The Secret Agent's Surprises (Harlequin American Romance) Read Free Page A

welcome news.” Priscilla took a deep breath. “However, I also liked my friends in the government office. I’ll be fine.”
    Cricket stood and hugged her. “It will all work out. In the meantime you can always go see what Mr. Morgan had up his sleeve. There’s usually money involved when he wants to pawn off one of his sons.”
    Priscilla laughed, surprised, and shook her head. “As much as I liked him, I fear Josiah is a one-man con game. Truthfully, the games he’s up to are beyond my scope.”
    “Yet he has such amazing success, especially with those hardheaded boys of his. Wouldn’t it be an old movie plot if he was behind this loan problem?” Cricket went out on the porch, opening her polka-dot umbrella. “This is the coldest and dreariest February I think I’ve ever seen in Fort Wylie.”
    “Mr. Morgan might be a busybody, but he wouldn’t deliberately sabotage my business,” Priscilla said, laughing.
    “I know. I was being dramatic. I think it’s the weather.” Water puddled at the base of the porch as the rain came down harder.
    “Drive carefully,” Priscilla said. “The roads can be slick.”
    “I’ll call you tomorrow. In the meantime, I’ll bepraying for you.” Cricket cast a glance back through the door longingly. “It’s so comfortable in your shop that I hate to leave. I can’t stand the thought that it might not be here much longer.”
    Priscilla waved goodbye, not sure what to say about that. She’d heard of several people in Fort Wylie having money woes—her situation was better than most.
    She went inside to examine some financial statements and see what she could come up with.
     
    P ETE M ORGAN sat on a military plane mulling over his prospects. The last thing he wanted was to return home to the Morgan ranch, but he’d been offered a million dollars to do so, as had his brothers. Gabe and Dane had fallen under the spell of money and lovely women, but Pete was harder, more stubborn. He wouldn’t have been a secret agent if he weren’t tough as steel, a trait he’d inherited from the old man. Maybe that was the only good thing he’d ever gotten from Pop. The old goat had wanted his boys tough, and that was how they’d turned out.
    The oldest son, Jack, wasn’t in touch with anyone in the family. He called the rodeo circuit home. Pete had no home at the moment. After he’d finished his assignment and been debriefed, he’d had time to ponder his life. He was glad he was retiring, not sorry it was all over. He was happy enough, if any of the Morgans knew what happiness was. Gabe and Dane were certainly new men since their marriages.
    Maybe that was what he was missing.
    Pete pushed the thought from his mind. That was Pop talking, getting in his head with his desire for more grandchildren, somehow wanting the past to be overlooked.
    Pete had no intention of caving. He decided he’d find Jack, pay him a visit. Maybe he’d become a rancher like his brothers, throw in a little real-estate venturing like Pop. Surely Jack had to be getting tired, too. Pete felt his own thirty years sitting on him like a weight, or perhaps it was the traveling that had worn him down. When he was younger, his job had made him feel very important. Now he just felt exhausted. Maybe it was the absence of light in his life—and why that miserable thought made him think of Miss Manners, the wonderfully elusive and prissy Priscilla Perkins, he wasn’t sure.
     
    “W ONDERED IF YOU’D ever get around to visiting me,” Josiah Morgan said to Priscilla two days later, his eyes gleaming. “You’re wanting to hear my plan, I expect.”
    “Mr. Morgan, I might just be paying a call on you to be kind. I could have a business proposition for you myself.” She seated herself in the massive den of the Morgan house, located just outside Union Junction. It was different here now that Josiah had taken up residence—the house felt more like a home.Last month, he’d been living in France. He said he’d