Her Best Bet Read online

  Praise for Pamela Ford’s novels

  “Fast paced and fun…it’s a delight!”

  —Romantic Times BOOKreviews on The Wedding Heiress

  “Delightfully amusing…a ‘not to be missed’ book by first-rate author Pamela Ford.”

  —CataRomance Reviews on The Wedding Heiress

  “Upbeat, witty and as much fun as the merry-go-round…I loved it.”

  —Romance Reader at Heart on The Wedding Heiress

  “Ms. Ford has delivered a truly delightful take. The Sister Switch is definitely headed for this reviewer’s keeper shelf.”

  —Romance Readers Connection

  “The dialogue between her characters sparkles.”

  —Romantic Times BOOKreviews on The Sister Switch

  “A warm-hearted family story, a sweet feel-good romance…a thoroughly enjoyable book.”

  —Romance Reviews Today on The Sister Switch

  Dear Reader,

  As I wrap up the finishing touches on this, my fifth novel for Harlequin Superromance, I am reminded of how fortunate I am to be writing for Harlequin Books. Though I didn’t discover romance fiction until my late twenties, once I did, I was hooked. I still remember reading my first romance novel—a historical—and wondering how I, an insatiable reader, had managed to miss this genre for so long. These were uplifting stories about women rising above adversity, taking charge of their lives, having adventures, raising children and falling in love. Who could ask for more?

  Making up for lost time, I began reading romances by the armful and soon decided I wanted to write them as well. My first couple of efforts were truly learning experiences, but by the third book, I managed to pull all the pieces into a novel that Harlequin wanted to buy. The day I got that call was one I will never forget. I am thrilled to be part of the Harlequin sisterhood (men included!) of readers, writers and publishing professionals, and I know, without a doubt, that the insight and input of my editors has helped make my books better.

  I hope you enjoy Her Best Bet, a story about dreams, how they can change and how we discover what we truly want only once we look into our hearts. I love hearing from readers; please e-mail me at [email protected] or through my Web site at www.pamelaford.net.

  All the best,

  Pamela Ford

  Her Best Bet

  Pamela Ford

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Award-winning author Pamela Ford spent many years writing for advertising agencies and corporations before chasing down her dream of becoming a freelance writer and novelist. Ever the romantic, she is already hard at work on her next novel. She loves to hear from readers and can be e-mailed at [email protected] or reached through her Web site www.pamelaford.net.

  Books by Pamela Ford

  HARLEQUIN SUPERROMANCE

  1247—OH BABY!

  1291—DEAR CORDELIA

  1404—THE SISTER SWITCH

  1521—THE WEDDING HEIRESS

  To Teri Wagner and Susan Mongoven,

  who are truly angels on Earth.

  And to Bob, because you’re the best.

  Acknowledgments

  My thanks to the following people for sharing their knowledge so this story could become a reality:

  Don Ford, Mel Pike, Mike Chmurski at Megel Corporation and Barry Mainwood at Mainly Editing.

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER ONE

  ON A BRIGHT SATURDAY MORNING in August, Elizabeth Gordon opened her mail, spilled her coffee and came face-to-face with her life. It wasn’t pretty.

  The dark liquid raced across the letter she laid open on the kitchen table and poured over the edge like a miniwaterfall to the scuffed hardwood floor below. She jumped to her feet and snatched a handful of napkins from the holder, blotting at the spill as though she could lift the words from that single sheet and make them disappear. As if it would make her forget what she had just read…

  Dear Izzy,

  If you’ve gotten this letter, it means you’re coming up to your ten-year high school reunion. Can you believe it, Iz? You’ve been out of high school ten years already. So, here’s what you’re doing for a living right now: you’re a movie director. Or, okay, maybe an assistant director. That’d be all right, too. Or even an assistant-to-an-assistant. As long as you’re doing what you want to do—and not what Mom and Dad want. Tell me you didn’t marry some guy they thought was perfect and become a trophy wife. On a shelf. With 2.5 perfect kids. Because, Izzy, if you did, I don’t know what I’ll do. I’m eighteen. I’m about to graduate from high school and go to college. I don’t want a husband. I want to do something fun, exciting, rewarding. I want to work in film. You want to work in film. So, Izzy, that’s your future. The movies! I can’t wait to get there. I can’t wait to read this in ten years and know that I’m doing something I love—just like they said I couldn’t.

  Love and kisses, xxxooo from yourself,

  Izzy

  It had been an English class assignment her senior year—write a letter to yourself describing what your life would be like in ten years. The teacher had collected the letters and said they would be mailed out with the reunion invitation.

  She’d forgotten all about it. Slowly she lowered herself back into her chair. What had happened to her dreams? Somehow she’d fallen into a lifestyle—pattern—rut. How had she let her life come to this, this moment where her loss of direction seemed exquisitely obvious? Suddenly she had the sensation that she was floating, looking down at herself like they say you do when you die.

  “Izzy?”

  She felt herself snap back into her body and focused on the willowy blonde in the doorway, her roommate, Shelly Kent. Though Shelly had the fine-boned features of a model, she rarely wore makeup outside of work and paid just enough attention to fashion to make sure she wasn’t out of style.

  “The mail came already?” Wrapped in a pink cotton robe, Shelly padded toward her and reached for the short pile of bills and junk mail.

  “Yeah.” Years were passing her by and she hadn’t even noticed. Dreams were passing her by. She’d meant to get into film and instead…She cringed.

  “What’s wrong with you?” Shelly glanced up from the mail. “Did you get on the scale this morning? Because I thought we decided we’d only weigh in every—”

  “I’m the traffic manager at a little cable TV station,” Izzy said with disdain. “Traffic manager.”

  “So?”

  “So? I manage the video inventory. I maintain the advertising logs. I schedule on-air promotion. I don’t do anything remotely related to making movies.”

  “And I’m the weather girl. A weather girl—not a movie star.”

  “Yeah, but traffic manager was never on my list of dreams. Weather girl was on yours.”

  “Only if I didn’t make it as a movie star. And you may have noticed, Hollywood hasn’t come calling yet, but when they do, I’ll be ready. Until then, it’s cumulus clouds for me.” Shelly poured herself a cup of coffee, refilled Izzy’s mug and slid into the seat opposite. “I’m sure traffic manager is on somebody’s list of dreams—just add it to yours. So, what’s this really about?”

  Izzy picked up the damp paper and slapped it on the table in front of Shelly. “Read this. How would you feel if you got this in the mail?”

  As Shelly read the letter, she pressed her li
ps together. “Like a loser. Especially if I got to my reunion and discovered everyone else had succeeded beyond their wildest dreams.”

  “Thanks.”

  Shelly pushed her chin-length hair behind one ear and took a sip of her coffee. “I was kidding. I’m sure it won’t be like that. When you’re eighteen you don’t know anything about life. You didn’t have a clue how hard it would be to break into directing—”

  “I hardly tried. My parents knew the manager at the cable station, so I landed there—and stayed. Dreams be damned, it was just easier. You were right the first time. Loser. At least I have a boyfriend.”

  Shelly made a gagging sound. She tilted her head thoughtfully for a long moment. Then she shoved back her chair, pushed up her robe sleeves and began to pick through the garbage in the wastebasket beneath the sink.

  “There’s food in the pantry. Just because we’re dieting doesn’t mean you have to resort to scraps.”

  “Ha-ha. I finally sorted that mountain of old junk mail and magazines on my nightstand yesterday,” Shelly said, still digging. “And wouldn’t you know it, today I need something I threw away. You always wonder why I keep all that stuff for so long, well, this is why. Because—Here it is!” She pulled a brochure from the bag and wiped a swath of coffee grounds off the front.

  “Here what is?”

  “Your salvation. The Americana Documentary Film Contest for amateur and student filmmakers.”

  Coffee cup halfway to her mouth, Izzy froze. “What?”

  “Now, if we have any luck at all…” Shelly opened the brochure and scanned the copy. “Thank goodness. The Outline Submission Round doesn’t close for four days.”

  Izzy almost choked on her coffee. “Are you out of your mind?”

  “Do you want to go to your class reunion as the person who didn’t even try to follow her dreams? They’ll probably be displaying everyone’s letters and goals in some big PowerPoint presentation.” Shelly waved a hand through the air. “I can almost see it. Column one—what each person wanted to do. Column two—a gold star for success and a sad face for you, because the one thing you accomplished was the only thing you told yourself not to do—settle down with some guy your parents thought was perfect.”

  Izzy stared, dumbfounded, as her friend kept talking without waiting for an answer.

  “Let’s try this, Izzy. All we need to do is submit a one-to-two-page summary describing the documentary film we want to make if we get chosen to progress to the Video Submission Round.”

  “We?”

  Shelly grinned. “We, baby. You want to be a director. I want to be a star. We might as well chase our dreams together.”

  Izzy snorted. “Go back to bed and get some more sleep. You’re delirious.”

  “Delirious? Replace the r with a c and I’m delicious.”

  “Ohmigod.”

  “Face it, Iz, it’s an absolutely delicious idea. And since we’re practically starving ourselves to lose ten pounds, delicious is a word I’d like to have in my vocabulary right now even if it only relates to making a movie.”

  This was absurd. Totally and absolutely absurd. And totally and absolutely tempting. “What happens if we progress to the Video Submission Round?”

  “I thought you’d never ask.” Shelly turned her attention back to the brochure. “Two weeks after the Outline Submission Round closes, ten entrants will be selected as finalists by a panel of judges,” she read aloud. “Finalists will have two months to create a six-minute short documentary expressing the topic presented in their outline.”

  The idea began to cozy its way deeper into her mind. “And the winners are announced…when?”

  Shelly dropped into her chair and tossed the brochure on the table. “Ten days after that. This whole contest will be wrapped up in three months—in plenty of time for your class reunion. Feels like it was meant to be, doesn’t it?”

  “I’m merely asking a couple of questions. I’m not actually considering it. I mean, what would Andrew think?”

  “Andrew would think you’re being silly and impulsive, that you don’t have a prayer of winning so why enter, that if you become a finalist, you won’t have as much free time to be the perfect girlfriend to him.” Shelley slowly straightened in her chair and raised her coffee cup. “Who cares what Andrew thinks?”

  “Well, I—”

  “No! No, you don’t! Come on, Izzy, it’s the chance of a lifetime. You get to follow your dreams and I get to be on film discussing something other than weather patterns.”

  Izzy pursed her lips and silently debated whether her roommate was brilliant or deranged. There was such a fine line between the two.

  “And, it could be a real boon for your career. I mean, think if we won. Doors would open—”

  “Could open.” Izzy stood and refilled her mug. Shelly could be on to something. Or not. She did have a penchant for jumping to wild conclusions.

  “Likely open. For both of us. No more traffic managering for you. No more weather girl for me.” She arched a hand through the air. “From now on it’ll be top billing for both of us! Come on, Izzy, help me out here.”

  “Shelly, what if—”

  “What could possibly go wrong?”

  Actually, she couldn’t think of a thing, short of Andrew getting exasperated with her. But if they finaled, Andrew’s exasperation would be the least of her concerns. The corners of her lips curved upward as she considered what it would feel like to attend her reunion with her head held high, as a finalist—maybe even the winner—of a documentary film contest.

  “What have we got to lose?”

  Nothing. She exhaled. “Okay, we’ll write an outline.”

  “We will?” Shelly jumped to her feet and danced over to give Izzy a hug. “You’re the best!”

  “Oh, stop. Just two pages, right? On any American topic?”

  “That’s what it says. Got any thoughts?”

  “I don’t know…Football? That’s pretty American.”

  Shelly stuck two pieces of wheat bread in the toaster. “Football skews male. What if some of the judges are female? How about apple pie?”

  “Skews female. And boring.”

  For the next several minutes they bandied about ideas, discarding each in turn for one reason or another.

  “What about that property your parents own? That old resort up in Wisconsin.” Shelly sprinkled cinnamon and sugar on the toast and handed a piece to Izzy. “Isn’t that place steeped in Americana?”

  Izzy shrugged. “They don’t own the resort—only the land. And they’re selling that, anyway. My great-great-grandfather gave some guy a hundred-year lease and finally it’s coming due.”

  “Hmm. That could be an interesting angle.”

  “Yeah, well, the broker told my parents it’s getting run-down. Who wants to see a documentary about a seedy resort?”

  “No one,” Shelly said glumly.

  Izzy bit into her toast. A memory of her grandfather telling stories of the old days popped into her mind. Unless…“Unless the documentary isn’t about the resort. What if it’s about the gangsters?”

  “What gangsters?”

  “My grampa used to tell me stories that his father told him. About growing up there during the twenties. How the gangsters from Chicago used to come to northern Wisconsin for vacations and—”

  “You mean like Al Capone?”

  “Yeah. And John Dillinger and Baby Face Nelson and—”

  “Are you kidding me?” Shelly set her coffee cup on the table and leaned forward onto her elbows. “Did they ever stay at your resort?”

  “It’s not our resort—”

  “Yeah, yeah, only the land. Did they ever stay there?”

  “That’s what he said. ’Course, he always loved to tell a good yarn.”

  “Good yarn? Gangster Getaways in the Wisconsin Northwoods. Izzy, it’s perfect!” Shelly reached excitedly for the contest brochure and knocked over her mug, spilling coffee on the ten-year-old letter once again. As t
he dark liquid dripped over the table edge like another miniwaterfall and down onto the floor, Shelly grabbed a handful of napkins and began to sop it up. “Good things are coming our way, Izzy, I can feel it. Clear skies ahead!”

  GIB MURPHY HAD ALWAYS KNOWN the lease would be trouble someday. He’d just hoped to be on the other side of the world when it happened. Well, best-laid plans and all that…

  He stepped out of the northern Wisconsin woods onto the sun-drenched beach of Menkesoq Lake, then stopped to let his grandfather and younger brother, Matt, catch up. Like a row of stately blue herons, they fell into a line shoulder to shoulder and looked out across the lake, at a view that had belonged to their family, and the resort they owned, for generations. Though their ages spanned fifty years, all stood straight-backed and tall, but Gib could tell his grandfather’s shoulders were starting to round. Hard work and age were taking their toll.

  The sun beat down with typical August intensity, heating everything it touched. It was a day meant for riding bikes and climbing trees. A perfect day for swimming and throwing your wet body down on a towel in the hot sand to gaze in wonder at the sky and muse about what it would be like to fly a spaceship.

  Too bad he wasn’t a kid anymore. Because the subject his grandfather had broached was far too serious for a day like this.

  “One hundred years our family’s been running this resort, leasing this land from the Gordons,” his grandfather said. His silver eyebrows drew together beneath the brim of his worn Chicago Cubs cap. “And now they want to sell it. One hundred years of shared history about to disappear.”

  Gib could hear the pain in his voice.

  “If the land is sold, the improvements become the property of the new owner. That’ll be the end of the resort.” Matt shielded his blue eyes with his hand as he gazed out over the lake; a breeze ruffled his shaggy brown hair. Though he was twenty, he still had the gangly, not-yet-mature appearance of a teenager.