Tidewater Seduction

Tidewater Seduction
Anne Mather

Mills & Boon are excited to present The Anne Mather Collection – the complete works by this classic author made available to download for the very first time! These books span six decades of a phenomenal writing career, and every story is available to read unedited and untouched from their original release. Back with her husband? Joanna had loved Cole Macallister with a passion which had taken her completely by storm. And she’d thought he felt the same. Theirs was a marriage made in heaven. But that didn’t stop it falling apart amid a tangle of accusation and suspicion.So she must be crazy to let him talk her into giving it another go!At Tidewater – Cole’s beautiful South Carolina home – Joanna’s shocked by their renewed passion. With chemistry as tempestuous as this, perhaps there is a chance they can re-capture what they have lost…?

Mills & Boon is proud to present a fabulous collection of fantastic novels by bestselling, much loved author

ANNE MATHER

Anne has a stellar record of achievement within the publishing industry, having written over one hundred and sixty books, with worldwide sales of more than forty-eight MILLION copies in multiple languages.

This amazing collection of classic stories offers a chance for readers to recapture the pleasure Anne’s powerful, passionate writing has given.

We are sure you will love them all!

I’ve always wanted to write—which is not to say I’ve always wanted to be a professional writer. On the contrary, for years I only wrote for my own pleasure and it wasn’t until my husband suggested sending one of my stories to a publisher that we put several publishers’ names into a hat and pulled one out. The rest, as they say, is history. And now, one hundred and sixty-two books later, I’m literally—excuse the pun—staggered by what’s happened.

I had written all through my infant and junior years and on into my teens, the stories changing from children’s adventures to torrid gypsy passions. My mother used to gather these manuscripts up from time to time, when my bedroom became too untidy, and dispose of them! In those days, I used not to finish any of the stories and Caroline, my first published novel, was the first I’d ever completed. I was newly married then and my daughter was just a baby, and it was quite a job juggling my household chores and scribbling away in exercise books every chance I got. Not very professional, as you can imagine, but that’s the way it was.

These days, I have a bit more time to devote to my work, but that first love of writing has never changed. I can’t imagine not having a current book on the typewriter—yes, it’s my husband who transcribes everything on to the computer. He’s my partner in both life and work and I depend on his good sense more than I care to admit.

We have two grown-up children, a son and a daughter, and two almost grown-up grandchildren, Abi and Ben. My e-mail address is mystic-am@msn.com (mailto:mystic-am@msn.com) and I’d be happy to hear from any of my wonderful readers.

Tidewater Seduction

Anne Mather

www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)

Table of Contents

Cover (#u1f4cc05e-913d-5d36-ad48-e560c3260de4)

About the Author (#u8feda516-d051-5d34-a453-fe3172013ec1)

Title Page (#u75bcc1b6-9b5b-5d46-accf-513824441cba)

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER ONE (#u7cc4d8f3-76a5-5fd5-843a-61cace406010)

IT COULDN’T be him: it shouldn’t be him; but it was. Striding towards her, across the terrace where she was having breakfast, giving every indication he had expected to find her there.

Joanna glanced, half guiltily, about her, wondering even then if she was making a mistake. Maybe he had seen someone else—some other guest. But no. She was breakfasting late, and the hotel coffee shop was almost empty, most of the other guests all too eager to acquire that all-important tan. She was the only person sitting in her corner of the terrace, her olive skin as brown now as it was ever going to get.

Uncle Charles, her father’s brother, used to say, teasingly, that she was the changeling in their otherwise so-English family. With her dark skin and silky black hair, she was nothing like her blonde and brown-haired parents. She had to be a throw-back to some scandalous liaison in the family’s history. But until her marriage to Cole Macallister she hadn’t found it a problem. Of course, that marriage, and the much-publicised divorce that had followed, had rather shaken her confidence. But, in recent months, she had managed to put the past behind her. Until this moment, she acknowledged tensely, experiencing an almost overwhelming urge to run, kicking and screaming, from a confrontation she had never thought to have to face.

Happily, she succeeded in controlling that compulsion, however, and by the time he stopped beside her table she had even contrived a faintly ironic smile. What the hell! She had nothing to be ashamed of, she assured herself tautly, crossing one long leg over the other in an unconsciously defensive gesture. She had just as much right to be here as he had.

‘Hello, Jo.’

His greeting was scarcely original, and she gained assurance from his diffidence. ‘Cole,’ she returned coolly, toying with the handle of her coffee-cup. ‘How are you?’

‘Fine.’

And he looked it, she conceded reluctantly. Even though he had never been a conventionally handsome man, the harsh planes and angles of his lean features possessed a much more potent attraction. A latent sexuality radiated from eyes as blue as amethysts, fringed by short thick lashes, several shades darker than his hair. There were rugged hollows beneath his arching cheekbones, and she knew his nose had been broken in his youth. But his mouth was what drew her gaze, thin, and hard, and masculine, yet infinitely sensual, and gentler than when she’d last seen it.

But the silvery blond hair was the same, she noticed, chiding the treacherous emotions that still found beauty in his face. Longer than was fashionable, it brushed the open collar of his chambray shirt, the fine strands upturned against his neck. He was not a man you could ever ignore, thought Joanna uneasily, though God knew she had done her best to do so for the past three years.

‘May I join you?’

The question was unexpected, and for a moment Joanna knew the mouth-drying sense of panic she had experienced when she first saw him coming towards her. No, she wanted to say harshly. No, you can’t. I don’t want you to. I don’t want to talk to you. I don’t want you spoiling my affection for these islands by your presence.

But, of course, she didn’t say any of those things. Although she knew she was probably being incredibly stupid, she was far too—polite—to behave so childishly, so obviously.

So, instead, ‘Why not?’ she murmured, moving her glass of orange juice aside, and relocating the cooling pot of coffee. ‘Be my guest.’

‘Thanks.’

With the inherent grace that had always seemed so unusual in a man of his size, Cole pulled out one of the vinyl-cushioned plastic chairs, and, turning its back to the table, straddled it. His bony knee, clad in cream cotton trousers, brushed the side of her bare thigh as he positioned himself, and it was all Joanna could do not to flinch away from even that slight contact. But Cole seemed not to notice any withdrawal on her part, as he draped his arms along the back of the chair, and cast a casual eye over the palm-shaded stretch of sand only a few yards away.