Military Man. Marie Ferrarella

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      Praise for Marie Ferrarella:

      “Ferrarella has penned a guaranteed page-turner!”

      —Romantic Times on Internal Affair

      “Time and again, Marie Ferrarella demonstrates her gift for storytelling in the romantic suspense genre, and Crime and Passion is no exception.”

      —Romantic Times on Crime and Passion

      “…the saucy quips will draw a laugh, and the chemistry will make you shiver. Marie Ferrarella does it again!”

      —Romantic Times on Mac’s Bedside Manner

      “Great romance, excellent plot, grabs you from page one.”

      —Affaire de Coeur on In Graywolf’s Hands

      “…the pleasure of this journey is in the getting there. Reading about warm, caring people and watching relationships mature under stressful situations is a pleasurable way to spend an afternoon. As usual, Ferrarella’s dialogue is in voice, crisp and moves the story along without ever bogging down in the emotional angst each brings to the relationship. Once a Father is a hearty recommend for a skilled writer.”

      —The Romance Reader on Once a Father

      Military Man

      Marie Ferrarella

      

www.millsandboon.co.uk

      Dear Reader,

      No, you are not experiencing déjà vu, this is actually my second time up at bat. I had the privilege of working on Book #2 of this continuity, A Baby Changes Everything, and here I am again, managing the lives of the people in Book #10. This time I’m meeting new people as well as beloved old favorites such as Vanessa Fortune and her father, Ryan.

      Doing a continuity is like being invited to become part of a large extended family and finding your place within it. Over the last twenty-two years I’ve written about a lot of heroes, but Lt. Collin Jamison is my very first military man. He’s a dashing, daring army ranger accustomed to risking his life on an almost daily basis. But here, he finds that he is asked to do the most dangerous thing of all—risk his heart. The same is asked of Lucy Gatling, a bright young third-year medical student who is more interested in medicine and forensics than she is venturing out into the real world. She doesn’t want to risk being hurt, either. But the chemistry between them is more than either can deny.

      Come with me and watch these two find their way into love, struggling and resisting all the way.

      I wish you love,

      To Patience Smith and the team we have become.

      Contents

      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

      Bonus Features

      One

      “You know I wouldn’t ordinarily be asking you to do this, but…”

      Lt. Collin Jamison heard his cousin’s voice awkwardly trail off on the other end of the line. Collin’s lips curved slightly in an understanding smile. That had always been his gift, for as far back as he could remember. Understanding. Although it took no special gift to know where Emmett was coming from.

      His cousin had trouble asking people for favors, even from someone he’d once been close to, the way they once had been.

      Granted it was a hell of a favor to ask. But at least, since he’d sought him out like this, it meant that Emmett had decided to come back to join the living. That alone would have had Collin saying yes, no matter what the obstacles.

      It wasn’t easy for Collin to arrange free time. When you worked as an Army Ranger for CIA Special Operations, specializing in manhunts and intelligence gathering, it wasn’t exactly as if you were just another easily replaceable cog.

      But he had a lot of time coming to him, time he’d never bothered using because there hadn’t been anything else he’d rather be doing than his job.

      Things could be managed, Collin thought. Things could always be managed.

      Collin shifted the receiver to his other ear. He’d barely walked into the small, two-bedroom condo he owned right outside of Langley, Virginia, when the phone had rung, demanding his attention. He’d thought it was a call to come in for a new assignment.

      In a way, he supposed it was.

      Exchanging quick, perfunctory pleasantries for less than two minutes, Emmett had swiftly filled him in as to why he’d called. Even when they were young, Emmett had never believed in wasting time. Neither did he. That was why they got along so well.

      “Yeah, I know,” Collin said in response to his cousin’s awkward pause. “I’ve got to admit, it’s a hell of a surprise, hearing from you. Uncle Blake said that you had gone off somewhere into the mountains in New Mexico to be by yourself.” He recalled the conversation in its entirety. Blake Jamison had been sincerely worried about his youngest son, not knowing if Emmett was going to permanently withdraw from life, or if he just needed time to come to terms with the things he’d witnessed during the course of his work as an FBI special agent.

      “I did.”

      He heard Emmett sigh quietly on the other end, as if a part of him still wanted to be back there, hidden in the mountains, away from the world. Collin knew how that could be. There were times when he’d thought seriously about just saying the hell with everything and retreating himself. That usually lasted until the next interesting case came along to challenge him. He was no good with free time. Free time made you think.

      “I needed some peace and quiet,” Emmett was saying. As always, his cousin was given to understatement.

      For a while there Collin had worried about Emmett’s sanity. Everyone thought about running away, but very few ever did it. Those who did generally invited speculation about the state of their mental health.

      But now that Emmett was back, Collin breathed a little easier. “Couldn’t find any, huh?” he joked.

      His uncle Blake had told Collin that when Emmett’s older brother, Christopher, had turned up murdered, it just intensified Emmett’s desire to stay away from the world. It was only after his father had made the pilgrimage to his shack to tell him that Christopher had been killed by Jason, the brother both he and Christopher had watched descend into madness, that Emmett had snapped out of his depression and left his self-imposed exile to battle the “bad guys” again. This time, the bad guy was his older brother.

      “No, it’s not that,” Emmett responded wearily to his cousin’s joke. “The world just won’t let me alone.” He took a deep breath and reiterated his initial plea. “I need your help in finding Jason.”

      Collin didn’t bother saying the obvious, that Emmett had greater