Desdemona Wainwright thinks Sam Stark looks much too calm for a man who has just been left at the altar. The males in her theatrical family would be letting their feelings explode. But she was hired to cater his wedding, not to save it. Desdemona marches into Stark’s den to demand the much-needed payment for the canceled reception – not to fall in love. But the self-controlled, steel-willed man behind Stark Security Systems, a multimillion-dollar consulting firm, does have the cold, logical brain of a computer – along with the muscular, sensual body of a medieval knight. He is Desdemona’s exact opposite. And don’t opposites attract?

Sam Stark cannot understand what is wrong with treating marriage as a business deal. His ex-fiancee, stately blond Pamela, had seemed so perfect, so reasonable. This hoyden with wild red hair and huge turquoise eyes, insisting he write a check for hundreds of uneaten miniature asparagus tarts, is a different type: temperamental, volatile, and likely to drive a man crazy with her moods – or with desire. But Desdemona has the professional catering skills he needs for his business. It never occurs to him that she might not accept his offer to be his no-strings-attached, stand-in wife.

Desdemona has other plans for herself and Stark. She thinks involving him with her staff, made up of her relatives and other out-ofwork actors, will give him a sense of family. He thinks he’d rather spend his time with computers, but all too soon his private life and his business affairs are under siege. Desdemona is breaking down the walls around his heart – and someone is trying to get into his files to steal a top-secret computer program. Stark’s suspicions soon center on the people Desdemona holds most dear, as intrigue and murder swirl around them all. For this unlikely but ravishing pair, their love and even their lives may depend on emotions and bonds that can’t be measured – like unstoppable passion and unbreakable trust – in this wonderful new love story from Jayne Ann Krentz.

Jayne Ann Krentz, née Jayne Castle (b. March 28, 1948) is an American writer of romance novels. Krentz is the author of a string of New York Times bestsellers under seven different pseudonyms. Now, she only uses three names. As Jayne Ann Krentz (her married name) she writes contemporary romantic-suspense. She uses Amanda Quick for her novels of historical romantic-suspense. Jayne Castle (her birth name) is reserved these days for her stories of futuristic/paranormal romantic-suspense.