Red Wine and Her Sexy Ex. Kate Hardy

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       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      KATE HARDY lives in Norwich, in the east of England, with her husband, two children, one bouncy spaniel, and too many books to count! When she’s not busy writing romance or researching local history, she also loves cooking—see if you can spot the recipes sneaked into her books. (They’re also on her website, along with excerpts and the stories behind the books.)

      Writing for Mills & Boon has been a dream come true for Kate—something she wanted to do ever since she was twelve. She’s been writing Medical™ Romances since 2001, and also writes for Modern Heat™; her novel BREAKFAST AT GIOVANNI’S won the Romantic Novelists’ Association’s Romance Prize in 2008. She says she loves what she does because she gets to learn lots of new things when she’s researching the background to a book: add warmth, heart and passion, plus a new gorgeous hero every time, and it’s the perfect job!

      Kate’s always delighted to hear from readers, so do drop in to her website at www.katehardy.com

       Recent titles by the same author:

       Modern Heat™

      GOOD GIRL OR GOLD-DIGGER?

      TEMPORARY BOSS, PERMANENT MISTRESS

       Medical™ Romance

      NEUROSURGEON…AND MUM

      THE DOCTOR’S LOST-AND-FOUND BRIDE

      For Maggie—who helped me see the wood for the trees—with love and thanks.

      Chapter One

       SHE was back.

      Xavier’s heart beat just that little bit faster as he put down the phone to his lawyer.

      This was ridiculous. He was completely over Allegra Beauchamp. He’d been over her for years. So of course it wasn’t nerves making his pulse race like this. It was anger—anger that she was planning to walk in after all this time and interfere. He’d put his heart and soul into the vineyard for the last ten years, and he was damn sure he wasn’t going to let her flounce in and ruin all his hard work.

      He didn’t trust her a single millimetre. Not any more. Quite apart from the way she’d broken his heart, dumping him when he’d needed her most, she hadn’t come back to support her great-uncle—the man who’d given her a home every summer while she was growing up—when he’d been old and frail and needed her. She hadn’t even made it back to France for Harry’s funeral; but she’d come straight back to claim her inheritance of fifteen hectares of top-quality vines and a big stone mas.

      Her actions spoke volumes.

      But in some ways it also made things easier. If Allegra was only interested in the money, then she’d be happy to sell her half of the vineyard to him, despite what she’d claimed to his lawyer this afternoon. Right now, she might have some romantic idea of what it was like to run a vineyard, but Xavier knew that as soon as she had a taste of the real thing she’d run straight back to London. Just as she had ten years ago—except this time she’d only be taking his money with her, not his heart. And this time he’d have no regrets.

      He grabbed his car keys from his desk drawer, locked his office door and strode off towards his car. The sooner he faced her, the better.

      Allegra sipped her coffee, but the dark, bitter liquid did nothing to clear her head.

      She’d been a fool to come back after all this time. She should’ve just agreed with the lawyer’s suggestion of selling Harry’s half of the vineyard to his business partner, stopped off briefly at the tiny church in the village to lay some flowers on her great-uncle’s grave and pay her respects, and then gone straight back to London.

      Instead, something had made her come back to the old stone farmhouse where she’d spent so many summers as a child. Whether it was an impulse to do right by her great-uncle or something else, she wasn’t sure. But now she was here in the Ardèche, she regretted the impulse. Seeing the house, smelling the sharp scent of the herbs growing in their terracotta troughs by the kitchen door, had made her feel physically sick with guilt. Guilt that she hadn’t come back before. Guilt that СКАЧАТЬ