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      DIXIE BROWNING

      A painter and gallery-operator whose interests include archaeology and astrology, folk music and baseball, Dixie Browning branched out in a brand-new direction in 1976, starting with a weekly newspaper column on art. Since then she’s written more than a hundred romances. Now living with her retired husband on North Carolina’s Outer Banks where she grew up, Dixie uses the area she knows best as background for many of her stories.

      For a personal reply, fans may contact her at P.O. Box 1389, Buxton, NC 27920, or through her Web site, www.dixiebrowning.com.

      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

      One

      Daisy, who prided herself on her dependability, was upset that she arrived late for the graveside service. First the blasted phone wouldn’t stop ringing, and then, in the middle of getting dressed, someone had pounded on the front door, causing her to accidentally kick one of her good shoes under the bed. Faylene had been there to answer it, thank goodness—it had been the power people wanting to know when to suspend service.

      She had dashed back upstairs in her stocking feet and retrieved her shoe, in the process pulling a run in her only pair of dark panty hose. As a result of all that, plus the fact that her car was always cranky in wet weather, she was already more than ten minutes late.

      Standing stiffly apart from the few others gathered at the graveside of her late patient, she felt the cold, blowing rain begin to soak through her raincoat, which was old, but at least it was black. Her yellow slicker had seemed somehow inappropriate.

      Egbert, of course, was already there. She’d never known him to be anything other than punctual. Under the cover of a pair of oversize sunglasses, Daisy studied the man she had picked out to marry. When it came to making matches, she was old enough to know what mattered and what didn’t. She wasn’t about to make the same mistake a second time.

      Egbert hadn’t a clue, bless his heart. It would never occur to him that any woman would deliberately set out to seduce him into marriage—but then, modesty was one of his better qualities. Daisy had scant patience with overt “testosteronism,” or blowhards as she called them.

      For the first time, a slight shift in the few people huddled on the other side of the grave gave her a clear view of the man standing next to Egbert. Now, there, she mused, was the perfect example. If that man had a modest bone in his long, lean body, she would be seriously surprised. Even the way he was standing with his feet spread apart, his arms crossed over his chest, spelled arrogance.

      I came, I saw, so what the hell—I conquered.

      She could almost read his thoughts.

      She could almost feel his thoughts.

      Egbert was wearing his usual dark suit along with a nicely cut black raincoat. A sensible man, he had brought along an umbrella. He really was a nice-looking man, she thought objectively. Maybe not Hollywood handsome, but certainly moderately attractive.

      Daisy was a firm believer in moderation. Unlike her two immoderate best friends, she didn’t have a string of failed marriages behind her, only a single ego-numbing near miss. Once he realized what a perfect wife she would make, Egbert would be her first. Theirs would be a lasting union between two mature professionals, not one of those starter marriages that were so popular these days.

      A noisy flock of ducks flew overhead to settle on the nearby river. She followed the ragged chevron until they were out of sight and then her gaze strayed back to the tall stranger.

      No sensible raincoat for him, much less an umbrella. Rain beat down on his bare head, plastering gleaming black hair to a deeply tanned brow. For reasons she was at a total loss to explain, she felt a shiver of purely sexual interest. If she’d learned one thing from the past—and she’d learned several—it was that the minute sexuality kicked in, common sense flew out the door.

      The man was a full head taller than Egbert, which would have made sharing Egbert’s umbrella difficult even if he had offered. And knowing Egbert, he would have offered, because he was not only polite, he was genuinely caring—another big mark in his favor.

      Between sneezes, the preacher managed to get in a few words about the man they were there to honor while Daisy wondered some more about the mysterious stranger. If she’d ever laid eyes on him she would definitely have remembered, not just because he was the only one present who was not appropriately dressed.

      Although she had to admit that his blue jeans and leather bomber jacket were far better suited to the weather than her