The Seduction Game

Chapter Two


Will paused at the entrance to K.I.T, the last store standing, and heard the voice of his newly acquired nemesis slapping down the gauntlet.

It’s just a waiting game now.

Trouble was, Will had no time left to wait. He ran a hand through his hair—flattened from the hard hat—and took a deep, dusty breath. Chris was in the store across from him, considering plans, working out schedules, and the news he’d just given Will was not good. They were already behind, thanks to Kate Kelly. It was crunch time now. If he didn’t convince her to sell in the next couple of weeks the whole project would fail.

That was unacceptable.

He glared at the storefront display. The posters made no sense to him. The machines and slogans on them were meaningless. But the woman inside did. She knew all about them and all about him. She knew what he needed. She simply was not complying. Damn her.

He glared some more. Who the hell could have guessed that the geek in charge of the tiny computer store would be the one to hold out? Not him, that was for sure, or his project managers, for that matter. Chris had assured him that all the shop owners were willing to sell and that they had practically begged for someone to come along and buy their dilapidated buildings. However, it seemed that somewhere between the e-mail he’d received in London two months ago telling him this information, and his landing in the US three days ago, Kate Kelly had changed her mind. She was refusing to sell, and by doing so, was derailing his whole goddamn plan.

Will thought of his staff, all eight hundred and thirty-two of them, all needing their paycheck at the end of the month. He thought, too, about the continuing economic slump, the balance sheets he’d pored over in London, the new business he was trying to create. Will had been developing property since he was nineteen years old and it had made him richer than he had ever imagined. But it had also brought him more responsibility than he’d ever thought to have. People depended on him and every single development counted. Nothing could be allowed to fail. Everything had to make a profit. Including this.

One woman could not be allowed to stop it.

“Did you offer the market price?” he’d asked Chris the moment he was back in his office.

His project manager, who also happened to be his brother-in-law, nodded. “Plus ten percent.”

An excellent price. No one else would offer better. “And did you explain to her what we were doing here? How many jobs The Risings will create?”

“Yes. It made no difference. She won’t budge.”

She won’t budge. Will dragged his hand through his hair, frowning when specks of dust danced in front of his vision. The whole complex was a wreck. Work had already started on the buildings he now owned—a maneuver on Chris’s part to push the geek into selling, one he wholeheartedly approved of. Only it hadn’t worked and her building sat apart from it all, right in the center. The quirky K.I.T. sign the last bit of bright color.

The last store standing.

“Why can’t she be like the rest?” he growled to himself, a combination of anger and frustration filling him all over again. “Take the money and run.”

Because she’s stubborn. Only stubborn didn’t develop buildings. Not her kind at least. His kind did and he played the words over in his mind again. A waiting game. Did she really think she could hold out? Win? Against him? He almost wanted to laugh. But she’d already held out for months. Held out against Chris, he reminded himself. Let’s see her hold out against me.

Will stepped forward and pushed open the door to the tiny shop. He expected a bell to sound—lots of shops had them. Instead he was assailed with a theme tune. He wasn’t sure what it was at first. A moment later and he realized. Star Trek. The familiar melody from his childhood filled his ears and announced his arrival to the woman behind the serving counter.

Meg. It had to be her. Will had pored over the personnel files Chris had compiled and Kate Kelly’s assistant was the only other constant besides her boss in the store. Of course, the files had not prepared him for the reality, and Will made a mental note to have his staff include descriptions in the future.

“Meg?” he asked, shooting her a smile.

“Who wants to know?” She glared and crossed her arms over her more than ample breasts. They were practically spilling out of the dark red corset she was wearing over her shirt. A corset! That coupled with her long ginger braids, crimson lipstick, glittery eye shadow and ridiculously short skirt, made him think of a heroine from one of his niece’s computer games. World of Warcraft or Zelda or something.

Will narrowed his eyes at both her appearance and belligerence, then stepped forward. Just six steps put him right in front of the counter. The store was smaller than he’d expected it to be, and he’d seen the plans. Perhaps it was the equipment and shelving systems lining the walls that made it so? Or maybe it was just because the building, one of many in this row, was tiny. Upstairs, which he knew was Kate’s living area, would be no better. With the money he was offering she could buy herself not only a bigger store, but a decent apartment above it, too. What was stopping her from doing that? Will had to find out. Only then could he convince her to sell. Only then could he prevent his development from failing.

“I’m Will Thornton,” he said, dropping his voice slightly. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

“Will Thornton?” the woman who had to be Meg asked. “He who will not be Googled. Well, well, well. What do you want?”

“Tempted though I am by your displays”—he waved a hand at the shelves of merchandise behind her—“I’d like to speak to your boss.”

“My displays?” She stared down at her bosom and then back at him. “Really?”

He couldn’t help but grin.

She uncrossed her arms, grinned back, and then seemed to realize what she was doing. She shot him another glare—though this one seemed a little halfhearted—before glancing toward the row of monitors at the end of the store. Will followed her gaze and spotted a length of blond hair in between two of the monitors. Kate Kelly herself.

“I don’t think Kate wants to—”

“It’s okay, Meg.”

The woman hidden behind the monitor row stood up and Will’s first impression was that she was tiny, would barely even reach his shoulders. Why hadn’t he expected that? His second and slightly more bemused thought? She was cute. Very cute. Something he certainly hadn’t anticipated.

She moved around the monitors at the same time as he moved forward to greet her. Her face was split by a frown and her fists were clenched tight. It didn’t take a genius to work out that she was angry…and something else, too. Something he couldn’t quite put his finger on.

They stopped with a yard or two between them and Will got his first proper view of the woman who, single-handedly, was threatening his whole development.

She was nothing like he’d imagined.

Honey-colored hair fell in loose waves around her shoulders, ridiculously large, thick-rimmed glasses outlined her cornflower blue eyes and her figure…Will took a deep breath, shocked to realize that she was exactly to his taste. Though her jeans were shapeless and far too long for her frame—almost covering her battered Converse—her black tee shirt was just the right side of tight. It was emblazoned with the words Geeks Do It Better, and suddenly Will found himself wondering exactly what “it” was.