Natural Blond Instincts Read online

  Dear Reader,

  First of all, let me come right out and say that my heroine, Kenna Mallory, has a bit of an attitude problem. As I have attitude issues myself—just ask anyone, especially my husband and editor; they’ll be happy to confirm this as fact—you’d think she would have been easy to write. Nope.

  Kenna Mallory just didn’t want to conform. She had to torture me the entire way. She didn’t want to wear what I wanted her to wear, didn’t want to say what I wanted her to say and she didn’t want to fall in love because I said she should.

  I’m afraid she didn’t torture just me. She tortured everyone she came in contact with—her family, her co-workers and especially one Mr. Weston Roth, the man sharing her position on the corporate ladder.

  But don’t feel too sorry for Wes. Tall, muscled and sharp as a tack, he thought he had Kenna all figured out. Unfortunately he was wrong. As a matter of fact, he was a lot wrong. Ah, the mess these two had to go through before they came to somewhat of a shocking realization.

  What realization, you ask? You’ll have to read to find out. I’ll give you one hint—this is a romance!

  Happy reading!

  Jill Shalvis

  P.S. I love to hear from readers! Come visit my Web site at www.jillshalvis.com to drop me a line and to check out my new releases.

  “What did he do, threaten to cut off your credit card?”

  If Wes had been any closer, Kenna’s look would have fried him on the spot. Good thing he stood a healthy distance from her.

  “I don’t care about my father’s money,” she enunciated slowly.

  “Really.” Wes found that hard to believe, given the evidence to the contrary. “So, if not the money, what do you care about?”

  “Not his money,” she repeated. “I earn my own. As for what I do care about… I care about my life. Living it how I want to, which until now has been very different than this structured, cutthroat business atmosphere. How about you, Mr. Roth?”

  “Wes.”

  “Okay. Wes,” she said with an acknowledging bow of her head. “What is it you care about?”

  “This structured, cutthroat business, for one.”

  She actually laughed, completely defusing the charged atmosphere between them. “Well, that’s going to make us quite the interesting pair.”

  Natural Blond Instincts

  JILL SHALVIS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Jill Shalvis has been making up stories since she could hold a pencil. Now, thankfully, she gets to do it for a living, and doesn’t plan to ever stop. She is the bestselling, award-winning author of over two dozen novels, including series romance for both Harlequin and Silhouette. She’s hit the Waldenbooks bestsellers lists, is a 2000 RITA® Award nominee and is a two-time National Reader’s Choice Award winner. She has been nominated for a Romantic Times Career Achievement Award in Romantic Comedy, Best Duets and Best Temptation. Jill lives in California with her family.

  Books by Jill Shalvis

  HARLEQUIN TEMPTATION

  742—WHO’S THE BOSS?

  771—THE BACHELOR’S BED

  804—OUT OF THE BLUE

  822—CHANCE ENCOUNTER

  845—AFTERSHOCK

  861—A PRINCE OF A GUY

  878—HER PERFECT STRANGER

  885—FOR THE LOVE OF NICK

  910—ROUGHING IT WITH RYAN*

  914—TANGLING WITH TY*

  918—MESSING WITH MAC*

  938—LUKE

  HARLEQUIN DUETS

  28—NEW AND…IMPROVED?

  42—KISS ME, KATIE!

  HUG ME, HOLLY!

  57—BLIND DATE DISASTERS

  EAT YOUR HEART OUT

  85—A ROYAL MESS

  HER KNIGHT TO REMEMBER

  HARLEQUIN BLAZE

  63—NAUGHTY BUT NICE

  HARLEQUIN SINGLE TITLE

  THE STREET WHERE SHE LIVES

  SILHOUETTE INTIMATE MOMENTS

  887—HIDING OUT AT THE CIRCLE C

  905—LONG-LOST MOM

  941—THE RANCHER’S SURRENDER

  1019—THE DETECTIVE’S UNDOING

  1194—SERVING UP TROUBLE

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Epilogue

  1

  KENNA MALLORY thought she’d turned out okay, though she supposed that depended on who you asked. Zipping alongside the Pacific coast just outside Santa Barbara, the sun at her back, the radio blaring…she herself couldn’t have asked for more.

  But her parents…undoubtedly they could have filled volumes on how they might have changed their only daughter. Changed and molded and created.

  Unfortunately, they’d blessed Kenna with her own mind. Hence, the Mallory family issues. She didn’t toe the line, she didn’t follow the rules, she didn’t fit the mold. Their mold.

  Which explained the slightly exasperated voice of her father in her ear, courtesy of the cell phone she’d won in a mail sweepstakes.

  “Kenna, honestly. You baffle me.” This was said in a paternal tone suggesting impatience, superiority and that mind-boggling emotion called love. A powerful combination on the best of days, designed to crank the guilt factor up to maximum overload. “I’ve got the perfect job for you, and you have no response.”

  None that he wanted to hear, anyway.

  Since he’d been doing his damnedest to run her life from the moment she’d been born, and she’d been doing her damnedest not to let him, the result had made for some interesting arguments over the past twenty-seven years. “Dad…thank you. I appreciate it, but I’ve got my own job, remember?”

  “Washing crap out of poodles’ tails is not a job, Kenna.”

  She glanced at the waves pounding the shore because it was calming, and at the moment, she needed calming. “I don’t do that anymore and you know it.” She purposely avoided reminding him exactly what she did do for a living. Did she really need to say—again—that she wasn’t in his world because he’d kicked her out of it?

  Since then, sure, she’d had some, uh, creative jobs to earn her way through college. But recently, she’d landed herself a position in the accounting department of Nordstrom’s. One thing she’d gotten from Kenneth Mallory, III, was her love of business and finance. She was good at it. So good, in fact, that on her better days she’d call herself a whiz.

  “The job I have for you is important,” he said. “As opposed to, say, slinging beer at that bar where the women wear those tight white tank tops.”

  “Now, you know I only did that for one week.” And she’d made enough money to cover an entire semester’s tuition. Who could complain about that?

  “Kenna, for once, listen.”

  “Fine.” She pretended his tone didn’t sneak past her defenses and stab at her. Was it so bad to want to make her own way? To want to be successful and please him at the same time, without compromising herself and her beliefs just because they were different than his?

  “You’re a Mallory—”

  Oh yeah, here it came. The Mallory card. She could recite it verbatim. As a Mallory, you owe it to the family… As a Mallory, you must present yourself this way… As a Mallory…

  Never mind that she didn’t consider herself a Mallory, and that she hadn’t for a long time. It wasn’t the nam