Contents

       Title Page

      Chapter One

      Chapter Two

      Chapter Three

      Chapter Four

      Chapter Five

      Chapter Six

      Chapter Seven

       Chapter Eight

       Copyright

       Chapter One

      She brought a bikini?

      Gabriel Fulton, owner of Fulton Everything, stared at his usually prim and proper assistant as she walked from his beach house toward him and his four-year-old daughter, Stacy. He hastily shut his sagging-in-disbelief mouth. But as his assistant got closer, her long legs making short order of the shiny white sand of the beach in Charleston, South Carolina, his mouth fell open again.

      “That’s some suit.”

      Hot pink with tiny bikini briefs held together by string ties on both sides of her hips, it could only be worn by someone with a smoking hot bod. He’d have never suspected conservative Kara Kincaid fit the bill. But she did.

      She laughed. “I’m a twenty-seven-year-old single woman. What did you think I’d wear to the beach? A turtleneck and jeans?”

      Yes. That’s exactly what he’d thought. Well, maybe not exactly, but he certainly hadn’t expected a bikini. Normally she wore bland suits and white blouses, her red hair always caught in a fat bun at her nape. He’d assumed she owned a one-piece. Never in a million years would he have guessed she’d wear a suit so…so…hot that it kicked his hormones awake. Or that she’d unbind her glorious auburn hair and let it fly around her in the ocean breeze.

      “You gave me two-hours warning that we’d be working from the beach for two weeks. I couldn’t shop. I had to pack what I had.”

      “It’s pretty,” Stacy piped in. Shielding her eyes from the sun, his blue-eyed, blond-haired daughter grinned. “You look like Barbie.”

      Smiling, Kara stooped down beside her. “Thanks.”

      “You’re welcome,” Stacy said as she bounced up to retrieve a plastic bucket that had rolled away in the ocean breeze.

      Kara quickly faced Gabe. “So why the sudden shift in plans?”

      Irritation flared in his gut at his ex-wife. He hated the way she made last-minute demands when it came to Stacy, knowing he’d never let his baby girl down. Normally, he didn’t talk about his ex, but he and Kara had no secrets.

      A fact that suddenly struck him as odd. He wasn’t the type of guy to confide in anyone, yet somehow Kara had bridged all his defenses.

      He shook his head. She was his assistant. Trusted assistant. She needed to be informed. Of course they didn’t have secrets.

      “My ex brought Stacy to my house an hour before her flight departed, saying she’d made a sudden decision to go to London. I had no choice except to bring Stacy with me. But with you along, I’ll get to spend time with Stacy and we’ll still be able to negotiate the Bronson takeover.”

      “Well, if plans have to change, this is a nice way to change them.” She sucked in the salt air, causing her full breasts to rise and fall and his temperature to hit simmer.

      He squeezed his eyes shut in frustration. Why was he suddenly noticing these things about his assistant?

      “Seems to me that this is one of the perks of being rich. You own a beach house. You have privacy to negotiate your super-secret deal, and you can still be with your daughter.” She turned to Stacy who returned with the flyaway plastic pail. “I’ll bet you love it here, don’t you?”

      Stacy nodded. “And there’s usually kids next door,” she said, pointing at the blue house beside his yellow one.

      That was supposed to have been another perk of his plan to work at his beach house. For a few hours every day, Stacy could play with Owen, Helaina and Claire, the triplets of Missy Johnson who had married publishing mogul Wyatt McKenzie, and he and Kara could get some work done.

      But their neighbors had been out when they’d arrived, and he and Kara had had to entertain Stacy. He was glad his daughter got along with Kara and that they were comfortable with each other. Except…

      Except today, maybe because they were playing instead of working, everything felt different. Especially the very casual way Kara spoke to him. In the office, their banter and her quick wit made for good communication. At the beach, it tingled up his spine like the hands of a lover. Worse, he was noticing things about her he shouldn’t notice. Not about an employee!

      He handed Kara a plastic bucket. “So what do you say we build a sand castle?”

      Stacy nodded enthusiastically.

      “You get the water,” he said to Kara.

      Kara glanced at the bucket and back at him. Her eyes narrowed. “For?”

      “To make the sand wet so we can pack it.”

      “Oh. I get it.”

      She gingerly picked her way along the sand to the water. Baffled, Gabe let his gaze follow her, only to be treated to a very nice view of her backside. He groaned, annoyed with himself. But when she carefully crouched down to dip the bucket into the retreating wave, she didn’t get any water.

      She stood there, as if confused until another wave came in. Then, stiff as a board, she filled the bucket.

      He frowned. Was she afraid?

      Of the water?

      She returned with salt water sloshing over the sides of the bucket.

      He motioned for her to dump it into the little bowl he and Stacy had scooped out of the sand. “Are you afraid of the water?”

      She shrugged. “I’ve never been to the ocean before.” She looked up and out over the beautiful blue sea. “It’s very big.”

      He gaped at her. “You own a bikini and you’ve never been to the ocean?”

      She shrugged. “I have a friend who has a pool. I tan there…and swim.”

      He almost asked her what kind of friend. Was her friend a man? A boyfriend? But he clamped down on his jealously. Where the hell was all this coming from?

      ***

      Kara focused her attention on the water she had poured into the hole.

      Stacy reached in and pulled out a blob of wet sand which she patted into a small pink bucket. She smiled at Kara. “I’m making bricks.”

      “Let me help.” Kara grabbed the second bucket.

      “So your mum never took you to the beach on vacation?” Gabe asked.

      She sucked in a breath, annoyed with herself. She’d gone an entire year of working with Gabe Fulton without revealing the details of her not-so-happy childhood, and after ten minutes together at the beach she’d slipped up.

      “My mother was a single mum, remember? We couldn’t afford to go on vacation.”

      “That’s too bad.”

      Drat.