“I don’t feel the love in this room.”

Jared Kincaid stared at Harold, who was standing in the middle of his office, hands on his leather pants-clad hips.

What Jared felt was not love, but a skull-grinding, breath-robbing headache. Trust him to get hired at a marketing firm where the boss was having an existential mid-life crisis.

It had started with Harold’s leaving his wife six weeks ago. Now it had graduated to his boss wearing a twenty-something hairdresser’s wardrobe to work every day, preaching to the staff about oneness with self, and eating massive quantities of hummus.

Since Jared’s instinct was to tell Harold to take his love and shove it up his leather pants, he remained silent. With a little luck, in a month or two Harold would rediscover his true passion lay in Beamers and Armani suits and they could get back to normal.

A sultry low laugh filled the room. Jared gritted his teeth.

That laugh was a perfect example of why he was doomed to middle management and a lifetime of dodging trouble. Trouble followed Jared. Everywhere he went.

Trouble usually had long legs and breasts. This trouble had all of that plus blowzy blond hair, a Southern accent, and lush cherry lips that pouted and taunted.

And her name. Who the hell named their kid Candy Appleton? Had her mother envisioned her newborn baby as a future porn star?

Maybe it had been cute when Candy was a little girl, before she’d grown breasts, but now, on that body… it was just perverted.

Candy, who looked relaxed and sexy as hell in her red suit, kicked the heel of her crossed foot up and down, annoying Jared even further. When she did that, he had a view straight up her thigh nearly to the promised land.

She’d be the type to wear garters, he was sure. Black ones, green ones. Red ones, cream ones.

He shifted in his chair, slouching to hide the fact that he now had a steel boner.

A boner. In the middle of the goddamn day, in the middle of his boss’s office.

Trouble. Plain and simple.

Trouble spoke. “Harold, I don’t think Jared’s ready to feel the love.”

He sat up straight. What was that supposed to mean? He could feel the love if he wanted to. If he could ever figure out what the hell Harold was talking about.

Candy tossed him one of those sultry, open mouth smiles that made him want to tug her full bottom lip into his mouth and suck hard. He dug his fingernails into his thigh.

Harold frowned. “Is that true, Jared? You’re not ready to feel the love?”

He was ready to feel up Candy’s curves. Did that count? Jared cleared his throat. “Uhh, what exactly are we talking about here?”

“I’m talking about the fact that we have exactly three weeks to get together the ad campaign for Chunky Chocolate and you and Candy have barely spent an hour on it.”

That’s because he just about ran away every time Candy came near him. She scared the hell out of him. He had been forced to leave five years of hard work and a 401k plan behind him when he’d left his previous marketing firm, due to an unplanned encounter in the break room with the big boss’s secretary. Unknown to him at the time, that secretary was also the boss’s girlfriend. So Jared lost any possibility of being the future boss post boss’s retirement. It was a major step backwards and while he didn’t exactly regret having his cock sucked by the coffeepot, he did despise the consequence.

Work and sex didn’t mix. Jared and women didn’t mix. Every embarrassing and detrimental incident in his life could be traced back to a woman and his inability to control himself around them.

The buck stopped here. Or his dick, however you wanted to look at it.

He was not going to screw this up. Or screw Candy, no matter how much he wanted to taste those lethal lips.

“We can work on it whenever Candy likes.” He avoided looking at her and focused on the bright yellow spot Harold had dyed on the front of his rapidly diminishing hair. It looked like a flashing caution light.

Caution: Middle-aged man approaching baldness.

Candy said, “Maybe you should assign someone else to work with Jared. I don’t think he really likes me all that much.” Her words were slow, and rolled, like a water drop across his skin.

That’s where she was wrong. He liked Candy. Candy was sweet and lickable and belonged in his mouth where he could swirl it around, sucking and tasting every delectable inch.

Harold clapped his hands together, startling Jared out of his erotic fantasy.

“See, that’s what I’m talking about! Jared doesn’t like you, and you don’t like Jared. I can’t have that.”

Candy didn’t like him? Jared turned to her in amazement. Well, hell, that was irritating. It was okay if he was avoiding her, but she wasn’t supposed to avoid him.

He was likable. He returned phone calls and held doors open for women. Of course, whenever Candy was around, he usually just grunted and bolted for the nearest exit. He supposed she might take that personally.

But what was he supposed to do? Tell her it wasn’t her, it was her hot tits that had him running like a cat from water? That was sure to go over big.

“I like Candy,” he managed to say, not at all sure he wanted to know where Harold was going with this.

Candy laughed again, and he was suddenly aware of his poor word choice.

“Liar,” she murmured. “But that shouldn’t have anything to do with this client.”

“It doesn’t.”

Harold studied them both and said, “I’ve noticed the tension between you two, and it’s got to stop. It’s affecting the rest of the staff. It’s altering the feng shui state of the office. There are negative auras camped in my company, and they have got to go.”

Jared thought Harold was borrowing from too many ideas and cramming them together without any actual knowledge of what any of it meant. If Harold pulled out crystals and started chanting, he was out of there.

Not that he could afford to quit. As luck would have it, he’d bought himself a pricey condo right before he’d gotten canned from his previous job. The three months pounding the pavement had put a real dent in his assets. Another stint of unemployment and he’d be eating macaroni and cheese out of his car after the bank foreclosed on his mortgage.

Nothing fucking sexy about that.

“We don’t want negative auras.” Candy dropped her foot to the ground and smiled at Harold.

It made Jared suspicious. She never looked like she was being sarcastic, yet he suspected she was. She was intelligent, and her ad work was brilliant, yet that brain was housed in a stripper’s body.

He had the feeling that, left alone, Candy could outmaneuver them all, leaving a string of drooling men in her wake as she deftly climbed her way up the corporate ladder.

Maybe he’d catch a glimpse under her skirt on her way up.

Damn, he was hopeless.

“So Candy is willing to work on improvement. What about you, Jared? Do I have your word that you’ll open your mind to a more natural unity?”

Sure. Why not. He had to say yes. This was his boss, no matter how off-the-wall Harold was acting, and he was still in charge. Jared didn’t like macaroni and cheese, so he forced his mouth to open and say, “You have my word, Harold.”

Harold beamed. “Yesterday I had the best brainchild idea. You’re going to love this. There is obviously something holding you and Candy back, something that needs to be resolved.” Harold put his finger to his lip. “We could be talking about a betrayal in a past life, I’m not sure.”

Jared pressed his hand to his temple. If he’d had a past life, he’d obviously done something really shitty to have earned this torture in his present life.

“What did you have in mind?” Candy leaned forward as she redirected Harold.

“I’ve signed the two of you up for online couples counseling.”

Jared’s head pulsed so violently he could swear he went momentarily blind.

“Oh!” Candy cleared her throat. “Well, that sounds like a great idea.”

It wasn’t a great idea. It was a stupid, asinine, garbage can full of crap idea cooked up by his boss who had temporarily lost his mind due to the onset of male pattern baldness. No one cared about being bald anymore. Harold could shave his head, buy a motorcycle, and start dating younger women, like every other man who hit his late forties. Be Bruce Willis. Not this mishmash of spiritual ideas that had no place in the workforce.

“We’re not a couple, Harold. We don’t need counseling.” He tugged on the pant leg of his black suit pants and tried not to panic.

He didn’t want some unlicensed online shrink telling him he had the hots for his mother or some other such sick shit.

“Yes, you do. There are unresolved issues between you, maybe some domination control problems from your past life, and I want this resolved before we lose Chunky Chocolate.” Harold pointed to his computer, sitting on his large masculine cherry desk.

“You’re all enrolled, ready to go. This is a three-hour session. You are not to leave my office until you’ve finished the session and given me the printable certificate of completion.”

Jared couldn’t breathe. Oh my God, Harold was locking him in the plush corner office with Candy for three hours? Alone? With a touchy-feely counseling session to muddle through?

Maybe he could suddenly develop a fever. Or trip and take his eye out on the corner of Harold’s desk.

Trouble. Had he pegged her or what?

Candy watched the horror flash across Jared Kincaid’s face with interest. He really didn’t like her.

She had joked about it, but it was starting to bother her. Everyone liked her, especially men. She had been born a flirt, had always known how to work a smile and a hair flip. It was in her genes, passed down through the women in her family, and instead of fighting it, she had learned to embrace it.

Candy was proud of her femininity, but even more so of her brain. But just because she had that brain, didn’t mean she wanted to deny she was a woman. She liked wearing heels, and soft flirty dresses when the occasion warranted, and she liked the casual push-pull between men and women.

She liked to flirt, and she was good at it. Candy knew she in no way qualified as a sexual savant, having slept with a couple of men by the age of twenty-seven. Nor was she a dick-tease as her ex-husband had once accused her. To her mind, you were only a tease if you let a man touch, then taunted him with no. You were only a tease if you promised him sex, then laughed in his face.

Those were nasty games she wasn’t interested in playing. But smiles and friendly conversation, that she couldn’t resist. And men responded.

All men except for Jared.

She was starting to take it personally.

Jared was saying coldly, “I don’t think I can do that, Harold. I don’t see the value in that type of exercise.”

Ouch. Probably not the best thing for Jared to say. Candy waited, watching Harold’s bowling ball-shaped face turn pink.

“I think there is value. And that’s all that matters. Don’t make me angry, Jared. We’re all about love here at Stratford Marketing.”

Jared’s jaw twitched. Candy pressed her lips together to prevent laughter from spilling out.

She didn’t think Jared was all about love. Jared was all about getting his job done and getting the hell out of the office, from what she could tell. He didn’t socialize with any of the staff, and he was downright cold to her.

There was a control, a raw edgy dominating control that flickered in his black eyes, and showed in his rigid stance every time she saw him.

It fascinated her.

And he was gorgeous.

It took a lot to draw Candy’s interest. Usually men were falling all over her, in a semi-idiotic tongue-wagging sort of way. Maybe that was the reason her eyes were drawn to Jared over and over again.

When he looked at her, she burned. Deep between her thighs where it mattered.

He always looked away with a flicker of disinterest. He never smiled.

Whereas she knew she tended to look like the wind had blown her into a room, Jared was impeccable in his black suit and merino-blue shirt and tie. His black hair never changed, but was short and smooth with a touch of product that flipped the front up half an inch.

Jared stared at Harold. “So you’re saying I have to do this?”

Harold, bless his confused and misguided heart, said firmly with lips pressed together, “That’s what I’m saying.”

Candy wasn’t looking forward to answering probing questions about past lives and intimacy issues either, but she was looking forward to three hours alone with Jared.

Surely in three hours she could make him smile.

Or groan.

Oh, my, where had that thought come from? Appalled at herself, she shifted in her chair and clenched her thighs together. There was enough energy between them to light up the Chicago skyline for three days and nights.

Or heat up Harold’s office for three hours.

“Fine.” Jared broke eye contact with Harold and leaned back in his chair, unbuttoning his suit jacket. His casual slouch belied the anger apparent on his face.

Candy smiled. “What a great idea, Harold. Jared and I are going to have so much fun getting to know each other.”

In more ways than one if she had any say in it.

Harold nodded. “I thought so too. Here.” He turned his laptop around to face them. “You’re all set to go. See you in three hours.”

“Okay.” She gave Harold a little finger wave as he headed for the door.

Harold paused. “Be nice to each other.”

“I’m always nice,” Jared said in a hard low voice that shivered over Candy.

Exactly how nice could she convince him to be?

Candy knew she should be ashamed of herself. But never, ever had she engaged in a casual affair. Nor had a man ever taken so much as one minute to think about satisfying her. They all looked at her and wanted. No one ever cared what she wanted.

Since the day Jared had walked into the office two months ago, she had been watching, wishing, imagining he would be different.

Jared was making her crazy, making her so achy and desperate that she was liable to start rubbing up against her desk at work if she didn’t find some kind of release soon. Would it be so wrong to indulge a little?

If she could break down Jared’s mysterious defenses, she would see he was like any other man, out to please himself, and the urgent need would dissipate. Then they could do the Chunky Chocolate ad, and she could get back to concentrating on something other than what his chest would look like bare.

“I’m nice too,” Candy reassured Harold as he gave them both a doubtful look.

Then the door closed and they were alone.

Jared did nothing. He sat in his chair without moving a muscle and stared out the window.

“Well, no sense in pouting, Jared.” She stood up and leaned over Harold’s desk, dragging the laptop towards her. “Let’s get started.”

If she were completely ignorant of her own sexuality, she would have no idea that her backside was in Jared’s face. But she was aware of her body, and knew very clearly that bending over meant she was showing a long display of leg. And that her behind with her skirt hugging tight over it was pushed slightly out towards him. She even knew to splay her palms on the desk, lock her elbows, and bend one knee to make the view all the more enticing.

Candy knew how to attract a man’s attention. She just didn’t know how to keep it focused on her once she had it. Jared, who displayed such iron-clad control, looked like he would never walk away from a woman until he knew she was satisfied. It would be a matter of pride for him, she suspected. And whoo-whee, was she ready to be satisfied. She wanted a reaction from him.

“Shit,” Jared said in a nasty angry whisper.

That was a start.

Candy grinned at the computer screen. “Hmmm? Did you say something?”

He spoke louder. “I said shit. I can’t believe I’m letting Harold get away with this.”

Candy read the title of the online course in front of her. “Rediscovering harmony. An intimate step-by-step guide for couples in jeopardy.”

Jared snorted.

“We have to type our names in.” She starting typing and felt Jared stand up and move beside her.

“You’re not really going to do this, are you?”

He filled her space, smothering her with a heady masculine scent of cologne and coffee.

“For my job, I can do Harold’s silly little counseling.” She flipped her hair out of her eyes. “I don’t have anything to hide, and it’s not like it means anything.”

“True.”

There seemed to be a world of meaning in that word and she shifted away from him, her cheeks burning. He was leaning over her to read the screen, his suit jacket brushing against her hip.

“Is Candy your real name?”

It was the first time Jared had ever expressed any interest in her, and she felt her confidence shake a little. Jared might just be too much for her to handle. But she’d never know unless she tried.

“Yes. It’s not short for Candace or anything.”

He made a noncommittal sound.

She typed Jared Kincaid into the spot for the partner’s name. “What’s your middle name?”

“Just skip it.”

Instead, she typed in Hoover, then smiled at him. “Am I close?”

“No.” He didn’t even pull a half-smile. “Let’s get on to the first question.”

Candy nodded. She was eager enough herself. To see exactly how far Jared would be willing to go.