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Being a father shouldn’t feel this risky!
There’s not a lot former CIA agent Mark Sharpe hasn’t done. Yet suddenly he’s in a world of firsts—first time being a father, first time being self-employed…and first time being attracted to his employee. JoJo Hatcher, with her attitude, her tattoos and her investigative talents, tempts him in ways he can’t explain. With each day she becomes more irresistible. How is he supposed to function in this messed-up situation?
Then his teenage daughter, Sophie, is threatened. There’s only one person he trusts to help him: JoJo. As they work to untangle the mystery, Mark imagines a future together that includes another first—family.
“I can walk right in front of you and you’ll never recognize me.”
Mark scoffed at JoJo’s boast. “JoJo, you do realize I was a CIA black-ops analyst in the field for years.”
“And years and years…” His daughter rolled her eyes.
Okay, maybe he wasn’t going to impress Sophie.
“Observation is what I do,” he continued as though Sophie hadn’t interrupted. “It’s how I survived. You can’t get past me. Especially not with the tattoos.”
JoJo held out her hand. “It’s a bet, then. I do this. I get the job. You win. You get to show off your observation skills to your daughter. The only thing you’re out is a half hour of your time.”
“We were going to go eat….”
“Are you kidding me? I’m not leaving,” Sophie said. “I want to see this.”
JoJo winked at Sophie and his daughter smiled back. Great, he thought. She’d known this woman for minutes and they had bonded more tightly than he had with his daughter in months.
Still, he’d play out this little wager. What did he have to lose? It wasn’t like JoJo would ever get past him.
Dear Reader,
This is my third story set in the Tyler Group world (One Final Step, October 2012, and An Act of Persuasion, March 2013) and while an author never plays favorites with her books, I have to say this was one of the most satisfying books I have ever written. I fell in love with Mark and Sophie, an absent father and his daughter, who reunited in An Act of Persuasion. When I thought about Mark’s story and giving him his happy-ever-after, I really couldn’t think about him alone.
It had to be Mark and Sophie and their happy-ever-after. That meant I needed the type of heroine I thought would suit them both. That’s when JoJo walked on to the scene.
She’s not exactly conventional and she comes with a lot of baggage. But somehow the three of them make this story work. So this isn’t a story about Mark and JoJo. This is a story about Mark and JoJo and Sophie and how together they become a family.
I love to hear from readers—the good, the bad and the ugly—so check out my website, www.stephaniedoyle.net.
Happy reading!
Stephanie Doyle
For the First Time
Stephanie Doyle
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Stephanie Doyle, a dedicated romance reader, began to pen her own romantic adventures at age sixteen. She began submitting to Mills & Boon at age eighteen and by twenty-six her first book was published. Fifteen years later, she still loves what she does, as each book is a new adventure. She lives in South Jersey with her cat, Lex, and her two kittens, who have taken over everything. When she isn’t thinking about escaping to the beach, she’s working on her next idea.
For Wanda
Because when I said I could never, ever write Mills & Boon Superromance books, she said let’s not say ever.
Contents
PROLOGUE
“I NEED YOU to focus, Josephine.”
She was focusing. She
