Table Of ContentOne
Jared Hamilton Stone paused in front of the small gift shop and studied its hand-
lettered sign. Personally yours, it read in script, with each letter a different color.
This was definitely the right place.
He hesitated before reaching for the polished brass doorknob. He didn't have to
go through with it, he reminded himself. The entire notion bordered on the
bizarre. But then, poor old Uncle Phillip himself bordered on the bizarre these
days. An image of the old man, his dark blue eyes brimming with tears, flashed
in Jared's mind's eye. Phillip Hamilton Stone was not a man given to tears.
Furious bouts of temper were his usual style. The sight of the proud old man,
tear-ful and pleading, had touched his nephew in a way the most ferocious
temper tantrum never could.
Which was why he was standing outside the small Cambridge gift shop in the
cold November rain, pon-dering how to meet its owner. Amber Aames.
The door was suddenly flung open and two girls, apparently college students,
emerged, each carrying a large, bulky package. Right on their heels followed a
sturdy blond toddler, dressed in light blue corduroy overalls and a blue, white,
and yellow striped shirt.
The baby was obviously intent on following the students out the door. Jared
paused and stared at the child. He certainly wasn't dressed for a cold-weather
outing, and the two students didn't seem aware of his presence at all. They had
already started down the street without a backward glance.
The little boy took a determined step after them, seemingly impervious to a blast
of wind and rain.
"Er, are you with them?" Jared asked the child uncertainly. He wasn't quite sure
how one conversed with a youngster. He was seldom, if ever, in the company of
children. "If so, they seem to have left you behind."
The boy grinned up at him, his brown eyes sparkling, and replied with a gleeful
"Hi!"
Jared cleared his throat. "Um, hello." What did he do now? Allow the little
Jared cleared his throat. "Um, hello." What did he do now? Allow the little
gentleman to proceed on his way or attempt to stop him? It was very cold, and
despite his self-assurance the young man was not wearing a coat.
"Go bye-bye," the boy said cheerfully, and stepped out into the rain. With an
uncertain frown, Jared scooped him up into his arms and carried him inside the
shop. It felt a bit strange, holding the firm little body in his arms. He tried to
remember the last time he'd held a baby and couldn't.
"Christopher!" A brown-eyed blonde who bore a marked resemblance to the
little boy raced across the shop toward them. "Were you trying to get out again?"
Christopher laughed and fairly leaped from Jared's arms into the blonde's,
jabbering a long string of syllables, none of which made the least sense to Jared.
She kissed the baby's cheek and he chortled mer-rily. "Thank you for rescuing
him," she said to Jared.
"I made the mistake of taking my eyes off him for a minute to close the cash
register." She smiled. "And one does not take one's eyes off Christopher, even
for a split second, these days."
Jared Hamilton Stone was not one who smiled easily or often, but he found
himself returning this woman's smile. It was almost impossible not to. Her large,
wide-set chocolate-brown eyes were shining with warmth, and the sight of her
cuddling the laughing baby made an irresistibly appealing picture.
"May I help you?" she asked. Her voice was clear and melodious. She continued
to smile at him, and for a moment his mind went blank. He forced himself to
concentrate. The woman was Amber Aames, she had to be. She was wearing an
embroidered name pin that read AMBER in five shades of green.
He stared at her, taking in every detail about her.
Her honey-blond hair was thick and bluntly cut, swinging lightly against the
curve of her neck, just below her chin. The light bangs seemed to accentuate
those big, velvet-brown eyes of hers. She had a firm little chin, a sweetly shaped
mouth, and an enchanting dimple in her left cheek.
She was wearing wine-red slacks that flattered her small waist and the soft flare
of her hips. Her oversize black and red shirt didn't quite disguise her firm, full
of her hips. Her oversize black and red shirt didn't quite disguise her firm, full
breasts, which were definitely unfettered by a bra.
Red and black triangle-shaped earrings dangled against the slender curve of her
neck, drawing his attention to the soft, sensitive skin there. Jared tried to
swallow—his mouth felt dry.
He'd been sexually attracted to women before, of course, but never with such
intense force. Never before had his gaze remained fixed on a woman, seemingly
of its own volition, totally beyond his control. Which, he reminded himself, was
considerable.
Jared Hamilton Stone was always, always in control—of himself, of his life, of
everything around him.
The woman was holding a child, he reprimanded himself. He wasn't, he couldn't
be attracted to a married woman with a baby! But how could Amber Aames be
married? Uncle Phillip had definitely said
. . . Jared's eyes widened. Suppose she were un-married with a baby? Hadn't
Uncle Phillip accused the Aames family of being notoriously liberal and
philosophically imprudent and impulsive? And he had said that Amber Aames
was the family's weakest link. Yes, those were the old man's exact words.
"Is there anything you're particularly interested in, or are you just browsing?"
Amber asked politely. The man was staring at her as if she had two heads! she
thought. When his gaze traveled over her body, lingering on her breasts, she
resisted the impulse to roll her eyes heavenward and sigh in disgust. He was
definitely giving her the once-over and he wasn't being at all subtle about it,
either!
He certainly didn't look like the type to ogle a woman so blatantly. She could see
the proper dark gray suit under his equally proper beige raincoat, the tailored
white shirt and gray and blue tie. His dark brown hair was conservatively cut,
too short for him to be a member of the university community, either student or
professor. His features were strong—
straight nose, firm jaw, high cheekbones.
So all-American, so New England, so WASP. Hadn't she decided that such
classic good looks were boring? He was tall, at least an inch or two over six feet,
and though he was wearing all those clothes she could easily see that he was trim
and though he was wearing all those clothes she could easily see that he was trim
and well built, without an ounce of excess weight on him.
Her gaze touched briefly on his mouth and she quickly looked away. His mouth
was definitely not boring. It was well shaped and sensually formed, his lips
neither too thin nor too full, but . . . beautifully
. . . sensitively . . . Amber gulped and purposefully jerked her gaze away.
Her eyes met and clashed with his over little Christopher's head. She'd never
seen eyes such a deep, dark blue. Indigo. Not navy blue, not purple, but a subtle,
distinct shade between. One she'd never seen before until this moment. Indigo
eyes.
Amber forced herself to dismiss those remarkable eyes and stared down at his
feet. He was wearing black wing-tip shoes, the conservative, no-nonsense style
worn by FBI agents and staid executives. She thought what her teenaged niece,
Sharon, would have to say about those shoes—"How hopelessly out of it. Aunt
Amber!"—and her lips curved into a smile.
It was much easier to deal with his hopelessly out-of-it shoes than his beautiful
mouth or his indigo eyes. Amber decided that the man's demeanor and dress
pegged him squarely as a tax attorney or a banker. Serious, somber, dedicated to
the rational, logical, infallible world of numbers. He was probably a workaholic,
married to his career. A zombie. She knew the type well. She had been one
herself.
"Mama!" It was Christopher who jarred them both from their careful inspection
of each other. He squirmed and wriggled in Amber's arms and called out to the
pretty blond woman emerging from the shop's storeroom, her arms filled with
dolls in Pilgrim dress.
Amber and Jared both turned to look. "Down!"
demanded Christopher, and Amber obligingly set him on his feet. He ran toward
his mother.
"Ashlee, let me help you with those dolls," Amber offered.
"Thanks, Am—" Ashlee stopped in midword and stared at Jared Hamilton Stone.
Her jaw dropped along with all the Pilgrim dolls.
Her jaw dropped along with all the Pilgrim dolls.
"Fall down," Christopher observed, and picked up one of the dolls by its long
yarn braid.
"Oh, dear!" Amber said, and stooped to gather up the dolls. Christopher tried to
help, but he was dis-tracted by the sight of a large stuffed gingham dog in the
corner of the shop and rushed off to claim it.
Ashlee stood stock-still, staring at Jared.
"You're—You two must be twins," Jared said, staring from one sister to the
other. Twins! Uncle Phillip's private investigator ought to have mentioned that,
he thought disconcertedly. "You look so much alike!"
"Yes, we're twins." Ashlee had recovered herself enough to speak. She gave
Jared a dazzling smile.
"I'm Ashlee Aames and this is my sister Amber. We're pleased to meet you, Mr. .
. . " She paused, waiting expectantly for his name.
"Stone. Jared Stone."
Ashlee dimpled. Her dimple was in her right cheek, Jared noted. Amber's was in
her left. Mirror-image twins.
"Jared." Ashlee took his big hand in her small one and clasped it. "I'm so glad to
meet you, Jared."
She sounded as if she really meant it, he thought.
As if she had been waiting for him to come into the shop and introduce himself
to her and her sister. And he wondered how someone born and bred in Aames,
Massachusetts, could have a distinctly Southern drawl. Uncle Phillip had boasted
how little he'd had to pay the private investigator to dig up personal information
on the Aames family. Apparently, the old man should have invested a little more
cash for a more thorough dossier.
Jared's gaze flickered from Ashlee to Amber. Both sisters had the same rich
chocolate-colored eyes, fringed with thick dark lashes. The same coloring, the
same features, the same height, and—he gulped—the same slender but
sensuously voluptuous figures. Their hairstyles were similar, with Amber's dark
sensuously voluptuous figures. Their hairstyles were similar, with Amber's dark
honey-blond hair being slightly shorter.
"Christopher took off his sweater again," Ashlee said as she watched her small
son drag the big stuffed dog into the center of the floor. She pulled her own
sweater tightly around her and rubbed her arms.
"I wonder where he put it? He needs it. It's so cold today."
"Christopher is a hardy, northern-born Yankee who doesn't freeze when the
temperature drops below sixty," Amber said dryly. "He's not cold, Ash, and he
doesn't want his sweater on. That's why he took it off."
Ashlee gave a small shiver and shook her head.
"November the sixth, and it's thirty-seven degrees outside. I—" She stopped and
stared back at Jared.
"Of course, November the sixth . . . November the sixth!"
The glow in her brown eyes seemed to light up her whole face. Scooping up
Christopher in her arms, she disappeared into the adjacent storeroom and work
area, humming a rendition of . . . ? Jared couldn't identify the totally tuneless
tune. Was it just him, or was Ashlee Aames a tad spacey?
His gaze automatically went to Amber, who had gathered up all of the Pilgrim
dolls and was setting them on a shelf. She was, he noticed, studiously ignoring
him.
What did the man want? Amber wondered as she carefully arranged the Pilgrim
girl dolls beside the Pilgrim boy dolls. He obviously had no interest in any of the
merchandise in the store. He hadn't glanced at a thing since setting foot inside.
Except her and Ashlee, she thought irritably.
The man did irritate her. She wished Ashlee hadn't been so friendly toward him.
An impossible wish, Amber conceded, since her sister was friendly toward
everyone she met. Amber tried hard to emulate Ashlee's open warmth and
friendliness, but in this case . . . after the way he'd stared at her . . . Amber
scowled at the Pilgrims. She hadn't wanted to know the man's name or anything
else about him.
Jared Stone. The name echoed silently through her head. Despite the hungrily
sexual glances he'd been giving her, she guessed that he was uptight, staid, and
boringly conservative. She knew the type well—
too well. He was the male version of her before her transformation from
grubworm to butterfly.
She turned to find him still watching her, and fumed inwardly. She would not
allow this indigo-eyed stranger to reduce her to a state of shattered nerves.
She'dspent the last two and a half years breaking out of that straitjacket of
awkward shyness.
"Mr. Stone, I assume you came into this shop for a reason," she said coolly,
pinning him with a direct stare. "Did you want to buy something?"
And if not, stop wasting my time and taking up precious floor space, Jared
silently finished what Amber Aames had implied, but not said aloud. He was not
doing a very good job of "charming the Aames girl," which had been Uncle
Phillip's expressed purpose. . . .
"She's the Aames family's weakest link," Phillip Hamilton Stone had said, his
dark blue eyes gleaming with an almost messianic fervor. "She runs a gift shop
and, according to Speck's report, she goes out almost every night. It should be
easy for you to romance such a simple creature, Jared. And when the time is
right and she's putty in your hands, pump her for everything she knows about
Aames's planned takeover of our bank."
If he hadn't known his uncle was deadly serious, Jared would have laughed.
"Your premise doesn't quite hold up, Uncle Phillip," he had said with a wry
smile. "Running a gift shop and dating frequently doesn't imply a lack of brains,
although I realize that to you any occupation other than banking appears
frivolous. But suppose your theory is correct. A simple-minded party girl is not
going to know much, if anything, about banking. Even if her family does own a
bank."
Phillip Hamilton Stone was undeterred. "Have you no imagination, my boy?
Even if the Aames girl knows nothing about the takeover, a relationship with her
is still a weapon in our arsenal. Make the girl fall for you, Jared. And when you
have her in the palm of your hand, threaten to drop her if her father and brothers
go ahead with the takeover. She's their only daughter—it would be natural for
go ahead with the takeover. She's their only daughter—it would be natural for
them to indulge her, eh?"
The first hundred and fifty times they'd had this conversation, Jared had politely,
but firmly, told his uncle that the plan was ridiculous and that he wouldn't dream
of considering it. But rumors had continued to swirl, and the old man's panic had
mounted. Jared was worried about his uncle's single-mindedness—his whole life
was Hamilton Bank. And when his uncle broke into tears and pleaded—
begged! —him to at least meet the "Aames girl," Jared was plunged into a crisis
of loyalty versus his own ethical standards.
His uncle was the only family he had. It hadn't been easy for the work-obsessed,
confirmed bachelor to take in his orphaned nephew, but he had done so.
Jared owed him. He'd recognized his obligation all his life.
"I'll meet her, Uncle Phillip," he told the old man wearily. "But that's as far as I'll
go. I won't romance her, I won't attempt to get any information about the bank
from her. I'll walk into her shop, meet her, and leave. That's it."
And now he was here and had met Amber Aames and . . . Jared's gaze swept
over her again and he felt his body begin to tighten. She had the most beautiful
brown eyes he'd ever seen. Liquid velvet. And the softest, sweetest mouth.
Against his will, his gaze dropped to her breasts, which thrust against the warm
cotton knit of her shirt. The outlines of her taut nipples were visible beneath the
material. He couldn't seem to look away from the enticing sight.
He was suddenly, furiously annoyed with the potent surge of desire that stabbed
through him. He could not allow himself to want Amber Aames. In light of
Uncle Phillip's Machiavellian schemes, she was the last woman that he dared to
become involved with—
Amber's voice, caustic and cross, broke into his reverie. "If you want to leer at a
woman, I suggest you take yourself to that X-rated porno shop two blocks down.
I'm told they have all sorts of books and magazines with pictures for men like
you to drool over."
Jared flushed. "Miss Aames, I assure you that I—I was not leering at you. That
is, I. . ."
Amber stifled the impulse to giggle. She'd certainly shaken up the poor stiff. If
the mention of a porno bookstore could send him into spasms, imagine what the
real thing would do to him! Bring on cardiac arrest?
"You see, I . . ." Jared tried again, the flush deepening. He saw the laughter in
her eyes and felt like a total fool. She was laughing at him, enjoying every
moment of his discomfiture! He drew himself to his full height—precisely six
feet and one and one quarter inches—and said stiffly, "I was not leering at you
and I most certainly do not patronize shops that handle pornography of any
kind."
"Have you ever been in one?" Amber asked curiously.
"Of course not!"
"I haven't either." She tilted her head and grinned.
10
"But I'm going to check one out sometime. Do you want to come with me?"
"I most certainly do not! And you shouldn't go anywhere near one of those
places either! I can't imagine why you would even consider it." He gave her a
disapproving frown.
"Because I've never been to one. And I want to experience everything—at least
once," Amber said gleefully, thoroughly enjoying her game of shocking this so
very proper stranger. "I threw the word should out of my vocabulary. It's too
suffocating and inhibiting."
There was more than one grain of truth in that, she thought. For years, she'd been
programmed by what she thought she should do. And it had been suffocating
and inhibiting.
Jared stared at her. She'd thrown the word should out of her vocabulary?
"Do you feel the same, Jared?" Her tone was husky, lilting, and he listened like
one mesmerized. "Don't you want to break out of that gray suit and sample
