Sex, Lies and Her Impossible Boss

Her lips opened to form an O. Pink, full lips. He sucked in his own bottom lip and shifted. He liked to tease her. Her creamy white English skin always turned a delightful shade of pink when he teased her. But he hadn’t noticed how full her lips were before.

‘You really believe that, don’t you? You really think sex is just sex?’ Her eyes flashed.

‘Yes. I really believe that.’

He knew the truth. Love didn’t exist. Lust, mutual attraction—that was what he believed in. And lust had caused him absolutely no pain the last nine years so he was sticking with it.

‘It’s time you let it go, Faith. Find something else. Move on. You never know—you might find something you’re really good at. Current affairs, maybe?’

‘I’m really good at sex!’

Her voice rang out at the precise moment when everyone got off the phone and paused. Her eyes opened wide, horrified. She turned away and bustled with her things.

Dear Reader

I am a massive fan of British journalist Dawn O’Porter. She is brutally honest and wine-spittingly funny and I adore the fact that she immerses herself in the worlds she researches in order to be able to really take you on the ride with her.

As a journo myself, I know that the only way to get the best quotes, the most interesting stories or the rawest response is to be there. To walk with someone and talk to them face to face. To immerse yourself in their world and their mind and feel the story so you really understand it. So you know more than just the facts.

In this book, sex journalist Faith immerses herself in the world of love and sex and relationships to try and understand it. But it’s not until she meets her new boss, Cash, that she discovers that falling in love is much like being a good journo. There’s no peeking around the corner and whispering questions from afar. You have to cross one hand over the other, bend your knees and dive right in. That’s the only way to feel it and the only way to understand it.

So now it’s time for you to jump right in and fall in love with Cash and Faith!

I love hearing from readers, so be sure to email me at jenniferraeromance@gmail.com with your comments or questions about Faith and Cash or anything else.

Love

Jennifer Rae x

Sex, Lies & Her

Impossible Boss

Jennifer Rae

www.millsandboon.co.uk

JENNIFER RAE was raised on a farm in Australia by salt-of-the-earth farming parents. There were two career options for girls like her—become a teacher or a nurse. Rather disappointingly for her dear old dad, she became neither.

All she’d ever wanted to do was write, but she didn’t have the confidence to share her stories with the world. So instead she forged a career in marketing and PR—after all, marketing and PR professionals are the greatest storytellers of our time!

But following an early mid-life crisis several years ago Jennifer decided to retrain and become a journalist. She rediscovered the joy of writing and became a freelance writer for some of Australia’s leading lifestyle magazines. When she received a commission to interview a couple of romance-writers for a feature article Jennifer met two incredible Australian authors whose compelling stories and beautiful writing touched her cold, cynical heart.

Finally the characters who had been milling around Jennifer’s head since her long years on the farm made sense. Jennifer realised romance was the genre she had to write.

So, with little more than a guidebook borrowed from the local library and a you-can-do-this attitude, Jennifer sat down to release her characters and write her first romance novel.

When she’s not ferrying her three children to their various sports, musical endeavours and birthday parties, you can find Jennifer at the boxing gym, out to dinner with her friends or at home devouring books.

Jennifer has lived in New Orleans, London and Sydney, but now calls country New South Wales home.

Other Modern Tempted™ titles by Jennifer Rae:

CONFESSIONS OF A BAD BRIDESMAID

This and other titles by Jennifer Rae are available in eBook format from www.millsandboon.co.uk

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To my sister Donna.

If you hadn’t rescued me from that bank, I’d never have written this book.

Thank you for that. And for making sure I never had to do anything completely alone.

x

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

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Extract

ONE

The first time her phone buzzed, Faith Harris was too busy taking photos of a burlesque dancer’s pasties to notice. They were new. Bright red and covered in thousands of dollars’ worth of diamonds. Betty Boom-Boom was very proud of them and swung them from side to side for effect as Faith pointed the camera.

‘Hang on, Bets, I just have to get you in focus—slow down.’ Betty stopped swinging as Faith’s phone beeped again. This time Faith plucked it from her back pocket and impatiently read the message on the screen.

Answer your damn phone. CA

Faith winced. He’d been calling all morning. She knew what it was about. Which was why she hadn’t answered any of his calls. Or his emails. But now he was angry and she wasn’t sure she’d be able to ignore him any longer.

‘Sorry, Bets. I’ve got to sort something out.’ Faith let out a breath as she slung the camera around her neck and stared down at her phone.

Cash Anderson.

The wheatgerm in her smoothie. The run in her stocking. The one bar on her phone.

The man who annoyed her, stressed her out and did her head in more than anyone else.

Cash-freaking-Anderson.

Who was calling her to give her the boot. The man had only been in the job for four weeks but so far he’d upset programming, annoyed advertising and turned the entire editing department into fruitcakes with his constant demands and changes. And now he had his sights set on her and her TV show, Sexy Sydney. A show she’d been building for two years. A show that had gained her a reputation for honest, thought-provoking journalism. A show that he now wanted to can.

Faith breathed in through her nose and out through her mouth. Calm. She needed to be calm. She remembered her yoga. Be a bee. She stuck her fingers in her ears, closed her eyes and hummed—just like Sri Sri Ravi had taught her.

‘Mmm...’ she hummed.

She was going to lose her job. She had no savings so she’d have to move out of her flat and then where would she go? She’d left most of her friends behind in England when she’d moved here to follow her dreams. She’d only managed to make a few friends here—her job had taken all her time these past two years.

‘Mmm...’

She’d have to move home. With her mad mother and her disappointed father and her layabout brothers who teased her incessantly about her job.

‘Mmm...’

Then she’d start drinking heavily. And take up smoking and adopt a load of stray cats. And she was allergic to cats so she’d probably end up wheezing and not being able to breathe from all the cigarettes and cats and she’d cark it and they wouldn’t find her until her parents noticed a strange smell coming from her room.

‘Mmm—bloody—mmm...!’

Then she’d be dead and Cash-freaking-Anderson would finally be happy.

She unplugged her fingers. Not helping. Sri Sri and his yoga were useless. As was avoiding this phone call. She dialled Cash’s number and waited, her gut clenched, her neck tense.

‘About bloody time. Where have you been? Where are you now?’ his gruff voice boomed through the phone.

‘I’m interviewing Betty Boom-Boom. I told you I’d be here all day.’

‘Forget Betty Boom-Boom. I need you here.’ Faith felt the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end. His tone was abrupt and demanding. She was reminded of the principal of her boarding school. Unrelenting. Harsh. A man who was incapable of understanding, even when a young girl was miles from home—scared, lonely and unable to fit in. That principal had told her to ‘toughen up’. And she had—which was why she wasn’t going to let this man push her around.

‘I really can’t. I have to get these photos—the crew want to come and shoot tomorrow and I need to do the sheets up.’

‘Faith. I’ll expect you back here in twenty minutes.’ He hung up. Twenty minutes. Yet she was forty-five minutes away. She closed her eyes, sucked in a deep breath and wondered, not for the first time, what the hell she’d got herself into. Only a few short years ago her dreams had seemed so clear. International travel and journalistic awards. They were the only two dreams she’d held her whole life. Ever since she was seven and found herself alone and unable to make friends in a new school full of girls with strange accents who seemed to consider her the resident freak. Back in those days her thick northern country accent, wild hair and outrageous comments made her the butt of many jokes. She’d learned to be small, to disappear and she’d gone to a lot of trouble to develop the thick, tough layer that now surrounded her. A layer she’d need to reinforce to deal with the abrupt, plain-speaking man who was determined to ruin all her plans. The Sexy Sydney show was her baby. She’d dreamt it up when she got her first station job back in Newcastle but no TV station in England would run it. Everyone called her bonkers; they’d snickered behind her back. But that was two years ago and everything had changed since then. Her dreams had come true. Escape. Freedom. Recognition. Finally. After being made fun of for so long, she was finally getting on her feet and now Cash Anderson was trying to take it all away.

‘I’ve gotta go, Bets.’

‘It’s not that gorgeous boss of yours again, is it?’

Faith groaned. There was no denying the man was handsome. You could cut a piece of cheesecake with his cheekbones. But looks meant nothing to her. This man was a hard-headed businessman who wanted to shut down everything that was good about the station and inflict his stupid ‘cost-cutting’ ideas on them all.

‘It’s the good-looking ones you have to watch, Bets. I’m pretty sure he’s trying to shut my show down.’

‘The bastard!’ Faith preened at Betty’s indignation on her behalf.

‘Right? It’s a good segment. Australia needs to know about this stuff.’

‘Of course they do. We’re artists, not strippers, and what we do is a valuable part of our culture.’

‘Yes! Exactly. But he doesn’t get that. Him and his prudish attitude. You know what he told me at the last editorial meeting?’

Betty held her eyes in satisfying fascination. ‘He said that all a woman needs in the bedroom is a smile. A smile! As if that’s all it takes. That man has no idea how much waxing and plucking and shaping and moisturising goes into making that “smile” look hot. No idea.’

‘Men,’ announced Betty with a sniff.

‘Men,’ agreed Faith.

If only this man didn’t hold her fate in his hands. Then she’d find ignoring him so much easier. But he could no longer be ignored. She’d been summoned to the Devil’s den and if she wasn’t there in twenty minutes, he’d have his staff out to poke her with it.

* * *

The blood pumped furiously in Faith’s ears. It rushed like a waterfall through her veins. Cash was flashing one of those unfair electric white smiles at her. One of those smiles some men possessed that lit up their face and crinkled their eyes, making them seem younger and slightly sexy, which tricked your stupid heart into thinking they could be trusted. Which he couldn’t. Especially not with the big boss of Apex TV in the room.

‘Faith’s segment is popular, I know. But there are some other things I’d like to try,’ purred Cash—his eyes still on her.

She met his gaze and jutted out her chin. She couldn’t trust him one bit.

‘Such as?’ Gordon Grant was an over-tanned man in his sixties. His American accent was smooth and polished and he was so damn sparkly, he had a way of making everyone in the room feel dull and dowdy in comparison.

‘Such as sport. I want to introduce a new show based on Australian sporting legends.’

Faith groaned then looked up quickly as she realised everyone had heard her.

‘You don’t agree, Miss Harris?’ Gordon smiled, his teeth blinding her for a second. His eyes travelled over her face and down to her neck and landed right where the button on her shirt wouldn’t stay done up. She lifted a hand to it and sat up.

‘No, actually. I don’t.’ She glanced at Cash. He was frowning at her. ‘I don’t agree. There are enough sporting shows on television already.’

‘Australians love sport. It’s our culture.’ Matty Harbinger—the station’s sports reporter—spoke up. Faith always thought of a terrier dog when she looked at Matty. All big teeth with his tongue always hanging out. And he talked too fast. ‘Sport is in our blood. Cricket, tennis, footy. We can’t get enough.’

‘Sex is what Australians can’t get enough of, Matty. Studies show that Australians are more interested in sex than any other country. But that Australians are behind the US, the UK and most of Europe when it comes to sexual satisfaction.’ She glanced at Cash, who was now throwing death daggers her way with his eyes. ‘People in this country are more likely to want to try new things in the bedroom than anyone else, but less likely to actually do them.’

Cash raised an eyebrow at her. The way he stood there, looking at her, made the blood in her wrists pump faster and her palms sweat. Betty was right, he was handsome. And tall, and broad-shouldered. She’d heard he was an ex-national rugby player. The muscles that rippled in his back whenever he took his jacket off meant he was still working out like one. He was tall and lean and chiselled and perfect. Except for his left eye. His one imperfection where a little bit of green had crept into the perfect brown rims. Which she was now beating herself over the head for thinking of. Right now. When her career was on the line and everyone was looking at her as if she’d just sprouted a second nose.

‘The Australian public need this show,’ she ended, her voice higher than before. She cleared her throat and swivelled her eyes to Gordon, who was smiling at her. Although leering seemed a more apt description.

‘Is that so?’ He turned away and set his glossy looks onto Cash. ‘Well, Anderson, Miss Harris here would know. She is the resident sexpert—or so they say.’ He tittered at his joke. As did Matty and half the other people in the room. She knew what they thought of her. The oversexed girl who reported on fetishes, orgies and polyamorous marriages. She’d heard all the nicknames. Fellatio Faith. Horny Harris. But she knew what she was. A good reporter. A vital part of this organisation. A woman who wasn’t afraid to talk about sex and relationships and love. And she wasn’t ashamed of what she did. But she was sick of having to defend herself at every meeting she went to lately. The chair scraped on the polished wood as she stood.

‘You’re wrong about this, Cash. The Australian public want to know about sex and love and relationships and communication. They want to know how to save their marriage. They want to feel like they’re not freaks and that they can explore their sexuality without feeling they’re doing anything wrong. And they’re sick of watching grown men play games with their balls!’

The room fell into an uncomfortable silence. Every eye was on her. Felicity—the producer of the breakfast programme—snorted and covered her mouth. Faith’s chest heaved. Her breasts strained against her shirt as it lifted up and down. She let her eyes lift to Cash and he stood there watching her. His eyebrow still cocked, his expression unreadable. Then she felt the breeze as the next button on her shirt popped open and exposed her bra to the table. The one Betty had given her. The one with the bows on the nipples.

‘Bloody hell!’ she cried before tugging her shirt back together, taking one final look around and fleeing from the room.

TWO

When he walked up to her desk, Faith was packing her coffee mug into a brown box. He recognised the mug. It was covered in red kisses and was usually full of black tea. He wondered why she bothered to make it as she always had to tip it out when it went cold.

‘What are you doing, Faith?’

‘What does it look like I’m doing? I’m packing.’

He decided to bite. Faith had a tendency to make him do that. She never agreed with him. She fought him on everything. It should irritate him, but it didn’t. Out of all the new employees he’d met in the last month it was Faith who interested him the most. She was smart and she told it as it was. And she never sucked up to him.

‘Why?’

‘Because I’m leaving. You obviously don’t want me here. You don’t get what I’m trying to do so I’m going to go somewhere where I’m understood. Where I’m appreciated.’ Her eyes were glassy. She was emotional. Faith was the type of woman who wore her emotions like a pair of very high heels. She teetered around on them. Fell over them. They got in the way. Which was one of the reasons he was canning her segment. She’d lost her edge. She’d become too invested.

‘I appreciate you, Faith.’

‘No, you don’t. You think what I do is pointless and stupid. Which is why you want to replace me with sport.’

His eyes flicked to her shirt. She’d found a pin or something to do it back up but he could still see the curve of her breasts. He remembered those bows and swallowed hard, bringing his eyes back up to hers. She suited her segment. Sexy Sydney. But she’d suit something else. Maybe the weather.

‘I don’t want you to leave, Faith. I’ll find you something else. You’re a good reporter.’

‘What? Are you going to find me a position as the weather girl? Make me dye my hair blond and giggle as I point to a high westerly blowing right up my skirt?’

Cash resisted the urge to laugh. Faith was funny. And quick and clever and he wondered why the hell she didn’t want to move on. Why she was so determined to stick to the sex show that just wasn’t working.

He’d been trying to get more advertisers to support the programme but they were hesitant. The content veered from quirky and amusing to deep and heavy from week to week. He wondered who was helping her produce the show—he needed to look into that. Maybe it was a production problem. The real problem, he suspected, was that, like him, audiences were just not that interested in nonsense like love and relationships and the various types of dildos. Everyone knew love didn’t really exist. Everyone except Faith, who thought it made a difference when couples perked up their sex life with handcuffs.

‘I’m sure we can find you something else. Something you’d rather be doing.’

‘What I want to do is this. My Sexy Sydney show. I’ve built up a following. People love my reports.’ She could talk as fast as a used-car salesmen, he’d give her that. She was engaging; she made you actually start to believe the drivel she was spouting. Her show was—at times—brilliant. But lately the content was getting too heavy. She’d actually cried on camera last week when interviewing some sex workers. Too emotional. Admittedly, she did seem to have a huge following if the comments on their Facebook page was anything to go by. Most people she came in contact with seemed to be under her spell. But he wasn’t most people.

‘It’s just sex, Faith.’

Her eyes burned into him. He hadn’t noticed before but they weren’t brown as he’d thought they were. They were very, very dark blue. An unusual colour that reminded him of the ocean out at the front of his apartment late at night. As the wind blew and the waves fell against the cliffs.

‘There’s no such thing as “just sex”, Cash. Sex always means more than just sex.’

Cash’s lip curled into a half-smile as he watched her determined face. Once upon a time he’d thought sex was more than just sex. When he was much younger. But now he knew better. Sex was just sex. His mind snapped back; he didn’t want to even think about what else sex could be.

‘No. Sex is sex. It’s a physical union between two people who find themselves horny and in the same place at the same time.’

Her lips opened to form an O. Pink, full lips. He sucked in his bottom lip and shifted. He liked to tease her. Her creamy white English skin always turned a delightful shade of pink when he teased her. But he hadn’t noticed how full her lips were before.

‘You really believe that, don’t you? You really think sex is just sex?’ Her eyes flashed.

‘Yes. I really believe that.’ He knew the truth. Love didn’t exist. Lust, mutual attraction—that was what he believed in. And lust had caused him absolutely no pain the last nine years so he was sticking with it. ‘It’s time you let it go, Faith. Find something else. Move on. You never know—you might find something you’re really good at. Current affairs maybe?’

‘I’m really good at sex!’ Her voice rang out at the precise moment everyone got off the phone and paused. Her eyes opened wide, and she turned a shade of beetroot, horrified, as a couple of the jokers who were supposed to be working laughed.

She turned away and bustled with her things. Heat rose in his face. She’d have to learn to toughen up if she wanted to work in this industry. He’d suffered rejection, ridicule and censure every day and if she was going to survive, she’d have to stop blushing and fumbling every time she got embarrassed.

He didn’t want her to give up. This station was riddled with idiots. That was why it was in trouble. That was why they’d called him back over here. Faith was one of the few he wanted to keep on. But she had to step up. He moved closer and decided it was time he made her step up. He didn’t want her to give up, so he did the only thing he could do: threw her right in the deep end and watched to see if she could swim.

When Cash leaned down, his mouth was perilously close to Faith’s earlobe. She breathed in. He smelled delicious. Heady, warm and sexy. When he finally spoke it came out deep and rough in the broad, abrasive accent he used when he was angry. ‘As your station manager, I insist you prove that statement to me.’ But he wasn’t angry. He was...something else.