The Italian's Love-Child. Sharon Kendrick

      

      Dear Reader,

      One hundred. Doesn’t matter how many times I say it, I still can’t believe that’s how many books I’ve written. It’s a fabulous feeling but more fabulous still is the news that Mills & Boon are issuing every single one of my backlist as digital titles. Wow. I can’t wait to share all my stories with you - which are as vivid to me now as when I wrote them.

      There’s BOUGHT FOR HER HUSBAND, with its outrageously macho Greek hero and A SCANDAL, A SECRET AND A BABY featuring a very sexy Tuscan. THE SHEIKH’S HEIR proved so popular with readers that it spent two weeks on the USA Today charts and…well, I could go on, but I’ll leave you to discover them for yourselves.

      I remember the first line of my very first book: “So you’ve come to Australia looking for a husband?” Actually, the heroine had gone to Australia to escape men, but guess what? She found a husband all the same! The man who inspired that book rang me up recently and when I told him I was beginning my 100th story and couldn’t decide what to write, he said, “Why don’t you go back to where it all started?”

      So I did. And that’s how A ROYAL VOW OF CONVENIENCE was born. It opens in beautiful Queensland and moves to England and New York. It’s about a runaway princess and the enigmatic billionaire who is infuriated by her, yet who winds up rescuing her. But then, she goes and rescues him… Wouldn’t you know it?

      I’ll end by saying how very grateful I am to have a career I love, and to thank each and every one of you who has supported me along the way. You really are very dear readers.

      Love,

      Sharon xxx

      Mills & Boon are proud to present a thrilling digital collection of all Sharon Kendrick’s novels and novellas for us to celebrate the publication of her amazing and awesome 100th book! Sharon is known worldwide for her likeable, spirited heroines and her gorgeous, utterly masculine heroes.

      SHARON KENDRICK once won a national writing competition, describing her ideal date: being flown to an exotic island by a gorgeous and powerful man. Little did she realise that she’d just wandered into her dream job! Today she writes for Mills & Boon, featuring her often stubborn but always to-die-for heroes and the women who bring them to their knees. She believes that the best books are those you never want to end. Just like life…

      The Italian’s Love-Child

      Sharon Kendrick

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      For the charmant Laurent Droguet,

       who not only has the most dazzling smile,

       but also the most wonderful friends

      CONTENTS

       Cover

       Dear Reader

       About the Author

       Title Page

       Dedication

       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

       EPILOGUE

       Copyright

       CHAPTER ONE

      EVE saw him across the other side of the room and her world stood still. It was like watching a film, where fantasy took over and made real life fade away and it had never happened to her before.

      That click. That buzz. That glance across the room which held and hung on in glorious disbelief as you met the eyes of a man and somehow knew that he was ‘the one’. But of course it was fantasy, it must be—for how on earth could you see someone for a minute or a second and know that this total stranger was the person you wanted to spend the rest of your life with?

      Except that this man was not a total stranger, though maybe that was fantasy, too. After all, it had been a long time.

      She quickly glanced down at her drink and pretended to examine it, before risking another look, only this time he had turned away, and although her heart lurched with disappointment that he obviously didn’t share her fascination, at least it gave her the chance to study him without embarrassment.

      She was almost certain he was Luca, but he was certainly Italian; he couldn’t have been anything else. Jet-dark hair framed the head he held so proudly and she drank in his perfect features as if trying to memorise them. Or remember them. The hard, intelligent black eyes, the Roman nose and an autocratic mouth which was both luscious and cruel.

      He was striking and innately sexy, with a careless confidence which drew the eye and made it stay. In a room full of rich, successful men he stood out like some beautiful, exotic creature—his golden-olive skin gleaming like softly oiled silk, his body all packed, tight muscle. He looked like the kind of man who would command without even trying—an arrogant aristocrat from another age, yet a man who was essentially modern.

      Eve was used to assessing people quickly, but her eyes could have lingered on him all evening. He wore his clothes with elegant assurance—a creamy shirt which hinted at a sinewed body beneath and dark, tapered trousers emphasising legs which were long and hard and muscular. He was very still, but that did not mask some indefinable quality he had, some shimmering vibrancy, which made every other man in the room fade into dull insignificance.

      He