All or Nothing: A Trust No One Novel

by Dixie Lee Brown

  She sighed heavily and asked the question that was tearing her up inside. “What took you so long?”

  He ambled a few steps closer. “When you left Rome so suddenly, you caught Walker off guard. He couldn’t get another flight out for twelve hours. By the time he got to Portland, you were long gone. It was a week before Ty bothered to open that e-mail from a hotel he’d never heard of and couldn’t pronounce and figured out it was a message from you. Clever, by the way.”

  “You had Walker watching me?”

  “Don’t be upset. I did it to make sure you were safe. That’s my job, remember? I didn’t quit on you just because you left. Besides, he had orders not to interfere unless there was something life-threatening that you couldn’t handle by yourself. Thankfully, he’s been bored out of his mind.”

  “I’m not upset.” Relief left her breathless. “I just wish I’d known. It might have made it easier.”

  “Easier to do what?” He was suddenly cautious.

  “To come home.”

  He moved a couple steps closer. “Why was it so hard?” Worry was evident in his eyes.

  “I was scared. Three months is a long time. Things change.”

  “Yeah, three months can seem like an eternity.” A frown furrowed his brow. “Did you accomplish what you wanted?”

  She nodded slowly. “I missed you.”

  “What now?” He was cautious again, holding back.

  She closed the distance between them, a smile spreading. “I was hoping you still want me to be a constant source of trouble… for the rest of your life.”

  He sighed, covered the last few steps that separated them, and pulled her into his arms. “I’m probably going to be sorry I said that, aren’t I? God, I’ve missed you,” he whispered next to her ear.

  She melted against him. This was where she belonged. It was what she’d been missing for the last three months… for her whole life. She laid her head on his chest and squeezed her eyes shut against the sting of ready tears. Joe gave her life back to her, and now he would give her his too. Nothing short of a miracle—one she would never take for granted.

  A smile curved her lips as she lifted her head to look in his eyes. Her arms went around his neck, and he pulled her tightly against him.

  “Remember that research you wanted to do when we first met? Maybe we could go somewhere away from here.” She inclined her head toward the casino. “Have dinner—get to know each other.”

  He chuckled as he shook his head. “Oh, we’re going somewhere, but dinner won’t really satisfy my appetite this time. It’s all or nothing now.”

  “You can have it all, Joe.” She smiled at the love shining from his eyes as he bent to kiss her.

  About the Author

  * * *

  Dixie started writing romantic suspense nearly twenty years ago. Then life took a few unexpected turns, and the writing career was put on hold in favor of starting a new life and a new job.

  One’s passion is not easily forgotten, however. Two years ago, Dixie started writing again—a YA novel—but before she could finish, another idea pushed to the forefront and wouldn’t go away until a full-fledged novel was completed.

  That idea became All or Nothing, the first book in the Trust No One series. All or Nothing placed third in the 2011 TARA Contest (Tampa Area Romance Authors) in the romantic suspense category.

  Dixie now lives in sunny Central Oregon with three small dogs and a cat for company while she writes the third book of the Trust No One series. When she’s not writing, she enjoys reading, movies, and trips to the beach.

  Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins authors.

  Give in to your impulses…

  Read on for a sneak peek at six brand-new

  e-book original tales of romance from Avon Books.

  Available now wherever e-books are sold.

  THE EARL IN MY BED

  A FORGOTTEN PRINCESSES VALENTINE NOVELLA

  By Sophie Jordan

  KISS ME

  AN AVON BOOKS VALENTINE’S DAY ANTHOLOGY

  By Codi Gary, Cheryl Harper, and Jaclyn Hatcher

  ADVENTURES WITH MAX AND LOUISE

  By Ellyn Oaksmith

  GET THERE

  By Megan Hart

  VAMPIRES GONE WILD

  SUPERNATURAL UNDERGROUND

  By Kerrelyn Sparks, Pamela Palmer, Amanda Arista, and Kim Falconer

  SAVED BY THE RANCHER

  BOOK ONE: THE HUNTED SERIES

  By Jennifer Ryan

  An Excerpt from

  THE EARL IN MY BED

  A FORGOTTEN PRINCESSES VALENTINE NOVELLA

  by Sophie Jordan

  From New York Times bestselling author Sophie Jordan comes a Forgotten Princesses Valentine novella. All her life, everyone assumed Paget Ellsworth was intended for one man. Little did they realize she was destined for another…

  She could delay no longer.

  As much as she hoped to put it off another day, another fortnight, Paget could wait no longer. As it was, the winter winds might freeze her to the bones if she did not return home soon. With a heavy breath, she took the final step that brought her to the crest of the hill overlooking the sprawling manor house that belonged to the Earl of Winningham. Exposed to the elements atop the rise, her wool dress whipped around her legs.

  Paget swallowed thickly. The earl himself was in residence. As he had been for the past month. He was all anyone discussed in the village. Every tongue wagged with his name. Speculation was ripe as to when he would surface. Whether he would attend Sunday service. Or even the annual Valentine’s Day fête. Everyone desperately craved a glimpse of him.

  Everyone except her.

  She released a heavy breath, blowing aside a pale strand of hair that dangled in her face. Every Sunday she sat in the first pew, eyes trained on Papa at the head of the church, hands folded neatly in her lap as she braced herself for the telltale titter among the congregation, signaling the earl’s long-anticipated arrival.

  Thus far it had not occurred.

  She fervently hoped he would not attend the baronet’s Valentine fête. The annual gathering had always been such a happy time. Memories of it were tangled up with her memories of Owen and Brand. Not Jamie. Never Jamie. He had never deigned to attend. He had looked down his aristocratic nose at such country gatherings. Only Owen and Brand had ever cared.

  She blinked back the hot press of tears at the memory of her friends. Both were gone from her. One dead. The other fighting in a war halfway around the world. They should be here. Either one of them. Both of them.

  An image of Jamie rose in her mind, that stiff walk of his with his hands clasped behind his back, his countenance dour, reflecting none of Brand’s warmth or Owen’s playfulness. He was the stiff, proper earl even when he had not been. Something dark twisted inside her heart. Perhaps he had known all along that the title would be his. Brand had always been weak and frail, after all.

  Shaking off her bitter thoughts, she adjusted her grip on the basket handle. The aroma of warm biscuits drifted up to her nose as she sucked in a breath and descended the hill.

  She wouldn’t be the first to call upon him. Her father had done so, of course. An obligatory visit. She usually accompanied him on his calls, but on that occasion she’d stayed behind, blaming an aching head. Sitting in the Winninghams’ opulent drawing room without either Brand or Owen… knowing Jamie was the new earl…

  She could not have borne it.

  She still could not stomach it, but her father had looked askance at her when she declared that she would not be calling upon the earl with the customary basket of homemade lemon biscuits that she presented everyone with for all noteworthy occasions—the birth of a new child, the announcement of a betrothal, the passing of a relation. The new earl returning home after years of war certainly warranted a basket of baked goods, and well her father knew it. Well she knew it.

  All was quiet in the morning light. Swans glide
d across the lake, faint ripples stretching out in ever-widening arcs. She eyed the manor’s wide double doors as she approached.

  The Earl of Winningham. Jamie was now the earl. This truth rattled around in her head as if looking for a place to settle. Dear, sweet Brand lay buried in the family cemetery on the other side of the sprawling manse. He’d never been long for this world. Never robust, never able to keep up and play with her or Owen. She and Owen had to backtrack for him constantly. For all that he had tried, Brand had always been more ghost than man.

  Now the title belonged to Jamie. Taciturn and aggravatingly proper James. Always looking down at Owen. Always making certain Owen never forgot he was a mere half-brother. Always looking down at her, a mere vicar’s daughter.

  KISS ME

  AN AVON BOOKS VALENTINE’S DAY ANTHOLOGY

  by Codi Gary, Cheryl Harper, and Jaclyn Hatcher

  Pucker up on the most romantic day of the year with three debut contemporary authors and their tales of romance, seduction, and… Elvis?

  She’s got a hot new makeover… and a boss to seduce! For prim and proper Ryan Ashton, sexy has always been an elusive quality. But with a little help from a new friend, she just might snag the one man who can set her seductive side loose in Codi Gary’s The Trouble With Sexy.

  Stuck in a king-size suite with a sexy man… What more could a girl ask for? But for Julie Dillon, being snowed in at an Elvis-themed Memphis hotel with Luke Pearce can’t mean anything but trouble. Too close for comfort gets close enough to taste in Cheryl Harper’s Love Me Tender.

  Her best friend’s brother just shook up her Valentine’s Day. Katie Quinn just wanted to spend the day watching Jurassic Park and eating chocolate. She certainly had no intention of running into Logan Cross—or running for her life! Suddenly caught in the crosshairs of danger, Katie and Logan must get together to find a way out in Jaclyn Hatcher’s Love, Guns, and Heart-Shaped Chocolate.

  An Excerpt from

  ADVENTURES WITH MAX AND LOUISE

  by Ellyn Oaksmith

  (Originally published under the title Knockers)

  Molly Gallagher does not like to be the center of attention, but before you can say “medical malpractice,” she wakes up from a routine procedure to find that her chart got switched with someone else’s, and now her A cup runneth over. Molly realized her new shape might change her life. She just never anticipated quite how much…

  I hold up my hand. “Whoa. Whoa. Hang on a second. Go back. Implants? You said implants.”

  “Yes, implants. Breast implants,” the nurse says briskly.

  I shake my head. “But I didn’t get implants. I had some scars repaired.” I wave my hand over the bandages as if this will clear things up.

  The nurse purses her lips, reads the chart again, following with her finger. “Yes, you did.” Tap, tap with her finger. “Exactly the kind you and the doctor discussed.”

  But I’m not listening. Lifting the sheets, I duck my head under the covers. The stitches strain. My chest radiates with pain, distant but hot. It’s too dark to see anything, so I throw back the sheets.

  Angeli stares at my chest, mouth gaping in shock. Looking down at the gentle swell under the bandages, I scream and grab my chest. Aching warmth shoots through me where my hands touch but also a new sensation: mounds of flesh, breasts. They feel huge, like mountains on a once-flat mesa. Everything becomes a surrealistic blur, like an old foreign film without subtitles. People in newspaper articles get messed up in surgery, not me.

  “I have breasts!” There is no way to describe how absolutely terrifying it is to wake up with an additional body part. Like Frankenstein; no, Frankenstein’s stripper. I have breast implants! My brain spins around wildly. Random thoughts flutter like cards in a hurricane. I remember a PBS documentary I once saw on exotic dancers. Each of them discussed their implants size and firmness like judges in the agricultural booth of a county fair.

  “Holy shit! He gave her implants!” Angeli’s hand flutters over her mouth. Her newfound professionalism withers in the face of catastrophe. “She didn’t come in here for implants,” she hisses at the nurse.

  She whispers in my ear. “You didn’t change your mind after I fainted, did you?”

  “No, I didn’t change my mind! It wasn’t even an option!” I yell.

  “You don’t have to scream!” Angeli shouts.

  “Yes, I do have to scream. I’m freaking out. I have breast implants! How could this happen?”

  The nose job girl and her mother happily perk up, heads swiveling back and forth between us, enjoying my predicament.

  “Of course it was an option,” the nurse says soothingly, as though I am a mental patient. She reminds me of Nurse Ratchet from One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. “It says right here”—she picks up the chart, taps it with a fingernail—“350 cc’s saline implants: Glaxco-Smythe, which, by the way, are the best.” She lowers her voice to a confidential whisper. “That’s what I have, although now they say silicone is just as safe. I’m thinking of getting mine switched. They’re so much more realistic.” This last comment is delivered with a wink.

  “My flatness was realistic!” I spit the words out so hard, it strains my stitches. “I came in here to get rid of my scars, not get fake boobs.”

  The nurse winces. I realize, too late, I have insulted her. For a split second, I actually feel sorry—until she thrusts her chart under my nose.

  “There it is in black and white.” Each syllable gets a finger tap for emphasis. This nonsense has gone as far as she’s going to let it.

  I quickly scan the chart. “And you’d be right if my name were Christine McDaniel. But it’s not!” The chest ache becomes a throb. My heart races along with my mind. How in the hell could this have happened?

  The nurse rushes from the room, leaving me, Angeli, nose job girl, and her mother in silence. Nose job girl mouths, “Oh my God” to her mother as if Angeli and I aren’t six feet away. Glaring at them, Angeli yanks the curtains shut around my bed.

  An Excerpt from

  GET THERE

  by Megan Hart

  (Originally appeared in the print anthology A Red Hot Valentine’s Day)

  No one ever said long-distance love was easy, and, after being apart for two years, Edie and Ty are more than ready for some time together—especially on Valentine’s Day. But as their erotic journeys come to a scintillating conclusion, they’re about to discover that getting there is half the fun…

  AN AVON RED NOVELLA

  I could get there by bus. Watch the country go by in ribbons of brown and green as we pass by towns the names of which don’t matter, because they’re not yours. The clatter-clack will lull me to sleep and I’ll dream of you. The mountains will become your breasts, the hills the slope of your hips, and the valleys… the valleys will turn into that sweet valley between your thighs, and I’ll wake with an erection hard enough to bore tunnels. And then, when I get there, all I’ll have to do is lay you down and fill you up with all of me.

  Because you’ve already filled me with all of you.

  Edie Darowish folded the note card closed and pressed it to her smile for a second before putting it aside in the “keep” pile. That one was twice the size of the “toss” pile, but she couldn’t bear to throw away even one of Ty’s letters. It didn’t matter that in just a couple weeks they’d be together again, this time for good. Having Ty in person would be infinitely better than having only his words, but these letters were important, too.

  He always said his strength was with drawing and not prose. He sent her lots of sketches, sometimes cute and funny cartoons and other times breath-stealing sensual line drawings, so the rarity of his written communication was doubly precious. Not to mention sexy as all get-out. Ty might claim he was better with pictures than with words, but reading over what he’d written to her just a few months ago, Edie disagreed.

  The file box in front of her was still half full as she sifted through the memorabilia she’d collected over the pa
st two years. She pulled out a handful of receipts from restaurants and hotels, places they’d gone on vacation. Each was a memory and a story all its own, but she tossed most of them in the trash. There really was only so much she could take with her all the way from California to Pennsylvania, and living with Ty would mean she didn’t have to keep every scrap anymore.

  Edie worked until her joints ached from sitting cross-legged on the floor, but when she was done, she ended up with a bulging manila envelope of letters and drawings and a garbage bag stuffed with the rest. Not bad for a few hours’ work. She got up, stretching, and looked around at the stacks of file boxes she’d seal with tape and ship to the new house.

  She’d already sold her furniture except for the Art Deco Waterfall armoire, dresser, and vanity that had been hers since childhood and had already been shipped off along with most everything else. The rest hadn’t been worth much. She’d lived in this apartment for seven years and hadn’t ever bothered to do more than make it a place to sleep and eat and work. She had a truck from the local thrift store scheduled the day before her flight to come for all that was left and an appointment at the car dealership to sell her car, too. She’d buy a new one in Pennsylvania. Ty planned on driving a moving truck, his car towed behind, from Maine. They were going to get there on Valentine’s Day.

  Edie’s stretch turned into a little dance as she thought of it. They’d been officially a couple for two years but had never managed to spend a Valentine’s Day together. Christmas and New Year’s, yes, and once a memorable Fourth of July, but February was a bad time for both of them to get away. Not this year, though. This year she’d be with him, and no matter what they did, it was going to be romantic because they were together.

  She’d stripped her apartment down to bare walls and floors, but she hadn’t yet dismantled her office. She’d gotten rid of the desk and boxed up most of her paperwork and binders, but she wouldn’t be able to completely pack up her laptop and her current projects until she was ready to move. A glance at the clock told her it was time to talk to Ty.