Ways to Tempt the Boss Read online

  Lucas couldn’t miss the flash of excitement in her eyes, or the way her fingers pressed into his forearm.

  All those signs of her hunger fueled his. Reminded him that he wasn’t in this haze of desire alone.

  Lucas dropped his forehead to hers, his heart slamming against his ribs. “In the interest of making sure we’re on the same page, what do you want to happen?”

  He needed to be clear. Needed her to be sure after the walls she’d carefully erected around herself.

  But when Blair closed the distance between them, leaning into him with her delectable body, he realized he needn’t have worried about that.

  “I want you to make me forget everything but you, Lucas.” Her hips rolled against his. “Please.”

  Hell.

  Of all the ways she enticed him, it was the please that turned the last of his restraint to ashes.

  * * *

  Ways to Tempt the Boss by Joanne Rock

  is part of the Brooklyn Nights series.

  Dear Reader,

  Welcome back to the Brooklyn brownstone where three friends are working hard to turn their dreams into reality! This month, Blair Westcott is bringing her talents to the makeup industry, one face at a time. I love Blair because she sees the potential for beauty all around her, using her skills to enhance what’s already there. Rather than craft a perfect face, she helps her clients feel beautiful.

  Of course, Lucas Deschamps doesn’t discover that right away. He sees a rebel adversary cloaked in pink and frills, someone who must be hiding an agenda behind the perpetual sunny smile. Because no one could be as sweet as Blair seems on the outside, could they? I think he’ll feel bad once he realizes the dark secrets Blair hides are much different than he first believes.

  Blair won’t let anyone dim her sparkle, though, and I hope you won’t, either.

  Happy reading!

  Joanne Rock

  Joanne Rock

  Ways to Tempt the Boss

  Joanne Rock credits her decision to write romance after a book she picked up during a flight delay engrossed her so thoroughly that she didn’t mind at all when her flight was delayed two more times. Giving her readers the chance to escape into another world has motivated her to write over eighty books for a variety of Harlequin series.

  Books by Joanne Rock

  Harlequin Desire

  Brooklyn Nights

  A Nine-Month Temptation

  Ways to Tempt the Boss

  Dynasties: Mesa Falls

  The Rebel

  The Rival

  Rule Breaker

  Heartbreaker

  The Rancher

  The Heir

  Visit her Author Profile page at Harlequin.com, or joannerock.com, for more titles.

  You can also find Joanne Rock on Facebook, along with other Harlequin Desire authors, at Facebook.com/HarlequinDesireAuthors!

  To the caregivers, for your selflessness.

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Excerpt from Foolish Hearts by Synithia Williams

  Excerpt from Best Laid Wedding Plans by Karen Booth

  One

  As corporate spies went, makeup artist Blair Westcott sure didn’t seem the type.

  Lucas Deschamps studied the newest hire for Deschamps Cosmetics from the shadows of a lighted set while his creative team prepared for a photo shoot in the West Village. Blair wielded an eyeliner brush with a steady hand as she created a cat’s-eye on the model seated in her chair. Latin pop music poured from a Bluetooth speaker on the mirrored vanity table, a makeup kit unfolding like Russian nesting dolls on a cart nearby. A shoulder-length blond ponytail swung over one shoulder as she leaned forward to work on the Brazilian Olympic athlete who’d agreed to endorse the Deschamps brand.

  Yet it wasn’t the celebrated international volleyball player who captured his attention. That distinction went solely to Blair, whose black apron cinched her waist and flared over hourglass hips. She laughed and chatted as she worked, her warm manner putting the other woman at ease, the same way it did with everyone she encountered.

  Except, of course, for Lucas. Ease was never what he experienced around the talented makeup artist his mother—founder of the brand—had hired without consulting him. Not that Cybil Deschamps needed his approval, since it was still technically her company. But with Lucas’s estranged father attempting to acquire the smaller brand as a way to undermine his ex-wife, Lucas wished his mom had come to him sooner to help stabilize the business. Lucas would have recommended a hiring freeze in case his shady father attempted to place a plant inside the company to gather corporate intelligence. He wouldn’t put it past the guy.

  Could Blair be that plant? It set off warning bells in Lucas’s head that her previous job was at a Long Island-based beauty company owned by the luxury-brand conglomerate headed by Lucas’s father. Biting back his frustration, Lucas sidestepped a photographer’s assistant as the young woman dragged a floor light off the set to make room for a fan. Another assistant passed Lucas a cup of black coffee he hadn’t asked for, but he accepted the mug while he added up what he knew about the makeup artist currently sifting through a tray of eye-shadow palettes.

  For starters, Blair Westcott seemed entirely too sweet. Too kind and warmhearted to be for real. She baked treats for the staff at Deschamps Cosmetics, for crying out loud. At least once a week since she started with the company six weeks ago, she showed up with plastic containers stuffed full of homemade cookies or cupcakes. Who did that? He tried to picture her juggling those big containers on the subway during rush hour and failed. Then again, she was also the sort of person others hastened to help. If Blair had been a cartoon princess, she would be the one that all of the forest animals followed around while they sang songs and cleaned her house. It was the Blair Effect.

  And the quality was so noticeable, so unusual, that it made him wonder what she was hiding under the sunny exterior. He’d suspected there was a mole in the company dating back almost six weeks—the same time frame Blair had been hired. So he’d taken a closer look at her. In his experience, no one was as thoughtful and sweet as she appeared to be without an ulterior motive.

  She raised red flags for him. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the only thing she raised. Along with his suspicion of her, Lucas also felt hot, unrelenting attraction. The unwanted hunger ticked him off and made him perpetually surly around her, which hadn’t exactly helped him figure her out.

  “Would you like to take an advance peek, Lucas?”

  The dulcet tone of Blair’s voice yanked him from his dark thoughts, and he glanced up to meet the pale, blue-green eyes of his tormentor. She gestured toward the athlete she’d been working on for the photo shoot, then took a step back from her makeup chair, as if to leave him an unobstructed view of her work. Too bad it was all but impossible to tear his gaze from her. Her lips were so full they had a perpetual pouting quality. Her cheeks were just rounded enough to make the appearance of her dimples a surprise when she smiled. But it was her tall, curvy form that was the source of too many personal fantasies. There was an unapologetic femininity in the way she dressed that flattered every delectable inch of her. Today’s frothy pink skirt and prim white blouse were typical of her wardrobe a
nd shouldn’t be so damn enticing.

  She raised her eyebrows, clueing him in to the fact he’d been staring.

  He felt himself scowl before he could restrain the reaction.

  She only smiled wider and continued, “You were frowning so hard, I thought I’d better check in with you in case I’m using the wrong shades on Antonia?”

  There, underneath the charming ways, he saw a flash of challenge in Blair’s eyes. Maybe even a hint of “go screw yourself.” He didn’t think she showed that attitude to anyone but him, and it wasn’t the first time he’d glimpsed the look that came and went in an instant. Everyone else saw her sweet side. He would swear there was plenty of fire beneath.

  “The makeup is perfect,” Lucas assured the young Olympian in the chair, figuring it would be safer to focus on her. “We really appreciate you working with us on the campaign.”

  He lifted his coffee mug in a toast, glad to deflect attention from the tension between him and Blair.

  “My pleasure.” Antonia gave him a nod of acknowledgement before leaning forward to scrutinize herself in the lighted mirror. “I’m grateful to Blair for making me look like myself instead of caking layers of foundation over all my freckles the way some makeup artists feel compelled to.”

  “The freckles are gorgeous.” Blair peered into the glass over the other woman’s shoulder, although it was his gaze she met in the reflective surface. “We wouldn’t dream of covering them up,” she practically cooed.

  Or maybe it just sounded that way to his ears since, during a planning meeting for the shoot the week before, he’d suggested the close-ups of the mascara might be more dramatic with a more air-brushed quality to the skin around the eye. He hadn’t considered it an indictment of freckles so much as a creative decision to showcase a product, but the art director and Blair had both taken the opposing view.

  And Blair was enjoying the vindication, apparently.

  “Are we almost ready?” he asked too sharply before gulping the black coffee too fast and scalding everything on the way down. “We want to keep Antonia on schedule.”

  His voice rasped from the burn as he set down the mug and shoved the drink away from him.

  Blair’s dimples appeared even as she bit her plump lower lip, and he was willing to bet she was struggling not to laugh.

  “Of course.” Blair whipped off the black protective drapery that had been covering Antonia. “I’ll just let Jermaine touch up her hair on set.”

  Nodding, Lucas stalked back to the shadows of the photographer’s studio, more than ready to view the results of the day on a laptop feed. Keeping his focus on the device was safer than watching Blair. Until he figured out her angle, he couldn’t afford to trust her. And he definitely couldn’t afford to indulge the attraction that gnawed at him more with each passing day.

  Even if he was damn curious to know if she felt sparks on her end, too.

  He only had a month left to help his mother make significant strides with Deschamps Cosmetics so they could secure the support of her board members in staving off a takeover by his father’s conglomerate. The sooner he could settle this, the better. Lucas had his own business to run, a start-up that connected a highly skilled home-based workforce with companies that needed to outsource. He’d put his own professional life on hold in order to do this one favor for his mother. One last kindness to finally atone for not telling her that his father was a liar and a cheat back when he’d first discovered the truth about his dad.

  If not for Lucas’s silence as a teen, his mom would have started her cosmetics company under her own steam, with her maiden name attached, and she wouldn’t be warding off BS corporate attacks like the one she faced now.

  One more month and he’d be free of the debt he owed her. He just hoped he’d be free of the hold Blair Westcott had on him.

  But to be sure of that, he withdrew his phone and emailed her a private message. Based on the way she’d baited him in front of the talent today, Lucas suspected the time had come to confront this heated awareness head-on.

  And if he could tease out her possible corporate spying connections, so much the better.

  * * *

  See me in my office at 5pm.

  Blair Westcott read and reread the ominous email subject line glaring at her from the top of her inbox once she got back to midtown headquarters that afternoon. There was no text in the body of the email. Not even an auto-filled signature that normally signaled the close of any Deschamps Cosmetics company message.

  Not that Blair needed a signature to know who wanted to see her in his office at the end of the business day. Lucas Deschamps, heir apparent to his mother’s cosmetics firm, had taken a personal dislike to her from their first meeting.

  Damn it.

  She couldn’t think about Lucas and his suspicious tawny eyes right now. After closing the laptop at her desk on the floor full of junior employees at Deschamps Cosmetics, Blair paused near the snack station in the center of the desks and withdrew a thin throw blanket from a freshly laundered stack in a wicker basket at the end of one countertop. The open-concept offices on this floor maintained a temperature that was always on the cool side, and the company prided itself on preserving a relaxed work community for the creative team. So even during business hours, Blair could wrap herself in a throw and sit in one of the casual lounge chairs lining the wall of windows overlooking the Hudson River. From the perch forty-two stories high, she could watch cruise ships and barges sail past the Statue of Liberty while a few of her colleagues brainstormed lipstick names and played a game of table tennis.

  Her phone buzzed with a notification just as she wiggled her way into a comfortable position in the lounge chair.

  Are you coming up this weekend?

  The text from her mother gave her conscience a jab as she thought about her sick mom alone in the little cabin Blair had rented for her an hour north of here, to be close to a good cancer center. Blair had quit her degree program and sold her mother’s house in Long Island to finance the surgery her mom had needed when Amber Westcott had been diagnosed with ovarian cancer. Thanks to having no healthcare insurance when a visit to a walk-in clinic led to the diagnosis, the bills were through the roof, even when medical providers worked with them to find financial assistance for treatment. The cancer center Amber now attended for her therapy was well-rated, with the benefit of being in an area with a lower cost of living. On the weekends, Blair took a train that followed the Hudson River, then got off at a stop where she had to take an Uber to reach the picturesque spot in the foothills of the Catskill Mountains.

  But the cost of the rented cabin and car fares were nothing compared to the price tag on the chemotherapy.

  Definitely! Blair typed back quickly, adding a string of emojis to sound cheery. I miss you! Feeling okay?

  Tired, actually. You should stay home this weekend, sweetheart. I’m just going to sleep, anyway.

  The knot in her belly tightened.

  All the more reason I should come take care of you. Her fingers shook a little as she typed this time—Blair hated that she couldn’t be with her mom 24/7 to look after her. Her father had remarried immediately following the divorce from Amber ten years ago, so he wasn’t in the picture. And Blair was an only child. Which meant her mom really needed her now, even though one of her friends lived nearby and took her to her chemo appointments. Sat with her afterward. It wasn’t the same as having family around. I’ll make that chicken soup you like.

  The next text took longer to arrive. She gripped the phone harder, as if that would make the answer come sooner.

  Text me Friday, and I’ll let you know how I feel. Napping now.

  Blair sent a few kiss emojis.

  Tugging the lightweight fleece blanket tighter around her, she closed her eyes against the pain that came with the concern for her mom’s health. She’d parked herself in front of the view to distr
act herself from worries about her enigmatic, taciturn boss. Yet thinking about the way Lucas fixed his smoldering gaze on her would be better than the gut-wrenching fear she felt for her mom and how to pay for the health care necessary to keep her alive.

  Because Blair couldn’t accept the unusual job offer she had received three days ago from her previous employer. Not when the job involved gathering strategic competitive intelligence on Deschamps Cosmetics. It was completely unethical, even if she wouldn’t have been doing anything technically illegal. She wouldn’t have even listened to the pitch except that taking the job meant she would have been able to pay for the chemo treatments. The former colleague who’d contacted her with the proposition had gotten her hopes up at first, saying he had a moonlighting gig that would be the financial answer to her prayers. But when the assignment became clearer, Blair knew she couldn’t be a spy. She’d have to find another way to afford the infusion therapy.

  Especially since she’d only been able to take the job at Deschamps thanks to an affordable-housing option extended to her by Cybil Deschamps. More than just the founder of Deschamps Cosmetics, Cybil was also a prominent philanthropist and socialite who had donated one of her properties in Brooklyn as a trial “club residence for women,” inspired by the historic Barbizon Hotel. Blair’s shared apartment and the roommates who came with it were the brightest part of the most nerve-racking time of her life. So Cybil was the last person Blair would ever want to spy on, no matter how big the paycheck.

  Her ex-coworker had insisted Blair continue to think it over for the week, however, making her feel guilty about the offer even though she hadn’t accepted. The conversation was made even stranger by the woman’s reminder that their communication was private and still covered under Blair’s nondisclosure agreement from her former employer. That didn’t seem possible now that she no longer worked for About Face, but she didn’t argue the point since she didn’t plan to discuss it, anyway.