words seemed to blurt out of her. “She’s very nice. I, uh, hope your father and she are very happy.”

He nodded, not replying. His long fingers wrapped around the cup and he tilted it, as if to drink. Hope automatically reached for the coffee pot and refilled his cup. “Did you want to see a menu?” She ignored the fact that she was due at her friend’s house in less than ten minutes. She’d promised to watch Evan, Jolie’s son, while Jolie and Drew Taggart drove to Gillette.

“I remember when Ruby used to just write the specials on that chalkboard over there.” Tristan glanced at the square board that was propped on a high corner shelf.

“She still puts the specials on the board.” Hope pulled a menu from beneath the counter and slid it across to him. “But we offer more these days. I could fix you a sandwich or something.”

“Coffee, tea or me?” Tris wanted to retract the suggestive words as soon as he said them. But they were already out there and hectic color was staining the waitress-teacher’s cheeks. Personally, he found the blush charming. How many women did he know anymore who blushed?

But he’d obviously embarrassed her.

“No. I guess not.” He was oddly disappointed. She wasn’t at all his type of woman. Hell, she looked barely old enough to vote, much less be a teacher. Besides, the only energy he had right now was expended simply by lifting the coffee cup to drain it of its life-giving liquid. He set the empty cup down, closed the menu and pushed to his feet, dropping a few bills on the counter as he did so.

He wondered when he’d become so jaded that he couldn’t recognize a naive girl when he met one. Not that he expected to see her again. He had a week to catch up on his brothers’ lives, then there was the wedding to get through. After that, he was due to meet Dom to finish up the case that had kept them all occupied far longer than anyone had expected, thanks to the mess made by a love-sick fool on their very own team. He didn’t have time to dwell on Hope’s innocent appeal. “Thanks for the java.” He headed to the open door. “It was just what I needed.”

“You’re quite welcome.”

He looked back at her painfully polite words. Her ivory cheeks were nearly as pink as the uniform-dress thing she wore. Behind her gold-rimmed glasses, her eyes were wide and so violet they looked like crushed flowers from the lilac bushes that bloomed around the big house at the ranch. If it weren’t for the glasses, he’d have figured that she was wearing some colored contact lenses to achieve that vivid color. But they were obviously the genuine article.

He cupped his hand tightly around the metal edge of the glass door as his attention drifted from her eyes to the rosy fullness of her lips. To the gentle, rounded curve of her jaw and the smooth line of her throat where the delicate links of a fine gold chain disappeared beneath the ill-fitting uniform. Behind him, a dog barked and he reeled in thoughts that could get him arrested in some states. Apparently, he wasn’t as beat from the last week as he’d thought. “Give my regards to your grandmother.”

“I will.” Her tongue peeped out, leaving a distracting glisten on her lower lip. “It was nice meeting you.”

“You too. Hope.”

The color in her cheeks flared again, but she smiled. And he found himself smiling back.

Then he heard his name being called, and turned to see his oldest brother, Sawyer, standing on the street a few yards down. He absently waved at his brother, still looking back inside the café. Feeling disappointed that Hope had turned away, busy with something at the counter.