Engineering Her Surrender [Novum Energy 2] (Siren Publishing Classic) Read online

  Novum Energy 2

  Engineering Her Surrender

  Having spent her childhood under the tyranny of an abusive set of parents, Penny Winters can’t help but shield her heart from the world. When she’s hired as an engineer at Novum Energy, Ethan White, her supervisor, has other plans in mind. Captivated by her passion and fiery spirit, he resolves to push past her tough front and train her to be the perfect submissive he knows she can be.

  Despite her efforts to keep Ethan at bay, Penny finds herself unable to resist him. Under his guidance, she experiences a powerful sexual awakening that shakes her to her core but leaves her more confused than ever. Although she tries to deny her feelings for him, Ethan knows that she is driven by a fear of intimacy and convinces her to work with him on overcoming her insecurities. But when Ethan uncovers the dark secret that Penny’s life is in danger, he realizes that he’ll have to fight hard to gain her trust so he can make sure she survives the threat and stays with him forever.

  Genre: Contemporary

  Length: 34,620 words

  ENGINEERING HER SURRENDER

  Novum Energy 2

  Kaley Colter

  EROTIC ROMANCE

  Siren Publishing, Inc.

  www.SirenPublishing.com

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  A SIREN PUBLISHING BOOK

  IMPRINT: Erotic Romance

  ENGINEERING HER SURRENDER

  Copyright © 2014 by Kaley Colter

  E-book ISBN: 978-1-62741-889-8

  First E-book Publication: June 2014

  Cover design by Harris Channing

  All art and logo copyright © 2014 by Siren Publishing, Inc.

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.

  All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

  PUBLISHER

  Siren Publishing, Inc.

  www.SirenPublishing.com

  Letter to Readers

  Dear Readers,

  If you have purchased this copy of Engineering Her Surrender by Kaley Colter from BookStrand.com or its official distributors, thank you. Also, thank you for not sharing your copy of this book.

  Regarding E-book Piracy

  This book is copyrighted intellectual property. No other individual or group has resale rights, auction rights, membership rights, sharing rights, or any kind of rights to sell or to give away a copy of this book.

  The author and the publisher work very hard to bring our paying readers high-quality reading entertainment.

  This is Kaley Colter’s livelihood. It’s fair and simple. Please respect Ms. Colter’s right to earn a living from her work.

  Amanda Hilton, Publisher

  www.SirenPublishing.com

  www.BookStrand.com

  DEDICATION

  To my husband. I am always writing our love story.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  About the Author

  ENGINEERING HER SURRENDER

  Novum Energy 2

  KALEY COLTER

  Copyright © 2014

  Chapter 1

  Penny Winters folded one leg over the other and leaned back in her chair. She was pleased with how her interview had been going. She had nailed each and every question she’d been asked, and her brain hadn’t seized up once. Not that it usually did. In fact, Penny thrived on pressure. It was her drug of choice, her adrenaline rush. It was the voice in her head that woke her up in the morning and put her to sleep at night.

  Ya, that’s right. Pressure is my middle name.

  Okay, her middle name was actually Anne. But all joking aside, Penny wasn’t afraid of a challenge. She had a great deal of self-confidence, and, apart from an unfortunate lack of actual job experience, she liked to think that she was more than qualified for this position—at least from an educational standpoint. She bit down on her cheek, hoping that they would give her a chance and let her show them how much of an asset she would be to the company. Shifting in her seat, she looked up at Nick Richardson, the president of the engineering firm, Novum Energy, where she was applying for a job. He was flipping through her resume, and she noticed him stop and raise his eyebrows when he came across her list of academic awards.

  “Very impressive,” he said with a smile. “It’s not too often that I see applicants with such high grades in their master’s degree. Well done.”

  “Thank you,” she answered, her eyes lighting up at the compliment. “I just hope that those grades can land me a good job. I’ve been following your company since I was an undergraduate student, and I really admire the work that you do. It would be a dream come true to work here.”

  Nick closed her resume and folded his hands on his desk. “You seem like an excellent candidate. And I would love to add a woman to our team. You’re smart, and you’re confident. And I think you’ll fit in very well here. I’d like to offer you the job.”

  Penny’s mouth dropped open. He was offering her the job? Already? She didn’t have to go home and sit by the phone to wait for a call? Didn’t have to bring the phone with her into the shower, or set it on her pillow before she went to sleep?

  “Really?” she finally let out. “Oh my God, thank you so much. I promise you won’t regret your decision.”

  Nick let out a laugh. “Don’t worry, Penny. I don’t doubt you in the slightest. There’s no question that you’re an extremely hard worker.”

  “Thank you,” Penny replied, trying to still her shaking hands. “This means the world to me.”

  “You’re very welcome. Now, I’d like you to start this coming Monday. Your position title is assistant mechanical superintendent. My head mechanical superintendent is Ethan White, so you’ll be reporting to him. He’ll spend the first little while training you, and then you’ll be on your way to becoming a full member of o
ur team.”

  “That sounds perfect,” she said, getting up and reaching across Nick’s desk to shake his hand. “I look forward to it.”

  Penny walked herself out of Nick Richardson’s office and headed to the elevator. She rode down to the main floor of the building with a look of unadulterated joy on her face, as happy as she would’ve been after a trip to cloud nine—which, she thought, wasn’t too far-fetched of an analogy, given the fact that Novum Energy was actually located on the ninth floor. It was a very appropriate coincidence, indeed.

  She floated her way onto the street and paused, shaking her head in amazement at her victory. She had been working for this since she was in high school, spending every waking minute on her education so that she could get a full scholarship to university for mechanical engineering. And she had worked just as hard as an undergraduate student, making sure that she was at the top of her class so that she’d be eligible for scholarships that would pay for her graduate degree.

  She had known from the time she was a little girl that she was going to get an education and have a well-paying career so that she wouldn’t end up like her parents. And now, fresh out of school, she had landed a job at one of the most prestigious engineering firms around.

  It was all worth it. Every last bit.

  She sucked in a breath and decided to take a look around at this little nook of the city, which, she reminded herself with a smile, she now had the privilege of seeing every day for the foreseeable future. The office building was smack-dab in the center of the city, and the area was nothing short of a bustling, teeming metropolis, which suited her very well, being that she was a bona fide city girl.

  She moved herself out of the way as a group of men came through the front doors of the building. They made their way across the street and went into a pub—for their lunch break, she supposed. She sucked the inside of her cheek in thought. Maybe she should go and have a drink. She couldn’t remember the last time she had had a beer, and even though it was only one o’clock in the afternoon, she felt that she more than deserved it.

  To hell with it. It’s time for a celebratory drink.

  Most people would be uncomfortable going into a restaurant and sitting alone, but Penny was more than used to it. Due to an unfortunate lack of friends, her trips to restaurants were always embarked upon as a fearless singleton, and she liked to think that she had become rather good at it.

  She slid onto one of the stools at the bar and ordered a tall glass of beer, smiling in thanks at the bartender as he filled her order and sighing in bliss as she took her first heavenly sip. But the longer she sat there sipping at her drink, the more her skin started to crawl with that irksome feeling of being stared at. Sighing in annoyance, she put her glass down and swivelled around in her chair to try and see who was looking at her, quickly finding the culprit sitting alone across the bar.

  Sure, he was good-looking. Maybe even incredibly good-looking. He was a big man with a chiselled face, a lot of muscle, and tousled blond hair—but his look was predatory. He didn’t dart his eyes elsewhere when she had caught him—he continued staring brazenly at her with a smug grin playing on his lips.

  Penny knew exactly what type of man he was. Controlling, egotistical, temperamental…Dominant was probably the best word to describe him. And, unlike most of the poor, misguided girls of her generation, Penny wasn’t interested in being dominated. She stared back at him with a fiercely scornful look in her eyes. She wouldn’t back down. She wouldn’t coyly dart her eyes to the ground and engage in a game of flirtation like the typical barhopping woman would. She wasn’t that kind of gal.

  * * * *

  Ethan White was captivated by the woman sitting across from him at the bar. He was a very regular customer at The Foxhound, and although he recognized most of the faces he came across there, he knew without a doubt that he had never seen her before.

  She was a spirited one, he would give her that. There were none of the practiced feminine wiles about her that most girls exhibited these days, and it lent her an air of authenticity that he found extremely appealing. She wasn’t wearing a stitch of makeup, her beautiful auburn hair was tied back in a no-fuss ponytail, and she was wearing a plain button-down shirt and black dress pants. She wasn’t trying to be seductive. But for Ethan, that did nothing to curb his growing attraction. In fact, it only made him more drawn to her.

  He could tell from the defensive expression on her face that she was used to looking out for herself. Her delicate features were pinched in a scowl that Ethan found utterly adorable. It made him want to walk over there, bend her over his knee, and smack her pretty ass for being so naughtily impolite. She would resist—at first. But he was fairly certain that with enough coaxing and training she would surrender to him. He knew instinctively from her mannerisms and body language that this whole “tough girl” vibe she was giving him was nothing more than an act. He would bet some serious money that she had been hurt or betrayed by someone in her past, and that this was her way of protecting herself from going through that pain again. And he would consider himself one lucky son of a bitch if he could be the one to strip her down to her naked, vulnerable core and train her to be the perfect little sub that he knew she could be.

  She looked to be growing extremely frustrated at him for continuing to stare at her. She was flaring her cute little nostrils and turning her lips down into an angry pout, and Ethan knew that she’d probably take a swing at him if he were to go over there and tell her that she was only succeeding in making herself look more adorable. But unfortunately for Ethan, she didn’t give him the option, because without any warning, she broke eye contact and whipped around in her chair, smacking some money onto the bar and making a run for the exit. She had slipped out the door before he had even stood up, and although Ethan was on the street in a matter of seconds, she was nowhere to be seen.

  He looked frantically down the sidewalk and across the street, but the little ninja had escaped. He ran his fingers through his hair in frustration and swore under his breath.

  It had been quite some time since a woman had caught his eye. Probably verging on a decade, if he was going to be honest. He had gotten sick and tired of the superficial party girl with perfect hair and perfect makeup that loved to talk nonsense, play games, and text on her cell phone. He had dated one of those girls after another in his teens and early twenties, and their lack of substance never failed to turn him cold. In fact, their company was so mind-numbingly and irritatingly dull that he had decided he’d rather not date at all than date one of them. And he had been watching carefully to find a real woman ever since, a woman with intelligence and passion that would challenge him at every turn and make his blood rush faster and his heart beat harder. And, years later, he had finally found her, only to let her slip out of his hands.

  He knew in his gut that, if he had just gotten the chance to coax her into accepting her submissive nature, she would’ve complimented him perfectly. And it burned him to lose her, because he was restless for a mate. Since the moment he realized that he possessed the psychology of a dom, he’d been waiting patiently for a real sub. And he wasn’t interested in the women who frequented D/s clubs and offered nothing more than their readiness to obey. No, he wanted a woman whose submissiveness was tempered by her gumption and wit and fiery spirit. And in all the years that had gone by, this feisty, auburn-haired mystery woman was the only one who’d ever made him want to give chase.

  Ethan leaned against the door and sighed.

  I’m sure as hell never going to see her again.

  Chapter 2

  Penny straightened her blouse and pencil skirt as she walked out of the elevator into the office. She hated wearing skirts, but it was the only other work-suitable outfit she had left after the dress pants she had worn for her interview, and she couldn’t very well wear those twice in a row. She supposed a bit of a shopping trip was in order that night, and although she knew it was a blasphemous thing for a girl to think, she had to admit that
she dreaded the activity.

  She wasn’t the kind to get nervous too often, but it was her first day on the job and she couldn’t stop her stomach from fluttering. She remembered Nick had told her to report to Ethan White first thing, so she made her way to his office. His door was open, and he was facing away from her, bending over and rifling through his briefcase.

  Penny knocked on the door. “Um, Ethan White? I’m Penny, the new assistant mechanical superintendent. Nick told me to report to you for some training.”

  Ethan immediately stood up and turned around to face her. Penny froze.

  No. No no no no no!

  It was him. That terribly cocky man from the bar. The guy with the enormous head built to fit his enormous ego. This couldn’t be happening. She closed her eyes, hoping her senses were playing some sadistically cruel trick on her, but when she opened them, he was still standing there. And with that same smug smile plastered on his face.

  He folded his arms across his chest and chuckled. “Well, well. Looks like you didn’t get away, after all.”

  Penny felt the blood drain from her face as his gravelly voice filtered into the air. For a minute, she didn’t even know how to respond, but the first instinct that came to her was denial.

  “I-I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she stammered.

  Ethan raised an eyebrow. “No? You don’t remember having a staring contest with me at the pub last Friday afternoon and then fleeing the scene?”