Whatever It Takes

By Luna Blue

Amber, a young barista, wants nothing more in life than to open her own coffee shop. The only problem is that it takes a lot of money—money she doesn’t have. Worse, she’s in the midst of a sexual drought and the only man expressing any interest in her is Jamie, her boss, a man she absolutely despises.

And a man who has money—the kind that will allow her to pursue her dream. The only catch: she has to sleep with him.

How much will she give to bring her dream to life? And when love is in the air and her heart leads her elsewhere, how hard will it be to break free of the man who buys her soul?

Whatever It Takes is a 22,000-word novella and was originally published as part of the Hot Roast Romance And Coffee Confessions anthology.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Deep Desires Press
• Release date: Aug 28, 2018
• ISBN: 9780463851197

Luna Blue

Luna Blue lives in Sydney, Australia, and is a full-time writer. Her life in Newtown is shared with a potentially lethal amounts of coffee, her boyfriend and their pet pantha, Buffy, who may, or may not be real. She is a regular relationship and dating advice columnist for a leading Australian Magazine and a radio show host. She is now an ex-journalist because writing romance is far more interesting than reporting the news. A Philosophy major from Sydney University is her favourite accolade. She is a feminist, lover of haute couture and all things sparkly. After the Bronze is her first novella. Follow Luna on twitter at @lunablueauthor, facebook @lunablueauthor and Instagram lunablueauthor and join her blog at www.lunablueauthor.com

Book preview

Contents

Title Page

Copyright

Whatever it Takes

Prologue

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

About Luna Blue

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Whatever It Takes

Luna Blue

Copyright © 2018 by Luna Blue

Cover design copyright © 2018 by Story Perfect Dreamscape

All characters are age 18 and over.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, business, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblances to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

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Prologue

I think Jamie is the most boring man on the planet. He might be the most boring man on other planets too, but I haven’t left Earth so I can’t really attest to how they gauge their level of boring. He would be up there though. Jamie. Even his name is boring. I always hated that name, but then I read the Diana Gabaldon series about a sexy and adventurous Highlander called Jamie Fraser. I fell in love with that Jamie, but remain stoic in my intense dislike for this Jamie.

He is so boring, even the seemingly endless pools of cash and bank accounts he has doesn’t make him interesting. And that’s saying something. I’m a woman, it’s in our DNA to love money. Having money should make Jamie desirable, but it doesn’t.

I think he is the most boring man on the planet with money. A lot of money. Sometimes having money can make a person more interesting but not in Jamie’s case. He might be too short to ever be interesting.

I’m sure Jamie has interests outside of his business of owning a ridiculous number of cafés here in Canberra, Australia, but I just can’t care enough about him to find out what they might be. I would assume they would be cars, maybe golf, probably hookers. I assume these things because the little I know about millionaires, I know they like these three things. And I know this because I have seen movies with millionaires in them.

Boring Jamie is my boss. I love my job but I give my boss a wide berth, which is hard because sometimes we work in small spaces together. Not all the time, but when they are stationed together in one of the many cafés he owns, it can get a bit uncomfortable, partly because my boobs take up a fair bit of room and partly because Jamie likes to stand within the range of my personal space. And my big boobs.

My name is Amber Hutley, I’m twenty-five years old and I’m pretty sure my millionaire boss is in love with me. Well, I know he is. He’s offered me an almost obscene amount of money to have sex with him.

Oh, and I have a weird phobia of serial killers.

Part One

Oh, God, it’s been way too long since I’ve had sex. Way, way too long. It’s been years. I think there are cobwebs between my legs. So embarrassing.

My sexual drought could be because I’m a smoker. But I don’t smoke in public. So, I doubt it’s that. The fact it’s winter in Canberra and I’m forced to hide behind coats and thick trousers doesn’t help either. Not that I really go out in skimpy outfits, I’m not sixteen. But I’m getting desperate enough to consider it. Winter notwithstanding.

Canberra is being its persistent self, brutal in the winter. And its cranky residents are in the thick of it, angry at the world because Australia isn’t supposed to be cold. It’s the sunburnt land of beaches, but Canberra isn’t a coastal town. There are no salty breezes, no squeaky sand underfoot and absolutely no surfer dudes with tanned skin and blond, sea-tossed hair. On the plus side there are no shark attacks, unless you count the agendas of some of the political residents. Yep, Canberra is a place of extremes, either too hot or too cold or too busy with the rubbish of politicians.

The cold is keeping me from meeting anyone I am vaguely interested in having sex with. That’s my excuse anyway. Truthfully, I’m too busy working in Jamie’s plethora of cafés and obsessing about how I can get enough money to buy one of my own. I think I need about forty-five thousand dollars. Give or take. So far, I have saved two hundred. I need to cut back on the shoe shopping.

Sexual drought aside, I’m not desperate enough to have sex with Jamie. Shit, I need to find someone soon or … the thought is smashed out of my brain before I go to a scary visual place of having sex with a short, boring man, who reminds me of a frilled neck lizard. Sometimes when he speaks at me he licks his bottom lip and his tongue flicks in and out like a lizard. It would be better if he was more lizard than man. At least he would disappear over the winter months and I wouldn’t have to associate with him.

I’ve heard rumors of kangaroos freezing to death in Canberra winters. Maybe lizards do too. Sometimes I wonder if I should learn how to knit so I can make jumpers for the kangaroos, but getting them dressed would probably prove to be a bigger problem that the actual knitting. So, I try not to think about the national emblem dying of cold. Plus, it takes all of my effort to keep myself alive in the winter months, let alone a wild animal who could knock me out with one punch or leap.

Marsupials are important in my family. My Mum is exactly like a wombat except she walks on her hind legs and her fur is isolated to a messy crop of grey curls on the top of her slightly square head. Her wombat-like appearance makes her an expert on all things native animals, and she insists the wintery tenures in Canberra doesn’t mean kangaroos are freezing to death.

They’re native animals, she says, her little wombat mouth waggling like an angry midget. They’d just move away if they were cold. Animals don’t freeze to death unless it’s an ice age or something. Wombat Mum doesn’t live in Canberra so she has no comprehension of the fact that Canberra does experience an ice age. Every. Single. Year.

I stretch deeply into my Egyptian cotton sheets, trying to ignore the pull of need emanating from between my thighs. I’m going to have to get some sex soon. The Sunday morning