Shattered by the CEO / The Boss's Demand

Did she dare try?

It would be a huge gamble. She might fail and get her heart shattered all over again, but at least she’d have the satisfaction of knowing she’d given it her best effort.

But how? How could she reach a commitment-phobic man who’d walked away once already? How could she prove to him that good relationships could and did happen?

She peeked at his reflection in the mirror that hung behind the sofa and caught his gaze raking her body. Heat flared in his eyes and kicked her pulse into a faster beat. And then he realized he was under scrutiny and masked his desire. He held her gaze dispassionately, but the raw hunger she’d glimpsed gave her the answer she needed.

She’d start with the one thing that had always been good between them—the sex—and build from there. And this time she wouldn’t blurt out her feelings prematurely and scare him away.

Her skin flushed and her heart pounded at the possibility of sleeping with Rand again. She would, ironically, be offering him almost the same deal his father had offered her. Move in, be her partner in every way, and she would help him with his problem.

Would Rand have the courage to accept where Tara had failed?

Blinking to break the connection, she wiped her damp hands on her dress, exhaled slowly—shakily—and faced him. “I’ll come back to Kincaid on two conditions.”

“Name them.”

“One, I want a glowing recommendation from you in writing. In advance.” If this gamble didn’t work out, she didn’t want to be forced into another low-paying, dead-end job. She had bills to pay and an obligation to keep this house.

“If I give you the letter now, what’s to keep you from walking before the year’s up?”

“My word.”

He hesitated, his square jaw shifting. “Done. What else?”

Chaos clamored inside her. She licked her dry lips and smoothed her damp hands on her hips again. “You. I want you, Rand. In my life. In my home. In my bed. Exclusively. For that year.”

Rand recoiled as if she’d slapped him. “That offer is not on the table.”

She fought to conceal her pain.

Did you expect him to be thrilled?

Maybe not thrilled, but something less than appalled would have been nice.

But without their intense physical chemistry on her side, the odds of succeeding in this quest were next to nil. She might as well give up now and save herself the false hopes and heartache. Mentally and physically, she backed away. “Then I can’t help you.”

His eyes narrowed suspiciously and the gold flecks in his irises glittered dangerously amidst the green. “What is this? Another attempt to get a ring out of me? I’ve told you before, I don’t do commitment.”

No, and he never would if she couldn’t get past the boundaries he guarded so carefully. Last time he’d never spent an entire night in her bed or even met her mother. If she wanted her plan to succeed, she had to find a way to slip past his defenses and make him a part of her life. But she’d have to be careful. Rand would bolt if he thought she entertained even the faintest hope for wedding bells in their future.

She held his gaze and forced a lackadaisical smile even though her nerves stretched as tightly as piano wires.

“I’m not asking for forever. Just twelve months. You’re not so irresistible that every woman wants to marry you, Rand. You and I both know this job is going to take long hours and involve a lot of overnight travel. I already have no social life—and therefore no sex life. Whatever else may have been lacking between us, the sex was always good.”

Raw, urgent hunger exploded in his eyes and his chest expanded on a swiftly drawn breath. Her heart missed a beat.

He remembered their passion.

And that subtle reaction gave her hope and the grit to press on. She lifted her chin and squared her shoulders. “When do we start?”

What man in his right mind would refuse sex with a beautiful woman he desired?

He would.

“I can’t give you what you want.” Rand forced the words through a locked jaw.

Tara lifted a hand and tucked a golden curl behind her ear. Rand clenched his fingers on the memory of how soft her hair had been against his skin and tangled around his hands and wrists. While part of him mourned the long, loose curls, he had to admit the way the chin-length style bared her neck and shoulders was sexy as hell. Professional, but just tousled enough that a man knew she wouldn’t mind him messing her up.

“Sex?” Her lips stretched in a tight smile.

“Love.” He almost couldn’t say the word. He didn’t do love. Would never do love.

He was, according to his family, a carbon copy of his father. He’d learned the hard way not to allow himself the luxury of the destructive sentiment.

He’d seen how loving his unfaithful father had destroyed his mother and driven her to take her own life. And Rand had repeated the pattern when he’d broken up with his high school girlfriend before going away to college because he’d wanted to experience all the campus—meaning the female students—had to offer.

He was a selfish bastard, and because of that Serita had swallowed a bunch of pills that night after he’d left her. She’d been luckier than his mother. Someone had found her and called 911 before it was too late. Serita had survived loving a callous Kincaid.

“Ah. This is about what I said that night.” Tara ducked her head, but not fast enough to conceal her pink cheeks. And then she lifted her chin and met his gaze. Her eyes were such an intense cobalt-blue that when they’d first met he’d believed them to be colored contacts. He’d been wrong. “I goofed, okay? If you’d hung around long enough for me to apologize and explain that I was lost in the moment—”

“Lost in the moment? You said you loved me, that you wanted to marry me and have my children. You practically named them.”

The minute she’d said those words he’d bolted—to protect her from the curse of loving a Kincaid. And he’d worried about her for three solid weeks before returning to find her sneaking out of his father’s suite after midnight.

Tara Anthony had played him for a fool and he’d fallen for her innocent act. Never again.

Her color darkened and her gaze bounced away again. “Um, yeah. Sorry about that. But you’re…really good in bed.”

Once more looking directly at him she added, “We can live here or at your condo. Either place is about the same distance from the office.”

Every cell inside him balked. “I’m not playing house with you.”

“Then I guess this discussion is over. I’ll show you out.”

Dammit.

Rand snagged her arm when she walked past him, and awareness shot through him on contact with her warm, satiny skin. The electricity between them had been there from the first time he’d shaken her hand on the day she’d signed in as his father’s PA. He’d ignored the attraction between them—or tried to—for seven torturous months before saying to hell with it.

It had taken him a month to get Tara to go out with him and another one to get her into bed. Had she been playing him against his father the entire time?

“I no longer own the condo. I live in California.”

Her eyebrows lifted and what appeared to be genuine surprise filled her eyes. “I didn’t know you’d moved.”

That reminded him of her earlier comment. He’d ignored it before because he thought she was lying. “How could you not know I’d left the company? My departure from KCL had to have caused an upheaval, and my father must have hit the ceiling when I accepted a job with his West Coast competitor less than twenty-four hours after leaving KCL.”

“I didn’t know because I never returned to the office after…that night.”

“The morning I caught you leaving my father’s bedroom.”

Thick lashes descended to shield her eyes. She stubbed a toe into the carpet. “Yes.”

The same day he’d told his father to go screw himself because he was through screwing his oldest son. Those were the last words he’d spoken to Everett Kincaid.

“Why did you leave? My father wouldn’t marry you, either?”

Her teeth clicked audibly. She jerked her arm free. “To borrow your words, that offer was never on the table. You need to leave, Rand.”

He wanted nothing more than to walk out that door and never look back. Her demands were absurd. Was he going to meet them?

Searching for another option, he stared into the eyes he’d once thought guileless—man, he’d been an idiot—and came up empty. For Mitch’s and Nadia’s sakes he had no choice. Not one his conscience would let him live with. He wouldn’t abandon his brother and sister again.

“You won’t get anything more than sex from me. No gifts. No rings. No promises. And definitely no children.”

Her breath hitched and her eyes rounded when she realized he’d accepted her terms. She blinked and swallowed and then dampened her lips with the pink tip of her tongue.

Hunger for her taste instantly consumed him.

Damn the desire. Damn her for making him want her.

Five years ago she’d made him forget every hard lesson he’d learned. She’d tempted him to break his vow to remain single and unattached.

He wouldn’t make the same mistake twice.

Tara Anthony couldn’t be trusted, and he was and always would be his father’s son. A chip off the old block. A selfish jerk to the core. A man incapable of fidelity.

One who could hurt a woman without a second thought.

A smile wobbled on her mouth. “If you’re paying me fifteen thousand dollars a month, then I won’t need anything else from you.”

He ripped his gaze from her damp lips. “Two weeks. I have to fly home and wrap up loose ends. I’ll be back on the sixteenth and our year will begin.”

And he hoped like hell he didn’t live to regret it.

Two

“Don’t waste my time.”

At the sound of his brother’s voice Rand set his laptop case on his father’s desk and turned toward the door. Mitch had followed him into the large office.

Rand had expected his brother to be glad he’d shown up not ready to pick a fight on Rand’s first day on the job. “Excuse me?”

“Don’t set up shop here if you’re not going to stay the full year. If we’re going to lose KCL, then let’s make a quick, clean break and get on with our lives. Nadia is going to be miserable stuck in Dallas with nothing to do for twelve months. Don’t put her through that if you’re going to blow this.”

Nadia’s portion of the will required her to penthouse-sit and remain unemployed for a year. His sister would go crazy without something to keep her distracted from the memories that haunted her of the husband and child she’d lost.

Just one more reason to curse his old man, the sadistic snake.

“Mitch, I resigned from a job I enjoyed and put my condo on the market. I’m not going to quit. I’m here for the full three-hundred and sixty-five. If we lose KCL, it won’t be because I failed to do my part.”

Mitch’s disbelief was plain on his face. “Why come back now?”

“Because this time he isn’t going to win.”

His brother didn’t look convinced.

Rand shoved a hand into his pants pocket, withdrew his pocket-knife key chain and flicked it open. The blade flashed silver in the light as he pressed it to his fingertip. With the emotions churning through him he barely felt the prick.

“What in the hell are you doing?” Mitch demanded.

Red oozed from the cut. “You want me to sign in blood?”

“We’re not kids anymore, Rand. Blood vows don’t cut it. This is business. A multibillion-dollar business in case you’ve forgotten.”

Clearly he wasn’t going to erase five years of silence with their old childhood ritual. “I haven’t forgotten.”

Rand looked around for a tissue and saw nothing usable in his father’s Spartan corner office. He dropped his knife with a clatter on the desk and put pressure on the tiny wound with his thumb.

Movement drew his attention to the doorway. Tara, in a pale yellow dress with her gleaming hair scraped back tightly against her skull, stood in the opening. The severe style wasn’t unattractive, not with her bone structure, but he missed her golden curls. He shut down that port of thought. Her hair was no concern of his.

Tara’s blue gaze traveled from his open knife to the small amount of blood on his fingers, then met his. “I’ll find the first-aid kit.”

Mitch’s gaze tracked her retreat before returning to Rand. “Is she the reason you left?”

“I’m sure Dad spewed his own version of why I quit.”

“He said nothing. That’s why I’m asking you.”

Rand tried to mask his surprise. His father had loved to gloat. “I left because he took our competition too far.”

“How so?”

He stonewalled his brother with a look. Sleeping with KCL employees had always been frowned upon. Rand had known better, and to this day he didn’t know why he hadn’t been able to resist Tara’s alluring trap. Since he hadn’t been her supervisor, and therefore wouldn’t technically be breaking any rules, he’d chosen to ignore company policy.

“What exactly do you want, Mitch? Guarantees? Fine. I guarantee you I’ll see this through to the end.”

“Why should I believe you? You walked away five years ago without a word. One day you were here. The next you were gone and completely incommunicado. Hell, I didn’t even know if you were alive until your name surfaced on the letterhead of our competition.” Mitch’s eyes narrowed. “Rumor had it you’d run away with Tara.”

Apparently the rumor mill hadn’t known Tara was two-timing him with his father. “You should know better than to listen to rumors.”

“C’mon, Rand. You and Tara disappeared on the same day.”

Tara’s gasp drew Rand’s attention to the door. Her wide-eyed expression indicated she’d overheard. She searched his face as if seeking confirmation of Mitch’s statement.

So she hadn’t been lying. About that. She really hadn’t known he’d left KCL.

“I—I have the first-aid kit. Let me see your cut,” Tara said when he neither confirmed nor denied Mitch’s statement. Her heels tapped out a brisk beat as she crossed the marble floor. She set a small plastic box on the desk, opened it and extracted the necessary items, then held out her hand.

Rand cursed himself for being a fool. Why had he thought he could walk back in here and have things be the same—specifically his formerly close relationship with his brother? He regretted that casualty more than any other, but he’d sowed those bitter seeds with his silence, and now he’d have to harvest the crop of resentment.

He laid the back of his hand in Tara’s palm and discovered that some things hadn’t changed. Even knowing she was a liar didn’t stop that same old zing from ripping through his veins. Her familiar sultry, spicy fragrance filled his lungs as she bent over her task. He welcomed the distracting sting of disinfectant as she gently cleaned the nick.

“Should I have the staff prepare your old suite of rooms at the house?” Mitch asked.

Rand’s living arrangements were only going to add fuel to the rumors. Was that Tara’s plan? Did she think she could use gossip to force him into a commitment? If so, she’d be disappointed.

Rand met Tara’s gaze then his brother’s. “I have a place lined up. Besides, you already have company.”

Mitch’s part of the will required him to play daddy to a child from one of their father’s affairs, a one-year-old half brother Rand hadn’t known existed until Richards handed out inheritance assignments. The boy and his guardian had moved into Kincaid Manor. Rand had yet to meet the kid. But in his opinion, the boy was better off not having Everett Kincaid in his life.

Tara quickly and efficiently bandaged Rand’s finger, then released his hand and packed away her first-aid supplies without mentioning their cohabitation. If she planned to use it as leverage, then why hadn’t she informed Mitch?

“Human resources has the first candidate for the director of shared services position downstairs. Which one of you is conducting the final interviews?” she asked.

“Show him or her to the conference room,” Rand directed and looked at Mitch. “Meet me there in five. You know Nadia’s current duties better than I do, and you’ll be better able to gauge which applicant can handle them. But I’m sitting in. The COO should join us, too.”

“There is no chief operating officer. Dad eliminated the position when you left.”

Rand banked the information to deal with later. No doubt that action had launched its own series of rumors. “Then we’ll handle the interviews together. As a team.”

Mitch remained motionless for a full ten seconds, his gaze direct and hard. Rand held his brother’s challenging stare and once again cursed his father for putting Rand in what should have been Mitch’s job. As chief financial officer, his brother was the logical choice if the COO position had been eliminated—even if Rand had been raised to be CEO of KCL and had the experience of the top job with the competition. Mitch nodded and left Rand’s office. Tara turned to follow him.

“Tara.” She paused then looked at Rand. He lifted his hand to indicate the bandage. “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.” She bit her lip and shifted on her sandaled feet. “Did you leave because of me?”

The pain in her voice slipped between his ribs quicker than his pen knife had pricked his finger. He hardened himself to the wounded shadows in her eyes.

She was a damned good actress. Too bad her talent was wasted on him.

“You were merely the straw that broke this camel’s back. You and my father deserved each other.”

She flinched. “But I—”

“What, Tara?” he barked when she didn’t continue.

Her chin and gaze fell. “Nothing.”

“Good. Because the subject of the past is closed. Clear?”

Her shoulders snapped straight. “Yes, sir. Anything else?”

Rand scanned his father’s—and now his—domain. He’d always hated this office. With its architectural glass-and-chrome desk, the bare, cold marble floors and the glass walls overlooking Biscayne Bay, the room looked more like a trophy case than a workspace. An empty trophy case. He eyed his father’s metal mesh ergonomic chair with disgust. The old man’s motto—“a real executive never looks like he’s working”—rang in Rand’s ears.

Not Rand’s management style.

“Get me some furniture. Desk. File cabinets. Shelves. Tables. Wood, for godsakes. This pane of glass is useless. I want a decent chair—leather—rugs on the floor and comfortable visitor seating that doesn’t look like acrylic urinals. And send the IT team up to connect my laptop to the company network. My father may have refused to work with a computer, but I won’t work without one.”

“Yes, sir.” Her words snapped as sharp as a salute.

“I need hard copies of the press releases for the past five years, a current financial statement and a list of KCL’s officers and division heads within the hour. That’s all for now.”

She pivoted sharply and headed for the doorway, but then stopped and faced him again without speaking.

“Spit it out, Tara.”

“When are you moving in?”

Ah, yes, the other part of this ridiculous farce. Why had she demanded sex and cohabitation? What did she expect to gain if not a rich husband? He didn’t buy her too-busy-to-date story. A woman who looked like Tara wouldn’t lack dates or sexual partners if she wanted them.

But this time the scheming witch would fail.

“Tonight.” Damned if the hunger for her didn’t hit him hard in the gut. He desired her and he resented the hell out of her ability to yank his strings. “I want my own bedroom.”

“But—”

“You’ll get laid, Tara. But I won’t sleep in your bed, hold you afterward or pretend we’re a happy couple. I’m living under your roof because you’ve given me no choice. Don’t forget that. Not for one second. I certainly won’t.”

She paled, nodded and quickly left him, driving home the fact that he really was a chip off the old block.

A real son of a bitch.

The voices in the KCL cafeteria petered out as soon as Tara entered. Heads turned and she found herself under the scrutiny of more than a hundred pairs of eyes.

She recognized a few familiar faces scattered among a sea of new ones and forced a smile. The buzz of conversation suddenly resumed. Apparently the employees who’d tapped into the gossip grapevine felt duty-bound to update those who hadn’t.

Mitch’s words replayed in her head. You and Tara disappeared on the same day.

She hadn’t known. She’d deliberately sought a job outside the travel industry and had skipped the business and travel sections of the newspaper so she wouldn’t hear talk about the Kincaids. She hadn’t even read Everett’s obituary. And now she and Rand were returning to KCL on the same day and working together. Tongues would wag for sure—especially if word of their living arrangements leaked out. That was one part of the plan she hadn’t thought through.

Chilling doubt crept over her. Had she made a mistake?

No. When she’d been with Rand, he’d made her feel special, as though he couldn’t get enough of her or wait to see her again. She’d felt the same way about him. He’d been a part of her life that had been carefree, happy and fun. Her life was none of those things now. She was tired of being alone and she wanted to feel connected again.

She only hoped those old feelings were still there, waiting to be nurtured back to life. From the quiver of awareness she experienced each time he was near, she had to believe that was the case. And today for the first time in ages she’d awoken looking forward to the day instead of counting the hours until it ended.

She crossed the bright and spacious cafeteria, and headed toward the food line. Kincaid’s had always pampered its employees with first-rate amenities. Tara had loved working here.

Despite rumors from the business community to the contrary, she’d always believed Everett Kincaid to be a decent guy. Her former boss had offered her the gentle affection she’d never received from her own absentee father. When her mother was diagnosed it had seemed natural to seek Everett’s advice. He’d offered a solution. Move in. Let him take care of everything. But the idea of sleeping with him when she still loved his son…

She pushed down the icky feeling and reminded herself Everett had been lonely and looking for companionship and a woman who didn’t have her sights set on being the next Mrs. Everett Kincaid. Tara had been a logical choice. They worked well together and respected each other. And Tara had needed the kind of financial help only someone with Everett’s deep pockets could afford.

But Tara ultimately hadn’t had the stomach to accept his offer, and she hated herself for being weak when her mother needed her. Weak where Rand had been strong.

The hum of conversation died again as Tara picked up a tray and silverware. She glanced over her shoulder toward the entrance and saw Rand. Almost as one the other employees’ gazes bounced from him to her and back again, like spectators of a tennis match waiting to see the next shot.

He spotted her and stalked in her direction. Tara’s appetite fled, but she went through the motions of ordering shrimp scampi, grilled asparagus and rice pilaf even though her antennae were attuned to his approach. She calmly said hello to a few of the familiar line staff as if her heart weren’t beating at twice its normal rate.

“My desk is gone,” Rand said from close behind her—too close for a boss-employee relationship. She could feel his body heat and smell his crisp Lacoste cologne. Her mouth dried.

Conscious of their audience, she neutralized her expression, put a few inches between them then turned and met his gaze. “I had your office emptied while you were conducting interviews. Your new desk, along with everything else you requested, will be delivered at two. IT has your laptop.”

“Good.”

She gaped at him. Years of bottling up her emotions bubbled over. “Good? I worked miracles and all you can say is good?”