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Owed: One Wedding Night
Nancy Holland
Jake Carlyle always gets what he wants… especially when it comes to his runaway bride.To save her family's business, determined Madison Ellsworth must turn to Jake Carlyle, her ex lover and the man she left standing at the altar.Jake eventually agrees to help, but on one condition – he gets what he’s owed. His wedding night.Still in love with Jake, Madison agrees, but once the passionate honeymoon is over, she can’t help but wonder if their marriage is based on convenience, love – or revenge.As they deal with the failing business, Madison and Jake soon learn that high-stakes games played in the boardroom will inevitably spill over into the bedroom!
Owed: One Wedding Night
NANCY HOLLAND
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First published in Great Britain by HarperImpulse 2015
Copyright © Nancy Holland 2015
Cover images © Shutterstock.com
Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2015
Cover design by Michelle Andrews
Nancy Holland asserts the moral right
to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue record for this book is
available from the British Library
This novel is entirely a work of fiction.
The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are
the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to
actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is
entirely coincidental.
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and Pan-American Copyright Conventions.
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Digital eFirst: Automatically produced by Atomik ePublisher from Easypress.
Ebook Edition © May 2015 ISBN: 9780008127374
Version 2015-05-27
In loving memory of my mother, who introduced me to romance and always believed this day would come.
Contents
Cover (#u5cc64c3e-c8d6-56ec-8632-b6092e93fc7d)
Title Page (#uddbb3b43-8245-52fd-ba14-64905c50370c)
Copyright (#u8c322788-7b6b-57fe-8199-d231994d688b)
Dedication (#uce28665f-e28f-5208-91ec-d285a7a2c58e)
Chapter One (#uc71b4944-0cd7-5ce2-98da-66c848477f55)
Chapter Two (#u7fa991de-d035-5bff-96e0-00ec0e23866c)
Chapter Three (#u17f851e7-ab76-53d8-a284-82c60f8baa1f)
Chapter Four (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Acknowledgements (#litres_trial_promo)
Nancy Holland (#litres_trial_promo)
About HarperImpulse (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One (#ud9e85975-1b2a-50d9-82ff-4fbd9fc8c6a9)
Madison Ellsworth’s heart pounded in rhythm with the noisy staccato of her heels on the marble floor of Carlyle & Sons’ San Francisco headquarters. The unwelcoming glass-and-steel decor, softened only here and there by hand-woven wall-hangings in shades of rust, gold, and azure, made the long path from the elevator to the receptionist’s desk seem endless.
She could do this. She had to do this. Her mother had gone through so much in the last two months. The least Madison could do was take this one burden off of her shoulders. If she felt like a sacrificial lamb on the way to slaughter, she had no one to blame but herself. She crossed her fingers for luck.
When she finally reached the stunning metal sculpture that was the receptionist’s desk, the redhead who sat behind it looked up at her with a small frown.
Madison shifted the Italian leather briefcase her mother had given her when she got into Stanford Business School from one damp hand to the other. “I’m here to see Mr. Carlyle.”
“I’m sorry.” The receptionist didn’t sound sorry at all. “He has an appointment with,” she glanced at the computer screen, cleverly hidden in the desk. “With a Mrs. Ellsworth.”
Madison took a deep breath and resisted the need to lift a hand and check that her sleek up-do was still perfect. “Mrs. Ellsworth couldn't make it. I’m her daughter.”
The redhead gave a small shrug and pushed a hidden button on the desk.
“Your ten o’clock appointment is here, Mr. Carlyle.”
The distance from the reception area to Jake Carlyle’s office was only a fraction of the walk from the elevator, but it felt ten times longer. At every clack of Madison’s heels on polished marble, the urge to forget this whole plan and head for the safety of home threatened to overwhelm her.
She forced her mother’s worried face to the front of her mind to block out everything but her promise to save Dartmoor Department Stores. If she thought too much about how Jake might react when he saw her, she could never do this. But her mother had paid too high a price to hold on to the family business for Madison to quit now.
Besides, there was no reason she and the head of Carlyle & Sons couldn’t discuss the issue like adults.
The receptionist glided ahead of her and opened the door to the office with a flourish.
The antique mahogany desk that dominated the room on the other side of the door was impressive. The man behind it was even more impressive.
Jake Carlyle’s face was elevated above mere masculine good looks by the slash of cheekbones inherited from the fashion model who had deigned to become his mother. The hand-tailored gray pinstripe suit emphasized the power of his tall, muscular frame.
He stood with a frown as Madison stepped into his inner sanctum.
Merely looking at the man took her breath away. When he raised sapphire-blue eyes to meet hers, her heart stopped entirely, then thudded back to life in double time.
Taking him by surprise was the only point in her favor. She watched the emotions run across the face she knew so well – surprise, a hint of lust, curiosity, and, finally, the beginnings of anger.
The anger made him lift his head slightly. His expression returned to the polite boredom a man like Jake Carlyle displayed to mere mortals, yet a frisson of sexual excitement lingered in the climate-controlled air.
“What are you doing here?”
Just what her frayed nerves needed – the man was channeling her father. She took a deep breath to calm herself.
“Mother doesn’t feel well, so I came instead.”
He looked away. For a moment, she’d rattled him. She lifted her chin a little higher and waited for his next move.
“How is she? It must have been a terrible shock.”
Madison’s eyes stung with a rush of unexpected grief. Shock, yes. Terrible, yes. But not in the way he thought.
For a moment the devastating memory of that pre-dawn phone call, made stronger by being in Jake’s presence, threatened to overwhelm her. Her first impulse, almost a compulsion, had been to call him, to go to him for the strength and comfort she needed, even though she’d no longer had a right to expect anything from him. Reality, and duty, had won out. She’d gone to her mother, been the strong one, the comforter. She’d had no other choice.
She fought off the still raw pain by making the Ms.-Manners-approved response. “It was nice of you to come to my father's memorial service.”
“Old friends and all that. You and your parents came to the one for my father.”
Those two unhappy events were the only times she and Jake had seen each other in three years. She sighed.
The momentary weakness didn’t go unpunished.
“So why did you, or rather your mother, want to talk to me?”
The ice in his voice made her knees wobble. Obviously the pleasantries were over.
She gave a meaningful look at the comfortable chairs that flanked the fireplace at the far end of the office, but instead he gestured at the stiff leather chair across the desk from his. They sat down at the same moment, eyes fixed on each other’s faces, like boxers circling in the ring.
She took a deep breath and began in a professional tone she hoped she could hang on to. “How much do you know about the circumstances surrounding my father’s death?”
He had the good grace to look uncomfortable. “Only what was in the newspapers. I didn’t follow all the stuff that showed up on the web.”
And thank you for that.
“I take it there are financial issues,” he continued.
She wondered if that was how her mother had phrased it when she made this appointment. Or was he only being polite? Madison took another deep breath and carefully unknotted her hands.
