Jennie

Mom: Jennie you must call me immediately.

Mom: I need to speak with you about this unfortunate situation.

Mom: Kerrigan Mortimer is shopping for a third wife. A wedding would be just the thing to distract everyone from your misstep, don't you think?

Mom: I'll never be able to show my face at the club again. Crystal Fordham had the audacity to ask what rehab facility I'll be sending you to. Call me!

Leaving the happy chaos of the lab behind me, I ducked into a storage room for a moment of quiet.

It was a habit I'd developed years ago. Sometimes things in my life were so big, so thrilling, that I needed a few minutes to take it in. To say a thank you to the universe. And to feel really damn proud of myself. Then I would compartmentalize it and neatly dive back into the next thousand details requiring my attention.

I blew my nose into the tissue I'd snuck out of the box by the door. It wouldn't do for my team to see the Jennie Kim tearing up over, well, anything.

We'd done it. The formulas would need to be refined and tested further. But this was a win. I was already thinking of price points and how to keep these little magical marvels affordable. Everyone deserved the chance to heal their scars. I didn't want this to end up as some high-end plastic surgery upgrade only available with the right bank account balance.

Money was a physical presence in my life. But sometimes, the hunger others had for it overwhelmed me. There would be a fight. A low-cost scar treatment didn't exactly fit with the rest of our high-end products. But I was confident we could find a way around it. Perhaps a more budget-conscious brand with a new line of products?

I laughed softly to myself.

My vision for the company had been evolving for quite some time. And in quiet moments like this, I worried that I would lose the ability to fight for that vision once I had shareholders to answer to.

"Suck it up, Kim," I whispered out loud. I would meet whatever challenges came my way just as I always had.

The walls of this room were crammed full of wire racks with equipment and the accessories of scientific study. Every test tube, every dry erase board, every pipette was mine. And I was going to use them well. This was just the beginning of the advancements possible. I wanted to make sure that Flawless was on the front lines of development.

There was so much more to do.

"Jennie?"

The door opened behind me, and I quickly swiped the tissue under my eyes.

For one whole minute, I forgot all about the mess that required Lisa Manoban's presence in my life.

"Just doing a quick inventory," I said without turning around. "I'll be out in a minute." A brisk brush-off that anyone tuned to human nature would read to mean "Leave, now."

She closed the door, but I could still sense her in the room with me. My acute awareness of her presence was yet another annoyance.

I felt hands on my shoulders, and then she was turning me to face her. Manhandling was something I did not tolerate. But rather than kicking her in the spectacular junk, I studied the tips of my shoes.

I was puttering around a lab in open-toed stilettos. I was an embarrassment to scientists everywhere.

"Jennie," she said again, nudging my chin up with an arrogant thumb.

I met her gaze with hostility. I hated being anything in the neighborhood of vulnerable. And being vulnerable in front of a someone I'd known for less than twenty-four hours? Well, that was unheard of. An impossibility. A rogue data point that would be ruthlessly stripped of significance.

"What? Why are you here?" My voice was cool, clipped.

"That was fucking amazing. You dazzle me," she said, running her hands down the sleeves of my lab coat.

I felt my eyebrows wing up. Uh-oh. "I beg your pardon?" I said stiffly.

"I'm going to cross a professional line here," she warned me. "It's your fault because that in there was like witnessing a miracle."

"Cross a professional line? You?" I scoffed, more nervous than I cared to admit. I'd handled unwanted advances with a frosty efficiency before. But this felt… different. "Are you breaking into my house and taking a bath again?"

"No. I'm going to kiss you right here in this science closet."

"It's a storage room, not a science closet. And no. You're not," I said, hands flying to her chest. There went my frosty efficiency.

"Afraid I am. And I'd apologize, but we both know I'm not going to really be sorry."

She was leaning in. My body, already revved from scientific achievement, happily threw itself into overdrive. Her chest, firm and toned, pressed into my palms, testing my resistance.

"I don't know you," I said quietly as her mouth moved closer. I didn't kiss strangers. Certainly not strangers who trespassed and stole. God, what would she take from me?

My heart beat out a tempo loud enough that I was sure she could hear it.

"I'm starting to know you, and I quite like it," she countered.

I was wearing a lab coat with my "librarian bun" as Alison liked to call it, and the sexiest person I'd ever laid eyes on was putting the moves on me. My brain scrambled to rationalize.

She's using you.

She wants something from you.

She'll hurt you.

She's not right for you.

"You can slap me after, I promise," she said just before her lips brushed mine.

Oh, those lips. Firm, demanding, insistent.

Biology took over. And not the knee-jerk self-defense kind. It was an instant chemical reaction.

"Dazzled," she whispered the word again, her mouth moving over mine. And then it was me who was dazzled.

I heard the thrum of my blood as it pumped through my veins. I tried to stay still. To be impassive. I couldn't allow her to think that it was acceptable to kiss me like this.

But, oh, it was.

Even my stomach stopped the acrobatic act it had been performing for the last hour and went warm and liquid.

I gripped her by the lapels of her coat and kissed her back as if there was nothing else in the world I'd rather be doing. As if there were no demands waiting for me outside that door. No family responsibilities. No concerns over perception or next steps.

I kissed her as if this moment was the only one that mattered.

Lisa's body pressed against mine was the only sensation I had to concern myself with.

Sorry, Mom. I'm too busy being seduced to worry about image and reputation.

She was lean and rangy. Made to wear fine suits and slim ties. Her height was lovely. Most people I dated were eye-to-eye with me when I was in heels. But Lisa had inches to spare.

Our tongues twined in an instinctive dance, and my senses were full of her.

Wrestling control back, she kissed me thoroughly, hungrily. Tongues mating, lips bruising. My breath was her. Her hands slipped inside my jacket and coasted over waist and hips.

"We need to stop," I said, kissing her with a desperation that was quite frankly terrifying.

"Absolutely. It's vital that we stop kissing immediately." Her tongue danced back into my mouth.

Oh, God. she was hard. Her erection pressed against my belly. I'd seen her naked already. And now I was feeling her. Was this a planned seduction? Some master plot designed to coax me into letting my guard down?

If it was, it was working quickly. Less than twenty-four hours, and I was allowing her to kiss me. Hell, I was forcing her to kiss me.

What would the board say if they could see us wrapped around each other? Lisa one day into her babysitting job. Me two days off a company-derailing scandal. If I was this hard up for physical contact, I could have Nayeon or Chaeyoung hook me up with an acceptable one-night stand. I could not pursue a physical relationship with my fixer.

As if sensing my mental gymnastics, Lisa pulled back and cupped my face in her hand. She brushed her thumb over my swollen, half-devoured lips. "You're incredible," she whispered.

My head moved in a half nod, half shake.

"We can't do this again," I told her. "Your advances are officially unwelcome."

"Yes, that's the message I got loud and clear," she said lightly. Her thumb skimmed under my lip, and she looked at me almost fondly.

"Get that look off your face immediately," I commanded.

She grinned and my knees nearly went out from under me. A smiling Lisa Manoban was dangerous, a weapon of mass destruction.

"I'm serious, Manoban. This isn't happening. We aren't happening."

"Not until you're ready," she promised.

--

"You look like you just got ravaged in a closet, boss," Alison said, eyeing us in the rear-view mirror when Lisa and I climbed in the back seat of the Range Rover.

I shot Lisa a frosty glare. She grinned devilishly.

"Jennie was on the receiving end of several hugs from her study's subjects," Lisa said smoothly. She tugged the tie out of my hair, and as I shoved her hand away, I wondered if I was imagining the possessiveness in that move.

One mistake of a kiss did not entitle anyone to any further physical contact.

"Must have gotten a few victory kisses, too," Alison mused.

Grumbling under my breath, I pulled out my lipstick and compact to right the damage that one steroidal pheromoned Lisa Manoban delivered.

It was four o'clock in the afternoon, and I'd faced the media, delivered an award, confirmed a significant scientific achievement, and been kissed senseless in a storage room.

For the first time in my adult life, I felt like calling it an early day and going home to hide in my bedroom.