Up Close and Personal. Maureen Child

      

       About the Author

      MAUREEN CHILD is the author of more than 130 romance novels and novellas that routinely appear on bestseller lists and have won numerous awards, including the National Reader’s Choice Award. A seven-time nominee for the prestigous RITA® award from Romance Writers of America, one of her books was made into a CBS-TV movie called The Soul Collecter. Maureen recently moved from California to the mountains of Utah and is trying to get used to snow.

      Up Close and Personal

      Maureen Child

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      ISBN: 978-1-408-97211-3

      UP CLOSE AND PERSONAL

      © 2012 Maureen Child

      Published in Great Britain 2020

      by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF

      All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

      This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.

      By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.

      ® and ™ are trademarks owned and used by the trademark owner and/or its licensee. Trademarks marked with ® are registered with the United Kingdom Patent Office and/or the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market and in other countries.

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

       Note to Readers

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       Contents

       Cover

About the Author

       Title Page

       Copyright

Note to Readers

       Dedication

One

Two

       Three

       Four

       Five

       Six

       Seven

       Eight

       Nine

       Ten

       Eleven

       Epilogue

       About the Publisher

      For Patti Hambleton

      That first trip to Ireland was the best

      Because it was shared with you.

      For all the years, for all the laughs,

      I love you my friend.

       One

      “Laura, I know you’re in there!”

      Ronan Connolly pounded on the brightly painted blue front door a few more times, then paused to listen. Not a sound from inside the house, though he knew too well that Laura was in there. Hell, he could practically feel her, standing just on the other side of the damned door.

      Bloody hardheaded woman. How had he ever thought that quality attractive? Now that attractive hardheadedness had come back to bite him in the ass.

      Seconds ticked past and there was no sound from within, which only irritated him further. He glanced at the sunshine-yellow Volkswagen parked alongside the house—her car—then glared again at the still-closed front door.

      “You won’t convince me you’re not at home. Your bloody car is parked in the street, Laura.”

      Her voice came then, muffled but clear. “It’s a driveway in America, Ronan. You’re not in Ireland, remember?”

      “More’s the pity.” He scrubbed one hand across his face and rolled his eyes in frustration. If they were in Ireland right now, he’d have half the village of Dunley on his side and he’d bloody well get her to open the damned door.

      “I