The Dakota Man Read online

  Praise for Award-Winning, National Bestselling Author

  JOAN HOHL

  “A compelling storyteller who weaves her tales with verve, passion and style.”

  —New York Times bestselling author Nora Roberts

  “Joan Hohl is a top gun!”

  —New York Times bestselling author Catherine Coulter

  “Writers come and writers go. Few have the staying power, the enthusiastic following, of Joan Hohl. That’s talent!”

  —New York Times bestselling author Kasey Michaels

  Don’t miss Mitch’s story—he’s the brother of Adam Grainger, the hero from Joan Hohl’s A Memorable Man (Silhouette Desire #1075)

  Dear Reader,

  Thanks to all who have shared, in letters and at our Web site, eHarlequin.com, how much you love Silhouette Desire! One Web visitor told us, “When I was nineteen, this man broke my heart. So I picked up a Silhouette Desire and…lost myself in other people’s happiness, sorrow, desire…. Guys came and went and the books kept entertaining me.” It is so gratifying to know how our books have touched and even changed your lives—especially with Silhouette celebrating our 20th anniversary in 2000.

  The incomparable Joan Hohl dreamed up October’s MAN OF THE MONTH. The Dakota Man is used to getting his way until he meets his match in a feisty jilted bride. And Anne Marie Winston offers you a Rancher’s Proposition, which is part of the highly sensual Desire promotion BODY & SOUL.

  First Comes Love is another sexy love story by Elizabeth Bevarly. A virgin finds an unexpected champion when she is rumored to be pregnant. The latest installment of the sensational Desire miniseries FORTUNE’S CHILDREN: THE GROOMS is Fortune’s Secret Child by Shawna Delacorte. Maureen Child’s popular BACHELOR BATTALION continues with Marooned with a Marine. And Joan Elliott Pickart returns to Desire with Baby: MacAllister-Made, part of her wonderful miniseries THE BABY BET.

  So take your own emotional journey through our six new powerful, passionate, provocative love stories from Silhouette Desire—and keep sending us those letters and e-mails, sharing your enthusiasm for our books!

  Enjoy!

  Joan Marlow Golan

  Senior Editor, Silhouette Desire

  The Dakota Man

  JOAN HOHL

  To my dear Melissa, the editor from…heaven.

  Books by Joan Hohl

  Silhouette Desire

  A Much Needed Holiday #247

  *Texas Gold #294

  *California Copper #312

  *Nevada Silver #330

  Lady Ice #354

  One Tough Hombre #372

  Falcon’s Flight #390

  The Gentleman Insists #475

  Christmas Stranger #540

  Handsome Devil #612

  Convenient Husband #732

  Lyon’s Cub #762

  †Wolfe Waiting #806

  †Wolfe Watching #865

  †Wolfe Wanting #884

  †Wolfe Wedding #973

  A Memorable Man #1075

  The Dakota Man #1321

  Silhouette Romance

  A Taste for Rich Things #334

  Someone Waiting #358

  The Scent of Lilacs #376

  Carried Away #1438

  “Ryan Objects”

  Silhouette Special Edition

  Thorne’s Way #54

  Forever Spring #444

  Thorne’s Wife #537

  Silhouette Intimate Moments

  Moments Harsh, Moments Gentle #35

  Silhouette Books

  †Wolfe Winter

  Silhouette Summer Sizzlers 1988

  “Grand Illusion”

  Silhouette Christmas Stories 1993

  “Holiday Homecoming”

  Silhouette Summer Sizzlers 1996

  “Gone Fishing”

  Delivered By Christmas 1999

  “The Gift of Joy”

  JOAN HOHL

  is the bestselling author of almost three dozen books. She has received numerous awards for her work, including the Romance Writers of America’s Golden Medallion award. In addition to contemporary romance, this prolific author also writes historical and time-travel romances. Joan lives in eastern Pennsylvania with her husband and family.

  Dear Reader,

  Twenty years!

  Can you believe it? It seems impossible that twenty years have passed since Silhouette burst onto the publishing scene, astounding the industry with its immediate success, thrilling readers, like you and me, with fresh, absorbing and exciting love stories from the different lines—Special Edition, Desire, Intimate Moments—that evolved from the original Silhouette Romance.

  And over these past twenty years, Silhouette has given its thousands—no, millions—of readers such gifted writers to craft those wonderful stories: Nora Roberts, Linda Howard, Diana Palmer, Elizabeth Lowell, Annette Broadrick, Kasey Michaels, Heather Graham Pozzessere and so many, many more.

  I am both proud and honored to be counted among the numbers of Silhouette writers. And I sincerely hope you enjoy my offering to the celebratory year, The Dakota Man.

  Twenty years! I still can’t believe it.

  It has been a spectacular twenty years.

  Thanks for the great books, Silhouette.

  And thank you, loyal readers, for making it all possible. We owe it all to you.

  All my best,

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  One

  His brow furrowed in a frown, his square jaw clenched and his lips sealed in an anger-tight thin line, Mitch Grainger sat at his desk and stared at the object cradled in the palm of his broad hand. He could only scowl at the brilliant, multi-faceted engagement ring of clustered pink diamonds, encircled by smaller rubies.

  Less than an hour ago, Mitch had retrieved the ring from the floor near his desk. Which is where the object had landed after bouncing off his chest, hurled at him in unreasonable fury by Natalie Crane, the beautiful, cool, usually unemotional woman who had been his fiancée mere moments before.

  The flawless gemstones caught the afternoon sun rays slanting through the window blinds behind him. Mitch made a soft sound that was part rude snort, part unpleasant laugh.

  Women. Would he ever understand them? Had any man ever understood them? More to the point, Mitch mused, closing his fingers around the bauble, did he give a damn anymore?

  Not for Natalie Crane, certainly, he thought, answering his own question. Without allowing him the courtesy of offering an explanation for the scene she’d witnessed, she had jumped to the wrong conclusion. Coldly calling him a cheat and telling him their engagement was over, she had thrown the ring at him.

  Fortunately, Mitch had never deluded himself into believing he was in love with her; he wasn’t and never had been. He had simply decided that, at the age of thirty-five, it was time to choose a wife. Natalie had appeared eminently suitable for the position, being from one of the most wealthy and prestigious families in the Deadwood, South Dakota, area.

  But now Natalie was history. With her precipitous accusations, she had impugned his honor, and he forgave no one for that.

  Honor, his personal honor, was the one standard Mitch held as absolute. He had believed Natalie knew the depths of his sense of honor. Apparently, he had been mistaken, or she never would have misconstrued the situation she had happened upon, immediately leaping to the erroneous conclusion that he was playing around behind her back with his secretary, Karla Singleton.

  Poor Karla, Mitch thought, recalling the stricken look on his secretary’s face after th
e scene. Shaking his head, he slid open the top desk drawer, carelessly tossed the ring inside and slammed it shut again. He had never really liked the token, anyway. The concoction of pink diamonds encircled by clustered rubies had been Natalie’s choice; his preference had been a simple, if large, elegant two-and-a-half-carat, marquis-cut solitaire.

  Poor, foolish Karla, he amended, heaving a sigh raised by both sympathy and impatience.

  Mitch could understand passion, he had experienced it himself…quite often, truth to tell. But what he couldn’t understand, would never understand, was why in hell any woman—or man, either, for that matter—would indulge their passions to the point that they’d risk their health as well as pregnancy through unprotected sex.

  But believing herself in love, and loved in return, Karla had risked all with a man who had taken his pleasure…then taken off. He had supposedly left to find a job with a future, but nonetheless leaving Karla devastated, pregnant, unwed and ashamed to tell her parents.

  Not knowing what else to do, Karla had turned to her employer, sobbing out her miserable tale of woe on Mitch’s broad shoulder. Of course, Natalie had picked that moment to pay a visit to his office. She had witnessed him holding the weeping young woman in his comforting arms and heard just enough to erroneously conclude that, not only had he been fooling around with Karla, but that he had impregnated her, as well.

  As if he would ever be that stupid.

  In retrospect, Mitch figured it was all for the best, since he certainly didn’t relish the thought of being married to a woman who didn’t trust him implicitly. From all historical indications, marriage could work without depthless love, but in his considered opinion, it couldn’t survive without trust.

  So had ended his brainstorm of acquiring a wife, setting up house and having a family.

  On reflection, Mitch acknowledged the niggling doubts he had been having lately about his choice of Natalie, not as a wife—he felt positive she would make an exemplary wife—but as the mother of his children. And Mitch did want children of his own some day. While he had admired Natalie’s cool composure at first, he had recently begun to wonder if her air of detachment would extend to her children…his children.

  Having grown up with two brothers and a sister, in a home that more often than not rang with the sound of boisterous kids, controlled by a mother who had always been loving, even when firm, Mitch desired a similar upbringing for his own progeny.

  In all honesty, Mitch admitted to himself that he was more relieved than disappointed by the results of Natalie’s false assumptions.

  But he still had Karla’s problem to contend with, for she had asked for his advice and help. Mitch had always been a sucker for a woman’s tears, especially a woman he cared about. His own sister could give testimony to that. The sight of a woman he cared for in tears turned him, this supposedly tough, no-nonsense C.E.O. of a gambling casino in Deadwood, South Dakota, into the stalwart protector, the solver of feminine trials and tribulations…in other words, pure mush.

  And Mitch did care about Karla, for her sake, because she was a genuinely nice person, and for his own sake, for she was the best assistant he had ever employed.

  He had made some progress with Karla after calming her down following Natalie’s dramatic little scene. With some gentle probing—in between dwindling, hiccuping sobs—Mitch had learned that Karla was determined to have and keep her baby. Not for any leftover feelings for the father, because she had none, but simply because it was her baby.

  A decision Mitch silently applauded.

  Still, Karla had maintained that she felt too ashamed to go to her parents, who lived in Rapid City, to ask for their financial or moral support. Karla was an only child, so there were no siblings to apply to for assistance. And, though she had made some friends in the year and a half she had been in Deadwood, she felt none were close enough to dump her problems on.

  That left him, Mitch Grainger, the man with the tough exterior, surrounding a core of marsh-mallow in regards to weeping, defenseless females.

  Helluva note, for sure.

  An ironic smile of acceptance teased the corners of his sculpted, masculine lips. He’d take on the combined roles of surrogate father, brother and friend to Karla because of his soft spot…and because, if he didn’t, and his sister ever found out about it, she’d have his hide.

  His humor restored, Mitch reached for the intercom to summon Karla, just as a timid rap sounded on his office door, followed by the subdued sound of Karla’s voice.

  “May I come in, Mr. Grainger?”

  “Yes, of course.” He sighed; despite the numerous times he had asked her to call him Mitch, Karla had persisted in the more formal address. Now, after the emotional scene enacted mere minutes before, the formality seemed ludicrous. “Come in and sit down,” he instructed as the door opened and she stepped inside. “And, from now on, call me Mitch.”

  “Yes, sir,” she said meekly, crossing to the chair in front of his desk and perching on the edge of the seat.

  He threw his hands up in exasperation. “I give up, call me anything you like. How are you feeling?”

  “Better.” She managed a tremulous smile. “Thank you…for the use of your shoulder to cry on.”

  He smiled back. “I’ve had plenty of practice. Years back, my younger sister went through a period in her teens when she was a regular waterworks.” His wry confidence achieved the desired effect.

  She laughed and eased back in the chair. But her laughter quickly faded, erased by a frown of consternation. “About Miss Crane… I’d like to go see her, explain…”

  “No.” Mitch cut her off, his voice sharp.

  Karla bit her trembling lip, blinked against a renewed well of tears. “But…it was a misunderstanding,” she said, her voice unsteady. “Surely, if I talked to her…”

  He silenced her with a slashing movement of his hand. “No, Karla. Natalie didn’t ask for, or wait long enough to hear an explanation. She added one and one and came up with three—you, me and your baby. Her mistake.” His tone hardened with cold finality. “It’s over. Now, let’s discuss another matter of business.”

  She frowned. “What business?”

  “Your business.”

  “Mine?” Karla’s expression went blank.

  “The baby,” he said, nudging her memory. “Your baby. Have you made any plans? Do you want to keep working? Or…”

  “Yes, I want to keep working,” she interrupted him. “That is, if you don’t mind?”

  “Why would I mind?” He grinned. “Hell, you’re the best assistant I’ve ever employed.”

  “Thank you.” A pleased glow brightened her brown eyes, and a flush colored her pale cheeks.

  “Okay, you want to continue working.”

  “Oh, yes, please.”

  “How long?”

  “As long as I can.” Karla hesitated a moment before quickly adding, “I’d like to work up to the last possible minute.”

  “Forget it.” He shook his head. “I don’t think that would be good for you or the baby.”

  “But the work’s not really physical,” she insisted. “Having a baby is expensive today, and I’ll need every dollar I can earn.”

  “I provide excellent health insurance coverage for you, Karla,” he reminded her. “Including maternity benefits.”

  “I know, and I appreciate that, but I want to save as much as I can for afterward,” she explained. “I’ll need enough to tide me over until I can go back to work.”

  “Don’t concern yourself with finances, I’ll take care of that. I want you to concentrate on taking care of yourself, and the child you’re carrying.” He held up a hand when she would have protested. “Five more months, Karla.”

  “Six,” she dared to bargain. “I’ll only be seven-and-a-half months by then.”

  He smiled at her show of temerity. “Okay, six,” he conceded. “But you will spend that sixth month training your replacement.”

  “But it won’t take me
a whole month to train someone,” she exclaimed. “I won’t have anything to do!”

  “Exactly. Consider it a small victory that I’m allowing that much.”

  She heaved a sigh of defeat. “You’re the boss.”

  “I know.” His grin lasted all of a few seconds before turning into a grimace. “Damn,” he muttered. “When the time comes, how in the hell are we ever going to find someone suitable to replace you?”

  A little over a month later, and many miles distant to the southeast, an individual ministorm raged beneath a sun-drenched corner of Pennsylvania….

  “Rat.” The scissors slashed through the voluminous skirt.

  “Louse.” A seam tore asunder.

  “Jerk.” The bodice was sheared into small pieces.

  “Creep.” Tiny buttons went flying.

  “There…done.” Her chest heaving from her emotion-driven exertions, Maggie Reynolds stepped back and glared down at the ragged shards of white watered taffeta material that had formerly been the most exquisite wedding gown she had ever seen.

  With a final burst of furious energy, she gave a vicious kick of one bare foot, scattering the pile of material into large and small pieces that glimmered in the early June sunlight streaming through the bedroom window.

  Tears pricked her eyes; Maggie told herself it was the glare of sunlight, and not the fact that she was to have been married in that designer extravagance in two weeks’ time.

  The sting in her eyes grew sharper. Just two days before, Maggie’s intended groom had thrown her a vicious curveball right out of left field. After sharing her apartment and her bed with him for nearly a year, and after all the arrangements for their wedding had been in place for months, she had come home from work to find all of his belongings gone, his clothes closet empty, and a note—a damned note—propped against the napkin holder on the kitchen table. The words he had written were imprinted on her memory.

  Maggie, I’m sorry, I really am, he had scrawled on the lined yellow paper she kept for grocery lists. But I can’t go through with our marriage. I have fallen in love with Ellen Bennethan, and we are eloping to Mexico today. Please try not to hate me too much. Todd.