Seducing The Boss (Pulse #2) - Mari Carr

Dear Reader,

The Pulse series was the brain child of two very dear friends, Cathryn Fox and Lauren Hawkeye. I recall the evening late last spring when Lauren emailed to see if I would be interested in writing one of the stories in the series. Lauren is one of my all-time favorite authors and people, so it took me all of five seconds to compose the “Hell Yes!” response. Finding out that Cat and Jan were involved was merely the icing on the cake.

I was equally delighted to be able to write a book for Entangled. This has long been a “dream” publisher for me. Seeing the contract appear in my inbox was another highlight in this journey.

Writing a four-book series with three other authors is a bit of challenge. Deciding on titles, creating the world we would all share, as well as finding ways to “cameo” each other’s characters took a lot of careful planning. I suspect there have been no less than several hundred emails between Jan, Cat, Lauren and I over the past year.

During the course of the writing, each of us faced some life-changing experiences, so there were many days when the conversations turned from fiction to reality as we tried to bolster and support each other personally the same way we had professionally. Pulse is a series, but for me, it’s become a sisterhood as well.

I hope you enjoy the world we’ve created and please be sure to look for future stories releasing.

Happy Reading!

Mari

This story is dedicated to Lauren Hawkeye, Cathryn Fox, and Jan Meredith.

Without their encouragement, support, and belief in my ability to do a “medical” romance, this book never would have been written. You gals have made the last year so much fun! So…what should we write next?

Chapter One

Kellan James leaned back in his chair and sighed. It had been a hell of a week at work, so he’d been only too happy to accept the invitation to kick back a few beers at the sports bar Score with his best friend Josh and a couple of colleagues from the hospital.

The Board of Directors for the hospital was breathing down his neck to cut costs, the local newspaper had done an exposé on the slow response times in the ER, and his Chief Nursing Officer had quit. That last problem wouldn’t be such a big deal if he could talk his friend Sara Connelly into taking the damn job, but the woman had a bad attitude when it came to hospital administration. She’d told him in no uncertain terms she would never cross over to the dark side with him.

She was talented and bright and completely wasted in the emergency room. He’d tried—without success—to get her into better positions in the hospital, but she constantly dug in her heels. Told him she was happy where she was. Which meant she was going to be pissed as hell after the meeting he’d called for Monday with the ER staff. He’d tried for months to get that department into shape. Now it was time to play hardball. Some heads were going to roll if they didn’t speed things up. Wait times were getting out of hand.

He rubbed his eyes wearily, glancing toward the pool table. Josh was in a pissing contest with one of the other guys about their skills, and they’d put twenty bucks on the game. Ordinarily Kellan would have taken them on as well, joining in the fun, but he wasn’t in the mood tonight.

There was a cute blonde sitting at the bar who was giving him an inviting look. He considered going over and buying her a drink but his heart wasn’t in it.

Shit. He really was in a funk. Usually he was better at leaving his work at the office. If he weren’t, his job as CEO of Hampton General Hospital would have chewed him up and spit him out already. That was what it had done to his two predecessors.

However, tonight he was failing in the attempt.

He had just decided to call it a night when he caught a glimpse of Sara sitting in a corner booth alone. It wasn’t unusual to run into her at Score. After all, the bar was located directly across from the hospital, so it was the watering hole of choice for most of the medical and administrative staff.

What struck him was that she was alone and looking hot as shit. Sara was a low maintenance girl. He never saw her in anything other than minimal