The Last Mercenary Read online

  PRAISE FOR DIANA PALMER

  “Nobody tops Diana Palmer when it comes to delivering pure, undiluted romance. I love her stories.”

  —New York Times bestselling author Jayne Ann Krentz

  “Diana Palmer is a mesmerizing storyteller who captures the essence of what a romance should be.”

  —Affaire de Coeur

  “Diana Palmer is a unique talent in the romance industry. Her writing combines wit, humor, and sensuality; and, as the song says, nobody does it better!”

  —New York Times bestselling author Linda Howard

  “No one beats this author for sensual anticipation.”

  —Rave Reviews

  “A love story that is pure and enjoyable.”

  —Romantic Times Magazine on Lord of the Desert

  “The dialogue is charming, the characters likable and the sex sizzling…”

  —Publishers Weekly on Once in Paris

  Dear Reader,

  International bestselling author Diana Palmer needs no introduction. Widely known for her sensual and emotional storytelling, and with more than forty million copies of her books in print, she is one of the genre’s most treasured authors. And this month, Special Edition is proud to bring you the exciting conclusion to her SOLDIERS OF FORTUNE series. The Last Mercenary is the thrilling tale of a mercenary hero risking it all for love. Between the covers is the passion and adventure you’ve come to expect from Diana Palmer!

  Speaking of passion and adventure, don’t miss To Catch a Thief by Sherryl Woods in which trouble—in the form of attorney Rafe O’Donnell—follows Gina Petrillo home for her high school reunion and sparks fly…. Things are hotter than the Hatfields and McCoys in Laurie Paige’s When I Dream of You—when heat turns to passion between two families that have been feuding for three generations!

  Is a heroine’s love strong enough to heal a hero scarred inside and out? Find out in Another Man’s Children by Christine Flynn. And when an interior designer pretends to be a millionaire’s lover, will Her Secret Affair lead to a public proposal? Don’t miss An Abundance of Babies by Marie Ferrarella—in which double the babies and double the love could be just what an estranged couple needs to bring them back together.

  This is the last month to enter our Silhouette Makes You a Star contest, so be sure to look inside for details. And as always, enjoy these fantastic stories celebrating life, love and family.

  Best,

  Karen Taylor Richman

  Senior Editor

  DIANA PALMER

  THE LAST MERCENARY

  In memoriam, Brenda Lou Lilly Rogers. My friend.

  Books by Diana Palmer

  Silhouette Special Edition

  Heather’s Song #33

  The Australian #239

  Maggie’s Dad #991

  †Matt Caldwell: Texas Tycoon #1297

  ‡The Last Mercenary #1417

  Silhouette Desire

  The Cowboy and the Lady #12

  September Morning #26

  Friends and Lovers #50

  Fire and Ice #80

  Snow Kisses #102

  Diamond Girl #110

  The Rawhide Man #157

  Lady Love #175

  Cattleman’s Choice #193

  ‡The Tender Stranger #230

  Love by Proxy #252

  Eye of the Tiger #271

  Loveplay #289

  Rawhide and Lace #306

  Rage of Passion #325

  Fit for a King #349

  Betrayed by Love #391

  ‡Enamored #420

  Reluctant Father #469

  Hoodwinked #492

  His Girl Friday #528

  Hunter #606

  Nelson’s Brand #618

  The Best Is Yet To Come #643

  *The Case of the Mesmerizing Boss #702

  *The Case of the Confirmed Bachelor #715

  *The Case of the Missing Secretary #733

  Night of Love #799

  Secret Agent Man #829

  †That Burke Man #913

  Man of Ice #1000

  The Patient Nurse #1099

  †Beloved #1189

  ‡The Winter Soldier #1351

  Silhouette Romance

  Darling Enemy #254

  Roomful of Roses #301

  Heart of Ice #314

  Passion Flower #328

  ‡Soldier of Fortune #340

  After the Music #406

  Champagne Girl #436

  Unlikely Lover #472

  Woman Hater #532

  †Calhoun #580

  †Justin #592

  †Tyler #604

  †Sutton’s Way #670

  †Ethan #694

  †Connal #741

  †Harden #783

  †Evan #819

  †Donavan #843

  †Emmett #910

  King’s Ransom #971

  †Regan’s Pride #1000

  †Coltrain’s Proposal #1103

  Mystery Man #1210

  †The Princess Bride #1282

  †Callaghan’s Bride #1355

  ‡Mercenary’s Woman #1444

  Silhouette Books

  Silhouette Christmas Stories “The Humbug Man”

  Silhouette Summer Sizzlers “Miss Greenhorn”

  To Mother with Love “Calamity Mom”

  Montana Mavericks Rogue Stallion

  Montana Mavericks Weddings “The Bride Who Was Stolen in the Night”

  Abduction and Seduction “Redbird”

  †A Long Tall Texan Summer Lone Star Christmas “Christmas Cowboy”

  †Love With a Long, Tall Texan

  Steeple Hill Love Inspired

  Blind Promises

  Dear Reader,

  This is the third book in the new trilogy of mercenary novels Silhouette was kind enough to let me do. I really enjoyed writing the original mercenary series back in the eighties, and I got to revisit some of the characters in these books. I hope you have enjoyed the new SOLDIERS OF FORTUNE series as much as I have enjoyed writing it for you. This is, in many ways, the most exciting of the three stories, because in it Callie Kirby helps Micah Steele lure the drug lord, Lopez, into a trap. In the process, Callie and Micah discover that the danger Lopez presents is equal to the danger of giving in to temptation. Can an independent woman settle for a man who has never known compromise—and can a mercenary give up the adrenaline rush of his lifestyle for the serenity of a small Texas town? Read the book and find out.

  Micah Steele has appeared in several books, including my MIRA Books title Paper Rose, and I thought he needed a longer book than the other mercenaries because of his complicated personal life—so he gets a Special Edition novel. I also like the chance to have an exotic location or two, particularly the Bahamas, where I have spent some of the loveliest days of my life. Nassau is such a beautiful blend of past and present, and I have a very special memories of watching the little tugboats turn the big passenger ships in the harbor, and walking through the straw market at Prince George Wharf.

  Not that Texas has any less impact in my memories! I have seen the cattle market at Fort Worth, and I have stood where Bowie and Travis and Crockett stood and died. I have seen vast ranches and majestic cities. And I have loved even the smallest of the small Texas towns.

  I have tried to show these wonderful places as I first saw them, with the same awe and sense of delight and wonder that I felt.

  I hope you enjoy The Last Mercenary, and the surroundings where the story unfolds. As always, thank you so much for all your kindness and caring over the years. When you have a minute, stop by and visit me at www.dianapalmer.com or write me in care of Silhouette Books. I am slow to answer mail, but, oh, how I love to get it!

  Love,

 
Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter One

  It had been a jarring encounter.

  Callie Kirby felt chilled, and it wasn’t just because it was November in south Texas. She watched the stepbrother she worshiped walk away from her as casually as if he’d moved around an obstacle in his path. In many ways, that was what Callie was to Micah Steele. He hated her. Of course, he hated her mother more. The two Kirby women had alienated him from the father he adored. Jack Steele had found his only son wrapped up in the arms of his young wife—Callie’s mother—and an ugly scene had followed. Callie’s mother, Anna, was sent packing. So was Micah, living mostly at his father’s home while he finished his last year of residency.

  That had been six years ago, and the breach still hadn’t healed. Jack Steele rarely spoke of his son. That suited Callie. The very sound of his name was painful to her. Speaking to him took nerve, too. He’d once called her a gold digger like her mother, among other insults. Words could hurt. His always had. But she was twenty-two now, and she could hold her own with him. That didn’t mean that her knees didn’t shake and her heartbeat didn’t do a tango while she was holding her own.

  She stood beside her little second-hand yellow VW and watched Micah bend his formidable height to open the door of the black convertible Porsche he drove. His thick, short blond hair caught the sunlight and gleamed like gold. He had eyes so dark they looked black, and he rarely smiled. She didn’t understand why he’d come home to Jacobsville, Texas, in the first place. He lived somewhere in the Bahamas. Jack had said that Micah inherited a trust fund from his late mother, but he’d sounded curious about his son’s luxurious lifestyle. The trust, he told Callie privately, wasn’t nearly enough to keep Micah in the Armani suits he wore and the exotic sports cars he bought new every year.

  Perhaps Micah had finished his residency somewhere else and was in private practice somewhere. He’d gone to medical school, but she remembered that there had been some trouble in his last year of his residency over a lawsuit, stemming from a surgical procedure he refused to do. Neither she nor his father knew the details. Even when he’d been living with his father, Micah was a clam. After he left, the silence about his life was complete.

  He glanced back at Callie. Even at a distance he looked worried. Her heart jumped in spite of her best efforts to control it. He’d had that effect on her from the beginning, from the first time she’d ever seen him. She’d only been in his arms once, from too much alcohol. He’d been furious, throwing her away from him before she could drag his beautiful, hard mouth down onto hers. The aftermath of her uncharacteristic boldness had been humiliating and painful. It wasn’t a pleasant memory. She wondered why he was so concerned about her. It was probably that he was concerned for his father, and she was his primary caretaker. That had to be it. She turned her attention back to her own car.

  With a jerk of his hand, he opened the door of the Porsche, climbed in and shot off like a teenager with his first car. The police would get him for that, she thought, if they saw it. For a few seconds, she smiled at the image of big, tall, sexy Micah being put in a jail cell with a man twice his size who liked blondes. Micah was so immaculate, so sophisticated, that she couldn’t imagine him ruffled nor intimidated. For all his size, he didn’t seem to be a physical man. But he was highly intelligent. He spoke five languages fluently and was a gourmet cook.

  She sighed sadly and got into her own little car and started the engine. She didn’t know why Micah was worried that she and his father might be in danger from that drug lord everyone locally was talking about. She knew that Cy Parks and Eb Scott had been instrumental in closing down a big drug distribution center, and that the drug lord, Manuel Lopez, had reputedly targeted them for revenge. But that didn’t explain Micah’s connection. He’d told her that he tipped law enforcement officials to a big drug cargo of Lopez’s that had subsequently been captured, and Lopez was out for blood. She couldn’t picture her so-straitlaced stepbrother doing something so dangerous. Micah wasn’t the sort of man who got involved in violence of any sort. Certainly, he was a far cry from the two mercenaries who’d shut down Lopez’s operation. Maybe he’d given the information to the feds for Cy and Eb. Yes, that could have happened, somehow. She remembered what he’d said about the danger to his family and she felt chilled all over again. She’d load that shotgun when she and Jack got home, she told herself firmly, and she’d shoot it if she had to. She would protect her stepfather with her last breath.

  As she turned down the street and drove out of town, toward the adult day care center where Jack Steele stayed following his stroke, she wondered where Micah was going in such a hurry. He didn’t spend a lot of time in the States. He hadn’t for years. He must have been visiting Eb Scott or Cy Parks. She knew they were friends. Odd friends for a tame man like Micah, she pondered. Even if they ran cattle now, they’d been professional mercenaries in the past. She wondered what Micah could possibly have in common with such men.

  She was so lost in thought that she didn’t notice that she was being followed by a dark, late model car. It didn’t really occur to her that anyone would think of harming her, despite her brief argument with Micah just now. She was a nonentity. She had short, dark hair and pale blue eyes, and a nice but unremarkable figure. She was simply ordinary. She never attracted attention from men, and Micah had found her totally resistible from the day they met. Why not? He could have any woman he wanted. She’d seen him with really beautiful women when she and her mother had first come to live with Jack Steele. Besides, there was the age thing. Callie was barely twenty-two. Micah was thirty-six. He didn’t like adolescents. He’d said that to Callie, just after that disastrous encounter—among other things. Some of the things he’d said still made her blush. He’d compared her to her mother, and he hadn’t been kind. Afterward, she’d been convinced that he was having an affair with her mother, who didn’t deny it when Callie asked. It had tarnished him in her eyes and made her hostile. She still was. It was something she couldn’t help. She’d idolized Micah until she saw him kissing her mother. It had killed something inside her, made her cold. She wondered if he’d been telling the truth when he said he hadn’t seen her mother recently. It hurt to think of him with Anna.

  She stopped at a crossroads, her eyes darting from one stop sign to another, looking for oncoming traffic. While she was engrossed in that activity, the car following her on the deserted road suddenly shot ahead and cut across in front of her, narrowly missing her front bumper.

  She gasped and hit the brake, forgetting to depress the clutch at the same time. The engine died. She reached over frantically to lock the passenger door, and at the same time, three slim, dark, formidable-looking men surrounded her car. The taller of the three jerked open the driver’s door and pulled her roughly out of the car.

  She fought, but a hand with a handkerchief was clapped over her nose and mouth and she moaned as the chloroform hit her nostrils and knocked her out flat. As she was placed quickly into the back seat of the other car, another man climbed into her little car and moved it onto the side of the road. He joined his colleagues. The dark car turned around and accelerated back the way it had come, with Callie unconscious in the back seat.

  Micah Steele roared away from the scene of his latest disagreement with Callie, his chiseled mouth a thin line above his square jaw. His big hands gripped the steering wheel with cold precision as he cursed his own lack of communication skills. He’d put her back up almost at once by being disparaging about the neat beige suit she was wearing with a plain white blouse. She never dressed to be noticed, only to be efficient. She was that, he had to admit. She
was so unlike him. He seemed conservative in his dress and manner. It was a deception. He was unconventional to the core, while Callie could have written the book on proper behavior.

  She hadn’t believed him, about the danger she and her stepfather—his father—could find themselves in. Manuel Lopez wasn’t the man to cross, and he wanted blood. He was going to go to the easiest target for that. He grimaced, thinking how vulnerable Callie would be in a desperate situation. She hated snakes, but he’d seen her go out of her way not to injure one. She was like that about everything. She was a sucker for a hard-luck story, an easy mark for a con artist. Her heart was as soft as wool, and she was sensitive; overly sensitive. He didn’t like remembering how he’d hurt her in the past.

  He did remember that he hadn’t eaten anything since breakfast. He stopped to have a sandwich at a local fast-food joint. Then he drove himself back to the motel he was staying at. He’d been helping Eb Scott and Cy Parks get rid of Lopez’s fledgling drug distribution center. Just nights ago, they’d shut down the whole operation and sent most of Lopez’s people to jail. Lopez’s high-tech equipment, all his vehicles, even the expensive tract of land they sat on, had been confiscated under the Rico statutes. And that didn’t even include the massive shipment of marijuana that had also been taken away. Micah himself had tipped off the authorities to the largest shipment of cocaine in the history of south Texas, which the Coast Guard, with DEA support, had appropriated before it even got to the Mexican coast. Lopez wouldn’t have to dig too deeply to know that Micah had cost him not only the multimillion-dollar shipment, but the respect of the cartel in Colombia as well. Lopez was in big trouble with his bosses. Micah Steele was the reason for that. Lopez couldn’t get to Micah, but he could get to Micah’s family because they were vulnerable. The knowledge of that scared him to death.

  He took a shower and stretched out on the bed in a towel, his hands under his damp blond hair while he stared at the ceiling and wondered how he could keep an eye on Callie Kirby and Jack Steele without their knowing. A private bodyguard would stick out like a sore thumb in a small Texas community like Jacobsville. On the other hand, Micah couldn’t do it himself without drawing Lopez’s immediate retaliation. It was a difficult determination. He couldn’t make himself go back to the Bahamas while he knew his father and Callie were in danger. On the other hand, he couldn’t stay here. Living in a small town would drive him nuts, even if he had done it in the past, before he went off to medical school.