The High-Society Wife. HELEN BIANCHIN

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      With Valentine’s Day, February is always a romantic month. And we’ve got some great books in store for you….

      The High-Society Wife by Helen Bianchin is the story of a marriage of convenience between two rich and powerful families…. But what this couple didn’t expect is for their marriage to become real! It’s also the first in our new miniseries RUTHLESS, where you’ll find commanding men, who stop at nothing to get what they want. Look out for more books coming soon! And if you love Italian men, don’t miss The Marchese’s Love-Child by Sara Craven, where our heroine is swept off her feet by a passionate tycoon.

      If you just want to get away from it all, let us whisk you off to the beautiful Greek Islands in Julia James’s hard-hitting story Baby of Shame. What will happen when a businessman discovers that his night of passion with a young Englishwoman five years ago resulted in a son? The Caribbean is the destination for our couple in Anne Mather’s intriguing tale The Virgin’s Seduction.

      Jane Porter has a dangerously sexy Sicilian for you in The Sicilian’s Defiant Mistress. This explosive reunion story promises to be dark and passionate! In Trish Morey’s Stolen by the Sheikh, the first in her new duet, THE ARRANGED BRIDES, a young woman is summoned to the palace of a demanding sheikh, who has plans for her future…. Don’t miss part two, coming in March.

      See the inside front cover for a list of titles and book numbers.

      Men who can’t be tamed…or so they think!

      If you love strong, commanding men, you’ll love this brand-new miniseries. Meet the guy who breaks the rules to get exactly what he wants, because he is…

      HARD-EDGED & HANDSOME

      He’s the man who’s impossible to resist…

      RICH & RAKISH

      He’s got everything—and needs nobody, until he meets one woman…

      He’s RUTHLESS!

      In his pursuit of passion; in his world the winner takes all!

      Brought to you by your favorite Harlequin Presents^® authors!

      The Billionaire Boss’s Forbidden Mistress

      by Miranda Lee

      #2524

      The High-Society Wife

      Helen Bianchin

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      All about the author…

      Helen Bianchin

      HELEN BIANCHIN grew up in New Zealand, an only child possessed by a vivid imagination and a love for reading. After four years of legal secretarial work, Helen embarked on a working holiday in Australia where she met her Italian-born husband, a tobacco sharefarmer in far north Queensland. His command of English was pitiful, and her command of Italian was nil. Fun? Oh yes! So too was being flung into cooking for workers immediately after marriage, stringing tobacco and living in primitive conditions.

      It was a few years later when Helen, her husband and their daughter returned to New Zealand, settled in Auckland and added two sons to their family. Encouraged by friends to recount anecdotes of her years as a tobacco sharefarmer’s wife living in an Italian community, Helen began setting words on paper and her first novel was published in 1975.

      Creating interesting characters and telling their stories remains as passionate a challenge for Helen as it did in the beginning of her writing career.

      Spending time with family, reading and watching movies are high on Helen’s list of pleasures. An animal lover, Helen says her Maltese terrier and two Birman cats regard her study as much theirs as hers.

      To Danilo, Lucia, Angelo and Peter

      for their love and support through the years

      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

      EPILOGUE

      CHAPTER ONE

      ‘SOMETHING bothers you?’

      The male voice held a faintly inflected drawl, and Gianna met her husband’s dark gaze across the master bedroom with equanimity.

      It was a spacious room with two walk-in wardrobes with adjoining dressing-rooms, and two en suite bathrooms. Beautifully carved antique furniture complemented plush furnishings in muted colours of cream and pale green.

      ‘What makes you think that?’ There was no point in relaying she’d had the day from hell, and right now she’d sell her soul for a soothing session in the Jacuzzi followed by an early night.

      Instead, she’d battled peak-hour traffic, arrived home late and raced upstairs to shed her tailored business suit and take a quick shower.

      The thought of attending a fundraiser held in a city hotel ballroom, where she’d graciously participate in conversation, attempt to make her way through a three-course dinner, limit herself to one glass of champagne and play the pretend game held little appeal.

      His eyes sharpened, and for a moment she thought he’d read her mind.

      ‘Take something for that headache before we leave.’

      Oh, my. ‘You know this…because?’ Her voice sounded vaguely truculent even to her own ears.

      He stood tall, with the build of a warrior, well-honed muscle and sinew flexing beneath smooth olive skin, his lithe body unadorned except for black silk hipster briefs covering his tight butt.

      His dark hair was damp from a recent shower, his strong facial features all angles and planes, the dark shadow beard clean-shaven.

      Dark eyes held her own. ‘You want to argue?’

      She waited a beat. ‘Not particularly.’

      One eyebrow lifted in silent cynicism before he returned to the task at hand.

      Franco Giancarlo was something else, Gianna reflected as she entered her en suite bathroom and began applying make-up.

      A ruggedly attractive man in his late thirties, who commanded respect among his peers and wreaked havoc with many a feminine heart.

      Something she knew only too well. He’d captured hers at an impossibly young age—an adoration for a teenager ten years her senior that had shifted to hero-worship with the growing years before taking the leap to love.

      An entity that had made it easy for her to accept his proposal.

      For the sake of the Giancarlo-Castelli conglomerate, founded by their respective grandparents during the last century. An extremely successful business temporarily put under pressure little more than three years ago by a fatal plane crash which had claimed both