THE BACHELOR'S STAND-IN WIFE – Susan Crosby
Wives For Hire, Book 1
Silhouette Special Edition #1912
ISBN-13: 978-0-373-24912-1
July 2008
Series Romance

Chance City, California – Present Day

David Falcon has just about given up hope of finding the perfect employee for his unique situation. As part owner of a custom car manufacturing company, he spends a lot of time out of the country selling their cars. Not only does he need a housekeeper/cook, he needs an administrative assistant to live at his house outside of Sacramento and be able to help him any time of day. Either the candidates have housekeeping experience or secretarial experience, not both. David would really like to stop his many long days outside of the country, but right now the family situation with his brother as part owner of Falcon Motorcars makes his many hours of work impossible to stop. His house outside of the city allows him the peace and quiet that soothes his soul between trips. The last applicant is Valerie Sinclair. Can a woman with an eight-year-old daughter be the best that he can expect?

Valerie Sinclair is at the end of her rope; she lives in a dump in a bad part of town, her savings are empty and her credit cards are charged to the max to pay for living expenses for her and her daughter Hannah. If she doesn't get this job...who knows what she can do next? But David decides to take a risk on her, and Valerie vows to be the best employee anyone has ever seen, and she wants to anticipate David's needs before he does. But how can she anticipate her attraction to this handsome and genuinely nice man who treats her in a kindly manner and has the spark of attraction in his eyes?

David's business is becoming harder to deal with; he does all the traveling and has no help from his brother, and then Valerie finds out her daughter's father has died. Family problems seem to assail both of them, and only the...well, you'll just have to read the book to find out what eases their various problems.

Susan Crosby's effortless writing has created characters we immediately feel an affinity for, and we are enthralled with each of them as they tell us their story. Valerie is close to homeless and needs to keep her job and avoid a possible relationship with her employer. The secret of her daughter's paternity is about to blow a lid on her carefully planned life, and yet her attraction to David is undeniable. David is a cautious man because his family history was not the best and his fear of abandonment seems to be a common element between the two of them.

David's half-brother, Noah, is his partner in business, but Noah's not pulling his own load. His wife died four years ago and left him with two sets of twins! Seems as if there's a lot of job turnaround in the family, and nannies don't stay around long. Similar to their father in his strictness and daunting personality, David and Noah have started their conflict over how their business is to be run. David's other half-brother, Gideon, has nothing to do with their business, but is able to read people much easier than David can. Joseph McCoy is an old friend of David's and his gardener. Along with his on again-off again girlfriend Dixie, Valerie meets some new people that make life in their small town more interesting. And David's ex-girlfriend, Laura, briefly appears as a way of taking his mind off Valerie. Think an old girlfriend will do the trick?

THE BACHELOR'S STAND-IN WIFE is a definite treat for a quick summer read one weekend. David's brothers, Noah and Gideon, will also have their stories told in the coming months, and finding out about the secret lives of three hunky men is nothing to be sneezed at. Get in on the ground floor and learn the history of the Falcon brothers.

Carolyn Crisher