Dear Reader,
Ever wonder about the man you might have married? Shannon met Alan and Jase the same day. Though drawn to Jase, it was Alan who swept her off her feet and married her. Years after Alan’s death, Jase is forced back into her life. Will their ending be different this time?
I like to explore the what-ifs of relationships. Would a woman forget a man who had captured her interest years ago, or rekindle that interest when nothing stood in her way? People change over the years, but does that first attraction ever fade?
Come and see what happens with Shannon and Jase after all these years.
I’ve set the story in Washington D.C. and San Francisco, two of my favorite cities. Let me know how you enjoy the book. Visit my Web site at www.barbaramcmahon.com
All the best,
Barbara
Barbara McMahon
in
Harlequin Romance®
Barbara McMahon creates stories bubbling with warmth and emotion. Her captivating style and believable characters will leave your romance senses tingling!
About The Sheikh’s Proposal:
“A delightful romance with two charming characters. The story is wonderful and the dialogue natural and snappy, which gives it a realistic feeling.”
—Romantic Times BOOKclub
HIS INHERITED WIFE
Barbara McMahon
Barbara McMahon was born and raised in the South, but settled in California after spending a year flying around the world for an international airline. After settling down to raise a family and work for a computer firm, she began writing when her children started school. Now, feeling fortunate in being able to realize a long-held dream of quitting her “day job” and writing full-time, she and her husband recently moved to the Sierra Nevada mountains of California, where she finds her desire to write is stronger than ever. With the beauty of the mountains visible from her windows, and the pace of life slower than the hectic San Francisco Bay area where they previously resided, she finds more time than ever to think up stories and characters and share them with others through writing. Barbara loves to hear from readers. You can reach her at PO Box 977, Pioneer, CA 95666-0977, U.S.A.
Books by Barbara McMahon
HARLEQUIN ROMANCE®
3847—THEIR PREGNANCY BOMBSHELL*
3851—PREGNANT: FATHER NEEDED*
3864—WINNING BACK HIS WIFE
3875—HER SPANISH BOSS
To Kay Polk, a new friend who is as special as all my old ones. Here’s to being in the NSDAR together!
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
EPILOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
Late July
SHANNON MORRIS LET herself into her home slowly. It was no longer home, only a building where she had once had such happiness. It was midafternoon, but the silence hung heavy as midnight.
“Alan?” she called from habit, then stopped, remembering. Alan would never answer again. The clutch of pain gripped her heart. Her husband of five years was dead. He’d never hold her, laugh with her, or share quiet evenings.
Shannon headed for their bedroom. A shower and fresh change of clothes were in order. She’d put in a full day at the office, working to close it down. It was not a labor of love, but one to be mourned as she mourned her husband’s passing.
The bedroom was dimmed, the drapes pulled against the afternoon sun. Antique furnishings and carpets were to be protected. Alan had loved this room. She hesitated in the doorway, looking immediately at the bed almost imagining Alan lying on top of the duvet, waiting for her.
“Alan?” she said softly. Of all the rooms in the house, she felt his presence most in this one. Shrugging out of her clothes, she took a quick shower. Wrapped in a light robe, she went to crawl into bed. She wished she could pull the covers over her head and stay there forever. Taking a deep breath, she could still smell the lingering scent of him. Tears began again. She felt as if she’d cried herself out long ago, but still they came.
Rolling over, she gathered his pillow against her, burying her face in it. It wasn’t fair he was gone and the pillow remained—a reminder of the man she’d loved who’d been taken too soon.
The last few months had been a blur. Coming home one day from her volunteer work at the animal shelter, she’d found him in bed with another killer headache. That afternoon she’d learned the truth. The headaches weren’t migraines, but symptoms of a tumor that was too invasive to eradicate. Her husband was going to die within months.
She’d tried to capture every moment since Alan had told her. But the immediate past was still a blur. She remembered railing against fate, urging him to consult other doctors, to find a surgeon willing to operate. To do something to stay alive!
He’d been kind, but firm. He’d already tried everything. He’d come to terms with the indictment, Shannon had not. She’d done all she could to stave off the inevitable.
When she’d finally accepted the fact, she’d stopped going to work, determined to spend every moment with him. Alan had not objected. Nor had his partner, Jase.
Closing her eyes, she could see Alan in this bed, trying to overcome the pain, the lines etched in his face from the intensity.
“I want you to promise me if anything happens to me you’ll go to Jase. He’ll take care of you.” Alan had said one afternoon.
Alan had been in his mid-fifties. He should have had decades of life ahead of him. Granted he’d been almost thirty years older than she, and she’d known in her mind that one day he’d probably die before her, but not so soon. He’d known he was dying for eight months. He’d done his best to protect her against the knowledge, until there was no hiding it.
“The prognosis wasn’t good from the beginning. No surgery. I could have tried radiation and chemo, but my oncologist didn’t hold out any hope, so I elected not to subject myself and you to the horrors in hopes of gaining a few weeks at most. Quality counts with me, you know that,” he’d told her that awful day.
“You can’t die,” she had repeated, shocked from the revelation.
“Shannon, you need to listen to me. This is important. I’ve been thinking of your future since I got the prognosis. You know most of our income is from my grandfather’s trust. Even the house we live in belongs to the trust. All that ends with my death. And I don’t see Dean continuing any allowance for you.”
“I don’t care about money!” she said hotly. He was talking about money at a time like this? “I care about you. I love you. I can’t go on if you’re not here.” Shannon knew his older brother Dean had never liked her. But that was the least of her concerns at this moment. She couldn’t accept that Alan was dying!
“Of course you will. You need to listen to me. I have it figured out. I’ve done my best to put aside some money for you over the last few months, without alerting Dean by drawing down extraordinary amounts. But it’s not enough. Jase and I began that expansion last year, unfortunately just before I got the diagnosis. So much of my personal income and assets went to that expansion and are now tied up in the company. I can’t ask Jase to buy you out yet. It’s a crucial junction for the firm. I know the expansion is going to pay off. You’ve seen the reports. I need you to promise me you’ll let everything stay the way it is for a year. Just a year. That gives Jase time to establish the business we both know is there, to start reaping the benefits. He can buy you out after that if you like. Or you can stay in the firm. You get my shares. You’ll be a full partner.”
“Oh, Alan,�
�� she sobbed. “You did your best. But I need you. I miss you so much.” Her tenure in the house was ending. Dean had given her two months to vacate, and the deadline was only days away.
Conscious of her promise to Alan, of all the implications, she wished she’d not given it. Alan’s partner rubbed her the wrong way. Not initially. When she’d first gone to work at Morris and Pembrooke as a secretary six years ago, she had enjoyed working with both partners. Jase had been only a few years older than she, with tons of terrific ideas, and a determined drive that assured his success.
Alan was the older, more cautious partner, and the one who had handled most of the financing.
It was only after she fell in love with Alan, and then married him, that her relationship with Jase had subtly changed.
He and Alan’s brother, Dean Morris, had been convinced she had married Alan for his money. As if! It didn’t matter a bit to her that he had been almost thirty years her senior. She loved him and she knew he loved her.
She’d continued to work after their marriage, progressing to office manager. She knew almost as much about the firm as Alan did. He often discussed things with her and even implemented her ideas from time to time. Maybe she should have left and found a job with a different firm. Then he wouldn’t have put any restrictions on her, or urged her to depend on Jase.
Shortly after their marriage, Jase had relocated to San Francisco, opening a branch of their security firm on the West Coast. The firm had recently expanded into some of the Pacific Rim countries. Alan had continued with the operation in Washington, D.C.
Fortunately for peace in the partnership, she and Jase had rarely seen each other over the last few years. Designing and installing state of the art security measures was a growing business as the threat of terrorism grew. Their speciality was training businessmen in how to be watchful in foreign settings, to minimize danger when away from home, and protect themselves in daily life.
It wasn’t enough she was losing her home. Alan had extracted another promise. “I want your promise you’ll work with Jase for a year. Put your efforts into helping him make the company the success I know it can be. Consolidate to reduce expenses. Close the D.C. office. Move to San Francisco. Work with Jase.”
She’d argued against it, knowing she’d work better with Jase if there was a continent between them. In the end, she’d given in. She would have done anything to make his last days happy. He was dying! She hadn’t wanted to talk about business. Hadn’t wanted to think about the partner about whom she had such mixed emotions.
At least she’d talked Alan out of the harebrained notion he’d voiced one time.
“One way to protect the assets of the company, and to make sure you two are pulling together as a team would be to marry,” Alan had said pensively.
She stared at Alan. “You are crazy. That tumor has affected your mind. I’m not going to marry Jase Pembrooke.”
“He’ll succeed, you know he will. And if you two were married, you wouldn’t have to dissolve the partnership later or fragment the business. I don’t want Dean making any trouble. I don’t want you floundering when I’m gone. I want to know you’ll be taken care of. Give me that one promise, Shannon. Please.”
It had been the one promise she couldn’t make.
She cried herself to sleep, Alan’s voice echoing around her.
Jase Pembrooke hung up the phone and leaned back in his chair. It was after seven on a Thursday night, but he was still at the office. He got more done when the place was empty and the phones quiet. Still, if the phone rang, he’d answered it as he had a few moments ago.
Robert Wiley had called to report in on Shannon. Robert was an operative in the D.C. office. Jase had asked him to keep an eye on Shannon while she worked through closing the office and the home she and Alan had shared. He’d called to report the last of the details had been seen to. As of Monday, the office would be vacant, a sublessee already lined up.
Jase rose and strode to the window to gaze out, not seeing the outline of the Bay Bridge spanning the San Francisco Bay, nor the high rise office buildings of the financial district. Instead he saw his friend the last time they’d been together in March. Alan had exacted Jase’s promise to take care of Shannon. Sick with worry and regrets, Jase had agreed. Now the reality of that promise was coming home to roost.
Shannon. She’d be moving to San Francisco soon. He’d see her every day. Would she fit in, or constantly be a thorn in his side?
Alan’s idea sucked. If Jase hadn’t known Alan was ill, that stupid scheme would have convinced him. Take care of Shannon, give her a role in keeping the business intact? Treat her like a full partner? Not likely. He’d find a way to buy her out. He wasn’t going to get tangled up with her. If Alan wasn’t going to be involved, he wanted the running of the business all to himself. Alan had been the more cautious partner, really delving into things before agreeing to major decisions. Did he really expect Shannon to assume his role? She was only twenty-eight; she didn’t begin to have the business experience Alan had brought to the firm.
When their young secretary had married the boss five years ago, Jase had been convinced she’d done so to latch onto the Morris millions. After five years of marriage, however, Jase wasn’t so sure. Shannon worked hard at the D.C. office. As far as he knew she’d always been faithful to Alan, and seemed to hold her much older husband in high regard. She hadn’t blown money on expensive clothes or jewels or trips to Europe. Maybe he’d misjudged her five years ago.
Still, a twenty-eight-year-old woman with a fifty-five-year-old man wasn’t a likely match made in heaven.
She was probably wishing now that she could have found a way to get some of the family trust money before Alan was gone. Dean would see to it she didn’t get a cent. Alan had complained often about how Dean disliked Shannon. Jase knew Alan’s brother had already given her notice to vacate the family home, although it had been expected. One of Alan’s regrets at the end was that he hadn’t provided better for Shannon and he was depending on Jase to do so.
Jase didn’t have a problem keeping an eye out for her. He just didn’t want her involved with Morris and Pembrooke.
Though he’d promised his friend he’d see to that exact thing. He’d promised, but could he deliver? Especially with Alan’s idea of keeping her on as a partner until the company was doing well enough for Jase to buy out her half without jeopardizing what they’d built?
“There are ways to safeguard your wife’s interests without keeping her with the firm,” Jase muttered.
Jase had put all he had, and all he could borrow, into expanding the company. The early returns showed great potential. Facing facts realistically, he knew they couldn’t absorb the expenses Alan’s trust normally took care of. Which meant no money to provide a place for Shannon to live. No second office in D.C. No way for her to stay with the company unless she moved to California.
He didn’t want Shannon within three thousand miles of him.
And not only because of his discomfort every time he thought about her marrying his partner, but because of the pure sexual attraction he’d felt when she was around. Jase had done his best to ignore it. Avoid her whenever he could. He and Alan were partners, not he and Shannon.
Alan had asked the impossible.
And Jase had promised to deliver.
CHAPTER TWO
August
SHANNON gazed out of the window of the airplane. They were cruising at something like six miles up. She’d heard the announcement, but it hadn’t really registered. From here, however, the heartland of America looked like some pattern in green and brown. Leaning back in her seat, she gazed at the sparse clouds dotting the horizon. In only a little longer she’d be landing in San Francisco.
She wondered whether the years had softened Jase’s belief that she’d married Alan for his money. Nothing had softened Dean’s.
He’d told her on the day after the funeral to vacate the family home. When Jase, standing nearby, had heard, he’
d argued on her behalf. Dean had grudgingly given her two months to move out. Only, she was sure, because of the pressure Jase had brought to bear.
She’d packed her few things and left the house immaculate. The nest egg that Alan had built for her was safely in the bank. She hoped she wouldn’t need to use it any time soon, but it was there. A last gift from her husband. Leaving the house had been hard, but only because of the happy memories she retained from her marriage.
The Virginia side of the Morris family had inherited wealth from generations of men who seemingly had the Midas touch. Alan’s grandfather, in order to safeguard that wealth, had tied up the family money in a trust to be doled out to each generation. She and Alan had had no children, so there was no more Morris money once he died.
As if she cared. She’d loved her husband and deeply grieved his passing. No matter what Dean thought, she had made Alan happy for the five years of their marriage.
Yet a slow anger smoldered inside her that Alan had extracted that promise from her to work with Jase for a year. She didn’t want to be tied up with Jason Pembrooke for twelve months. Didn’t want to have to endure his scorn and dislike.
She could renege—Alan was gone, he’d never know. But that didn’t feel right. She’d made the promise in order to ease his last days. She wouldn’t back out now—she’d know she’d broken her word and she couldn’t live with that.
Somehow she and Jase had to make this work. She’d talk to him when she landed and hopefully come to some kind of compromise. Once she arrived in San Francisco, she’d have lots to do. She needed to find a small apartment. Arrange for her furnishings to be delivered. Find a niche for herself within the firm.
While she’d continued working for the company after she had married Alan, it had been as an employee. Now she had her husband’s shares so she was an equal partner with Jase Pembrooke, rather than being a mere office manager. That would certainly change the dynamics. She almost looked forward to butting heads with the man. It would take her mind off losing Alan.
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