Love Against Odds Volume One (Love Agaist Odds Book 10) Read online

  Love Against Odds

  Mandy Harbin

  Mandolin Park

  Contents

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Book One

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Book Two

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Also by Mandy Harbin

  About the Author

  Love Against Odds: Volume One

  ISBN: 978-1-941467-18-3

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  Copyright © 2015 Mandy Harbin

  Cover Art by Mayhem Cover Creations / JTLW Design

  This book may not be reproduced or used in whole or in part by any existing means without written permission from Mandy Harbin, M.W. Muse, Penning Princess Publishing, or Mandolin Park, LLC.

  This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. The characters are products of the author's imagination and used fictitiously.

  All rights reserved.

  To my sisters.

  1

  “Get your ass in gear, girl, we’re gonna be late!” Sasha yelled as Cassie was trying to pour a cup of coffee before rushing to the meeting that was suddenly called.

  Why was Richard throwing everybody into a tizzy first thing on a Monday morning? Cassie overslept, didn’t get her jog in and now was being hustled into a staff meeting. Oh she’d be getting her java first. Richard could kiss it.

  “I’m coming,” Cassie grumbled, stirring in the creamer as she grabbed her laptop. “What’s this about anyway?”

  Sasha ran her free hand through her jet-black hair as she juggled her laptop in the other. She was a free spirit, danced to her own tune, which included chopping her hair into a spiky mess and dyeing it, though it suited her spunky persona. “No clue. But I have better things to do than sit in a meeting.”

  “You and me both,” Cassie mumbled as they entered the conference room and took their seats.

  “Glad you could join us,” Richard said as he pulled down the projection screen for what was probably a video conference. Great. So this wasn’t going to be just a staff meeting.

  “What’s this about?” Sasha asked while she and Cassie logged on to their laptops through the wireless connection in the building.

  “You know the application we built for that home security company? Well, the west coast office got a contract to build something similar for a major security company out there. Corporate doesn’t want them to reinvent the wheel.” He turned to Cassie. “Since you were lead on that project, Tucker, you’ll be working with the software development leader in that office to modify the existing application to fit the needs of their client.”

  Cassie stared at Richard, speechless. The person Richard was talking about was Ian—

  “Cope is an efficient leader and will do a fine job on this project,” Richard continued, interrupting her thoughts.

  Cassie’s company-wide IM popped up on her laptop.

  Ian Cope is hot as hell! I can’t believe you get to work with the west coast hottie.

  Apparently, Sasha couldn’t wait for the meeting to end before voicing her opinion.

  Cassie glanced over at Sasha, but she was covertly arranging her notebook, not looking at Cassie.

  “This is Mac. You got us, Richard?” Carl “Mac” Mackenzie asked as he appeared on the screen. He was VP in charge of the west coast office. Cassie didn’t care for him much, but she didn’t have to deal with him regularly either.

  “Yes, Mac. I’ll let you drive this meeting.”

  “Great, thanks. Hi, everyone. Sorry we’re just now getting online. I know all of you are busy, but I need to discuss some preliminaries before getting to the heart of the matter.”

  Mac droned on about quarterly reports while Cassie sipped her coffee and cocked an eyebrow up at Sasha, who was typing.

  Who the hell cares about financial statements? It’s not like he’s addressing corporate.

  You know how Mac is, Sasha. I’m just glad we don’t work under him, Cassie responded.

  Looks like you could be working under Ian Cope. I can think of a lot worse places to be. She threw on a smiley face at the end of her IM.

  Wasn’t that the truth? Ian Cope was the epitome of masculine yum-yum. With his unruly curly brown hair and light-brown eyes the color of expensive whiskey, he had an attitude just as smooth and intoxicating as the liquor he personified.

  Tell me about it, girlfriend. He’s a hunk and a half.

  At least Cassie didn’t have to work with him in person. She hadn’t gotten laid in over a year and didn’t know how well she’d be able to control herself around such a gorgeous man. The last boyfriend she’d had couldn’t deal with her success, but something told her Ian was a very secure man. He was successful too, but he seemed the type to not let money get in the way of what he wanted. Of course she didn’t know this for sure, and if she was smart, she would never know. She needed to keep her interaction with him strictly professional. She sat back and sipped her coffee, figuring she should focus on the meeting.

  “Cassandra Tucker.”

  Cassie’s head shot up. She coughed, trying not to spit out the brew. Oh shit. They were talking about her.

  All heads turned in her direction as she gently placed her cup on the table beside her laptop, dabbing her mouth, and prepared to fake her way through this so as not to embarrass herself further.

  Shame on you. Got caught not paying attention.

  Cassie read the IM, automatically thinking it was from Sasha. Why would she try to distract her when she should know Cassie needed her wits about her?

  It was from Ian, not Sasha.

  Double oh shit!

  “I think I can take it from here, Mac,” Ian volunteered. “As Mac was saying…” He hesitated, throwing a pointed look in Cassie’s direction. “We need a prototype built for our client by the tenth of this month. That’s next week. I’ll be working with Tucker to get it built. It’ll be our top priority until it’s completed.”

  “Is this going to cause any problems with your other projects?” Richard asked her.

  Cassie straightened in her chair, thankful for Ian’s save. “No. I’m finalizing the other large project I’m working on, which is ahead of schedule.” She cleared her throat. “Sasha Jones was lead developer on the original build of this application. We could use her team to make the necessary modifications.”

  “No dice,” Mac said suddenly. All eyes turned to him at his outburst. “Cope already has a team in place who’s met with our client. They know their needs, and it’ll just waste time bringing her team up to speed on the new requirements.”

  That is bullshit! Sasha messaged to Cassie.

  Cassie gave her a sympathetic look. She was right, but from the firm set of Mac’s face, it was apparent there’d be no discussion on the matter. Cassie had to tamp down her own irritation.

  “Okay, I’ll get with Ian Cope this afternoon to get started. If he’s available.”

  “How about two?” he asked.

  “Works for me.” Cassie didn’t look at him, her mind reeling over the implications of this.

  “Good. That’s all. We’ll to
uch base later on the status,” Mac said and disconnected the call after a few courtesy goodbyes.

  Cassie stared at Richard because Sasha looked as if she were about to blow a gasket, and Cassie wasn’t that far behind either. “What the hell’s going on? Why is Mac acting holier than thou, not letting Sasha’s team in on this?”

  Richard raised his hands in a placating gesture. “Don’t take it out on me. I have no idea why they don’t want to use her team.” He looked at Sasha and shrugged.

  “Well, it seems to me if they didn’t want to reinvent the wheel, then they’d use the same developers who coded the application,” Sasha spat.

  Cassie shook her head and sighed, reining in her anger. “Sasha, everything is in the data library. They can pull the work that was done and use it. I have a feeling they’ve already done that.”

  Richard’s cheeks tinged red and he looked down. It was evident that was exactly what had happened.

  “Oh my God! Why didn’t you give us a heads-up?” Sasha demanded.

  “It was out of my hands.” He sounded defeated, so there really was no reason in berating him over this.

  “C’mon, Sasha. You can help me go over the coding, so at least I’m prepared for my meeting this afternoon.”

  Cassie grabbed Sasha’s arm and hauled her out of the conference room and to her cubicle.

  “This is such bullshit!” Sasha whispered as she put her laptop on her docking station and booted it back up.

  “I know. But I need you to focus. I’ve already been caught sitting down on the job.”

  “Oh please. No one knew you were distracted, chatting with me during the meeting.” Sasha waved her hand dismissively.

  “Not true. Ian sent me an IM. He wanted it known that he, at least, caught me, so now I have to make sure I do a really great job on this.”

  Sasha’s eyes got wide, then narrowed. “You tell that hunk of man to kiss your ass. I don’t care how sexy he is. Don’t let him bully you on this project.”

  “Oh I won’t, but since Weiner threw me to the wolves wrapped in raw meat, I want to make sure I’m prepared for my next encounter.”

  Sasha chuckled. “Now why in the hell does Richard Weiner call everyone by their last names when he was cursed with the one he got? I mean, really? Dick Weiner? I’d cut my dad’s pecker off in his sleep if he named me that!”

  Cassie laughed with Sasha, and it eased the tension of the morning. Now Cassie had to focus. She had a new project, and she damn sure was going to do a good job.

  Ian Cope was finally getting what he’d wished for—a chance to work with Cassie Tucker. When Mac had told him they’d be pulling her in on this project, Ian had covered his excitement. He’d had a thing for her for the past two years, waiting for the right opportunity to work with her while dropping subtle hints to his boss whenever an opportunity presented itself. Mac had finally listened, but she didn’t seem too thrilled to be working on this project for some reason. Her disgruntled face as the conference call ended was a blow to the ol’ ego, but Ian could work with that. He just had to play this very carefully.

  “Come with me to my office, Cope,” Mac said.

  Ian nodded as he gathered his laptop and meeting book, then followed his boss.

  “What’s up?”

  “Shut the door and take a seat.”

  Ian suppressed a sigh. He had work to do, and that included figuring out how to woo his new coworker. But he followed the orders and waited for Mac to speak his mind.

  “There’s a reason why we’ve pulled the south regional office in on this project.”

  “Yeah, I know they’ve already built a similar project and I’ve already started looking at it. It’s really close to what we need for our new client.”

  “Cope, the game is changing. Corporate wants us to make a move into the security industry. If we can generalize this software and promote it to that sector, we could push our company to the forefront of our competitors and corner the market.”

  “And you want to do this with the application they’ve already built.”

  Mac chuckled. “Not exactly. See, I know you could’ve built a customizable application that’d fit our client’s needs and the bigwigs’ desire to initiate their strategy. The deal is that they also want to cut costs. We are looking at closing the south regional office.”

  Ian stared at Mac, not sure what to say. Why would corporate want to do that?

  “Someone has to go. We just got that major contract, so we’re in the clear. That office is the smartest choice to be cut. The fact this project came up gave us an in.”

  Ian felt his blood boiling. “An in to what?” he asked through his teeth.

  “I need you to prepare a consolidation plan on their outstanding projects, showing how their work can be absorbed by other associates within the company at other locations. Cassandra Tucker is high enough up in the company that you should be able to get all the information you need from her under the guise of this project.”

  Ian shot to his feet. “You want me to deceive her?” he asked incredulously.

  Mac’s face turned venomous. “Well, now. You’ve been champing at the bit to work with little Miss Tucker. So here’s your chance. Get to know her. Get to know everything about that office. And do it without her finding out why. As of now, she’s already out of a job. Don’t lose yours too.”

  Cassie ate lunch at her desk so she could read over the coding on the application her office had built for the local home security company in preparation for her meeting with Ian. She hardly ate, though. She dug herself into her work because she wanted to make a good impression. She’d never worked with him in the past, so she felt as if she had something to prove. Her track record was impeccable, but it wasn’t as if she could pull out all her old projects and gloat about what she was capable of. She had to show him on this project.

  But why did her thoughts wander to inappropriate things? Things like how his touch would feel when he caressed her cheek with his barely calloused hands. He wouldn’t have rough hands since he didn’t do manual labor, but they wouldn’t be really soft either. He was the type of man who didn’t mind getting his hands dirty doing his own work around the house. And because his hands would show signs of work, so would his chest, his biceps. He’d be able to hold her down, keep her still while she tried to writhe as her orgasm built from him licking her pussy.

  Cassie felt flush just thinking about what he could do with his tongue, hands, body. God, she needed to get laid something fierce! She was a professional, for crying out loud.

  Her company cell phone buzzed, startling her with the signal she had a new text message.

  Stuck in another meeting. Need to push ours back thirty minutes.

  Ian. If he only knew what she’d been thinking about. Her heart raced, which was silly. It wasn’t as if he were some guy sending her a personal text. This was business. She should use that extra half-hour reprieve to screw her head back on straight.

  No problem, she responded.

  Really sorry if this messes up your schedule.

  Hmm. She didn’t think he’d respond again. What should she say? It’s okay. Just let me know when you’re ready. There. That was professional enough. Now he could get back to his meeting and she could try to keep her mind out of the gutter.

  I’m ready now but can’t get away from these goons.

  Cassie smiled. Ian was texting her, chatting with her. Her palms started sweating. She knew this was business, but she could pretend for a minute he was just a hot guy texting her.

  Shame on you, not paying attention to your meeting. She chuckled as she sent that message to him.

  LOL! Didn’t take you long to use my words against me.

  What can I say? I’m good.

  After a couple of minutes with no response, Cassie shook her head with a smile as she tossed her phone onto her desk. Time to get back to work. She logged back into her laptop as her phone buzzed again.

  I intend to find out.

&nb
sp; Was she on a roller coaster? Because her stomach just dropped. Surely he was just talking about finding out how good she was at her job. That was what he had to have meant.

  We’re finishing up now. I’ll be online in ten minutes.

  God, she was an idiot. Of course that was all he had meant. She quickly typed a confirmation and gathered her notes for their meeting. When she logged into the webinar, he was already there.

  Time to put her game face on. They had a job to do and she wanted him to be impressed by her. Fantasies would have to wait for after-hours.

  Ian waited for Cassie to log on to their meeting, reading over their texts. He didn’t know if he wanted the innuendo to be blatantly obvious or for her to be oblivious to his come-on. God, he was in another state. It wasn’t as if anything could come of this. Especially not now that Mac had him doing his dirty work. Yeah, Ian was in a meeting earlier, but what he’d found out was that Mac was the one who was supposed to devise a migration plan for the closure of the south regional office. But when this project started, it was his way to pawn off the work to Ian.

  Now Ian was stuck. He’d waited and practically begged to work with Cassie for two years. Well, he got exactly what he wanted. He had to get close enough to her to get her talking about work not specific to their project. He hated lying to her, and he knew even if she was interested in him, he couldn’t forge a relationship on a lie. He needed to cool it, get this project finished, and maybe then he could look her up. Maybe he should friend her on Facebook. It’d provide an opening to her afterward since all their interactions so far had been through company means. He’d then be able to lend a sympathetic ear to the atrocities of corporate cutbacks and even help her find a new job.