by Lynda Chance
****
Chapter One
“What you need is a wife.”
David Bennett leaned back in his chair, crossed his hands behind his head and gave his best friend and legal counsel the kind of look that indicated he was insane.
Craig Brantley continued. “Don’t look at me like you think I’ve lost my mind. Think about it, man. The board of directors is trying to fuck you. You know it.” He paused and then continued with his opinion. “You should have this shit wrapped up tight. The presidency should be yours. You’ve got the education and the experience. Fuck, you’ve got the family dynasty behind you. Your family owns the goddamn corporation. Not to mention you’ve been single-handedly running the business for years.”
David contemplated the other man in silence. What his friend was voicing out loud was nothing new to him. He was experiencing a reversed form of nepotism. The reason the board of directors were dragging their feet was because he was family. He was a Bennett.
The old bastards were taking it one step too far. They were considering handing the job to a younger man with much less experience. A good, valuable employee, true. But Troy Johnson didn’t have the backbone it would take, much less the ruthless drive to expand when the time was called for. It was a fine line. Always a fine line. If you didn’t expand, you were sunk. If you expanded too quickly, you were sunk. Johnson didn’t have the knowledge or the balls it would take to advance the company.
It was a private corporation, and David’s frustration and resentment rose when he thought about the risk the old dinosaurs on the board were taking by not seeing the forest because of the trees. They were not only fucking around with him, they were fucking with his preferred stock, his inheritance, and his family name.
He steadily concentrated on the man sitting in front of his desk. “How do you think a wife would help me?” David asked.
Craig leaned back and crossed a large, booted foot over his knee. “It’s simple, man. They see you as a risk because you’re not settled. You’re nothing but a player to the old geezers. A liability. They listen to the rumors. Your exploits get magnified ten times before they get back to the board. Johnson’s steady. He has a wife and the designated two-point-five kids. A house with a yard. A goddamn dog.” He paused and crossed his arms over his chest for emphasis. “You’ve got to get that shit, David. You need to get a wife, and quick-fast.”
David raised a semi-amused eyebrow. “And where the hell am I supposed to find her? 1-800-HOTWIFE?”
Craig raised his eyebrows and responded seriously. “You’ve got women coming out of the damn woodwork. Just choose one.”
David scowled. “I pay you a shitload of money to keep you on retainer. Is this the best idea you can come up with?”
“Yeah. You pay me a ton of money to have your back. I’m telling you what you have to do to win this fight. I’ll have the pre-nup ready in two days. Choose a girl, man.”
****
Jenna Marie Hardin sat at her desk at work and rummaged through her bottom drawer. It was past lunchtime, she was starving, and as usual, she didn’t have any money. She usually kept ramen noodles, microwave popcorn and cups of macaroni and cheese for such occasions. The problem was, she had been having a lot of such occasions lately. Her drawer was depressingly empty.
Frustration gripped her. She liked to think of herself as relatively smart. How the hell she had ended up in this situation was a mystery. Not a complete mystery, but as time passed, her debt had only grown, and her circumstances were dire. Why the hell didn’t they make seniors in high school take a basic financial class? Then maybe she wouldn’t have listened when everyone told her to take out student loans. It’s okay. Go to a good college and take out loans. Then when you get an awesome job, you can repay them. Sure. That was working out real well for her.
Now, the whole college thing just seemed like a scam. And had she gone to a state school? No. Private college was for her. At the time, the smaller setting seemed more conducive to studying. She had been a serious student, and didn’t feel the need to party as much. And look where she had wound up. Over a hundred grand in debt with a fine arts degree that apparently meant nothing.
Oh, the irony of it all. She had actually had to dummy down her resume to get this job. As far as the people she was working for knew, she didn’t have any college under her belt, much less a degree. After months and months of looking for a job that made good use of her degree, the recession had finally forced her to take anything she could get. And she was damn glad to have it. A girl had to eat. And now she sat all day in front of a terminal, inputting information for accounts receivables for this wholesale safety distribution network.
She looked up from her bare drawer and glanced around the office. She worked in a large central room, at one of many open desks lined up and surrounded on two sides by cubicles. The cubicles were the offices of mid-management and were adjacent to the executive corridor that was better known as mahogany row. That was where the offices of the corporate executives were located. Where the guys sat at mahogany desks all day. The men that controlled the business. The guys in suits. She had worked here for six months now, and had never spoken to any of them. She would recognize them on the street, but that was about it. The highest ranking employees she had ever had a conversation with worked in Human Resources.
Her stomach rumbled, and she knew with a sinking heart that she wouldn’t get to feed it until she got home. But she was young and strong and she had gone without meals before, so this wouldn’t kill her. Still, a cup of coffee would dull some of the hunger pains. Coffee with lots of creamer and sugar. She needed some carbs, and if empty carbs were all she could get, oh well.
She stood up and made her way to the lunch room. It was almost two o’clock, and the small room was deserted. She poured the last dregs of the coffee into a Styrofoam cup and dumped three sugar packets in. She upended the creamer container, but it was empty. Opening the cabinet below her, she knelt down and began opening a new box of coffee supplies.
She heard the door shut, the shuffle of feet and an irritated male voice. “Goddamnit, let it go. What the fuck am I supposed to do, post a job opening for a wife?”
Jenna heard the disgusted words and amusement came to the fore. Advertise for a wife? How funny was that?
She stood to her feet and turned in a graceful movement to face the men she realized hadn’t seen her when they entered. Her eyes landed on the first man, a tall, good-looking blond with an easy-going expression on his face. She vaguely recognized him from mahogany row. Before she could stop herself, she heard the words that impetuously popped from her mouth. “Do I apply in H.R.?” She gave him a teasing smile and moved her eyes to the next man and the smile fell from her lips. David Bennett.
She froze by the countertop as she recognized the man that ran the company. She had seen him from a distance many times, and the girls in accounting had certainly pointed him out when she was first hired. They all thought he was freaking God’s gift, but Jenna didn’t see it. Whenever she saw him, the only thing she felt was vaguely threatened. She had found his eyes on her more times than she could count when she’d glanced up from her computer screen as he walked to the elevators. As if they were connected by an invisible live wire, she could feel when he watched her. And he watched her often.
When it came to men and attraction, she had encountered two types of men in her life. One type looked right past her to the blue-eyed, skinny blonde girls of the world. The other type of men saw her and stared. They stared at her C cups, down her hourglass shape, and back to her C cups as if they’d died and gone to heaven. David Bennett was one such man. She’d known from the first day she saw him. It made her stomach tighten and her breath hitch. It also made her uncomfortable.
He had an aura of ruthlessness that chilled her. He was tall and brawny and his face held a hawkish countenance that was only magnified by his cold, assessing eyes. Eyes that were directed on her now.
She shifted restlessly and mortification spread t
hrough her when she realized he had been the one who had made the cutting comment. She seriously doubted the blond man would have used that tone of voice to the boss. So that meant that she had just teased David Bennett about applying for the role of his wife. Agitation filled her and all she wanted was to slink from the room.
The men stood in a frozen tableau by the door and the quiet after her question was deafening as they continued to stand and stare at her.
Her hands shook slightly as she grabbed her coffee sans creamer and turned to go. The atmosphere was tense, and she felt the need to say something before she got the hell out of there. She looked at the handsome blond because he was infinitely the less dangerous of the two. “I’m sorry for interrupting you. I’ll get back to work.”
The blond man smiled at her lazily and gently teased, “No problem. He’s the one that needs a wife.”
Her eyes skittered to his companion and the bottom fell out of her stomach as his piercing eyes watched her with a feral, territorial look that froze the air in her lungs. She shifted restlessly as nerves tightened into distress. He was looking at her with a punishing intensity that she didn’t think the situation called for. Like she had committed a gross infraction and was going to have to pay for it. She cleared her throat and looked away. “Yes, well… g-good luck with that.”
Jenna balanced her coffee carefully in her hand and side-stepped the men in front of the door. She twisted the handle, squeezed through it, and fled for her life.
****
The silence in the break room continued for a moment until David spoke. “Fuck. I should kick your ass for this, Brantley.”
Craig laughed and walked to the refrigerator.
David raked his hand through his hair. “She works in accounting. What do you know about her?”
Craig grabbed a soft drink from the fridge. “Nothing. I have no clue. But you scared the shit out of her.”
David stiffened and blasted his friend with an arctic look. “We. We scared the shit out of her.”
Craig leaned against the counter and casually popped the top. “I don’t think so, buddy. She was more than willing to flirt and talk to me until she saw you.” He smiled like the cat that got the canary as he lifted the can to his mouth and took a large pull of the drink.
David clenched his teeth and scowled at the smug look on his lawyer’s face and said, “Find out who she is. I want the file on her this afternoon.”
“You thinking what I think you’re thinking?”
“Maybe. I don’t know, but I want to know more about her.”
“Did you see her, man? What more do you need to know?”
David’s features hardened as he gave the other man a menacing stare. “Just get me the damn file.”
Chapter Two
At four o’clock, David sat alone in his office and couldn’t believe he was contemplating this. Jenna Marie Hardin’s file sat closed in front of him. He had studied it long enough to get the picture. Twenty-five years old, single and a high school graduate, she had flitted from one job to the next until she had landed here six months ago. The job she currently held in accounts receivables was obviously a big score for her, and she probably didn’t want anything to threaten that security.
What could he offer to get her to agree? Money, no doubt, was the answer. Money and a short-term marriage.
His hand reached out as he flipped the folder open again. Her pleasant face and hesitant smile popped up from the picture that was snapped the day she had been hired. It was a quietly pretty face, and it had been fucking with his libido and equilibrium for months. Even though he had intimated to Craig that he didn’t know who she was, that was pure bullshit. He had noticed her months ago, and if she hadn’t been an employee, he’d have been all over her shit.
She was that fucking hot.
Once again his cock swelled from the sight of her as he studied the picture.
She wasn’t overtly beautiful. Or beautiful at all, for that matter. She had a gentle appearance, a calming countenance with bright eyes and sweet, dimpled cheeks. Until you noticed her lips. Her lips were soft and full and they licked a trace of fire through his insides. Those lips gave her an earthy sexiness that was far more dangerous to his state of mind than mere beauty would have been. Her hair was thick and a light, golden brown and fell softly around her shoulders. It was that hair he had noticed the first time he saw her. It was silky and smooth and he imagined his hands sinking into it as those lips enclosed him. It was the number one fantasy that dominated his brain recently. It fucked with him incessantly.
He had never hit on an employee before, knew he couldn’t hit on her and the temptation had been quietly driving him insane for the last six months. Every time she caught him looking at her, panic clouded her features. And that made his situation worse. It underlined the fact that he couldn’t make a single move on her. He had watched her for six months and waited. He had bided his time because he had no choice, and waited for an opening, any opening, and he’d be damned if he’d let this slip by him now. The teasing quip she had thrown out in the break room was the crack he needed.
He tried to justify his actions for the extreme maneuver he was prepared to take. What Craig said made sense, and his first responsibility lay with this company. He would do whatever he had to do to make sure it succeeded. If that meant letting someone else have the presidency, he would do it. Or, as in this case, if it meant forming a business partnership he never anticipated with a woman he didn’t know, to make sure he acceded to the presidency, he would do that, too. After all, it wouldn’t be forever. A short term marriage was what he needed both for the job and for the relationship with her to run its course.
He vaguely thought about considering other women, but quickly shot the idea down. An uneasy feeling traced down his spine. He knew that if it wasn’t for her, he wouldn’t even be considering the ludicrous idea of marriage. His intelligence was above average. He could undoubtedly figure out a different way to solve the problem. No, considering another woman wasn’t even an option.
At thirty-five, he’d never come remotely close to meeting a woman that threatened his single status. While he didn’t have anything against marriage per se, he had never before met a woman that he couldn’t do without.
His uncle was set to retire and step down in three months. David had to have all his cards in a row by then. If he was going to go through with this, he needed to get the ball rolling. The sooner the marriage, the better.
He studied the picture in front of him and waited for his common sense to rebel. All he felt was a slow sizzle deep in his gut and an intense satisfaction at the thought of finally parting her thighs and sliding inside.
****
Jenna was at her desk the next morning fully engrossed with her work when she felt an ever familiar heat in her veins. She slowly glanced up from her computer screen and looked toward the bank of elevators, expecting to see him making his way toward them. He wasn’t there. Confused that her heightened senses had let her down, her eyes scanned the room.
She saw him immediately.
He was standing at the end of mahogany row, arms crossed and surveying the accounting department with a shuttered look on his face.
The accounting department or just her? No doubt about it, his dark gaze was riveted on her. She sucked in a breath as his eyes tangled with hers. Alarm jolted through her system, as she quickly looked away, trying to concentrate on the screen in front of her.
This was new. He’d never just stopped what he was doing to come stare at her this way. And there was no doubt about it, he was staring at her. Her fingers quivered as they moved over the keyboard, the image of him standing and observing her in silence fixed in her head.
The trembling in her fingers intensified until she couldn’t stand it anymore and looked up again.
She let out a pent-up breath. He was gone.
****
At two o’clock her phone rang. She picked it up, and was shocked to realize it was a bill
collector calling her at work. Mortification spread through her, and she lowered her voice and tried to sound stern. “You can’t call me at w-work. I know my rights. Don’t call back here, Mister.”
She gently hung up the phone as apprehension spread through her. Her situation was getting worse.
****
At eleven o’clock the next morning, Jenna’s extension rang. That phone rarely rang, as all her work correspondence was done through email. And now it had rung two days in a row. She had no protocol for answering it and worried it was the bill collector again. She looked around and hoped no one could overhear her.
She picked it up and stated her name. “Jenna Hardin.”
“Miss Hardin?” a smooth, female voice questioned.
“This is she.” Jenna could be smooth also. Maybe the collectors were trying something different, having a woman call her this time instead of a man. She stiffened her shoulders and prepared for the verbal attack she was going to give back.
“This is Pam in Mr. Bennett’s office. Mr. David Bennett. He’d like to see you for a minute if you can spare the time.”
Fear and confusion hit Jenna. That name. David Bennett. It was starting to scare the crap out of her. It never had before. It had made her uneasy, sure. How could it not, when his dark, intent stare somehow always managed to find her? But his name had never scared the crap out of her before. But then again, she never had bill collectors calling her at work. And she had never thrown out a flirty little smile and teased that she wanted to be his wife. Her insides clenched at the thought. No doubt about it, she needed to learn how to rein in her freaking mouth before it got her in serious trouble.
An arrow of fear slid down her spine when she thought about them finding out she had bill collectors on her butt. The worst place an employee with financial problems could work was in accounting. It just wasn’t conducive to good business. She knew that. That was basic business procedure.
But it really didn’t make sense that this would be about her collection troubles. David Bennett was too high up and important to handle a matter as small as this would be in the scheme of things. No doubt about it, he was the man in charge, even though her checks were stamped with the name Charles Bennett. Someone else from human resources should be doing the dirty work.