His E-Mail Order Wife

AROUND CHI-TOWN

Summer may be coming to a close, but things are still hot enough in the corporate offices on the 17th floor of Connelly Towers, where Drew Connelly has apparently been spending his coffee breaks surfing the Net for a new wife and mother to his young daughter. Inside sources report a “lightning-quick” engagement to a fresh-faced young teacher from Oshkosh whose vital statistics were posted on the Net. And you thought nothing respectable could come from a Web site named “Singlemania.”

Chicago plays host once again to Connelly matriarch Miss Lilly, who’s visiting from Palm Springs with hubby Tobias—no doubt orchestrating the upcoming nuptials. Instead of matchmaking, the feisty-tempered, eagle-eyed grande dame ought to set her sights on detecting. Seems the troubles at Connelly Corporation continue, and now other family members report further incidents. Scion Grant Connelly’s two hired guns have been seen burning the midnight oil and scouring the town for leads into the strange goings-on at the giant corporation. But to date there’s been no solution to the mysteries plaguing the venerable family.

Dear Reader,

Dog days of summer got you down? Chill out and relax with six brand-new love stories from Silhouette Desire!

August’s MAN OF THE MONTH is the first book in the exciting family-based saga BECKETT’S FORTUNE by Dixie Browning. Beckett’s Cinderella features a hero honor-bound to repay a generations-old debt and a poor-but-proud heroine leery of love and money she can’t believe is offered unconditionally. His E-Mail Order Wife by Kristi Gold, in which matchmaking relatives use the Internet to find a high-powered exec a bride, is the latest title in the powerful DYNASTIES: THE CONNELLYS series.

A daughter seeking revenge discovers love instead in Falling for the Enemy by Shawna Delacorte. Then, in Millionaire Cop & Mom-To-Be by Charlotte Hughes, a jilted, pregnant bride is rescued by her childhood sweetheart.

Passion flares between a family-minded rancher and a marriage-shy divorcée in Kathie DeNosky’s Cowboy Boss. And a pretend marriage leads to undeniable passion in Desperado Dad by Linda Conrad.

So find some shade, grab a cold one…and read all six passionate, powerful and provocative new love stories from Silhouette Desire this month.

Enjoy!

Joan Marlow Golan

Senior Editor, Silhouette Desire

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Acknowledgments and Dedication

Many thanks to the other Connelly authors for their assistance with this story. And special acknowledgment to all the Drew Connellys of the world who realize that it’s the size of a woman’s heart that counts.

KRISTI GOLD

began her romance-writing career at the tender age of twelve, when she and her sister spun romantic yarns involving a childhood friend and a popular talk-show host. Since that time, she’s given up celebrity heroes for her favorite types of men, doctors and cowboys, as her husband is both. An avid sports fan, she attends football and baseball games in her spare time. She resides on a small ranch in central Texas with her three children and retired neurosurgeon husband, along with various livestock ranging from Texas longhorn cattle to spoiled yet talented equine. At one time she competed in regional and national Appaloosa horse shows as a nonpro, but gave up riding for writing and turned the reins over to her youngest daughter. She attributes much of her success to her sister, Kim, who encouraged her in her writing, even during the tough times. When she’s not in her office writing her current book, she’s dreaming about it. Readers may contact Kristi at P.O. Box 11292, Robinson, TX 76716.

MEET THE CONNELLYS

Meet the Connellys of Chicago—wealthy, powerful and rocked by scandal, betrayal…and passion!

Who’s Who in

HIS E-MAIL ORDER WIFE

Drew Connelly—He thinks of himself as a widowed single dad/corporate VP who’s too harried to arrange even dinner and a movie. To the rest of the world, he’s sexy, successful and so available….

Kristina Simmons—She thinks of herself as full-figured, the kind of woman with a “nice personality.” Desirable has never been a term to describe her…until she sees herself reflected in Drew’s eyes….

Lilly Connelly—Don’t let the cane and the old birth certificate fool you. Nothing gets past the Connelly matriarch. But does she see everything?

Contents

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Epilogue

Prologue

“Is she really coming, Nana Lilly?”

Lilly hugged her cherished great-granddaughter securely against her chest as they sat before the computer.

“Yes, Amanda, she’s really coming.”

Lilly Connelly was an old dog short on new tricks, at one time believing the almighty Internet was the spawn of the devil. But she’d recently found that surfing the Net was pretty darned nifty at that, especially when she discovered Chicago’s latest matchmaking website, a place to scan prospective young women looking for male companionship. Much like a high-tech coming-out party minus the caterer.

As far as Lilly was concerned, one young woman definitely fit the bill for the perfect wife for her grandson, Drew, and a suitable mother for his little Amanda. This particular candidate loved children, logical since she was a Montessori teacher—and also wanted a steady relationship and marriage. She was a far cry from the succession of women who had marched through Drew’s life for the past five years since his wife’s death, women who only had designs on his fortune and all the status that came with the Connelly name.

Darn that Drew, Lilly thought. He didn’t know what was good for him. Fortunately, she did. Still, he was a considerate man and an excellent father. Oh, he might be a trifle mad when he learned what she had done. But if luck prevailed, he’d come to realize that grandmother always knows best.

Lilly pressed the send button on the final e-mail, setting in motion a plan that had been weeks in the making. This should probably be the moment Lilly felt a little nip of guilt, but she didn’t. The Connellys were a stubborn lot; Drew was no exception. He needed a little push, something Lilly was more than happy to provide, with or without the benefit of her cane.

She brushed a kiss across Amanda’s cheek and gave her a gentle nudge. “Hop down, dear heart. I have to go now. Grandpa Toby’s expecting me home soon.”

Amanda scooted off Lilly’s lap and swiveled the office chair so that Lilly could stand. Lilly grasped the cane and rose on uncooperative legs, her eighty-three-year-old joints groaning in protest. She’d been sitting too long, and she was too creaky to stay in the same position for minutes, much less hours.

Looking down on sweet, sweet Amanda’s trusting green eyes so full of hope, the guilt finally hit Lilly full-force. Had she done the right thing? Entirely too late to turn back now.

Lilly wished she could kneel at Amanda’s level but she might never get up if she did. She settled for touching the top of Amanda’s head covered in fine white-blond hair. “Dear, you realize this might not work between your father and Kristina, don’t you?”

“It will work,” Amanda said adamantly, topped off by a determined jut of her chin. “She’ll love my daddy, and my daddy will love her, too.”

Lilly’s heart took a little tumble. Although Amanda might look like her mother—God rest poor Talia’s misguided soul—she had her father’s tenacity. Luckily she’d been blessed with Lilly’s optimism. “We’ll hope your daddy and Kristina get along, but I want you to know that sometimes adults don’t see eye to eye on things. We also have to keep this our little secret for a while.” And, she hoped, by the time Kristina Simmons did learn the truth, all would be settled with love.

“Kristina says she likes puppies,” Amanda replied as if she refused to consider the possibility that the arrangement wouldn’t work. “Maybe she’ll talk Daddy into getting me one.”

“One step at a time, dear. She has to meet your daddy first.” And convince him to let her stay.

Lilly prayed she had, indeed, done the right thing. Prayed that Drew would give the young woman a chance. Prayed that Kristina Simmons possessed a strong heart and the ability to heal Drew’s shattered one.

One could always hope that that would be the case.

One

Drew Connelly dropped his bags at the bottom of the staircase leading to the second floor—and landed the largest on his foot. He muttered a string of curses directed at his stupidity, the late hour, the sound of the nanny’s grating voice coming from the kitchen while she gabbed on the phone with God only knew who.

When Mrs. Parker had abruptly left his employ to move in with her ailing daughter out of state, Drew had been desperate. The agency had sent him Debbie Randles, a young au pair with minimal experience. One week in her presence and he’d had his doubts about her abilities, but because of urgent business in Europe, he’d had no choice.

At least he’d been assured that his grandmother would stop by to check on Amanda daily. Thankfully nothing out of the ordinary had happened during his absence.

After the weekend, he’d contact the agency again and demand that they find him a suitable replacement, someone a little older with more experience. Someone who liked Amanda, and whom Amanda liked.

God, how he’d missed his daughter. A month was entirely too long to be away from her. The daily phone calls had been sorry replacements for seeing her vibrant smile, hearing her contagious laughter. He recalled their last conversation in which she’d told him she had a surprise for him. At least the nanny had followed one of his mandates—bedtime for Amanda no later than 10:00 p.m. since it was summer—otherwise he would have been greeted by his squealing six-year-old, a bundle of energy and joy wrapped up in one delicate dynamite package. The very light of his life, and the reason why he got up every morning to face his grueling schedule as Vice President of Overseas Operations for Connelly Corporation, his family’s legacy.

Unfortunately, the responsibility was rapidly aging him. Tonight he felt two hundred years old, not twenty-seven.

Trudging up the stairs, Drew planned to go immediately to Mandy’s room and kiss her good-night, take a quick shower, then pass out in bed. But he stopped short when he heard a giggle coming from his second-floor study. Amanda’s giggle.

So much for his daughter being tucked soundly into bed. Yeah, he had to find another nanny, and soon.

Drew dropped his bags once again, this time avoiding his toes, and strode down the hallway and into the office to find Amanda perched on her knees in his chair, her face lit by the glow of the computer screen and sheer amusement.

“Young lady, you’re supposed to be in bed,” he said with all the sternness he could muster.

“Daddy! You’re home!” Amanda climbed out of the chair and rushed him like a tiny tornado. Drew hoisted her up in his arms, relishing the clean scent of her hair, her soft cheek resting against his evening-shadowed jaw, her fragile frame curled against his chest. Little did his baby girl know she had his heart so securely tied around her little finger he could never stay mad at her for any length of time. Then again, she probably did know.

After he hugged her hard and kissed her cheek, she pulled back and studied him with green eyes bright with excitement. “Daddy, I missed you so bad!”

“I missed you too, sweetheart, but we need to talk about the computer.” He attempted to look serious, sound serious, a difficult thing to do with Amanda smiling at him. “Haven’t I told you that you’re not supposed to be on the Internet unless an adult is with you? It’s dangerous, Mandy.”

“I know, Daddy.” She began to play with his tie, avoiding his scrutiny. “But Nana Lilly was with me.” She looked up and nailed him with another luminous grin. “I showed her how to use the computer.”

A miracle in itself. His grandmother normally had to be dragged kicking and screaming into the new world. “But she’s not here now, is she? Which means you’ve disobeyed me.”

Amanda’s lip puckered and Drew’s heart began to hurt. “Debbie was with me until a few minutes ago, Daddy. We were surfing together.”

That provided little relief for Drew. “Visiting your favorite animal site?”

“I helped her pick out a man.”

Obviously he’d underestimated the nanny’s poor judgment. “What do you mean you picked out a man?”

“On Singlemania.”

“Singlemania?”

“The same place we got your surprise.”

The scenario was getting more and more bizarre. “My surprise?”

His daughter’s face once again brightened. “The surprise I told you about on the phone, silly Daddy. It will be here in the morning.”

Drew sensed certain disaster. “Debbie helped you with this surprise?”

“Debbie showed me and Nana the website. Nana helped me get you the surprise.”

Great. Just great. He couldn’t imagine anything of merit to be found on a singles’ site. His grandmother could be way out there at times, but she wouldn’t subject Amanda to anything kinky. Still, Drew didn’t have a clue what Lilly had done. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know, but he had to find out. “What kind of surprise did you and Nana come up with?”

She looked away again. “I’m not supposed to tell you ’cause then it won’t be a surprise.”

“Ah, come on, Mandy,” he cajoled. “Just a little hint. I won’t tell Nana you told me.”

Amanda tipped up her chin with pride, beamed like a billboard and proudly announced, “We got you a wife.”

“Get off the phone, Ms. Randles. Now.”

Kicked back in a chair in the kitchen, Debbie stared up at Drew, the cordless phone tucked between her jaw and shoulder while she filed her nails. “I’ll call you back, Henry.”

She dropped the nail file and phone onto the table and her feet from the chair across from her then came to attention. “Uh, Mr. Connelly, I didn’t know you were home.”

“No kidding.”

“Is there something wrong?”

Drew released a humorless bark of a laugh. “You could say that. Amanda tells me she’s been getting quite an education on your singles’ site. Seems she helped you pick out a man.” And in turn helped his grandmother select him a wife.

“I was only checking out some profiles and getting her opinion.”

“And you think this is proper for my daughter?”

“I don’t think she’s been damaged by the experience.”

Drew lost any semblance of calm. “She’s six years old, dammit.”

The nanny had the nerve to look innocent. “It’s never too early to learn good skills in the singles world.”

“You’re fired.”

Her eyes went saucer wide. “What?”

“You heard me. Get your things and get out of here. I’ll send your final check to the agency.”

“It’s after midnight.”

Drew realized that was true, and he couldn’t very well put her out in the streets this time of night. “Then I want you out first thing in the morning. I’ll have my company driver pick you up and take you wherever you want to go.”

“Please, Mr. Connelly,” she pleaded. “I can’t go live with my mother again. She’ll drive me crazy.”

Drew was already halfway there so she might as well join him. “I’m sorry, Ms. Randles, but that’s your problem. You should have thought about that when you turned my daughter loose on the Internet.” And subsequently his grandmother.

He spun around and headed back up the stairs, leaving the nanny alone with her mouth gaping. In the hallway, he headed toward Amanda’s room to make sure she was still in bed where he’d left her a few moments before.

While he’d tucked her in bed, he’d told his daughter that no matter what transpired between him and the mysterious Kristina the following morning, the circumstances behind their meeting—the e-mails and his grandmother’s scheming—shouldn’t be revealed because he didn’t want to hurt the lady’s feelings. And Drew sincerely didn’t want to do that regardless of the fact he knew nothing about her. As far as he was concerned, Kristina Simmons had been an innocent victim in this whole bizarre mess.

Mandy had assured Drew they would keep it “their own little secret” and promised she wouldn’t say anything to “hurt her Kristina’s feelings.” Drew felt somewhat satisfied, yet he couldn’t trust that Mandy wouldn’t innocently spill the beans. All the more reason to find some way to gently tell Kristina the truth, then send her on her way.

Through the partially open door of Mandy’s room, Drew found her asleep, her angelic face turned toward him, her eyes closed against the hall light. She looked like a pint-size princess—like her mother. He certainly didn’t need to think about her now.

In his room, Drew collapsed onto the bed and grabbed the phone, hitting the speed dial. One task down, one to go.

“H’lo.”

“Grandfather, it’s Drew. Is Grandmother there?”

“Good grief, son, do you know what time it is?”

“I know, but this can’t wait.”

“Is something wrong?”

Oh, yeah, thanks to thoroughly meddling Lilly. “I just need to talk to her. Is she asleep?”

“No. She’s in the other room watching late-night talk shows. The ones that turn into a free-for-all.”

Not surprising to Drew. Lilly was into high drama. “Can you get her for me?”

“Certainly, son. Lilly, it’s Drew!”

Drew held the phone away, fearing his grandfather’s booming voice might burst an eardrum. That would be all he needed tonight.

“Hello, Drew,” Lilly said in her sweet-as-sugar voice that indicated she was up to no good. “Did you have a nice trip?”

“Did you have fun playing on my computer?”

“Oh, yes, dear. That Amanda is quite a little whiz—”

“Cut the crap, Grandmother.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“I know what you’ve done.”

“Now, simmer down, young man. I’ve done you a favor.”

“A favor?” Drew’s ears began to burn and ring simultaneously. “Did you really think I’d want you setting me up with some woman I don’t even know? I’m not interested in going on a blind date!”

“It’s not a date, dear.”

“Call it what you will, but I don’t enjoy the thought of some stranger showing up at my doorstep expecting to meet me in the morning after I’ve been up most of the night.”

“She won’t be there to meet you.”

“Stop talking in riddles, Lilly.”

“She’ll be there to move in with you.”

His arrival from Europe into the Twilight Zone was now complete. “You’re kidding, right?”

“No. For your information, you’ve been e-mailing her for the month you were away. So has Amanda. Her name is Kristina Simmons—a nice name, don’t you think?”

Nothing about this was nice. “Dammit, Lilly, this is insane!”

“Don’t curse me, young man.”

He cursed the fact that he’d come home to find this mess. “Just what do you really know about her?”

“She seems to be a very cordial—”

“Cordial? What if she’s a criminal, for God’s sake? How could you invite some stranger into my home?”

“Stop interrupting and I will provide all the details necessary for you to give her a proper welcome.” Lilly paused to catch a breath. “I’ve had her checked out thoroughly, and she’s a model citizen, as I suspected from her correspondence. Amanda helped me write all the e-mails. Very harmless, really. And of course, you’ve recently proposed, the only fitting thing to do with a child in the house and your reputation at stake. It will be a trial engagement of a month, and after that time, if all goes well—which it will—you will make the wedding plans. Kristina need never know the truth.”

This was so absurd. So surreal. So Lilly. “Grandmother, I don’t know what century you think this is, but arranged marriages went out with potbellied stoves.”

“This is for your own good, Drew. For Amanda’s own good. I can no longer stand by and watch your child being raised by a succession of hapless nannies while you travel about the world and date floozies who only want to get into your pants as well as your pocketbook.”

Nothing Lilly had done to this point shocked Drew more than her current scheme, and her low opinion of his social life. Didn’t she realize how much he hated leaving Amanda because his job demanded he spend time out of the country? Hated the whole dating scene because not one woman measured up to his ideal, both as a wife for him and mother for his child? Hated that his grandmother saw fit to remedy that situation by finding him a bride? “You can’t play me like this, Grandmother.”

“I already have, my beloved, lonely grandson. And being the gentleman that you are, you will welcome this woman with open arms and give her a chance.”

“And if I don’t?”

“You will have to answer to me, a fate worse than hell.”

With that the line went dead, but Drew’s temper was alive and well, hovering close to the boiling point.

What was he going to do now? Hope that the mysterious Kristina wouldn’t show up? That she’d bow out graciously, maybe even laugh once she learned this was some stunt executed by a matchmaking matriarch? One way or the other, he would let her know point-blank that this whole setup was one huge mistake.

Sitting in her car at the curb in front of Drew Connelly’s impressive Chicago residence, Kristina Simmons was beginning to wonder if she’d made a colossal mistake.

When her friend Tori had proposed putting Kristina’s profile and photo on the singles site, Kristina had balked. Despite her objections, and without her knowledge, Tori had put them up anyway. Then came the e-mails from Drew Connelly that she’d originally intended to ignore. But she hadn’t been able to ignore those sent by his daughter, Amanda.

As it turned out, Drew was a very interesting correspondent, and Kristina found herself being drawn in by his words, by his daughter. Yet never in her wildest imaginings had she believed she would actually meet someone over the Internet, much less agree to a trial engagement to that someone. It still wasn’t too late to change her mind.

Then she glanced at the copy of the e-mail attached to the bottom of the directions lying on the passenger seat.

dear Kristina.

i cant wait to see you in the morning. you are pretty and you look like a mommy. daddy needs a wife bad. if you come i promis i will be good.

love, Amanda.

How could she refuse a child’s heartfelt plea? Okay, so maybe somewhere deep inside she clung to the hope that Amanda’s father might be the man of her dreams. He seemed so nice in the e-mails, so much like her, a lonely person searching for a meaningful relationship. She could relate to that loneliness, the pitfalls of single life. Though she was barely twenty-seven, she had already grown tired of sorting through the dating chaos, encountering those armed with questionable intentions and pretty lies. Now she had agreed to reside with a man she didn’t know beyond e-mail correspondence.