The Untamed Hunter

The Untamed Hunter
Lindsay McKenna

Rock-solid, hard-bitten and no stranger to danger, mercenary Shep Hunter was going to run his latest mission without interference from Dr. Maggie Harper, the woman who'd stubbornly walked away from him years ago.But Maggie had some definite ideas about how to handle their covert assignment–and her passionate persuasion told Shep she knew just how to handle him! Now the strong soldier of fortune wondered if he could keep beautiful Maggie under his command without giving up his steel-clad grip on his heart….

“You’re One Of A Kind, Maggie Harper. Headstrong Or Not, I Can’t Help Myself,” Shep Said.

As Maggie lifted her head to meet his descending mouth, something wonderful broke loose in her wildly beating heart. Closing her eyes, she leaned against him.

When his mouth tenderly grazed her parting lips, a sigh rippled from her. It was that dichotomy about Shep that always threw her. He looked like a warrior: big, bruising, hard looking and so very, very powerful. Yet, she was privileged to know this other side of him, too, so it was easy to yield to him completely. With him, she was safe. She knew he would care for her as if she were a priceless and fragile treasure.

Moaning, she slid her arms against his broad, tense shoulders. Maggie wanted him. And as his lips moved in a claiming gesture against hers, she knew that what they’d shared so long ago was alive today. That he wanted her now just as much as he had in the past.

Maybe even more.

Dear Reader,

Welcome in the millennium, and the 20

anniversary of Silhouette, with Silhouette Desire—where you’re guaranteed powerful, passionate and provocative love stories that feature rugged heroes and spirited heroines who experience the full emotional intensity of falling in love!

We are happy to announce that the ever-fabulous Annette Broadrick will give us the first MAN OF THE MONTH of the 21

century, Tall, Dark & Texan. A highly successful Texas tycoon opens his heart and home to a young woman who’s holding a secret. Lindsay McKenna makes a dazzling return to Desire with The Untamed Hunter, part of her highly successful MORGAN’S MERCENARIES: THE HUNTERS miniseries. Watch sparks fly when a hard-bitten mercenary is reunited with a spirited doctor—the one woman who got away.

A Texan Comes Courting features another of THE KEEPERS OF TEXAS from Lass Small’s miniseries. A cowboy discovers the woman of his dreams—and a shocking revelation. Alexandra Sellers proves a virginal heroine can bring a Casanova to his knees in Occupation: Casanova. Desire’s themed series THE BRIDAL BID debuts with Amy J. Fetzer’s Going…Going…Wed! And in Conveniently His, Shirley Rogers presents best friends turned lovers in a marriage-of-convenience story.

Each and every month, Silhouette Desire offers you six exhilarating journeys into the seductive world of romance. So start off the new millennium right, by making a commitment to sensual love and treating yourself to all six!

Enjoy!

Joan Marlow Golan

Senior Editor, Silhouette Desire

The Untamed Hunter

Lindsay McKenna

LINDSAY MCKENNA

is a practicing homeopath and emergency medical technician on the Navajo Reservation in Arizona. She comes from an Eastern Cherokee medicine family and is a member of the Wolf Clan. Dividing her energies between alternative medicine and writing, she feels books on and about love are the greatest positive healing force in the world. She lives with her husband, David, at La Casa de Madre Tierra, near Sedona.

To Emile and Patricia Daher,

who serve the best food in Sedona at Shugrue’s.

It’s a joy to come and relax, laugh and share

pleasantries and friendship.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

One

“You could die on this mission, Maggie. This one is no walk in the park.” Dr. Casey Morrow-Hunter drilled Dr. Maggie Harper with a hard look hoping to convince her of the danger she’d be facing. The world-renowned virologist sat on the other side of Casey’s huge oak desk at the Office of Infectious Diseases.

Maggie raised her eyebrows slightly at her boss’s huskily spoken warning. Sighing, she lifted her long, artistic looking hands. “I risk my life every day in the hot zone. So what’s new?” With a shrug of her shoulders, she gave her a challenging grin. “Tell me what in our business isn’t dangerous, Casey.”

“Touché,” Casey muttered. She tapped her pencil on the top-secret file that was open on her desk as she studied the woman before her. Maggie’s red hair, which was almost always captured in a chignon at the nape of her long neck when she went into the lab to work with deadly viruses and bacteria, flowed across her proud, thin shoulders. Casey had caught Maggie and pulled her into her office for this discussion before the doctor had a chance to suit up for hot zone work scheduled later that morning.

Maggie pulled the tea bag out of her flowery cup and placed it on the white china saucer balanced on her crossed legs. “So,” she murmured, giving Casey a knowing look, “what little special assignment have you cooked up for me this time? You know how bored I get. It must be a field assignment? To Africa?”

Casey smiled at her assistant. Maggie was only five foot three inches tall, but she was a firm one hundred and twenty pounds and an all-around athlete. Despite how small she was, Maggie had a seventeen-hand-high Thoroughbred that she raced in cross country events whenever OID issues didn’t take her weekends away from her. Twelve miles and twenty or so challenging jumps at top speed didn’t faze Casey’s friend of many years. Maggie could break her neck at any time. More than once, Casey has seen her limp into the OID after a brutal weekend of competition. And now, at the thought of a new assignment, Maggie’s hazel eyes inevitably were sparkling with life. She liked living on the edge.

As if that wasn’t enough, Maggie was not only on the OID sharpshooters’ team, she was leader of it, being more than a little handy with pistols and rifles. Which was why Casey had pulled her for this dangerous mission. Maggie thrived on competition and adventure. When in danger, she was coolheaded, and didn’t allow her emotions to interfere with the steps a doctor on a mission for OID often had to take to save her life. More than once, Casey and Maggie had had a good chuckle over Maggie’s trauma-junkie attitude toward life. It served her well in their dangerous field missions to epidemic outbreaks around the world.

Tapping the file, Casey said, “I’d take this one myself, but as you know, I tested positive for pregnancy a week ago.”

Glowing with genuine joy, Maggie sipped her tea. “I know. I’m thrilled for you and Reid. Is he still walking on air?”

Chuckling, Casey nodded. “Yes, and he’s having hissy fits over me working with all these microbes, saying I’ve got to be extra careful now.”

“Yeah, like in our business, we’re sloppy.” Maggie burst into laughter.

The room rang with their black humor that only those in the medical field could truly appreciate. Behind Casey through the slats of the venetian blinds, the sun sent blinding light into her pale pink office, drawing her eye momentarily to the peaceful landscape paintings on three of the four walls. “Oh, he’s like any expectant father. A worrywart,” she murmured softly.

“That’s why you took yourself off the hot zone list.” Maggie nodded and squeezed a tad of lemon juice into her tea. Delicately, she placed the lemon wedge on the side of the saucer. “Wise move. Have you had morning sickness yet?”

Rolling her eyes, Casey said, “I’m only six weeks along. And no, no morning sickness—yet.”