Code & Chemistry, 1
She came to win a deal. He came to win her heart. Neither expected to share a hotel room.
Software developer Lucia Mendez has one shot at the World Technology Conference in the Grand Cayman Islands: land the client that will transform her business. The only problem? Her infuriating rival Hansen Holte wants the same deal.
Hansen is everything Lucia should avoid—cocky, relentless, and dangerously charming. He's also the only man who's ever made her lose focus. When a hotel mix-up forces them to share a room, the proximity ignites sparks she's tried for years to ignore.
For tech world rockstar Hansen Holte, success has always come easy, except when it comes to Lucia. Now that fate has trapped them together in paradise, he makes her an offer: a temporary truce, no strings attached.
But when desire collides with ambition, someone's bound to surrender.
Excerpt:
We lay there, gasping for breath. Finding it eventually. She brushed my hair back from my sweaty forehead, her fingertips like wet velvet against my skin.
“Good news is you are as good as they say.”
I lifted on my elbows. “Umm, what?”
She looked at me, her smile emerging. “Come on, Hansen, you don’t get a reputation without people talking.”
“Great.” I fell back. My womanizer reputation was front and center in my face. Good news for me was Lucia appreciated it, not busted my chops for it. “I’m glad you approve. It would be a long week if you didn’t.”
“Oh, I approve.” She sat up then, pulling her knees into her. “There is one thing.”
Shit. What was this one thing? Hadn’t we had enough ‘things’ between us?
“And that would be?” I turned on my side to face her.
Her hand dropped to the bed. “We must have rules.”
Of course. Lucia and her rules. “More rules? Sweetheart, we threw all the rules out the window as soon as that door shut.”
“Well, those rules, yes. Let me guess, you don’t like rules.” She smirked.
“Not if they’re someone else’s rules.”
“Not even mine?” she asked, her mouth partially open.
I couldn’t keep my eyes off of her lips, plump and blood red. “Not even yours, sweetheart.”
“Rules, or this proposition is null and void.”
“I don’t want null and void. And after the two orgasms I just gave you, I don’t think you want it either.” I pulled her to me, my lips meeting hers. My tongue slipped between her luscious, pillowed lips, tasting her. With my mouth hovering over hers, I said, “What are these rules you have in mind?”
“No one can know about us. And I just don’t mean here. After this week, we act like this did not happen.”
Fine. I could live with that. It would probably be better anyway. Once we left this island, we’d leave this fling behind too. “Obviously.”
“Good. So, no touching out there.” She pointed to the door.
“Not even a hug.”
“But in here, all bets are off.” She bit her lip.
“All bets are off?” My blood surged through my veins giving me life. “As in, I can do anything I want to you?”
“To a point,” she added quickly. “And I can do anything I want to you.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Be more specific about what I can do.” I knew what I wanted to do.
Her eyebrow lifted as if she’d read my thoughts. “What you do to me, I can do to you. How about that?”
Not exactly what I’d had in mind. “Okay, let’s just say anything is under consideration.”
She breathed in slowly and deliberately. “Deal.”
Excitement flooded my system with all the possibilities and the realization that Lucia and I would have a week of unadulterated fun with no worries. No attachments. No expectations. No…nothing.
No nothing… Wait. I suddenly had a rule I needed to add to the mix.
“I have a rule of my own.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Okay…”
“I want to be the only one. No one else.” I couldn’t believe the words that came out of my mouth. It was my rule—the last rule I thought I’d ever have.
Our eyes met. The air grew stiff around us. This was a turn of events clearly neither of us expected. But there we were, simmering in the rules we’d just set. The rules that included short-term exclusivity. The rules that bound each other to the other.
“No one else,” Lucia finally said, her voice hoarse.
The deal had been struck.
Now the devil wanted his due.
- Series:
- /series-code-chemistry/
