Chosen for Power (Women of Power, #1) by Kathleen Brooks Read Free Book Online Page A

thing he happened to have a lot of phones around. He went into the lab and found the right charger. He plugged it in and started trying to guess her password.
    “Dammit.” The most common passwords didn’t work. He shouldn’t be surprised. There was nothing common about this woman. He found a USB cord and connected the phone to his computer. It was time to get serious. There was no way he was going to lose this woman. He would find her no matter how long it took.
     
    Elle gave Finn a quick kiss on his cheek and wished him a merry Christmas before punching the elevator button in the secure parking garage below her building. She looked in her purse for her phone to check the time and froze. No phone. The elevator dinged and she hopped in, pressing the top floor.
    She had to have left it in the courtyard. She’d have to call security and have them check. Crap. That phone had her life in it. At least her brother had talked her into putting a state-of-the-art security system in it. She knew no one would be able to hack it. She would go pick it up later.
    The doors to the elevator opened and she hurried through the dark hallway maze to her office. She flipped on the lights and glanced at the clock. She had two minutes. She kicked off her shoes, untied her mask, and slipped out of her dress. She then grabbed some tissues to wash the makeup from around her eyes. She applied some light brown and beige eye shadow as her computer hooked up to the videoconference.
    She pulled a cream-colored blouse out of the closet and slipped it on. Her computer started beeping, indicating an incoming videoconference call. She grabbed a blazer and buttoned it up. Her bare bottom sat down in the leather chair by the third ring. Elle tucked her hair back and pressed Accept.
    “ Grüezi mitenand ,” she said in Swiss German as the bank’s board of directors appeared. The men looking back at her all said hello as well, and they got to work.
     
    *     *     *
     
    Elle smiled and said good-bye to the group of bankers all heading home for Christmas. The three-hour conference call had wiped her out. Further, she struggled for the first time in her life to pay attention. She’d be listening to someone and the image of looking down at her masked-man’s face as she sat naked upon him took over her mind.
    She wished she could kick herself as she slipped on her panties and a pair of jeans. She'd left the only man she’d had crazy chemistry with sitting naked on a bench. One thing she knew for sure—he wasn’t out for her money. Add to that the fact that she instantly trusted him, and the feeling of being in his arms made her decide with surety that she couldn't settle for one-night stands. She wanted the rest of her life filled with nights like that. The sadness that wrapped her like a blanket tightened. She’d met the one and she’d never see him again.
    With tears trickling down her face, she wrapped up the Swiss bank deal, made her way to her car, and drove forty-five minutes to her mother’s house.
     
    Drake cursed and sat back in his chair. Who was this woman? She had top-of-the-line security on her phone that most people didn’t even know about. How did he know that? He’d invented the damn thing. The good news was he could hack it. The bad news, it was going to take a while and he didn’t have the time now. He was due at Children’s Hospital to hand out presents. His perfect woman’s identity had to wait a bit longer.

CHAPTER SEVEN
     
    Elle slammed the reindeer cookie cutter down and viciously yanked the extra dough from around it. Her mother, brother, and sisters all stopped to stare at her.
    “Whoa. Put the reindeer down gently and step away from Santa,” her brother said in mock seriousness.
    “I thought it would get better after she took that long nap this morning, but she’s been this way all afternoon,” her mother told her siblings, as if Elle wasn’t standing right in the middle of them.
    “What’s up, Elle?