Wondering what caught the editors’ eyes when judging the Harlequin Presents Writing Competition 2009? Here is the first chapter of “The Boss’s Intimate Takeover” by Gill Clegg, selected as the “Modern Heat” winner:

“The Boss’s Intimate Takeover” by Gill Clegg (as Jilly Aston)

Jumping out of a plane at three thousand feet seemed suddenly very appealing, though given Felicity Hayman’s aversion to anything much higher than a step-stool, that might just be overstating things a little.

But the pink furry elephant-suit? Oxford Street? Saturday? Oh, yeah. She’d settle for that one, alright.

She pasted a smile as the next guy in line puckered right up and leaned in towards her, planting a pair of lager-laced lips a little too firmly on hers: Carlsberg Special, circa, five minutes ago, and it really didn’t offer any comfort at all to realise she was becoming quite expert at this.

“Three minutes and COUNTING!” the DJ announced, preparing to fire up the umpteenth rendition of—what else?—Tom Jones’s ‘Kiss’. “So let’s stew in that queue and dig deep in those pockets. No pauses on causes, guys. We’re here to raise money tonight.”

That statement was met by a deafening outburst of roof-lifting whooping and whistling, not least from her four so-called friends at the front of the stage, and Fliss’s suspicion—no, make that belief—that the draw in the office had somehow been fixed shot straight into full-blown conviction. They were enjoying all this just a little too much, added to which their exhaustive poster-and-leaflet campaign – which, of course, they’d conveniently forgotten to even mention—had succeeded in pulling in something approaching half of the male population of London.

Mallory’s was packed—much more than it should have been on a damp and cold Thursday evening, and the minute she’d arrived to see all of those pink-and-white ‘Kiss-a-Fliss-athon’ banners strung from the walls and the ceiling, Fliss had known straightaway that those thirty short minutes were about to become the longest, most humiliating half-hour of her life.

Unless you counted getting ditched at the altar, of course. Compared to that, this was a stroll in the park.

Fliss felt the relief sweep right up from her toes as Doggy ‘Dog’ Benson—Kevin, in fact, but hey, a mere technicality – began the ten-second countdown. The lips passing by her streaked to a blur and all she could think was if Jenny was watching, she’d be laughing her socks off right now.

“The pouts are now OUT!” Dog screamed into the microphone, sounding the claxon to a clamour of boos and applause. Fliss looked at the guy who was standing in front of her, halted mid-pucker, stranded in limbo. He was pretty damned hot, she had to admit, but the rules were the rules, after all.

“Sorry,” she smiled with a shrug of her shoulders then felt her jaw drop as he gave her a wink, stripped off his shirt then fell to his knees at her feet. The whole place erupted, chanting her name as he tipped back his head and invitingly spread out his arms.

Fliss felt herself hesitate—she couldn’t refuse him, not really now, could she? It was, after all, in a very good cause. A great cause. The best cause.

“This one’s for you, Jen,” she said in a whisper, then held back a mane of shoulder-length blonde hair as she bent down towards him and gave him an out-of-time smacker.

So this was Felicity Hayman, newly-appointed features editor of Single magazine.

Ross Chamberlain half-smiled as he watched from the wings, thinking she wasn’t quite what he’d expected. Not that he’d actually given it much thought. He’d drawn his conclusions in ten seconds flat when he’d spotted her name in the files he’d commissioned on GM International’s staff: a spoilt little rich girl with all the connections—or, in her case, just one big connection. Playing at a career in the features department of an upbeat trendy magazine would just be as easy as falling off a log when you had Don Hayman as a father. A word in an ear, one two-minute phone-call – she wouldn’t have needed to even break sweat. And her promotion to editor at just age twenty-six after Jenny Rutherford’s untimely demise had only succeeded in proving his point.

He gave a brief nod as the guy she’d relented to tossed a fifty in the bright-pink collection bin then walked off the stage, his shirt slung over his shoulder. “Worth every penny,” he smiled and Ross returned it, minus the humour.

“You’re right,” he said, deliberately misunderstanding. “That cause deserves every penny it gets.”

His comment was met by a look that implied he’d just grown an extra two heads then the guy looked away, gave a shake of his head and strutted away without comment.

Ross clenched up his jaw. The two big ‘F’s’. Fundraising. Fun. That’s what tonight was supposed to be about.

He looked back at the stage as Miss Kiss-athon smiled and made her way over to the microphone. Fun, he thought – remember that? And just watching her move in that tight silver dress had him thinking about a few other things he’d chosen to cut from his life.

“Gentlemen,” she began, and that soft breathy voice, intensified and amplified by the power of the microphone, slithered its way down his spine. “Can I first of all thank you for being just that—perfect gentleman. First through to last.” She gave a wide grin, blushed just a little as a chorus of whistles exploded round the room.

“And second of all,” she continued, raising a hand in an attempt to silence the mayhem, “second and most important of all, can I please say thank you for coming along here and supporting us at Mallory’s tonight.”

Another explosion, another quick lift of her hand, and Ross found his eyes drawn straight to that movement, the way it hitched up her cleavage just a little. “And I’d like, if I may, to just take a moment to remember the reason we’re here. For a woman who can’t be. A woman who, despite all her strength and her courage, just couldn’t quite conquer the odds. Jenny Rutherford: my colleague, my mentor and, above all, my very dear friend.”

The catch in her voice was sudden and pronounced and the clamour died off into silence. Ross watched as she swallowed, stroked back her hair, and something inside him twisted a little. She looked so alone at the front of that stage; alone and exposed and touchingly vulnerable, and he cursed his stupidity at coming here tonight. He’d allowed curiosity to sway his judgement when that leaflet had been thrust into his hand and now—even worse—he was in danger of allowing sentiment to cloud it still further.

“This was her cause,” she continued with a show of composure that Ross could only admire. “A cause that she fought for, right to the end. A cause for which she literally raised thousands in the two years she battled this dreadful disease. A cause which we will continue to support, not only in memory of Jenny Rutherford but for all of those women for whom this charity, Breast Cancer Campaign, provides the hope that, through funding and research, we’ll one day be able to beat this.”

No cheering, no whistling; just steady applause that gained momentum and echoed its way round the room. She raised up her hands, clapped her acknowledgement high in mid-air then pressed her mouth close to the microphone. “And the pouts may be out,” she said, smiling across at the DJ, “but donating most definitely isn’t. So please, keep on filling those bins. Whatever you can. And thanks once again.”

She turned her head suddenly, straight round towards him, looking right there where he stood in the shadows off-stage. Ross felt himself tense. Even from there he could see her eyes widen and wondered if maybe she’d seen him; wondered if maybe she’d felt that same pull, that tight little tug in the pit of her stomach. She frowned for a moment, took a step closer then turned with a start as two guys from the line-up appeared either side of her, took both her hands and escorted her down off the stage. The cheering erupted and Ross’s lips tightened. Despite what he’d thought—what he’d hoped—in that moment, she wouldn’t be taking this route off the stage.

He watched her descent down those few narrow steps and into a crowd of cheering supporters. She didn’t look back, and that was just fine—why the hell should he care what Miss Kiss-a-thon looked like, felt like, smelt like, standing up close? Business was business: something that Ms Felicity Hayman would be finding out very, very soon.

He took out his wallet, peeled off some notes, signalled to Dog who was standing just feet away, fiddling with switches and slide-controls. Dog took off his headphones, strolled across to the wings, his eyes almost popping straight out of their sockets as Ross handed over a crisp wad of notes. “Wow,” he breathed. “That’s a whole lot of dosh there, my friend.”

“It’s a whole lot of cause,” Ross replied then turned from the stage as he made his way out through the wings.

Clearly that cocktail of lips she’d just tasted was having some kind of hallucinatory effect. Fliss could have sworn she’d just seen someone watching her—sensed someone watching her—off to the side of the stage.

Definitely male—extremely male, judging by that zing of awareness she’d felt when she’d turned her head and looked round to the wings. When she’d turned her head and seen—what, exactly?

Nothing at all; just a shift in the shadows. A vague impression of something magnetic; something that had made her heart race a little faster….

Fliss shook it away, fixed on a smile and battled her way across the dance-floor. Her self-imposed strategy of male-deprivation was obviously taking its toll, and with four would-be Cupids now geared-up and waiting, all of them waving at her frantically from their seats, that was a weakness she could ill afford to show.

She reached the table, pulled out her chair and braced herself for the onslaught. It took precisely eight seconds.

“That last one was hot,” Fran observed.

“With a capital ‘H’,” Gemma offered.

“And those biceps—” said Suzy.

“Those shoulders—” drooled Maxine.

Fliss picked up her glass to a meaningful silence as four pairs of eyes swivelled then fixed on her face. They were obviously expecting some kind of reaction, but right now her patience was teetering on a knife-edge. Their matchmaking efforts were starting to wear just a teensy bit thin, and this latest attempt had just about finished her off. She knew they all meant well—and heaven only knew that for Jenny she’d have done this a million times over—but if she had to endure the ‘It’s time to get back on the horse, Fliss’ speech just one more time….

“Whisky,” she said as she lifted the glass to her lips. “Neat. No ice. Definitely not my type.” She took a sip of her white wine spritzer while four puzzled faces swapped frowns round the table. “And anyway,” she shrugged, “he was obviously just so in love with himself, there wouldn’t be room for anyone else.”

Fran heaved out a groan, Suzy a sigh, while Gemma the drama queen—soon-to-be skydiver—threw up her hands, slid down in her seat and pointedly folded her arms. Fliss glanced towards Maxine: she was the hopeful one. Lucky, in some ways, considering she’d landed the London-to-Paris cycling fundraiser and her bottom hadn’t been in contact with a saddle since she’d crashed in a fence, aged ten-and-a-half.

“So-o-o,” Maxine ventured, apparently oblivious to the don’t-even-think-about-it- look Fliss had just fired at her, “were there any candidates? Definite, or otherwise?”

Her second-in-command in the features department looked positively desperate and depressingly optimistic and Fliss put down her glass with a show of restraint she was far from actually feeling. “’Fraid not,” she said with the tightest of smiles. “So all of your efforts in fixing that draw—” a collective gasp of shocked indignation echoed its way round the table “—have got you precisely nowhere. Again.”

“It wasn’t a fix!”

“Strictly legit!”

“How could we have?”

“Fliss—”

Fliss shot up her hands and four gaping mouths snapped shut in quick-fire succession. “Okay,” she said. “This all stops right here and now.”

Maxine looked crushed, Gemma incredulous while Suzy and Fran simply settled for studying the table. Fliss felt herself waver; these, above all, were her friends. Friends who’d stuck with her, right through the worst; cried with her, screamed with her, ranted and raved with her, ditched their bouquets and wrapped her in close as they’d fired up a chorus of ‘I Will Survive’ then marched her away down the aisle.

And they above anyone at Single magazine knew just what she’d lost when Jenny had died six weeks ago.

“First off, I love you,” she smiled, swallowing the lump that was suddenly clogging her throat. “And second,” she added to a loud sigh of ‘aah’s’, “I’ll get back on that horse when I’m good and ready and not a moment before. Which means,” she ploughed on as

Fran’s mouth shot open, “no more dinner-parties with—oops, I miscounted—one dishy and unattached male going spare. No more videos from internet dating-agencies mysteriously appearing on my desk. And definitely—definitely—no more speed-dating in the guise of, ‘Fancy a drink tonight, Fliss?’”

She looked round the table. They nodded in unison and Fliss gave a smile as she pushed back her chair. “Great,” she said. “So now that’s all settled, I’m off to the powder-room. See how my lips have stood up to the onslaught.”

“You look great,” Suzy grinned.

“Just gorgeous,” Fran gushed.

“And that dress,” Gemma breathed, sketching an exaggerated figure-of-eight in mid-air.

“You’ll have raised a truck-load,” Maxine assured her. “But don’t be too long, Fliss. Kev—sorry, ‘Dog’—is bound to be announcing it soon.”

Kev, in his real life, was Maxine’s cousin. It was all down to her that they’d landed the use of Mallory’s for tonight.

“Two ticks,” Fliss smiled as she picked up her bag. “And I’m calling it quits as soon as we get the grand total. It’s deadline-day tomorrow, remember, so all nice and early. Bright-eyed and bushy-tailed.”

“I’m always up early,” Fran groaned. “I’m in marathon training, remember?”

“Ditto for me,” Maxine sighed. “I’ll tame that bike if it’s the last thing I do.”

“Count me out,” Suzy snorted. “Don’t need any training to parade along Oxford Street dressed as a pink cuddly elephant.”

“Hey, Fliss,” Gemma called to her, tipping her eyebrows as Fliss turned back to the table. “You’ve got to admit, though. That last guy was hot.”

Fliss paused for a moment, gave it due thought then slowly nodded her head.

“Scorching,” she said then let out a groan as a chorus of cheering blasted its way round the table.

Well, ‘scorching’ just wasn’t in it.

Six-feet-plus of drop-dead-gorgeous propped up the wall in the brightly-lit corridor,  right by the door to the ladies’ powder-room. The sight of him there stopped Fliss dead in her tracks, just as she’d spun round the corner. If this was Mallory’s new take on security, maybe she ought to be considering a career-move.

That theory held sway for exactly three seconds, the time that it took to absorb this vision of Super-Male-Hunky-And-Loving-It: the cut of his suit—dark-blue perfection, the jacket drawn enticingly to one side by a long and drool-worthy masculine hand which was partially thrust into the tight front pocket of deliciously close-fitting trousers. The view that afforded, emphasising as it did some physical attributes that she really didn’t want to be dwelling on right then, had her eyes shooting down to a pair of crossed ankles and black leather shoes that whispered Designer Italian.

Hardly security-issue, Fliss decided, and was starting to wonder if maybe she might be hallucinating again when the mirage quite suddenly spoke.

Well, ‘spoke’ was maybe stretching it a bit. More of a mutter—a choice little curse, Fliss imagined, since it coincided with him glaring at the phone he was holding in his other and equally-drool-worthy hand.

Clearly, the guy needed help. Probably lost and attempting to call for assistance. The least she could do was to help him out in what was quite obviously his moment of need.

“I think you’ll find yours round the corner,” she said, indicating the corridor behind her. She started to smile then suddenly stopped when he spun his head round towards her.

That zing of awareness: the same one she’d felt when she’d sensed someone watching her off to the side of the stage.

Was this the same guy, the one that she thought she’d imagined? And, if it was, just what was his game here, skulking around like a perv in the shadows then hanging around by the ladies’ restroom? He didn’t look like a perv, she had to admit, but then you never could tell. He’d hardly walk round with a stamp on his forehead saying, ‘Hey, look out, I’m a weirdo’.

She was thinking of doing a quick about-turn when he suddenly smiled and flipped shut his phone. “I know which is which, Ms Hayman. The pictures on the doors are a bit of a giveaway.”

Great, Fliss thought. A perv with attitude; but all the same she couldn’t help noticing the way that smile was crinkling his eyes. Eyes that were looking straight into hers, the same intense and disturbingly dark blue as that phone-numbers-suit he was wearing.

And the voice hadn’t helped. Not one little bit. It fitted him perfectly, oozing with masculine promise….

“Fine,” she said, shifting her eyes to the floor. “I’ll leave you to it, then.” She was spinning around on her high silver heels when that voice made a grab for her pulse.

“Leave me to what, Ms Hayman?”

Fliss halted mid-spin, battling her heart-rate and wondering if he could possibly be serious. Did she really need to spell it out to him?

“Okay,” she said as she turned back towards him, a little put out that she’d let herself notice the way that black and thick wavy hair curled into the side of his neck. “Let’s put it this way. You might get your kicks hovering around ladies’ powder-rooms, but somehow it’s not quite my thing, so—”

Fliss broke off abruptly, belatedly registering, and looked across at him accusingly. “And you know my name,” she said, narrowing her eyes. “My surname, at least. Explain that away, Mr.—”

She flapped a hand briskly in mid-air then fought back the urge to connect it more firmly to his face. He was on the brink of laughing—at her: she could see it in every last beautiful inch of that heart-stopping masculine face.

“Ross Chamberlain,” he said as he took two steps closer and Fliss automatically took two steps back. “And please, don’t flatter yourself, Ms Hayman. I have no interest in you personally, unhealthy or otherwise. At least, not in a physical sense.”

His eyes drifted down the length of her dress—which, in fairness, didn’t take long. Its alarming degree of exposure was something she’d wrestled with long and hard in front of that changing-room mirror. In the end, the cause had won out. She’d bitten the bullet then cheerfully parted with a hefty chunk of a whole month’s salary just for the privilege of doing it.

And right now she felt acutely aware of every bit of that exposure as his eyes clearly registered a depth of approval that challenged his claim to a lack of physical interest.

“And I imagine,” he went on with the faintest of smiles, “that there isn’t a male in the whole of the building who isn’t aware of your name. It’s been plastered on leaflets dished out around London and announced here several times tonight.”

Fliss felt herself shrink. He was obviously right, and just why that hadn’t occurred to her before she couldn’t begin to imagine.

She looked across at him: arrogance, indulgence, and felt her hackles starting to rise.

“Fair enough,” she said to him, setting her shoulders and refusing to hoist the white flag.

“But that doesn’t explain—”

“My predilection for ladies’ toilets?”

Fliss blushed—bright crimson, which seemed to amuse him and that made her blush even more. “Believe me, Ms Hayman, if I wanted a woman I wouldn’t need to resort to importuning to get one.”

Now that I believe, Fliss thought with conviction. He’d probably be fighting them off with a stick. A cudgel. Whip-and-chair….

“Signal,” he said, flipping open his phone while Fliss attempted to shake off an image that had no right even being there. “I’m trying to get one. Without success.” His mouth hitched up at one corner; ditto, one dark shapely eyebrow. “Care to check?”

He held up the phone, gave a tilt of his head and Fliss gave a shrug of her shoulders. She strolled across to him, glanced casually at the phone, registered zero bars on the screen. “Okay,” she said with an audible sniff. “Looks like you’re safely off the hook.”

That was her first mistake—just breathing in. He smelt every bit as delicious as he looked.

“As long as you’re satisfied, Ms Hayman,” he said, closing the phone with a sharp little ‘snap’; and the touch of emphasis he’d just placed on ‘satisfied’ had Fliss’s mind spinning off in all kinds of totally-unrelated directions.

And that’s when she made her second mistake. A crucial mistake. The Big One.

She looked up from the phone straight into his face and felt like someone had just plugged her into the mains. Her breath seized right up—everything seized up, with the glaringly-obvious exception of her nipples which seemed to have developed a life of their own and were straining towards him with an eagerness so rampant it was bordering on the embarrassing.

Evidently, he’d noticed. She saw his eyes instantly darken, one heart-racing second before they fixed onto her mouth.

And clearly, Fliss thought, it was simply good manners to return that tempting little favour. “You weren’t in the queue,” she said softly, surprised by that sudden sharp rasp in her voice.

Sensual lips; beautiful lips; lips that were just crying out to be kissed. She watched as they parted, slowly, invitingly, and inched up her own just that teensy bit closer.

“I don’t queue for anything, Ms Hayman,” he murmured, edging his head in towards her. She felt his breath softly fanning her mouth as he stopped with his mouth just a whisper from hers. “I prefer the more personal approach.”

“So I see,” Fliss replied in the smallest of whispers then closed up her eyes to a rush of sensation as his lips softly touched onto hers. She felt the brush of his sleeve on her skin, the graze of his teeth as he opened up wider. Her hands flew instinctively to the front of his shirt, the hardness she felt there releasing a groan that she hadn’t a hope in hell of containing. It was simply too much; it had been far too long, and her hormones quite obviously were out to make up for lost time.

Just what Ross Chamberlain’s reasons might be, Fliss really had no way of knowing. All that she knew was she sensed something in him: a need just as desperate, as demanding as her own. In the way that that kiss had burned straight up to flammable in the space of a few blinding seconds; the way that his groin, now resting deliciously on the plane of her stomach, was clearly registering the kind of response that defied all the laws of time-span and gravity.

His self-restraint turned out to be almost as impressive. Just when it seemed they were reaching the point of no return, he pulled back his mouth along with his groin and gave her a tight aching smile. “Thank you, Miss Kiss-athon,” he said to her, his breathing now noticeably ragged. “And I’ve already made my donation, by the way. Before you decide I’m a cheat and a cheap-skate, as well as a stalker and a sex-pest.”

Fliss opened her mouth and nothing came out; her brain, it seemed, was in meltdown. Probably due to extreme-lust-overload, something it hadn’t had to deal with for a while. Eight long months, to be precise.

If ever, she thought, attempting to recover her lost power of speech. And certainly not in that kind of amount.

“Dinner,” he said without preamble. “Tomorrow night. Make sure you’re free.”

Definitely a statement—certainly not a question; in fact, it was more like an order, and much to her annoyance Fliss found herself doing her stunned-fish impression for the second time in less than a minute.

When something audible finally escaped, he was already turning the corner. “Don’t count on it,” she called in a belated attempt to exert a degree of authority.

It didn’t work. Not even for a second. He merely looked back at her, gave her an infuriatingly-smug little smile.

“But I already am, Ms Hayman. The table’s already booked.”

“Then you’d better un-book it,” Fliss answered, planting her hands on her hips. “Just because I kiss guys for charity, Mr. Chamberlain, doesn’t mean that I’m – ”

She paused abruptly, struggling to find an appropriate and inoffensive word. “Easy,” she finished and knew how it sounded the moment it shot from her mouth.

Lame and tame and cringingly out-dated. Something her mother would probably have said, though of course she had no way of knowing.

And hadn’t she just given him that very impression, losing herself in that blistering kiss?

“I’m sure you’re anything but easy,” he said in that annoyingly unflappable tone of his. “I’m sure there are times when you’re very, very difficult.”

Well, that was a back-handed compliment if ever she’d heard one—just who did this guy think he was?

“But, either way, I’ll be seeing you tomorrow, Ms Hayman. And that you really can count on.”

“Oh, can I? Really?” Fliss folded her arms, preparing to floor him with a dose of her legendary sarcasm. “So I take it you’re not just some ten-a-penny everyday sex-pest. You obviously possess the power of telepathy, seeing as you haven’t the remotest idea of where I’ll be and how you can contact me.”

It ran off his back like so much duck-water. “I’ll find you,” he said with a look    that left her in no doubt at all that right at that moment he meant it; and before Fliss could try to drag up an answer, he’d turned round the corner and vanished from sight.

She spun on her heels, slammed into the ladies’, threw down her bag and seethed at her reflection. High spots of colour burned in her cheeks; her nipples still strained through the front of her dress. And that dull little throb at the crux of her thighs did nothing to make her feel better.

Men, she thought. Why the hell do we bother?

She yanked her bag open, snatched out her lipstick, thinking Ross Chamberlain was without doubt the most arrogant, the most patronising, the most self-centred specimen of out-and-out maleness it had ever been her misfortune to meet.

And sexy, of course. With a body to die for. A body that had already hinted at things she really didn’t want to even think about.

Well, actually, she did – in graphic and technicolor detail, but that was really beside the point. She certainly wouldn’t be seeing him again – not in this lifetime. Unless he really was telepathic.

She swivelled the lipstick, began to apply it, attempted to argue a convincing defence as to why not seeing him would actually constitute a positive. She was almost on the verge of succeeding when something he’d said to her shot its way straight through her head.

Fliss pulled back her lipstick, frowned in the mirror. ‘I have no interest in you personally, unhealthy or otherwise. At least, not in a physical sense.’

She straightened up slowly, narrowed her eyes, gently put down the lipstick.

‘At least, not in a physical sense.’

Now what the hell had he meant by that?