by Kat Cantrell
“That’s a much better marriage deal than the first one you offered me. I accept.” Roz fished her wedding rings from her pocket and handed them to him solemnly. “As long as we both shall live?”
He better. She wasn’t a serial wife. This was forever and she knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that she’d love him until the day she died.
He slid the cool bands onto her third finger and it was a thousand times more meaningful than the actual wedding ceremony. “I do.”
Epilogue
Jonas and Warren were already seated in the corner booth when Hendrix arrived—late, because his wife had been very unwilling to let him out of the shower.
“This seems familiar,” he joked as he slid into the seat next to Jonas and raised his brows at Warren. “Down to you being buried in your phone.”
Warren glanced up from the lit screen and then immediately back down. “I like my job. I won’t apologize for it.”
“I like my job too but I like conversing with real people, as well,” Hendrix shot back mildly, well aware that he was stalling. “Maybe you could try it?”
With a sigh, Warren laid his precious link to Flying Squirrel, his energy drink company, facedown on the table. “I’m dealing with a crap-ton of issues that have no solution, but okay. Let’s talk about the Blue Devils why don’t we? Or maybe the Hornets? What’s the topic du jour, guys?”
Hendrix picked up his beer and set it back down again. There was no easy way to do this, so he just ripped the Band-Aid off. “I’m not divorcing Roz.”
A thundercloud drifted over Warren’s face as Jonas started laughing.
“I knew it.” Warren put his head in his hands with a moan. “You fell in love with her, didn’t you?”
“It’s not that big of a deal.” Hendrix scowled at his friend, knowing full well that it was a big deal to him. “Jonas did it, too.”
Warren drained his beer, his mouth tight against the glass as his throat worked. He put the glass down with a thunk. “And both of you are really stretching my forgiveness gene.”
“It was a shock to me too, if that helps.”
“It doesn’t.”
Jonas put a comforting hand on Warren’s arm. “It’s okay, you’ll find yourself in this same situation and see how hard it is to fight what you’re feeling.”
“I’ll never go against the pact,” Warren countered fiercely, his voice rising above the thumping music and happy hour crowd. “There were—are—reasons we made that pact. You guys are completely dishonoring Marcus’s memory.”
Marcus had been a coward. Hendrix had only recently begun to reframe his thoughts on the matter, but after seeing a coward’s face in the mirror for the length of time it had taken for him to figure out that love wasn’t the problem, he knew a little better what cowardice looked like. “Maybe we should talk about those reasons.”
Instead of agreeing like a rational person might, Warren slid from the booth and dropped his phone into his pocket. “I can’t do this now.”
Hendrix and Jonas watched him stride from the bar like the hounds of hell were nipping at his heels. Dealing with rejection did suck, no two ways about it. But he was getting better at it because he wasn’t a coward, not any longer. He was a Harris through and through, every bit his mother’s child. Helene had raised him with her own special blend of Southern grit and he’d turned out okay despite never knowing his father. He was done letting that disappointment drive him to make mistakes.
“Welcome to the club.” Solemnly, Jonas clinked his glass to Hendrix’s and they drank to their respective marriages that had both turned out to be love matches in spite of their bone-headedness.
“Thanks. I hate to say it, but being a member of that club means I really don’t want to sit around in a bar with you when I could be at home with my wife.”
Jonas grinned. “As I agree with the sentiment, you can say it twice.”
Hendrix made it to his house in Oakwood in record time. Their house. His and Roz’s. She’d moved back in and put her loft up for sale even though he’d told her at least four times that he’d move in with her. His Oakwood place was a legitimate house but wherever Roz was made it home.
He found her in the bedroom, spread across the bed. Naked.
“Thought you’d never get here,” she murmured throatily. “I was about to send you a selfie to hurry you along.”
“So our next scandal can be a phone-hack leak of our personal photo album?” His clothes hit the floor in under thirty seconds.
“No more scandals. We’re a respectable married couple, remember?” Roz squealed as he flipped her over on the bed and crawled up the length of her back.
“Only in public. Behind closed doors, all bets are off.”
She shuddered under his tongue and arched in pleasure. “See what you’ve done to me? I’m a total sex addict, thanks to you. Before we got married, I was in the running for most pious fiancée alive.”
“Not sorry.” As much as he enjoyed Roz’s back, he liked her front a lot better. That’s where her eyes were and he’d discovered a wealth of intimacy in them when they made love, an act which he planned to repeat a million more times. He rolled her in his arms and sank into her.
She was his favorite part of being married.
* * * * *
Don’t miss the first IN NAME ONLY book,
Jonas’s story
BEST FRIEND BRIDE
and look for Warren’s story,
coming in January 2018
CONTRACT BRIDE
And for more of Kat Cantrell’s sexy, emotional style, pick up these other titles!
THE THINGS SHE SAYS
MARRIAGE WITH BENEFITS
PREGNANT BY MORNING
Available now from Harlequin Desire!
***
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Keep reading for an excerpt from BILLIONAIRE BOSS, HOLIDAY BABY by Janice Maynard.
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Billionaire Boss, Holiday Baby
&nbs
p; by Janice Maynard
One
December 23
The calendar might say otherwise, but for Dani Meadows, today had been the longest day of the year. The morning started out okay. Business as usual. Her taciturn but oh-so-handsome boss had not by any stretch of the imagination been exhibiting a holiday mood.
She’d spent several hours locating hard-to-reach suppliers who were already in vacation mode. While most of the country was shutting down for a long end-of-the-year break, Nathaniel Winston, president and owner of New Century Tech, was looking for ways to increase the bottom line in the upcoming months. He worked hard. Dani, his executive assistant, matched him email for email, working lunch for working lunch.
The only place their schedules differed was in the fact that Dani left for home at five every day, while Nathaniel sometimes worked well into the evening.
He didn’t expect that of her. In fact, he was an extremely fair boss who never asked anything of his employees that was out of line. If there were occasionally situations where the company needed an extra measure of devotion, Nathaniel never demanded it. Such assignments were strictly voluntary. The employees who participated were compensated well.
Dani glanced at her computer screen and sighed. She’d just received another out-of-office reply. That made a dozen in the last two hours.
Nathaniel should give up and go home himself. That, however, was as likely to happen as the snow-pocalypse forecast to hit Atlanta tonight. The capital of the Peach State got ice occasionally. Sometimes a dollop of snow. But never in December.
Yesterday had been a balmy fifty-five degrees. Today, though, a cold front was predicted to move through. In Dani’s experience, that meant a miserable rain event and temps in the upper thirties. No worries. She kept her rain boots in a tote under her desk. A sprint to the MARTA station during a downpour wouldn’t hurt her.
She raised her voice to be heard above the whoosh of the heat kicking on through the vents. “Nathaniel? I’m not having any luck. Do you want me to keep a record of these calls and emails and try again the first week in January?”
A tall, dark-haired man appeared without warning in the doorway to her office. He was overdue for a haircut, but his tailored suit was pristine. Intense brown eyes and a strong jaw shadowed with the beginnings of late-day stubble contributed to an appearance that was unequivocally male.
He raked a hand through his hair, for a brief moment appearing frazzled. The show of emotion was so unlike him, she blinked. “Um, you okay, boss? Is there anything else you want me to do before I leave?”
He leaned a shoulder against the door frame and frowned. “You’ve worked as my assistant for almost two years, right?”
She gulped inwardly. “Yes.” Customarily, she went to his office and not the other way around.
Instead of answering, he glanced around her cramped quarters and frowned. “We need to do something in here. New carpet maybe. And furniture. Make that a priority when you get back.”
“Yes, sir.”
When he scowled, she backtracked quickly. “Yes, Nathaniel.” His name threatened to stick in her throat.
In the privacy of her own thoughts she often referred to him as Nathaniel, but it was another thing entirely to say it aloud, even though he insisted that all his employees call him by his first name.
She noted he had said when you get back, not we. Which probably meant he would be working in this building all alone during the holidays. He didn’t have any family that she knew of, though anything was possible. He was a private man.
It was ridiculous to feel sorry for him. The guy was a gazillionaire. If he wanted a homey, cozy Christmas, he could buy himself one.
After a long, awkward silence, Nathaniel glanced at his watch and grimaced. “I suppose I have to make an appearance downstairs?” The tone of his voice made it a question.
Dani nodded. “They’ll be expecting you.” She indicated a manila envelope on the corner of her desk. “I have the bonus checks right there.”
“You could give them out.”
She sensed he was only half joking. Just in case, she answered seriously, “Your employees like hearing from you, Nathaniel. Getting a perk from the boss himself is a nice way to start the holidays.”
“What about you?”
This conversation was taking a turn that made her palms sweat. “Payroll put a check in there for me, too,” she said.
He grimaced. “You deserve more. This place wouldn’t run half as well without you.”
“I appreciate the sentiment, but the usual bonus check is fine. Let me shut down my computer, and I’ll be right behind you.”
“I’ll wait.”
She took that terse statement to mean in the reception area. But no. Nathaniel watched her every move for the next five minutes as she took care of the brief routine she repeated at the end of every workday. She decided not to take her purse and tote to the party. It would be easier to pop back up here before she went home. Because the office contained sensitive information as well as her valuables, she slipped a key card that opened the executive suite into her pocket. If the boss got trapped at the party, she didn’t want to have to wait.
At last, she stood and smoothed the skirt of her simple black dress. She’d chosen sophistication over traditional holiday colors. At five feet four inches and with plenty of curves, she tended to look like a perky tomato when she wore all red.
Nathaniel studied her in silence. There was nothing insulting or offensive about his regard. Still, she knew without a doubt that in this moment he saw her as a woman and not simply a piece of office equipment.
She picked up the envelope with the checks and handed it to him. “Shall we go?” Her heart beat far faster than it should. It was becoming more and more difficult to act normally. Feeling so aware of him rattled her. Something had to change, or she was going to end up embarrassing herself.
No one would blink an eye if she and her boss entered the large conference room downstairs together. Nathaniel Winston might as well be a monk. His reputation with the opposite sex was not only squeaky clean, it was nonexistent.
That fact shouldn’t have pleased her. But she was attracted to him, and in some tiny corner of her psyche, a fantasy flourished. It wasn’t as if she had any real shot at a relationship with him. Even so, his single status kept her reluctant fascination alive. It was impossible to be near him day after day without wondering what it would be like to share his bed.
Dani felt on edge as they walked toward the elevator and then headed twelve floors down in silence. Nathaniel had his hands jammed in his pockets. More than once she had wished she could read his mind. In the beginning, it was only because she wanted to know if he thought she was doing a good job. Now that she had a serious crush on him, her curiosity was far more personal.
Why didn’t he date? Or maybe he did go out but in secret. Not likely. What woman would put up with his workaholic schedule?
On impulse, she blurted out a clumsy conversational gambit. “Will you be traveling for the holidays?”
He shot her a sideways glance tinged with incredulity. “No.”
Poor man. She had probably shocked him. No one asked the boss about his personal life. Dani was the closest employee to him, yet she managed to be remarkably circumspect despite the many questions she had. At this point, the deliberate choice to avoid any hint of intimacy, even conversationally, was the smart thing to do.
She wanted to learn everything there was to know about Nathaniel—of course she did. Keeping a professional distance was a matter of self-preservation. By relegating the man at her side to a box labeled boss, she told herself she could keep from getting hurt.
The elevator dinged as the door opened. The unmistakable sounds of merrymaking drifted down the carpeted hallway. “Well,” Nathaniel muttered. “Here goes.
”
As bizarre as it sounded, Dani thought he was nervous. Surely not. Her boss was well educated, well traveled and wildly successful at a young age. There was no reason at all for him to dread this momentary formality.
Just inside the doorway of the crowded room, Dani abandoned the man who drew attention with no more than a quick, guarded smile.
As people greeted him, she found a group of women she had known from the beginning of her employment at NCT. Several of them shared a Pilates class. A couple of others had bonded over their young children. Ever since Dani became Nathaniel’s assistant, though, her coworkers treated her with a certain deference.
She didn’t particularly like it, but she understood it.
As she sipped a glass of punch and nibbled on a cheese straw, she noted the men and women who had already imbibed to the peril of their careers. Dani had nothing against alcohol. Sadly, though, some employees lost all circumspection when they enjoyed the office party a little too much.
Nathaniel was socializing, though his posture betrayed his lack of ease. At least it did to Dani. He was playing the genial host, but he would rather be most anywhere else. She’d bet her last dollar on it.
Nathaniel was never too excited about the office Christmas party. He wasn’t a warm, fuzzy kind of guy. On the other hand, he was no Scrooge, either. At his urging, Dani had planned this lavish, catered affair complete with an open bar. The festivities had begun at four o’clock and were still going strong two hours later.
At last, Nathaniel made his holiday toast and passed out bonuses to key players of the various divisions. His speech was wry and funny and remarkably charming. Dani had to step forward when he called her name. “Thanks,” she muttered.
Their fingers brushed briefly. “Merry Christmas, Dani,” he said gruffly.
“Thank you.” Her throat tightened inexplicably. Boyfriends were a dime a dozen. She needed a good job more than she needed a fling with her boss. But for the last year and a half—the length of time she had been fantasizing about Nathaniel—the idea of a physical relationship, no matter how unlikely, had made it increasingly uncomfortable for her to work with him. So much so that she had actually polished up her résumé and sent out half a dozen applications already.