The Red Files
Under Your Skin
The Superheroine Collection
Shattered
Standalone
The Awkward Truth
Sliced Ice
Hotel Queens
Changing the Script
Breaking Character
The Brutal Truth
Requiem for Immortals
FOREWORD
Welcome to the heady world of powerful media bosses Elena Bartell and Felicity Simmons! I thoroughly enjoyed writing these two ice queens, who are so different, bound only by their love of Bartell Corp and strive for excellence.
You may wonder in what order you should read these stories. Good question. I’d recommend tackling The Brutal Truth and “Five Times Felicity Met Elena” first, then the rest can be read in any order without hitting any spoilers.
But for those who prefer to read stories strictly chronologically, the timeline goes like this:
First up: “Five Times Felicity Met Elena”, a backgrounder short story that introduces who dedicated lawyer Felicity is before she starts working for her fascinating boss at Bartell Corporation.
Then The Brutal Truth begins, where Elena meets and falls for Maddie Grey, a pesky Australian reporter at the New York newspaper she’s just bought.
Toward the end of The Brutal Truth, an upset Felicity throws a cup against her boss’s office wall. That kicks off the opening of The Awkward Truth, which follows Felicity’s adventures, including a week spent at a homeless animal charity she’s investigating for Elena.
Both Truth novels finish on the same day. As a result, The Awkward Truth is more of a “sidequel” than a sequel, as it sits beside The Brutal Truth rather than following it.
A year after the epilogue in The Brutal Truth, Maddie is in New York again to launch a book of blogs about her lonely time living in a city that was everyone else’s dream. The short story about book launch day shares the title with her blog: “Aliens of New York”.
Twelve days later, Elena is toasting the success of her fashion magazine having great circulation figures in the short story “The Brutal Lie”. She and Maddie celebrate only for Elena’s rival editor to attack them in print.
From the opening moment of The Brutal Truth to the last page of “The Brutal Lie”, two years and four months have passed.
I love these stories so much. Maddie’s tormented period in New York was semi-autobiographical of when I did a night shift job in Melbourne, far from home as a junior newspaper reporter. I didn’t, however, have the hot boss to take my mind off my misery!
Felicity is dear to me too. On the surface, she’s abrasive and rude—awkward—but underneath, she’s trying so hard to be the best she can, to impress the boss she idolizes, and generally figure out her life. I admire the fact she’s never afraid of readjusting her views if she realizes she might be in error. It’s rare and brave, just like Felicity. I’m glad her equally impressive girlfriend, veterinarian Sandy Cooper, gets to see exactly who she is under all those prickles.
But my eternal love goes to my queen of ice queens, Elena Bartell—lonely and fierce, smart and shrewd, and entirely too beautiful. I can well understand why she won Maddie’s heart.
I’m so grateful for the enormous warmth from readers when these stories first came out. And now I’m absolutely delighted they’ve all been gathered together in this Ultimate Boss Set collection.
So, finally, to quote Elena Bartell: “We’re done.”
— Lee Winter
THE BRUTAL TRUTH
CHAPTER 1
The Apocalypse
The apocalypse arrived when Maddie Grey had shampoo in her eyes, was half awake, and attempting to block out the whine of prehistoric plumbing from her ears.
“Mads! It’s the Armageddon!” Her flatmate, Simon Itani, thumped on the bathroom door, scaring the life out of her.
“What the hell?” Maddie shouted back. Her childhood friend had his good points, but he couldn’t exactly be considered trustworthy when it came to reporting end times.
“Your boss is texting you. Looks official. So I’m making the leap.”
Her boss never texted her. Maybe Simon was on to something. Maddie shut off the shower, quickly dried off, and pulled on battered shorts and a T-shirt. As she towel-dried her hair, she stared blearily in the mirror at the rings under her eyes. No sleep again. Not surprising. She was having more nightmares about getting lost and trying to find her way home. Her subconscious wasn’t exactly subtle. It was usually that nightmare or awkward sex dreams about the ex-girlfriend she hadn’t seen in three years. She’d always wake up anxious, aroused, and annoyed. Craving Rachel only because her ex was back home in Sydney was kind of pathetic.
