All about the author…

       Carole Mortimer

      CAROLE MORTIMER is one of Harlequin’s most popular and prolific authors. Since her first novel was published in 1979, this British writer has shown no signs of slowing her pace. In fact, she has published more than 125 books to date!

      Carole was born in a village in England that she claims was so small “if you blinked as you drove through it you could miss seeing it completely!” She adds that her parents still live in the house where she was born, and her two brothers live very close by.

      Carole’s early ambition to become a nurse came to an abrupt end after only one year of training, due to a weakness in her back suffered after a fall. Instead she went on to work in the computer department of a well-known stationery company.

      During her time there, Carole made her first attempt at writing a novel for Harlequin Books. “The manuscript was far too short and the plotline not up to standard, so I naturally received a rejection slip,” she says. “Not taking rejection well, I went off in a sulk for two years before deciding to have another go.” Her second manuscript was accepted, beginning a long and fruitful career. She says she has “enjoyed every moment of it!”

      Carole lives “in a most beautiful part of Britain” with her husband and children.

      “I really do enjoy my writing, and have every intention of continuing to do so for another twenty years!”

      CONTENTS

      PROLOGUE

      CHAPTER ONE

      CHAPTER TWO

      CHAPTER THREE

      CHAPTER FOUR

      CHAPTER FIVE

      CHAPTER SIX

      CHAPTER SEVEN

      CHAPTER EIGHT

      CHAPTER NINE

      CHAPTER TEN

      CHAPTER ELEVEN

      CHAPTER TWELVE

      EPILOGUE

      PROLOGUE

      GONE.

      It was all gone.

      The money had been spent long ago. In the last year, his London apartment had gone too, plus the villa in France and his red Ferrari. All of them lost to the turn of a roulette wheel.

      It was a sickness; he knew it was. But, hard as he tried, it was a sickness he didn’t seem to be able to find a cure for.

      Last night he had lost the one thing that he had always sworn he would never use to finance his gambling, and he had let his family down in the worst way possible.

      Oh, God…!

      His hands tightened on the steering wheel of the car he drove—a hire-car; he had no money left to buy one of his own. His steering was instinctive as he negotiated the hairpin bends of the mountain road that took him away from Monte Carlo, the azure blue of the Mediterranean Sea sparkling invitingly far below. It was a journey which he knew, despite his efforts to fight the urge, he would make back again this evening, when the fever became too much for him and he once again returned to the fascination of the gaming tables.

      How would he ever be able to face his father and Robin, and tell them what he had done? How could he ever explain his betrayal?

      He couldn’t.

      After all the heartache he had already caused them, he really couldn’t!

      And that blue sea below did look so very inviting…

      Maybe he wouldn’t bother to turn the wheel at the next sharp bend. Maybe that was the answer to the sickness that possessed him, like a fever in his blood, drawing him back time and time again to Lady Luck.

      A lady that had completely abandoned him….

      Over.

      It was all over.

      All her hopes and dreams meant nothing now that she knew Pierre had never loved her at all. Certainly he’d never had any intention of leaving his wife for her.

      She had believed him a year ago when he’d told her he loved her, hadn’t cared that he was a married man, only wanted to be with him, to be loved by him, to love him in return.

      She had been so sure that the son she had borne him three months ago would be the spur he needed to leave his wife. Instead, the coward had chosen to confess all to his wife, to beg her forgiveness in order to stay at her