Drive-By Daddy: Drive-By Daddy / Calamity Jo. Patricia Knoll

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      Dear Reader,

      A funny thing happened on the way to the delivery room isn’t how most women talk about the miracle of life, but the phrase perfectly fits Cheryl Anne Porter’s story Drive-By Daddy, Harlequin Duets #21. Yes, the hero really does deliver a baby by the side of the road…but leaving mother and child behind is more difficult than he expected. Then Patricia Knoll weaves a charming tale of the eccentrics and matchmakers in a small town and the intrepid girl reporter who is trying to get herself out of Hicksville in Calamity Jo.

      In Harlequin Duets #22 Liz Ireland returns with The Love Police. Sure, police officer Bill Wagner is a hunk of burning love, but that doesn’t mean he has the right to interfere in Trish Peterson’s love life—or does he? Then, fans of Colleen Collins will enjoy the return of Raven from Right Chest, Wrong Name (Love & Laughter #26). He’s changed his rough and rugged image slightly…but magazine editor Liney Reed wants to pull out the animal in him to sell her magazine. Only problem is she finds herself far too attracted to the primal man he really is.

      Treat yourself to a good time with Harlequin Duets.

      Sincerely,

      Malle Vallik

      Senior Editor

       Drive-by Daddy/Calamity Jo

      Drive-by Daddy

      Cheryl Anne Porter

      Calamity Jo

      Patricia Knoll

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      Contents

       Drive-By Daddy

       1

       2

       3

       4

       5

       6

       7

       8

       9

       10

       11

       12

       Patricia Knoll

       Prologue

       1

       2

       3

       4

       5

       6

       7

       8

       9

       10

Drive-By Daddy

      “She looks a little like that cowboy who brought you in yesterday.”

      Her mother had a one-track mind. Darcy shifted…painfully…in her bed. “Oh, stop that Mother. He delivered her. He didn’t father her.”

      “Well, I wish he had. I saw him, you know. A handsome man, with that white hat and white truck. It’s all just unbelievable. And in the newspaper. See,” she said, handing Darcy the folded newspaper, “big headlines. And a nice picture.”

      “A picture?” In her mind, Darcy again saw the camera flashes as she and her baby, wrapped in a Navajo blanket, were carried in by the cowboy whose unbuttoned chambray shirt had bared his chest to her cheek. “Dear God, I must have looked a fright.”

      Her mother waved her hand. “With that gorgeous cowboy in the picture, nobody will be looking at you, dear.”

      A Note from the Author

      Heaven forbid you ever find yourself in Darcy Alcott’s, the heroine of Drive-By Daddy, position. But if you do, I hope a tall, strapping cowboy like Tom Elliott happens to be driving by in his white truck. In my book, you just can’t get any better than a guy like him. When I was a little girl living in Tucson, I had a thing for cowboys. I dreamt about them day and night. So I was thrilled that this book gave me the chance to do a little more “research.”

      I discovered that those gorgeous cowboys still exist today. They still wear white hats…and tight jeans. And yes, I probably still dream about them a little more than I should. Well, what can I say? I guess I still have a thing for cowboys.…

      Cheryl Anne Porter

      Books by Cheryl Anne Porter

      HARLEQUIN DUETS

      12—PUPPY LOVE

      HARLEQUIN LOVE & LAUGHTER

      21—A MAN IN DEMAND

      44—THE GREAT ESCAPE

      63—FROM HERE TO MATERNITY

      To my fiction writing class at Hillsborough Community College in Brandon, Florida…all of whom I know will be checking this book to see if I’ve adhered to everything I’m teaching them.

      And to Mary Rodriguez, my “boss” at college, who insists she’s never met the person who can boss me.

      1

      “THIS IS NOT happening to me.”

      Darcy Alcott really needed to believe that. Because if she didn’t, then this was happening to her, she was here alone, on a deserted stretch of southwestern Arizona highway. On a bright and steadily warming Wednesday in May. With a car that had broken down. And she was in labor. Big time labor. Baby-on-its-way labor.

      “Don’t panic, Darcy,” she told herself, breathing fast and furiously. Don’t panic? Here I am—my baby about to make an appearance any moment and me, stuck to the tacky vinyl of the back seat of my secondhand sub-compact car. With the doors open for air. And Mom waiting on me in town for lunch. And what did I forget? The cell phone. So…don’t panic? Right.

      As the full extent of her situation hit