Read A Hard Man to Forget Online
Authors: Kerry Connor
A Hard Man to Forget
Kidnapped...by
her husband?
Laura Morgan spent two years searching for the truth about her past,
ever since the rainy night when she was found badly beaten and
half-dead in a small California town. The attack left her with no
memory of her life before that night, or even her true identity. But
just when she’d nearly given up on ever finding answers, she
found herself captured by a tall, dark stranger who claimed she was
his wife.
Three years ago, Simon Randall’s wife Meredith mysteriously
disappeared without a trace. Nearly everyone believed she was dead,
drowned in the dark waters of the lake behind their home, her body
never recovered. Only Simon believed she was still alive, a
conviction that seemed proven when he found Laura, the spitting image
of his supposedly late wife.
Determined to get the truth, he swept her away to his isolated home.
He wanted answers; Laura didn’t have any. Simon struck a chord
in her unlike any man she could remember, but was she his wife? The
more she learned, the more she began to wonder if this was a life she
would want to remember, especially when the attempts on her life
began. Someone wanted Meredith to stay dead permanently this time—and
the only person Laura could turn to was her “husband.”
A HARD MAN TO
FORGET
Kerry Connor
Kindle Edition
Copyright 2011 Kerry
Connor
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This book is a work of
fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the
product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any
resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is
entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved,
including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.
For questions or comments
regarding this ebook, please contact the author at
[email protected]
.
Table
of Contents
Note
Dear Reader,
A HARD MAN TO FORGET is one of the first books I ever wrote and
remains a favorite of mine. I’m a big fan of the classic gothic
style and wanted to write a contemporary romantic mystery with that
kind of darkly compelling romance and atmospheric suspense. As I
developed the story, I poured my love of the old gothic tropes into
it: the dark, brooding hero; the vulnerable heroine drawn to a man
she isn’t sure she should trust; the isolated setting; the
moody tone. Of course, I wanted to put my own twist on them. In the
gothic tradition, if the hero was married before the story began, the
marriage was usually unhappy, and his wife—whether the heroine
before the book began or a previous wife—often wasn’t a
very nice person. So I wanted the hero and his wife to have genuinely
been in love, which would only enhance the mystery of why she
disappeared. I also wanted to create a mystery that would truly keep
the reader guessing about the heroine’s identity. Is she the
hero’s long-lost wife…or isn’t she?
Like most of my earlier manuscripts, the book was originally targeted
for Harlequin Intrigue. Unfortunately, the story wasn’t quite
right for them, and it wasn’t until my next submission,
STRANGERS IN THE NIGHT, that I made my first sale to the line. As
time went by, I was afraid this story would never see the light of
day. I’m so happy to finally be able to bring it to readers. I
hope you enjoy it.
Happy reading!
Kerry Connor
of Characters
Laura Morgan
– After two years of searching for the
truth about her identity and her past, a possible answer arrives in
the form of a tall, dark stranger.
Simon Randall
– Three years after he lost his wife, he
believes he’s found her again.
Meredith Randall
– Simon’s late wife, whose death
is much less certain than it seems.
Will Vincent
– Simon’s business partner isn’t
pleased at the prospect of Meredith’s return.
Aimee Sinclair
– She wants Simon, and doesn’t
intend to let anyone stand in her way.
Garrett Coombs
– The sheriff considers the case closed,
and has no interest in reopening it.
Jason Collins
– Laura’s friend wants to be
something more.
Dr. Lewis Walker
– Can he help Laura piece together her
past?
Patsy Burke
– She’s been keeping a secret for
three long years.
They said she was dead.
They were wrong.
Simon Randall’s life had been turned upside down, throwing
everything he’d once believed in doubt. There was only one
thing left in this world he knew for certain. Alone in more ways than
one, he clung to it like a lifeline.
They said she was dead.
They were wrong.
Darkness had descended long ago. He hadn’t bothered to turn on
a light, hadn’t moved in hours. He preferred the peace of the
dark to the stark lighting that illuminated things he didn’t
want to see. Every inch of the house tormented him, filling him with
memories of her and making him question what was real and what was
fake. She’d designed the house. She’d decorated it. She’d
filled it with life. Now that she was gone, it lay as dead as they
claimed she was. The only thing that made it bearable was when he
didn’t have to see it.
Instead, he sat before the massive living room windows and stared out
into the inky blackness, lost in his thoughts, in those memories that
were most likely lies.
There were good lies. The lie that she had loved him as much as he
loved her. That she was as sweet, as caring as people believed. That
she never would have left him.
There were the bad lies. That she was dead. That she’d been
caught in a violent storm while sailing and had drowned in the lake.
That it wasn’t unexpected for her body not to turn up. There
were so many uncharted depths in those waters that they could drag
the damned thing a hundred times over without recovering it.
And there was the truth, which only he seemed to believe. That a
sailor as experienced as Meredith would never have gone out in the
storm the forecasters had predicted for that day. That she’d
been tense and moody, distant for weeks before she disappeared. That
deep down in his soul, everything inside of him denied the
possibility of her death.
She was his wife, the only woman he’d ever thought of loving.
Shouldn’t he be able to feel it if that emotional connection
between them was suddenly, irrevocably severed?
Not if there was never a connection to begin with...
His grip tightened on the half-full glass of whiskey in his right
hand. The glass strained, threatening to shatter beneath the force of
his anger. He forced himself to ease the pressure his fingers
exerted. He didn’t know why he was even holding the damned
thing. He didn’t drink the stuff, had long since given up hope
that he could bury the questions that tormented him behind an
alcoholic haze.
Instead, the questions continued to eat away at him with the
voraciousness of sharks that smelled blood in the water.
The facts didn’t add up. He knew her too well. She never would
have been out there on a day like that. Yet the fact remained, she
was gone. Try as he might, there was only one way those two pieces of
information could be reconciled.
She’d left him. Run away as they’d always predicted she
would. Everyone had questioned how someone as sweet as her could end
up with someone like him. Surely there was no hope that any
attraction between such two opposites could last. Yet late at night,
when he loved her with a passion that stunned him, when her goodness
had seeped into the dark corners of his soul and made him feel, he’d
dared to believe they were wrong.
Even now, even when faced with the prospect of her abandonment, he
ached for her.
Meredith...
What might have passed for tears if he were capable of them pricked
at the back of his eyes. That was the worst of it. She’d made
him believe like no other, then had yanked it away in the cruelest
way possible, without a word of explanation. And more than his desire
for her, more than his anger at her disappearance, he needed to know
why.
He would find her. He would demand the reason. And he would be done
with her.
But first he had to find her.
Like a burst of clarity amid the confusion that had dogged him for
weeks, the purpose of that goal filled him with a kind of calm. He
would find her, no matter what it took, no matter what he was forced
to do.
Losing her had very nearly killed him.
And as long as he had it, he didn’t give a damn if the truth
finally did.
One
She was midway down the courthouse steps when she saw him.
Coming out of the massive wooden doors at the front of the county
courthouse, Laura had instinctively narrowed her eyes and shaded them
from the sudden brightness with the back of her hand. It was one of
those hazy summer days when the sunlight glared off the pavement and
the heat shimmered in the air, making objects even a short distance
away seem wavy and indistinct. It took all of two seconds for the
effects of the air conditioning to evaporate and a fine sheen of
perspiration to develop on her skin.
She grimaced and tugged at the clinging fabric of her suit. Welcome
to August in central California. Never had the Arctic seemed more
appealing.
Keeping her gaze lowered, Laura began to descend the cement steps,
eager to get to her lunch date with Jason. The promise of a cool
drink on a day like this was enough to get anyone moving faster.
Apparently she wasn’t the only one who thought so. A sweeping
glance across the courthouse plaza found it abuzz with pedestrians
hurrying to and from the building, dashing in and out of the park
across the street, all flirting with heat stroke as they, like her,
rushed to fit their lunch breaks in during the noon recess.
And then she saw him.
He was sitting at the bus stop on the other side of the street,
facing the courthouse. She wasn’t sure what drew her eye to
him. In a black T-shirt and jeans, he wasn’t dressed all that
differently from the other park dwellers. He wasn’t doing
anything to draw attention to himself, simply sitting, utterly still,
on the bench.