Merry and Bright

CHRISTMAS WITH MR. WRONG . . .

“So you wanted me to be your Mr. Wrong,” he said. “To break your not-quite-two-year dry spell with some hot sex.” He arched his brow. “Were there any particulars? Special requests? Kinks?”

She sighed. “Do you have to be crude?”

“Oh, baby, if you think that’s crude, then we’re going to be in trouble when we get down to the doing.”

“I’m not doing! Not with you!” She covered her face. “I’m over it.”

He put a hand on either side of her hips. “But you wanted to. With me.”

“Could you shut up now?” she begged. “Please?”

“I’ve got a better idea.” His mouth nuzzled at her jaw and she attempted not to melt. “How about I keep my mouth busy with other things?”

The Novels of Jill Shalvis

Aussie Rules
Get a Clue
Out of This World
Smart and Sexy
Strong and Sexy
Superb and Sexy
Instant Attraction
Instant Gratification
Instant Temptation

Anthologies Featuring Jill

Bad Boys Southern Style
He’s the One
Merry and Bright

Merry and Bright

Jill Shalvis

KENSINGTON PUBLISHING CORP.
http://www.kensingtonbooks.com

All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

Table of Contents

CHRISTMAS WITH MR. WRONG . . .
Also by
Title Page
F
INDING
M
R
. R
IGHT

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10

B
AH
,
H
ANDSOME
!

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10

M
S
. H
UMBUG

1
2
3
4
5
6
7

Teaser chapter
Copyright Page

F
INDING
M
R
. R
IGHT

1

F
or two months, Maggie Bell walked past him every day on her way out of the office, and every day she took in that tall, leanly muscled body, those incredibly well-fitted Levi’s hanging low on his hips thanks to his tool belt, and forgot everything else just to take it all in.

Take
him
in.

As the guy in charge of earthquake retrofitting her office building, he usually carried a roll of architectural plans in one hand and a radio in his other as he dealt with his men, looking confident—not to mention smoking-hot—and every day she thought the same thing.

Yum
.

She actually knew him, at least vaguely. Not that he’d remember, but twelve years ago they’d gone to high school together for one semester. Back then, she’d been a bookworm and a true science geek, and little had changed. Jacob Wahler had been the basketball star, a tough kid, though kind enough to be the only guy on his team to ever bother to smile at her. Twice she’d helped him with his chemistry homework, and then there’d been that one time he’d asked her to shut the door—when she’d walked in on him in a dark classroom with his hands down the jeans of a cheerleader.

God, she’d hated high school.

Twelve years, and she’d not ever looked back, but she was looking now. Jacob had gotten a little taller, and had filled out that long rangy body, which now appeared to be rock hard and clearly honed from the physicality of his job. And then there was everything from the neck up, which packed just as much sexual heat as the rest of him. Dark hair curling just past his collar, even darker eyes, olive skin, and a quick smile capable of melting Greenland faster than global warming.

But no matter how gorgeous, she reminded herself that guys like him weren’t her fantasy, and never had been. She was a cerebral woman, and she went for cerebral men.

It was her thing.

Unfortunately her thing wasn’t working so well. Somehow her Mr. Right always turned into Mr. Wrong, but she had other issues to worry about, such as her job.

She was lead chemist at Data Tech, a company run by two brothers, scientists who together employed other scientists on the cutting edge of technology. Tim and Scott West funded individual projects and innovative inventions that they deemed impressive and viable.

She planned on being both impressive
and
viable. In light of that goal, she’d been working on a skin care technology that acted as a drug delivery for cancer prevention treatments and gene repair agents. The idea wasn’t new, it was actually in the preliminary experimental stages at many labs across the world, but no one had been consistently successful, not yet. She was close to it though, possibly within the next year or so—if Data Tech continued to fund her.

Tim and Scott had a lot to gain in her success, as they would claim the fame and fortune from it. Maggie didn’t care about that, what she cared about was revolutionizing the delivery of drugs to the bloodstream. Every time she thought about it and the possibilities—treating skin cancer, for example, a method which could have saved her own mother—she felt so hopeful about the future, about saving lives, that she could hardly stand it.

What this meant, what it had meant for two long years, was work, work, and more work, and little-tono social life—hence drooling after Jacob Wahler, aka Sexy Contractor Guy. Today alone she’d been in her lab since eight
A
.
M
.
, and as it was six
P
.
M
.
now, her eyes were a little blurry. She knew she needed to call it a day and go home to the empty condo she’d bought last year.

Unbelievably, here it was again, a week before Christmas and she’d scarcely noticed the festive decorations all around her, much less even pulled out her own boxed tree and Christmas stocking for Santa. And really, what could Santa possibly bring her anyway?

A man . . .

That thought came out of nowhere but it was true. She wanted a man for Christmas. She realized it was sexist and anti-feminist, and set women back decades but she didn’t care. She was a chemist, a woman with a brain who knew how to use it, and she was using it now to wish for a man.

Tonight she’d settle for a man-made orgasm . . .

Wow, she was more tired than she’d thought, and she slipped out of her lab coat, flipped off the lights in the lab, and headed into her connecting office. There she shut her laptop and slid it into her briefcase. She was going to go home, find her Christmas decorations, and get festive. Maybe sip some eggnog and try to figure out how to get un-alone. She walked out of her office and into the construction zone as she headed toward the elevators and told herself in the grand scheme of things, she was fine. Fine.

Fine.

Okay, that was a few too many fines, but she really was.

“Hey, Mags.” Scott West, boss number one, poked his head out of his office, having to peer around a ladder. He was very cute, which usually made her dizzy if she looked at him too long. He wore a white lab coat over his expensive Hugo Boss shirt and pants, looking like a very expensive Doogie Howser. He was a nice catch, and they’d gone out once several weeks back, and that had been really nice, too. But then he’d gone traveling, and she’d been buried in her lab testing and reporting on the results, and . . . and they’d not gotten together again.

“Did you get a look at the showroom today?” he asked.

The showroom was on the lobby floor, filled with all the inventions Data Tech had funded, like the rainmaker that harvested water from the air, a motorized pool lounger, a human exoskeleton that could carry heavy loads over long distances, snorkel radio gear, lightbulb sheets, and any of a hundred other wild and crazy things.

“There’s a new exhibit,” he told her. “Floating furniture made with matching sets of repelling magnets. The couch can support up to two thousand pounds, can you believe it? How cool is that, a floating couch?”

“Very,” she said, wondering who would want a floating couch.

He smiled. “I’m putting one in my office. They’re carrying it up now. Want to stick around and see?”

Was he gearing up to finally ask her out again? Unlike Jacob, Scott
was
her type. She knew this. He was cerebral, brilliant really, and extremely into science, which made him perfect.

“Hey.” This from boss number two, who poked his head out of
his
office, right next to his brother’s.

They were identical twins. Crazily competitive twins, with Tim into robotics and Scott into molecular bionics. They ran Data Tech as a legacy to their father, while each doing their damnedest to one up the other, at work, at play, in any way they could.

Tim tossed a glass vial to Maggie. Her latest formula, which she’d given him a few days ago. “It’s beautiful,” he told her. “But we’ve added a secret ingredient. Let us know what you think.”

She held the vial up to the light but didn’t see any change. “What is it?”

“Tim,” Scott said, suddenly looking unhappy. “I—”

“Just something to smooth the formula,” Tim said over Scott. “It’s a secret until you let us know if you like it.”

“I’ll try it out tonight.” She’d been running test groups on the drug delivery formula using Vitamin B3 and other essential oils as the drug of choice. So far, she’d been inconsistently successful, but she
would
get there.

“Tim.”
Scott sent his brother a long look. “I thought we—you know I wanted to . . .”

“Spit it out, bro.”

But Scott appeared to have lost his words, and just glanced at his brother.

“Lethologica,” Maggie said. “The state of not being able to find the word you want.” She patted Scott’s arm. “Don’t worry, it happens to me all the time, it’ll pass.”

Scott blinked and she smiled, but he didn’t return it. “I’ll test it for you,” he said instead, reaching for the vial. “No need for you to have to.”

“Oh, no, that’s okay. I don’t mind at all.”

“She doesn’t mind,” Tim said to Scott. “Let it go. ’Night, Maggie.”

Maggie looked at Scott, who clearly wasn’t going to ask her out now. “ ’Night.”

“Maggie.” Scott eyed the vial. “I really think—”

“ ’Night,”
Tim repeated, putting a hand over his twin’s face and pushing him back into his office. “Don’t have too much fun tonight, Maggie.”

Okay, they were acting strange. But who was she to judge? As for having fun, ha. After a lifetime of being the nerd, of going to Stanford three years ahead of her peers, of completing college before anyone her age had even begun, she’d gotten damn good at
not
having fun.

And wasn’t that just the problem.

Turning, she walked to the elevator. She could see Jacob and his crew at work, just down the hall. He stood on a ladder, pulling a hammer out of his tool belt, reaching far above him to a ceiling tile, that long, hard body all stretched taut . . .

The elevator dinged and she stepped into it, craning her neck, not to see all the pretty decorations, but to catch the last view of Jacob’s tush as the doors slid shut. Was Scott’s butt that cute? Since he always wore a white lab coat, she couldn’t say.