The Tycoon Meets His Match. Barbara Benedict

      

       So this was life on the edge.

      Rhys knew that a single call home could resolve their financial crisis, but logic wasn’t governing his actions this evening. Looking at Trae, he held out their last coin. “This is it.”

      She smiled in approval. “Then we’re in this together. How about showing this machine who’s in charge?”

      Rubbing the coin for good luck, Rhys dropped it in the slot. He didn’t look at the symbols flash, focusing instead on Trae’s hand on his arm, until all at once she released her grip with a squeal to the accompaniment of a million bells and whistles.

      They turned towards each other, excitement overriding all other emotions. As she fell into his arms, Rhys understood that she merely meant to hug him, but between the thrill of winning – and her enticing scent – was it any wonder he wanted more than a simple embrace?

       BARBARA BENEDICT

      Weaving a story has always been part of Barbara Benedict’s life, from the days when her grandfather would gather the kids around his banjo to the nights of bedtime tales with her own children. For Barbara, starting a story should be like saying, “Come, enter a special new world with me.”

      Her ten books and two novellas are set in varied places and time periods, but her heart is really in contemporary romance.

      The Tycoon Meets His Match

      BARBARA BENEDICT

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      Dear Reader,

      To this day I can’t help but feel a certain thrill every time I hear the cry, “Road trip!” Maybe it’s the challenge of it all, the setting off into the unknown, the call to adventure with its promise of fun and laughter. Caught up in the demands of our busy modern lives, when do we have time to escape so impulsively?

      In The Tycoon Meets His Match, I’m offering the vicarious opportunity. Join Trae and Rhys as they set off on their cross-country journey. Along the way they’ll hit snags, find surprises and experience how it feels to fall madly, deliriously, head over heels in love.

      So buckle up and enjoy the ride.

       Lilian Darcy

      prologue

      It was a dark and stormy night…

      Technically, it was a dark and stormy night, but if Teresa Andrelini hoped ever to be a published writer, she couldn’t settle for such a cliché. Trae’s professors, even her classmates, would insist she could come up with a better description.

      The word hokey popped into her mind.

      The “let’s-make-a-vow” ceremony was Quinn’s idea. Trae wouldn’t put it past her drama-queen friend to have brokered a deal with the powers-that-be for the gale now howling outside their living-room window. Talk about atmosphere. Here they stood in this solemn circle, Trae and her three housemates, their faces shadowed behind flickering candles, trying not to flinch with each crash of thunder.

      It was hard not to be impressed by everyone’s grim determination. Well, by Quinn and Alana’s determination, anyway. The way Lucie kept avoiding their gazes, Trae figured her poor roomie must be having trouble taking Quinn’s oath.

      Heiress Lucinda Beckwith believed in fairy-tale endings. If Lucie were the budding author, she’d write a romance and probably make oodles of money. Trae, though, had found that the guys who seemed to be the real-life charmers had a tendency to turn out to be jerks—the proverbial snake in Prince’s clothing. Jo Kerrin’s husband was a perfect example.

      At the thought of their missing friend, Trae felt an uncomfortable pang. Jo would have loved the melodramatic hoopla of Quinn’s ceremony, but she was now on her way to St. Louis to escape her so-called Prince Charming. Poor Jo had bought into the fairy-tale ending, and look what had happened to her.

      “Earth to Trae.”

      Quinn’s strained voice betrayed her impatience, but then they were all stretched tight after putting Jo on the bus that morning. Looking up to find Quinn frowning, Trae realized she’d been lost in her thoughts again, a habit that drove her roommate crazy.

      “I said,” Quinn tried again, “do you so swear?”

      “Yes,” Trae said in her loudest, clearest voice. “I won’t get married until I’ve achieved my goal to be successfully published.”

      In actual truth, she’d already made the oath to herself years ago. Coming from an Italian father and five older brothers, she’d felt, early on, the need to establish her independence. Trae would not end up like her Cuban mama, an unpaid servant to the males in her life. If and when she hooked up with a man, she’d be the one in charge of her future. No male distraction was going to get in her way.

      Satisfied with her answer, Quinn turned to Alana. “Do you, Alana Simms, swear not to wed until you’ve attained your goal of a successful career?”

      Alana straightened her spine. “I swear,” she said clearly, despite the soft purr of her Southern drawl. “No man will stop me from establishing my own modeling agency.”

      Trae didn’t doubt her. With her black hair and classic beauty, Alana need only walk into a room to stop all male conversation, but she rarely dated. With her understated grace and her slender, gorgeous body, she could snag any modeling job she wanted, yet she was forever turning down lucrative offers to make modeling a full-time career. She only modeled the little bit that she did to pay the bills and learn the industry. She had every intention of putting the knowledge to use. Pity the fool who thought he could seduce Alana away from earning her business degree. Her features might have the delicate perfection of a Dresden figurine, but underneath that beautiful exterior was a core of pure steel.

      “Okay, Lucie,” Quinn announced, “that leaves you.”

      Seeing her friend’s nervous expression, Trae offered an encouraging smile. Tiny, blond and seeming far younger than her twenty-two years, Lucie often relied on others to make up her mind. She’d become like the little sister Trae never had, and Trae often felt the need to protect her.

      What Quinn didn’t know—and what Trae had sworn not to reveal—was that Lucie was all but hitched to her parents’ wealthy neighbor, Rhys Allen Paxton III, a man who, in Trae’s opinion, acted more like Lucie’s older brother than a lover. A strict, disapproving brother at that.

      Talk about conflicted. Part of Trae felt a need to shield Lucie from Quinn’s bullying, but a larger part, the one that knew Lucie’s marrying Rhys Paxton would be a disastrous mistake, believed that if the oath should be mandatory for anyone, Lucie Beckwith was the gal.

      “I swear,” Lucie started hesitantly, letting the words trail off as she looked away.

      “Swear what, Lucie?” Driven by her own ambitions, Quinn had little patience or understanding for anyone else’s hesitation.

      “I, uh, won’t get married.”

      “Until?” Quinn prompted, tapping her foot. “What do you hope to accomplish?”

      Good question. Lucie might have the funds and connections to achieve anything she wanted, yet here she was, nearing graduation, and she still had no idea what to do with the rest of her life.

      Which made her doubly vulnerable to her Rhys Paxton arrangement.

      “Well, I always wanted to be an actress,” Lucie offered haltingly. “Remember, I got that A in drama class? How about I don’t get married until I get my first movie role?”

      Trae tried not to groan. Talk about reaching for the stars. As if Mitsy Beckwith would let her only child get anywhere near Hollywood. It was a miracle Lucie had even convinced her to let her go to college at Tulane—far away from