Beauty is about to tame her beast…

Researcher Maggie Donovan has no luck with men, and it doesn’t help that she can’t keep her eyes off of her sexy boss – the one everyone else in the office calls The Beast. Relationships in the office are forbidden. So no one is more surprised than Maggie when she pretends to be his fiancée to save him during a difficult situation. Not only has she put her job on the line, but the future of the company.

Billionaire Benjamin Gale III doesn’t believe in love or romance, but the look on his mother’s face when Maggie tells her that she’s his fiancée is worth millions. Instead of firing her for her insubordination, he goes along with the ruse. In his arms–and in his bed–she’d be everything he could ever want…which is why he can’t have her.

But if he doesn’t let her go, they’ll lose everything…

Table of Contents

Dedication

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Epilogue

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Also by Diane Alberts…

Try Me

Love Me

Play Me

Take Me

Shillings Agency series

Temporarily Yours

Stealing His Heart

Seducing the Princess

Taking What’s His

Faking It

Falling for the Groomsman

Kiss Me at Midnight

Divinely Ruined

On One Condition

Discover more category romance titles from Entangled Indulgence…

A Wife in Every Sense

The Seduction Game

Blurring the Lines

Talking Dirty with the CEO

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

Copyright © 2015 by Diane Alberts. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Publisher.

Entangled Publishing, LLC

2614 South Timberline Road

Suite 109

Fort Collins, CO 80525

Visit our website at www.entangledpublishing.com.

Indulgence is an imprint of Entangled Publishing, LLC.

Edited by Candace Havens

Cover design by Heather Howland

Cover art from iStock

ISBN 978-1-63375-471-3

Manufactured in the United States of America

First Edition November 2015

This one goes out to all those readers out there who love the story of Beauty and the Beast as much as I do.

Chapter One

Benjamin Gale III rubbed his temples, let out an exasperated sigh, and then leaned back in his chair. The sun had already faded to a dull orange glow, and the sky darkened over the famous New York City skyline with each passing moment, but he was still working his ass off, and probably would be for another few hours, at the very least. He didn’t really have a choice.

His family was trying to wrestle control of the company, and he’d be damned if he was going to allow that to happen without a hell of a fight. This was his life. His wife. His world. His baby. He’d dedicated the last five years to this office.

And it belonged to him.

If they wanted to take control of Gale Incorporated out of his hands, they’d have to pry it out with the use of deadly force. If there was one thing he got from his mother—who despised him—it was her stubborn determination to win.

And he would damn well win.

Hell, he knew why his mother hated him, and even understood it. He’d fucked up years ago, when his father died, and she blamed him for it. If it made her happy to hate him, if it made missing her husband a little easier on her, then more power to her. But now she wanted to take his company away from him? His own birthright?

Not in this damn lifetime. Or the next.

Over the five years since his father had passed away, he’d dedicated his life to trying to make things right. He’d quit partying. Stopped fucking around, and his whole life had been focused on this. On his work. And if he wasn’t at work, he was attending a function for work. He spent every moment of every waking hour being the man his father would have wanted him to be. He’d been dedicated, studious, and predictable as hell.

All his friends had abandoned him. Called him boring.

It was true. He was.

He even lived in the penthouse upstairs to be close to his office at all hours. His entire life existed in this damn Beacon Court building. If that wasn’t dedication, he wasn’t sure what was. But still—it wasn’t enough. It would never be—

“What are you doing?” one of his employees asked. He straightened out of reflex, but she was outside the door, not in his office. “Why are you still here?”

“I’m not finished with my report yet,” he heard Maggie Donovan, his lead researcher, say. She had the most angelic voice he’d ever known, and she was perpetually kind and always smiling. Pretty much the opposite of him. “You heading out?”

“Yeah. Everyone is.”

“Well, I’m not,” Maggie said, clearing her throat. “I’ll be here for a little while longer, so go ahead without me.”

“Why do you always stay late?” the other employee asked—and for the life of him, he couldn’t remember her name. She worked on the left side of the office, and had brown hair, but that’s all he remembered. “The beast doesn’t appreciate it, or you.”

He stiffened. The beast, of course, was him.

All of his employees called him that. They thought he wasn’t aware of it, but he kept up to date on everything that happened outside of his executive office.

“Don’t call him that,” Maggie hissed, her voice dropping lower. “He’s not a beast, he’s just a guy who—”

Her voice was too low for him to hear the rest, but that was just as well. He didn’t need to hear another damn word. His employees could hate him all they wanted, as long as they turned their fucking work in on time. But the fact that Maggie defended him? It made him like her even more than he already did.

Which was an anomaly, since he didn’t really like anyone. Not anymore.

Picking up his phone, he pushed the button that rang directly into his apartment. His butler answered. “What can I do for you, sir?”

“Hey, Willie.”

“Willie?” William, his elderly and very British butler, let out a long, annoyed sigh. “I don’t know anyone who goes by that name, sir.”

He laughed. This was a game they played, and Willie was a good sport about it. “Fine. William.”

“What can I do for you, sir?”

“Can you send some dinner down for me now? Mr. Forbes should be here any minute.” He checked the time. Quarter till seven. “What is it tonight?”