Shopping for a CEO's Fiancee

  Table of Contents

  Praise for Julia Kent

  Acknowledgements

  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

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Epilogue

  Other Books by Julia Kent

  About the Author

  Shopping for a CEO’s Fiancée

  Julia Kent

  We skipped right over the whole fiancée thing and went straight from girlfriend to wife.

  At least, I think that’s what happened. I wake up after my brother’s Vegas wedding reception with my luscious girlfriend in bed with me. We’re both wearing wedding rings.

  So is her coworker, Josh.

  And our Vegas chauffeur, Geordi.

  Who the hell am I married to?

  Unraveling this mystery will be as difficult as figuring out why Amanda and I are having panic attacks over the thought of being husband and wife.

  Or whoever we’re actually married to.

  Oh, ^%$#.

  It’s true that what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, with one exception:

  If she’s my wife, we’ll make it work.

  If she’s not?

  I’ll make it happen.

  Copyright © 2016 by Julia Kent

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission from the author / publisher.

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  Praise for Julia Kent

  From Authors

  “This one has it all: hilarious laughs, a sexy (almost) billionaire and a hint of tears. The best of the series!”

  —Celia Kyle, New York Times bestselling romantic comedy author

  “Julia Kent’s romantic comedies are so funny you’ll snort soda out your nose, so emotionally honest you’ll get misty eyed, and so charming you’ll be back for more. Loved the whole series!”

  —Cheri Allan, author of the Betting on Romance series

  Reader Reviews

  “You can see that he really loves Shannon to the very core of his soul, and it’s beyond interesting to watch how that love can bring a strong, confident, alpha male like Declan to his knees.”

  “Wonderful laugh out loud story of a family that reminds me of my own. I’m a sucker for good ‘how they met’ stories, and this is is by far the most creative. I wholeheartedly recommend you read the series.”

  “Every chapter made my heart beat faster in anticipation. Julia Kent once again pulls at our emotions and allows us to fall in love with the characters all over again.… Very well worth my heart palpitations.”

  “If I could describe this book in a word, it would be, ‘EVERYTHING’.

  It has everything you want in a romance.

  It has those witty and sometimes downright hysterical situations that you can’t help but laugh at.

  It has those hot, sexy moments that make a romance book a, well, hot and sexy romance book.

  It has all those quirky, fun characters we’ve all come to enjoy through this series.

  But better than all that, it has what I loved best about this book: those sweet, tender expressions of love that are written so beautifully and artistically.”

  “As an avid reader I have to say there is nothing better than an author that can combine romance and humor. Julia never disappoints, and is one of the best at creating stories that suck you in and keep you laughing.”

  Reader Emails

  “I just can’t imagine how you come up with this stuff, but am so glad you do!”

  “I finally had to write to you and tell you that you are simply one of the most amazing authors. Your humor is perfect. I really do bust out laughing out loud. My family thinks that I am crazy when I do it but I can count on a good read from you especially when it has been a rough day. There hasn’t been a single thing that you have written that I haven’t fallen in love with the characters. They become real and some of your lines have become a part of our family language. Thank you for sharing your amazing gift.”

  “Having another fantastic evening as I just finished your latest book and now the fam can go to sleep since the laughing/screaming out loud has stopped... Stomach muscles are sore. Better than sit-ups! :-)”

  Acknowledgements

  To Elizabeth, who helped me with the historical costume details in the book, and whose tour of the Vokes Theater in Wayland, Massachusetts and discussion and review of parts of this manuscript helped me greatly. I now know the difference between “rise” and “inseam,” and so do Andrew and Vince. ;)

  To Kate, whose post on detachable octopus penises in my Facebook group provided a lively little fact in this book.

  To my husband, “Clark” Kent, for sparking an exceptionally lively discussion on my Facebook reader group, Laugh Your Way to Love, about MATH. Only you, honey. Only you could get a bunch of romance readers arguing over exponential vs. factorial combinations.

  And to my maternal grandmother, whose love for the 1990s BBC production of Pride and Prejudice was infectious. I attended a very high-tech university at the time, and had early access to good Internet search engines. Printing off the rare fan pages about Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle became a hobby for me, and Grandma’s deep appreciation for those pages, and utter delight at the miniseries, has stayed with me as I wrote portions of this book. The image of those VHS tapes in their boxed set, proudly displayed on her television and lovingly re-watched, resting next to the stacks of printouts about the stars, makes me now realize my grandmother was an eighty-something diehard fangirl.

  She’s been gone for many, many years, but her love of Pride and Prejudice remains in me. I miss you, Grandma. I wish you’d lived to see this book. You were a librarian and instilled a love of reading in me, bringing my five-year-old self with you to alphabetize the library return cards, and letting me re-shelve books, all with an eye toward exposing me to a richer culture through books. You succeeded.

  For EFW, who lives on in so many different ways.

  Chapter One

  Waking up naked with your face between your girlfriend’s legs is the best way to start your morning in Vegas.

  With your brother screaming at you from the other side of the covers? Not so much.

  Amanda’s thighs make great pillows that muffle out my brother bellowing, “What the hell happened in here?” His outrage makes the mattress vibrate, like those beds in seedy motels on television shows. In a pinch, Declan’s yell is worth a quarter. Maybe fifty cents.

  I sit up and scream back, “WHAT THE FUCK?”

  Because that is a perfect example of executive mastery and grace under pressure.

  It’s the morning after my brother’s wedding. I am in my hotel suite here at Litraeon, the Las Vegas Strip resort owned by my company, Anterdec. My girlfriend, Amanda, is with me. We’re both naked. We should be alone.

  We�
�re not.

  That needs to be rectified.

  My head fills with metal shavings masquerading as lightning bolts that run through my veins. I flop back, eyes closed.

  The world needs to stop spinning. Now.

  I reach for Amanda. Her soft, creamy skin anchors me to the world. She’s mine again. Mine. All mine. She moans, the sound unrecognizable. It’s nothing like the little gasp I elicit during intimate moments. She sounds like Gloria Steinem at a Ted Cruz rally.

  If I ignore Declan, he’ll go away. Maybe this is a nightmare.

  “ANDREW!”

  Nope.

  I lift my arm to rub my eyes and ask Declan why the hell he’s barging in on Amanda and me. Who keyed him into my suite? Someone on our security team is getting fired. Besides, it’s the first day of his honeymoon. Doesn’t he have something better to do right now?

  Something deep in my core stirs, a discontent that is both familiar and exasperating.

  I start to rub my eyes in a weak attempt to wake up and—

  Wait. What’s that weight on my left hand?

  And when the hell did Declan start to look so much like my dad? My vision clears and there’s Dec, standing next to Shannon, who is watching Amanda with an intensity I’ve only seen in one other woman, ever.

  Jessica Coffin.

  “Is that a wedding ring on your left hand?” Declan shouts, like I’m Gollum and he’s Sauron. What ring? What the hell is he talking about?

  I check my hands. Right hand clear. Left hand—

  Uh, oh. How did that get there?

  Amanda screams. My sister-in-law’s cat, Chuckles, is on the bed. He’s wearing a veterinarian’s surgical cone with the words “WILL SLEEP WITH PUSSY FOR FOOD” written in Sharpie.

  The handwriting is familiar.

  Too familiar.

  Chuckles claws Amanda, yielding a wild shriek from both. Declan gets the cat off her and she sits up and—

  She’s Gollum, too. Yep.

  My precious has the Ring.

  Amanda starts saying something about a tuba, and then her friend Josh pops up from the floor. He looks like a really whiny ninja with no body fat. He’s fully dressed, fastidiously so.

  I clear my throat and start to stand, ready to resume control over this mess. The stirring inside me has taken more breaths and awakens, assessing, observing. Time to exert authority over these people. The cacophony is too much. I can’t take it. They need to do exactly what I tell them, which means leave.

  I stand.

  I’m naked. Damn.

  Unlike my brother, I don’t believe in parading my junk for the world to see. Only people with something to prove need to do that.

  You know. Like guys who aren’t CEOs of Fortune 500 companies.

  I clutch the covers. My stomach twists. I feel like a victim in a Dexter episode, except there’s been a mistake. Amanda’s pinning her head in place with her palms, and a weird ringing fills my head. Josh has his hand in the air, a strange glare of sunlight on—

  Oh, shit. A ring.

  What the hell happened last night?

  Rainbows explode all over the other side of the bed. Rainbows and chocolate penises. A chocolate penis the size of a baseball bat is in the hands of a guy wearing a tie-dyed shirt and a head made of rainbow hair.

  This is all a dream, right? The rainbow is wearing a wedding ring, but no underwear, and a sudden, cold clarity hits me as I look around the room.

  I have a wedding ring.

  Amanda has a wedding ring.

  Josh has a wedding ring.

  Rainbow chocolate-dong-holding dude has a wedding ring.

  One of the hallmarks of my moving up the ranks so quickly at Anterdec has been my split-second decision-making ability, and my willingness to take business risks that scare the hell out of anyone else. Puzzle pieces fall in place in seconds when I observe, analyze and act. No wishy-washy wondering.

  Intuition kicks in. Judgment is based on the gut. Decisions rest on data points and an ambiguous collection of—

  Hold on. Sunlight passes over Amanda’s left hand.

  “Who the hell is she married to?” I ask Declan, pointing at Amanda. Her skin is so luscious in this morning light. A lovely, healthy glow that reminds me of sunsets on the ocean.

  Then I narrow my eyes and realize her breasts are orange.

  Day-glo orange. They look like Donald Trump’s face. The nipples are paler than the rest, like eyes.

  Shannon’s damn cat pees all over the really nice giant teddy bear I bought Amanda, prances over, and leaps into Declan’s arms. I want to ask how my brother trained the cat to do that, but Amanda’s screaming in my ear.

  “Who am I married to? What? What kind of question is that?” she snaps. I liked her better when she moaned like Rachel Maddow interviewing the Zodiac Killer at a presidential primary.

  “There are three men in here with wedding rings on!” I shout back. Only one of us should be her husband, of course. Me.

  I pause. Why did I think that? I don’t want to marry Amanda. Not yet, at least.

  Not yet. Not...what? What am I thinking?

  “That’s riiiiiiigggght,” Josh says. “And the Supreme Court declared last year that I can marry anyone I want, too.” He wiggles his eyebrows at me like I’m a dessert buffet. “You could be my hubby!”

  Guys have hit on me before. It’s cool. Signals get crossed.

  But hold on, here.

  Josh is not my type.

  If I had a guy type, I mean.

  Oh, hell.

  Declan’s voice cuts through it all. “Little bro, the more important question is: who the hell are you married to?”

  My brother has this way of looking at me that combines disgust, amusement, determination and just enough abuse to make me jump off the bed, nakedness be damned, and tackle him around the waist.

  And right into the giant teddy bear.

  “Ooooo! Cat pee! Cat pee!” Shannon squeals.

  “Cat fight! Cat fight!” Josh shouts, clapping. “My bet’s on my hubby, Andrew!”

  “I am not your husband!” I shout, my cheek against Declan’s belt.

  “You don’t knooooooow that,” Josh calls back.

  “Why is Andrew’s mouth orange?” someone asks.

  “I’m Shannon’s husband, you dumbass!” Dec grunts. “Speaking of which—hey! Shannon! Get a spray bottle!” Dec calls out.

  “Why? Just wrestle him off you. He’s drunk and in pain. You can take him,” she replies.

  Shannon has a hidden dark side.

  “I don’t know where to put my hands!” Dec confesses. “His junk is everywhere!”

  “That—grunt—is because—grunt—my junk is so big—grunt,” I groan.

  “YOU BOYS STOP RIGHT NOW.”

  As if this couldn’t get any worse. Just did.

  That’s my dad.

  We ignore him.

  Like hell I’m giving up.

  “You are such a little shit,” Declan hisses, as he tries to fight me without actually touching my bare skin.

  I am winning.

  And then Dad shouts to Shannon, she tosses something at him, and I hear:

  “This is remarkably satisfying, Shannon! You’re on to something,” he says with a tone of admiration, as I get a face full of water mist. Declan lets go.

  “For the record,” I say, wiping my cheeks, “you let go first. I win.”

  “Dad sprayed us like dogs!”

  I rush him again, but he stops me with arms of steel.

  Mine, however, are titanium. We lock grips and wait, poised.

  “Andrew James McCormick, you just blew off a two-hour meeting with the Sultan of Al-Massi. The damage control on this is incalculable. I didn’t build this company just so you could tear it down because you were on a bender in Vegas!” Dad roars, his body tense and immobile, but his voice carefully calculated to intimidate.

  That doesn’t work on me, though. It makes me let go of Declan, who casually hands me something from the
floor to cover my groin. It’s brown and plush but it makes me respectable.

  Ish.

  “I’ll fix it,” I snap.

  Amanda gives me an odd look, then goes back to fighting her inner tubas.

  “No time.” Dad turns to Declan and looks him over. Dec is dressed in a bespoke suit from a tailor I discovered and referred him to. “Your brother, unlike you, looks professional enough for a meeting with the Sultan.”

  “Or a Moroccan stripper,” Shannon whispers in a weirdly bitter tone that makes Declan’s eyebrow arch.

  Declan’s demeanor changes instantly, his stance uncomfortable. Shannon averts her eyes and the two look like teenagers at a dance in Napoleon Dynamite, trying to figure out how to fit in.

  “How,” Josh asks, peering intently at my crotch, “did you turn your love pole into a Wookiee?”

  “Love pole?” The entire room says the phrase in unison, and in the exact tone I’m thinking.

  I look down. Dec handed me a Chewbacca stuffed toy as my junk cover.

  “Maybe he just wants a little Chewie down there,” Rainbow dude notes, as he starts to back out of the room, taking Josh with him. Self-preservation is a strong instinct.

  Rainbow dude finally covers himself. I hold one finger up to Dad, like I’m pausing him.

  Dad doesn’t handle being paused well.

  “Well,” Josh says slowly, giving Rainbow dude, who I realize is one of the chauffeurs (George? Geoff?) a series of nervous looks. “We snuck back in to find Geordi’s pants sometime after three a.m., I think.”

  Geordi. That’s right.

  “And my dong.” Geordi holds up the item in question. The chocolate is starting to melt in his hand.

  “So you didn’t sleep in the room all night? You weren’t, er....” Shannon grimaces, looking at Dec, who gets an aha! expression on his face.

  “This wasn’t a foursome?” Dec asks bluntly.

  “What a ridiculous question!” Dad shouts, exploding on the spot.

  “Oh, no!” Josh squeals, flailing his hands. “No, no, no! I don’t sleep with—” He breaks off the sentence and looks at me, biting his lower lip, eyes filled with the kind of panic usually reserved for contestants on Hell’s Kitchen who move a basil leaf counterclockwise as Gordon Ramsay’s coming over.