Free Hot for Him by Amy Armstrong

Chapter One
     
     
     
    With a low, drawn-out groan, Elena reached out and whacked the button on her alarm clock before burrowing deeper under the toasty duvet with a satisfied grunt. The blasted thing continued to buzz.
    “Leave me alone,” she moaned hoarsely. “It isn’t time to get up yet.”
    The buzzing increased until it was so loud the noise was like a physical thing inside her head, as if her brain was thrashing around in there, trying to beat its way out of her skull with a claw hammer. With a silent curse, she threw off the covers and sat up.
    Whoa. Bad decision. When the room began to spin and a hot flush erupted, her entire body got so hot she thought it was trying to solve the world’s energy problem. She made a grab for the bedside table and gripped it tightly, trying to breathe through the sudden nausea while she waited for the woozy feeling to pass.
    The good news was that the incessant buzzing had quit. But why was she so parched? She must have taken up astral projection in her sleep because eight hours of crawling through the Sahara without so much as a sip of water was the only possible explanation for her indescribable thirst. Well, that or the six tequila shots she’d knocked back in The Salsa Bar the night before. Oh, and that bottle of red wine she’d polished off in All Bar One might have contributed.
    When images of dancing with a five-foot-nothing Ricky Martin wannabe ran through her mind, Elena put her head in hands and leant back against the headboard. She couldn’t remember much about the night, but she did recall slapping the guy when he’d tried to cop a feel. Made sense. Elena hated men who got all up in her face—or arse as the case might be. What the hell gave them the right to treat women like sex objects? Consenting to a dance did not give him the right to grope her like she was his for the taking—nothing more than a possession. Elena belonged to no one but herself.
    The damn buzzing started up again.
    “No, no, no, no!” She reached for the alarm clock and squinted at it in the dim light of the room, but the evil thing was silent. Ah, it wasn’t the alarm, it was her mobile phone. Who the hell would be calling her in the middle of the night? Okay, it was nearly six, but what the hell?
    She grabbed the phone and fumbled mindlessly with it before finding the right button to answer the call. It had better be an emergency or the sodding sleep destroyer was going to get a piece of her mind.
    “Hello,” she all but growled out.
    “What sort of greeting is that for your favourite uncle?”
    Elena frowned, fighting through the fog in her groggy, sleep-deprived mind. “Uncle Hen?”
    Her query was answered with a low, rumbling chuckle. “You’re twenty-six now, Elena. Henry would be sufficient.”
    “Wha—?” Elena’s mouth was so dry, she couldn’t finish the question. She grabbed a glass of water from the nightstand, downed the lot then tried again. “What can I do for you Uncle, uh, Henry . Is everything okay?”
    “Quite. I thought it would be good to catch up. I’m in your neck of the woods.”
    “London?”
    “No, Europe. I’m going to be staying at the villa in Cannes for at least a week. I was hoping you’d join me.”
    “Oh, that’s, uh, very nice of you to offer, but I have work and…”
    “You’re the boss.”
    “Well, yes, but I couldn’t…”
    “Yes, you could. You work too damn hard for someone so young. I admire your dedication, but it wouldn’t kill you to take a break. You have staff. Delegate.”
    Elena started to shake her head, but thought better of it when the claw hammer started its bashing routine again. She couldn’t possibly take a holiday, could she? Elena’s interior design company was fast becoming one of the best known in London. And she’d worked incredibly hard for the past four years to ensure its continued success. The last holiday she took was…wow, she couldn’t remember, but it had to have been at least three years