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In Bed With The Boss
Sharon Kendrik
Mills & Boon are proud to present a thrilling digital collection of all Sharon Kendrick’s novels and novellas for us to celebrate the publication of her amazing 100th book! Many of these books are available as e books for the first time.The man to claim her….It had to be him. Blake Devlin. The man who had cruelly abandoned Josephine Spencer after one passionate night, only to become engaged to another woman the next day! So of course, it had to be Blake who brought the news that Josephine’s worthless husband has fled the country with her best-friend!Now Blake is claiming that it’s his responsibility to give her a job, and a place to stay. With no other option, Josephine must agree. But as the chemistry between them reaches fever pitch, could she really get into bed with her new boss?
DEAR READER LETTER
By Sharon Kendrick
Dear Reader (#u62f14908-f765-5d17-803e-d0bbcf357666),
One hundred. Doesn’t matter how many times I say it, I still can’t believe that’s how many books I’ve written. It’s a fabulous feeling but more fabulous still is the news that Mills & Boon are issuing every single one of my backlist as digital titles. Wow. I can’t wait to share all my stories with you - which are as vivid to me now as when I wrote them.
There’s BOUGHT FOR HER HUSBAND, with its outrageously macho Greek hero and A SCANDAL, A SECRET AND A BABY featuring a very sexy Tuscan. THE SHEIKH’S HEIR proved so popular with readers that it spent two weeks on the USA Today charts and…well, I could go on, but I’ll leave you to discover them for yourselves.
I remember the first line of my very first book: “So you’ve come to Australia looking for a husband?” Actually, the heroine had gone to Australia escape men, but guess what? She found a husband all the same! The man who inspired that book rang me up recently and when I told him I was beginning my 100th story and couldn’t decide what to write, he said, “Why don’t you go back to where it all started?”
So I did. And that’s how A ROYAL VOW OF CONVENIENCE was born. It opens in beautiful Queensland and moves to England and New York. It’s about a runaway princess and the enigmatic billionaire who is infuriated by her, yet who winds up rescuing her. But then, she goes and rescues him… Wouldn’t you know it?
I’ll end by saying how very grateful I am to have a career I love, and to thank each and every one of you who has supported me along the way. You really are very dear readers.
Love,
Sharon xxx
Mills & Boon are proud to present a thrilling digital collection of all Sharon Kendrick’s novels and novellas for us to celebrate the publication of her amazing and awesome 100th book! Sharon is known worldwide for her likeable, spirited heroines and her gorgeous, utterly masculine heroes.
SHARON KENDRICK once won a national writing competition, describing her ideal date: being flown to an exotic island by a gorgeous and powerful man. Little did she realise that she’d just wandered into her dream job! Today she writes for Mills & Boon, featuring her often stubborn but always to-die-for heroes and the women who bring them to their knees. She believes that the best books are those you never want to end. Just like life…
In Bed with the Boss
Sharon Kendrick
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
To Gerald Jackson, Sr.—thanks for being
the special man that you are.
To all my readers who enjoy a good love story
that centers on family.
To my Heavenly Father, who shows me each
and every day how much he loves me.
Withhold not good from them to whom it is due,
when it is in the power of thine hand to do it.
Proverbs 3:27
Contents
Cover (#uc92d4a5e-4aea-5a09-a47c-50b1420eeaba)
Dear Reader (#u2df1b6f0-d777-51cb-ab71-2151a2a5f427)
About the Author (#u4c16c539-d2b1-53da-a3c0-568772382464)
Title Page (#u77c5579e-40d3-5c6b-ab31-0c67152bcf67)
Chapter 1 (#uae53bd77-dc5a-524a-930a-e667449b0583)
Chapter 2 (#u0b2681c3-08ac-5c0c-93ef-d578ee060c42)
Chapter 3 (#u978d7c83-504b-5d45-b241-feee7ff1ff92)
Chapter 4 (#u141a73d6-5bf9-5540-af32-3b726f61bd8d)
Chapter 5 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 6 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 11 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 12 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 13 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 14 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 15 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 16 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 17 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 18 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 19 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 20 (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 1 (#u62f14908-f765-5d17-803e-d0bbcf357666)
HE started with her ankles, which were the most delicious ankles he had ever seen, then his eyes traveled slowly to her knees, and beyond.
From across the room, he made a leisurely appraisal of slim hips and a tiny waist, exquisite breasts and hair the color of fire. He saved the face until last, and when at last his gaze reached the huge emerald eyes and pouty pink lips, he almost choked on his glass of champagne.
“Josephine?” he silently mouthed in incredulous question, and because she hadn’t moved, he walked over to where she stood. “Josephine?”
Josephine’s heart was racing and her hands felt clammy, but not just because he was the most devastating man in the room—he had always had precisely that effect on her.
“Of course it’s me, Blake,” she remonstrated. “Surely you recognized me?”
There was a pause. “Not really.” Last time he’d seen her, she’d had braces on her teeth and freckles. The little girl next door. In the tiny village they’d lived in he had watched her grow from toddler to teenager. And now? He swallowed, even though he was no longer drinking. “You’ve … you’ve grown up all of a sudden.”
“But I’m 23 years old now, Blake,” she said softly.
“And you live in London now?” he guessed.
“That’s right. You, too?”
“Mmm.” God, she was beautiful! More than beautiful. “How long since we’ve seen each other?”
She stared into the ice-blue eyes. She could have told him to the exact minute. “Oh, must be about seven years,” she said casually. “Not since you moved away.”
He couldn’t take his eyes off her. “What kind of work do you do?” he questioned casually.
“I’m a model.”
A model. Yes. That would explain the sudden transformation from duckling to dazzling swan.
“A successful model?” he questioned.
She gave a modest smile. “Kind of.” She sipped her drink and smiled at him. “How about you?”
The smile beguiled him. “I’m a venture capitalist.”
“Sounds like a bandit!”
He laughed. “Does it?” A bandit might have carried her straight off to bed with him, something he—uncharacteristically—felt just like doing.
“Do I look like a bandit?”
Kind of, she thought, but shook her head. “No, you look like a venture capitalist!”
“How about another drink?” His lips curved in a smile. “Or would you rather dance?”
There was no choice! But she managed to shrug her shoulders, as if she didn’t mind either way. “I love dancing,” she admitted.
Normally, he could take it or leave it, and he couldn’t remember the last time he had danced with a woman who wasn’t Kim. But the opportunity to hold her was too much to miss. “Me, too. Come on, then.”
The gods must have been looking down on her, because at that moment the music slowed, and he took her in his arms and she felt almost dizzy, achingly aware of the hard, lean strength of his body.
“I—I like this song,” she said, rather shakily.
“Mmm.” He liked the drift of her scent even more.
He absently pulled her closer and buried his lips in her hair and Josephine was unprepared for the shimmering of heat that skittered such debilitating sensations across her skin.
Blake felt the sudden jackknifing of desire as her slender curves melted against his flesh like butter, and he had to stifle a moan.
Maybe he’d better just take her home and say good-night.
Sooner, rather than later.
But he was seduced by the moonlight and the way she walked, the way she made him laugh. And a shared past could produce nostalgia … and nostalgia could be pretty potent stuff.
He accepted coffee. And then another, and her eyes mesmerized him with their dazzling green fire.
“Guess I’d better think about leaving,” he said reluctantly.
“I guess so. It’s been … fun.”
“Yeah.”
She was lost in the light of his eyes. “Goodbye, Blake.”
“Goodbye, Josephine.”
She wondered if she would ever see him again, and when she reached up on tiptoe to kiss him goodbye, her lips somehow collided with the faint rasp of his jaw, and it felt so earthy that she shivered against him in unstoppable response.
Something inexplicable exploded inside him and he turned his head and captured her mouth with his, knowing without a shadow of a doubt that this was heading for the bedroom.
“I don’t usually do this kind of thing,” he groaned, as the kiss got hotter and harder.
Neither did she, but once again his mouth had hungrily covered hers and her words somehow got lost on his lips.
It was the best night of Josephine’s life, but in the morning he had left without asking to see her again, and much later she heard that he had gone back to Kim and that they had become engaged.
And soon after that she had met his cousin Luke, and within three months they were married.
Chapter 2 (#u62f14908-f765-5d17-803e-d0bbcf357666)
LUKE had gone.
He hadn’t even taken his toothbrush, but she knew he had gone. That fact hit her with a certainty even more intense than the blade of lightning that illuminated the bathroom with its harsh blue-white light. Josephine momentarily shrank from its impact, and winced.
