Accidental Hero

Marshal Howard is a death wish wrapped in mystery. Cold, rude, insanely overprotective single dad. Everyone in our little town warned me to stay far, far away. I didn't listen. I answered the castoff's nanny ad because no one else would. I got too close. I saw through his vicious reputation. He's a man who's turning my heart inside out, making me a fool. If it was just the bad blood with him and my family, maybe we'd work through this. Maybe we'd find paradise. Just me, him, and that adorable little girl. But surprises come in threes. Like the lines on the pregnancy test. 

They say revenge is a dish best served cold. I’d had four years to stew on what Daria Followhill did to me...now my heart was completely iced. I took her first kiss. She took the only thing I loved. I was poor. She was rich. The good thing about circumstances? They can change. Fast. Now, I’m her parents’ latest shiny project. Her housemate. Her tormentor. The captain of the rival football team she hates so much. Yeah, baby girl, say it. I’m your foster brother. There’s a price to pay for ruining the only good thing in my life. She’s about to shell out some serious tears.

Dr. Russell has a bad reputation around our hospital. I try to avoid him and his temper at all costs. It’s just as easy to admire his sexy, grip-it-while-he’s-ravishing-you hair and chiseled jaw from a healthy distance. Unfortunately, my plan crumbles when my trusty ol’ boss decides to swap his white coat for a Hawaiian shirt. His retirement leaves me with two terrible options: Switch specialties and spend months retraining or take an open position as Dr. Russell’s surgical assistant.

Last night was the most embarrassing night of my life. I was that girl. You know, the highly intoxicated chick celebrating her 30th with her two best friends - the ones who are happily married. And the more I drank, the more I wanted to do something reckless to celebrate. By reckless, I meant the sexy and alluring man dressed in a business suit standing near the bar. 

This isn’t the first time I’ve known tragedy. My self-imposed exile ends when a terrible twist of fate makes me the guardian of my four-month-old brother. Suddenly I’ve got a kid to raise and a family business to save and there’s no time for anything else. That’s why Kathleen Doyle and I made this arrangement. Once a skinny little girl who used to follow me around everywhere, she’s now a single mom with flaming hair, a killer body and too many responsibilities. We told each other it was just physical. We told each other there were no strings attached, no expectations. We lied.

I never knew what hit me. Rex stormed into my little world with two adorable twin boys and no apologies. Bearish. Short-fused. Consuming. Huge. Torturously gorgeous. Leave-your-heart-in-pieces wrong. Did I mention HUGE? He's instant trouble the second he checks into our lodge and my overprotective grandpa hires him. Then I catch him staring with that knowing ache in his eyes. I forget what trouble even means. He also needs a nanny. Sold.  

I'm a lot of things - a screwup, a basket case, a flunky. But when I take a nanny job to be near my pregnant sister, I swear to myself I'll walk the straight and narrow, which means I cannot fall for my insanely hot boss. I don't want to be tempted by that rugged rancher. By his chiseled muscles or southern charm or the way he snuggles his kids at bedtime. Ethan Carter won't get the key to my heart, no matter how much I want him.

Some women just have it - that combination of stunning looks and sexual confidence that brings men to their knees. Not me. My last boyfriend once fell asleep while we were...you know. Not my proudest moment. And my crush on my hot, arrogant, and oh-so-unattainable CEO? Never going to happen. But one night, after too much wine, I find myself online, creating a profile for a sex kitten called SweetVixen. Safe behind my computer screen, I'm suddenly the seductive goddess of my wildest imagination.

I'll be the first to admit that I live at extremes. After going 10 years locked in what felt like a dysfunctional marriage, I'm now decidedly boy-free. In nearly three years I've had no boyfriends, no flings, no dates, and no sex. For the sake of my dream career, the sacrifice has been easy. At least it was. Until he came along. Lukas Hendricks. He's rude, gorgeous, arrogant - a stone-carved wall of muscle and distraction. He's everything I know to avoid but there's no avoiding your next-door neighbor.

Imagine this. You're ready to leave after a one-night stand, and you're figuring out how to - shock horror - leave your number and ask him to be your fake boyfriend for your sister's wedding this weekend. When he wakes up. Well, that happened to me. And over coffee and omelets, I found myself a date. Which was how I ended up arriving at the wedding with a guy I knew nothing about.

My biological clock just exploded. Eighteen months. That's how long I have to make a baby happen before it becomes one more broken dream. Fate has a sick sense of humor, though. Its name is Hayden Shaw. Yes, the Hayden Shaw. Billionaire developer, scandalously gorgeous, his hard-headed ego only eclipsed by his enormous...reputation. He needs a bride to fool the world. I need a baby. It's simple business. Strictly professional.

We're not free to give into this. She's 19, and I'm 38. And I'm her boyfriend's father. Unfortunately, they both just moved into my house.

All Beau Montgomery, one of Charleston's most eligible bachelors, wants to do is build boats. He has no interest in marriage whatsoever...until it means he might not get his inheritance and he can kiss his boat-building dreams good-bye. Gwen has loved Beau Montgomery since she used to run barefoot around the marina as a scrappy preteen tomboy. Knowing she'll never fit into his high-society family, she decided long ago she'd become his indispensable best friend rather than not be in his life at all. When he tells her he needs to marry in order to fulfill his dreams, she panics....

It all started with a mysterious blue note sewn into a wedding dress. Something blue. I’d gone to sell my own unworn bridal gown at a vintage clothing store. That’s when I found another bride’s “something old.” Stitched into the lining of a fabulously feathered design was the loveliest message I’d ever read: Thank you for making all of my dreams come true. The name embossed on the blue stationery: Reed Eastwood, obviously the most romantic man who ever lived. I also discovered he’s the most gorgeous. If only my true-love fantasies had stopped there.

Thomas Goldstone. A man of a billion-dollar deals in custom-tailored suits, he demands more than your best. He’s scary. Driven. Haunted by inner demons that have taken him to the brink. But beneath the arrogant, controlling facade lies a heart of gold. It makes me want to solve him one growly, messy piece at a time. To be the only one who sees the truth of the man.