Bought for the Sicilian Billionaire's Bed

Bought for the Sicilian Billionaire's Bed
Sharon Kendrik

From cleaner to billionaire’s mistress!To get the hordes of predatory women off his back, billionaire Salvatore Cardini had made an impulsive proposition and asked his petite office cleaner to be his convenient mistress! Jessica had reluctantly agreed – who would say no to such an incredibly attractive and commanding man? But he was on the international rich list, with a glamorous lifestyle to match, while she was working two jobs just to survive.And Jessica hadn’t realised her role wasn’t just being on his arm in public – but his mistress in private, too!

DEAR READER LETTER

By Sharon Kendrick

Dear Reader (#ulink_3ea0dc64-ab96-53bd-96f0-0eaeb8a53c01),

One hundred. Doesn’t matter how many times I say it, I still can’t believe that’s how many books I’ve written. It’s a fabulous feeling but more fabulous still is the news that Mills & Boon are issuing every single one of my backlist as digital titles. Wow. I can’t wait to share all my stories with you - which are as vivid to me now as when I wrote them.

There’s BOUGHT FOR HER HUSBAND, with its outrageously macho Greek hero and A SCANDAL, A SECRET AND A BABY featuring a very sexy Tuscan. THE SHEIKH’S HEIR proved so popular with readers that it spent two weeks on the USA Today charts and…well, I could go on, but I’ll leave you to discover them for yourselves.

I remember the first line of my very first book: “So you’ve come to Australia looking for a husband?” Actually, the heroine had gone to Australia escape men, but guess what? She found a husband all the same! The man who inspired that book rang me up recently and when I told him I was beginning my 100

story and couldn’t decide what to write, he said, “Why don’t you go back to where it all started?”

So I did. And that’s how A ROYAL VOW OF CONVENIENCE was born. It opens in beautiful Queensland and moves to England and New York. It’s about a runaway princess and the enigmatic billionaire who is infuriated by her, yet who winds up rescuing her. But then, she goes and rescues him… Wouldn’t you know it?

I’ll end by saying how very grateful I am to have a career I love, and to thank each and every one of you who has supported me along the way. You really are very dear readers.

Love,

Sharon xxx

‘How would you like to accompany me to that dinner I was telling you about?’

‘You mean as your guest?’ she queried, her voice quivering on the brink of astonishment. ‘But there must be a million women you could ask!’

‘Oh, at least a million,’ he answered, with cool and mocking humour. ‘But none of them suitable and for all kinds of reasons.’

‘But won’t…?’ Jessica bit her lip. Wasn’t it more than a bit humiliating to have to ask the next question? ‘Won’t it be slightly unbelievable…someone like me going out with someone like you?’

‘Possibly,’ Salvatore conceded, his eyes flicking disparagingly over her bulky waterproof. ‘If you were dressed like that.’

‘Oddly enough, it didn’t occur to me to put on my best party dress for work,’ she said, hurt.

‘You mean you might have something suitable tucked away?’

‘Of course,’ she said proudly, and then a sudden, heady sense of her own power swept over her in a way it had never done before. ‘But I haven’t said I’ll go yet, sir.’

Fractionally, he leaned forward, his face closer, his voice soft. ‘But I think you will—won’t you, Jessica?’

He was so close that she could see the moonlight glinting in his sapphire eyes and sense his animal warmth, the tangy scent of soap and raw masculinity. This close, he was… Jessica felt her heart give an irregular skip. He was irresistible.

‘Yes, I’ll come,’ she said, and then stumbled out of the car before either of them could change their minds.

Mills & Boon are proud to present a thrilling digital collection of all Sharon Kendrick’s novels and novellas for us to celebrate the publication of her amazing and awesome 100th book! Sharon is known worldwide for her likeable, spirited heroines and her gorgeous, utterly masculine heroes.

SHARON KENDRICK once won a national writing competition, describing her ideal date: being flown to an exotic island by a gorgeous and powerful man. Little did she realise that she’d just wandered into her dream job! Today she writes for Mills & Boon, featuring her often stubborn but always to-die-for heroes and the women who bring them to their knees. She believes that the best books are those you never want to end. Just like life…

Bought for the Sicilian Billionaire’s Bed

by

Sharon Kendrick

www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)

To Janet, Barbara and Allen, with love.

Contents

Cover (#u8decdcce-3ef7-5891-ad32-132413612df5)Dear Reader (#ulink_398d34cb-4618-52c4-ac60-e461a1bff7f6)Excerpt (#ub4bde2fd-5326-52ce-a37c-da8bd55b7a94)About the Author (#u2f69f285-6aaa-5514-a854-7100f2b697fd)Title Page (#u3562a4d1-aa0b-5d97-a1a8-9ebcad4b4458)Dedication (#u349c118d-4002-5480-9b94-975dc130a85f)CHAPTER ONE (#ulink_28f2926b-a3bd-5bad-b727-7b62b6077813)CHAPTER TWO (#ulink_256dd245-dca5-573a-8895-532be936286b)CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_4fdac0d0-80fd-59d6-826d-ca75163f192b)CHAPTER FOUR (#ulink_b22b1d34-92e5-584a-abaa-55c672604556)CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER THIRTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER FOURTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)CHAPTER FIFTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo)Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)

CHAPTER ONE (#ulink_3ea0dc64-ab96-53bd-96f0-0eaeb8a53c01)

‘MADONNA MIA!’

The words sounded as bitter as Sicilian lemons and as rich as its wine, but Jessica didn’t lift her head from her task. There was a whole floor to wash and the executive cloakroom still to clean before she could go home. And besides, looking at Salvatore was distracting. She swirled her mop over the floor. Much too distracting.

‘What is it with these women?’ Salvatore demanded heatedly, and his eyes narrowed when he saw he was getting no response from the shadowy figure in the corner. ‘Jessica?’

The question cracked out as sharply as if he had shot it from a gun—taut and harsh and unconditional—and Jessica raised her head to look at the man who had fired it at her, steeling herself against his undeniable attraction, though that was easier said than done.

Even she, with her scant experience of the opposite sex, recognised that men like this were few and far between, something which might account for his arrogance and his famous short temper. Salvatore Cardini— the figurehead of the powerful Cardini family. Dashing, dominant and the darling of just about every woman in London, if the gossip in the staff-room was to be believed.

‘Yes, sir?’ she said calmly, though it wasn’t easy when he had fixed her within the powerful and intimidating spotlight of his eyes.

‘Didn’t you realise I was talking to you?’

Jessica put her mop into the bucket of suds and swallowed. ‘Er, actually, no, I didn’t. I thought you were talking to yourself.’

He glowered at her. ‘I do not,’ he said icily, in his accented yet flawless English, ‘make a habit of talking to myself. I was expressing my anger—and if you had any degree of insight then you might have recognised that.’

And the subtext to that, Jessica supposed, was that if she possessed the kind of insight he was talking about, then she wouldn’t be doing such a lowly job as cleaning the floor of his office.

But in the past months since the influential owner of Cardini Industries had flown in from his native Sicily, Jessica had wisely learnt to adapt to the great man’s quirks of character. If Signor Cardini wished to talk to her, then she would let him talk away to his heart’s content. The floor would always get finished when he left for the night. You ignored the head of such a successful company at your peril!

‘I’m sorry, sir,’ Jessica said serenely. ‘Is there something I can help with?’

‘I doubt it.’ Moodily, Salvatore surveyed the computer screen. ‘I am invited to a business dinner tomorrow night.’

‘That’s nice.’

Turning his dark head away from the screen, he threw her a cool stare. ‘No, it is not nice,’ he mocked. ‘Why do you English always describe things as nice? It is necessary. It makes good business sense to socialise with these people.’

Jessica looked at him a little helplessly. ‘Then I’m afraid I don’t really see what the problem is.’