Heroine Miranda Johansson has had a very bad day. The strait-laced, ultraconservative
stock-market analyst in Chicago’s LaSalle Street financial district just lost
eighty-seven million dollars of her clients’ money in a massive stock-market
implosion. And if that weren’t bad
enough, she just had wild, no-holds-barred sex with a complete stranger on her
coffee break----and that complete stranger turns out to be her new boss! Can Miranda get control of herself without
losing her job, and her mind? Or will
her sexy new boss completely derail her self-discipline, her stock portfolio, and her career? (Not to mention the sudden intrusion of his
manipulative ex-girlfriend---a scheming, ruthless woman who controls half of
Wall Street.)
Will Miranda survive the ups and downs of her new love life,
which is just as volatile and unpredictable as the market? Or will her new romance go down the tubes
along with the economy? Only time will
tell.
Excerpt:
“Three double-espressos,
please,” Miranda barked at the purple-dreadlocked college student behind the
counter of her building’s lobby coffee shop. “With soy milk and a dash of
hazelnut syrup. And can you put all three double-espressos in the same big
cup, please? Just leave off the lid. I’ll drink it here.”
The purple-dreadlocked clerk didn’t
acknowledge Miranda’s order. He just stared at her.
Miranda rolled her eyes. She
didn’t have time for this. “Pardon me, but are you hard of
hearing?”
“No,” the glassy-eyed, purple-haired
clerk said after a long, awkward moment. “Sorry. I was just kind of
freaked out by your--face, that’s all.”
“My face? Are you
implying there’s something wrong with my face?” Miranda’s temper—short in
even the best of circumstances—let loose in full post-market-crash fury.
“Because if you are honestly going to stand there making comments about my face
when yourhair looks like something out of a Dr. Seuss book, then
you have really got a lot of nerve, buddy.”
Purple Dread Head’s mouth popped
open for a moment, then clapped shut with a click. Silently
he turned his back on Miranda and began frothing some milk for her espresso
order.
“That’s more like it,” she said
under her breath. “Lazy freaking hippie.”
Tossing petty insults at low-paid
service workers wasn’t exactly Miranda’s style----in fact, she’d put herself
through business school slinging lattes at this coffee chain’s main
competition----but losing eighty-seven million dollars’ worth of her clients’
money in one day wasn’t exactly her style, either. With that kind of bad news
weighing her down, Miranda figured she was entitled to blow her stack a little
bit. She stepped down to the end of the counter to await her order,
seething, and grinding her teeth in time to the espresso machine.
As she stood there, gathering up
about nineteen packets of sugar for what would probably be the most intense
shot of caffeine in her life, Miranda felt a sharp tap on her shoulder.
“I really think you owe the
Rastafarian behind the counter an apology, miss.”
Miranda whirled around. A tall
man stood just to her left, carrying an extra-large mug of hot chocolate
complete with about four inches worth of whipped cream on top. A tall, slim,
trim, well-dressed, and very attractive man. Dark hair in an immaculate,
well-combed cut. Ice-blue eyes. Jawline so angular and sharp it was probably
capable of shredding lettuce. Broad shoulders, square chest, dimpled
chin. A stop-your-heart-right-between-beats kind of tall, attractive man.
In other words ….
Drop. Dead. Gorgeous.
A drop-dead-gorgeous man who also
looked about two seconds shy of tossing his hot chocolate right into Miranda’s
face.
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