Risking It All. Beverly Bird

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      “In. Out,” Aiden said.

      “What?” Grace gasped the word, and suddenly he could feel her trembling under his touch. Oh, man, he thought. Beautiful, mysterious and trembling.

      “Inhale, exhale,” he explained. “That’s what I meant.”

      “I’m breathing,” she retorted.

      “Not well. And your pulse is going off like a machine gun.”

      “What kind of mind uses machine guns in an analogy?”

      He tightened his grip on her wrist. “Maybe a criminal mind,” he suggested. “Maybe dark characters excite you.”

      “Go to hell.”

      “I might, for what I’m thinking about doing to you right now. You know, there are only so many miles of legs, so much dark hair, a man can stand.” That did it.

      She wrenched away from him.

      He really rattled her, he realized, and he didn’t understand why. All this mystery was going to make for one very long night.

      Dear Reader,

      This is definitely a month to celebrate, because Kathleen Korbel is back! This award-winning, bestselling author continues the saga of the Kendall family with Some Men’s Dreams, a journey of the heart that will have you smiling through tears as you join Gen Kendall in meeting Dr. Jack O’Neill and his very special daughter, Elizabeth. Run—don’t walk—to the store to get your copy of this genuine keeper.

      Don’t miss out on the rest of our books this month, either. Kylie Brant continues THE TREMAINE TRADITION with Truth or Lies, a dicey tale of love on both sides of the law. Then pick up RaeAnne Thayne’s Freefall for a haunting, mysterious, page-turner of a romance. Round out the month with new books by favorites Beverly Bird, who’s Risking It All, and Frances Housden, who’ll introduce you to a Heartbreak Hero, and brand-new author Madalyn Reese, who gives you No Place To Hide from her talented debut.

      And, as always, come back again next month, when Silhouette Intimate Moments offers you six more of the best and most exciting romances around.

      Enjoy!

      Leslie J. Wainger

       Executive Editor

      Risking It All

      Beverly Bird

      MILLS & BOON

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      BEVERLY BIRD

      has lived in several places in the United States, but she is currently back where her roots began on an island in New Jersey. Her time is devoted to her family and her writing. She is the author of numerous romance novels, both contemporary and historical. Beverly loves to hear from readers. You can write to her at [email protected].

      For Don again…. The Title Man.

      Contents

      Chapter 1

      Chapter 2

      Chapter 3

      Chapter 4

      Chapter 5

      Chapter 6

      Chapter 7

      Chapter 8

      Chapter 9

      Chapter 10

      Chapter 11

      Chapter 12

      Chapter 13

      Chapter 1

      Aidan McKenna decided that he could easily be provoked into hurting the man who was shoving him down Cell Block Nine of the county prison. One more nudge of that nightstick into the small of his back would do it, he thought, then the bastard did it again.

      Aidan stopped walking and the guard ran up his heels. He pivoted and crowded him bodily against a gray brick wall that seemed to have absorbed the decaying odor of all the evil that had passed this way over the years. Every convict down the cell block was rattling the bars of his cage now, hooting and shouting obscenities.

      He couldn’t stay here, Aidan thought. “Where are you taking me?”

      “The holding cell for now,” the guard answered.

      “That’s downstairs. Block One.”

      The guard began inching to his left. Aidan looked that way. There was an alarm button on the wall there. He crowded the man harder into the brick to keep him from reaching it. Aidan had an easy twenty pounds on him and most of the guard’s pounds seemed given to fat anyway, so it didn’t take much effort.

      “I’m a cop, you idiot,” he warned. “Did you read the paperwork that came in with me? Does the term protective custody mean anything to you? Listen to them!” They knew he was a cop—somehow the inmates always knew. And this was the worst of the bunch. Block Nine was for the hardened criminals waiting to be moved out to the state pen.

      The guard’s belligerent expression faltered. “Your paperwork doesn’t say you’re a cop.”

      “Look again. What’s my name?”

      “Bran Downey.”

      “Nope. Listen to them,” Aidan said again. He moved one shoulder in the direction of the cells and all the raucous inmates.

      “They know.”

      The guard glanced up and down the block, uncertainty putting creases in his expression now. The inmates’ hurled expletives left very little doubt as to Aidan’s identity. The man swore. “I’ll put you downstairs until we straighten this out. But if you’re pulling one on me, Baines is going to have my job.”

      “He’s already got mine.” Edward Baines was the chief of police and Aidan was still trying to figure out what part he played in this.

      They made a U-turn and went back to the elevator. The calls from the cells grew louder, more vicious. In eleven years on the streets, five in a uniform, six as a detective, Aidan had heard it all and he caught a few phrases now that even he wasn’t familiar with. Then the elevator doors slid shut behind them and sealed them into quiet.

      “Call Plattsmier,” Aidan decided as the elevator doors slid open again. Plattsmier was the Robbery-Homicide captain.

      “He’ll tell you who I am. If he sounds hinky about IDing me, ask him to check with Fox Whittington.” He had a few buddies in the R-H unit.

      They stepped out onto the first floor. The guy pushed him again, this time toward a small temp cell halfway down a wing off the prison lobby. Aidan went in gladly, given the alternative. But he still winced when the bars clanged shut.

      Fear was clawing madly in his gut now since he had temporarily fixed his most immediate problem—that