The Bashful Billionaire

by Elana Johnson

  “Thanks. I think I’m ready to do something a little more aggressive with my investments.”

  “Who are you using?”

  “Infinity Investments?” The fact that Jasper phrased it as a question meant he hadn’t done all the homework on the company. At least not what Tyler would’ve done.

  “You should talk to Lexie. Her firm is top-notch.”

  “Are you with her?”

  “Her company,” Tyler said. “My accountants and investment bankers are out of LA. I’ll send you what I’ve got.”

  “Great, thanks.” The call ended, and Tyler appreciated the quick, business-like way he could interact with his billionaire friends. After all, they were all busy. Well, Tyler wasn’t, but everyone else seemed to have a never-ending to-do list.

  He chose to listen to his voicemail messages next and found that Tawny hadn’t left any. He put off calling her back because he teetered on the edge of indecision. Maybe he shouldn’t go to dinner with her. Maybe they should just do the one-time thing and move on. Who cared what the papers said? Or what the major weblines said?

  Something else would come up, and everyone would forget about him like they had before. And he could waste a few more months of his life and then ask Tawny out for real. Tons of strings attached.

  He didn’t want to talk to his brother either, so he stayed in the hammock doing nothing. A dog barked, alerting him to the fact that he had no idea where Lazy Bones was. Not that it mattered. The golden retriever never wandered far, and he was probably lying in the shade nearby, his favorite patch near the trio of pineapple plants Tyler cultivated himself. Marshall had given him the suckers to plant, and he’d actually been pleased and surprised to watch the foliage grow and produce something he could eat.

  Lazy Bones wasn’t there, and another bark sounded, this one closer. Tyler stood and walked to the edge of the trees so he could look both ways down the beach.

  He found his dog trotting along, certainly not in any hurry.

  Right behind him was a certain brown-haired woman who’d turned Tyler’s life upside down in a matter of seconds.

  He became acutely aware that he wasn’t wearing a shirt as Tawny drew closer. “Your dog found me,” she said. “I swear I didn’t come searching for your place.” She arrived in front of him and peered behind him to the hammock, the back yard that was littered with dog toys and Frisbees, his surfboards, wetsuits, boogie boards, and flippers.

  Tyler didn’t turn. He knew what his yard looked like. “We’re sort of neighbors.”

  “Yeah.” She looked back the way she’d come. “I only live about a half a mile from here. Different neighborhood though.”

  He nodded, as he’d been to her house before.

  “I can’t believe this is where you live.” She stepped past him, and he twisted to watch her. She touched the rope of his hammock and scanned the simple house. He’d painted it blue a couple of years ago, and it could stand a new coat, in all honesty.

  “This is where I live.”

  She locked eyes with him. “How many bedrooms is this?”

  “Just the one.” Always one. Tyler had gotten very good at living for one. It wasn’t until he’d asked Tawny out that he’d even considered a life built for two.

  “Really?”

  “Why are you so surprised?” Tyler didn’t think he spoke too harshly, but Tawny’s eyes rounded as if he had.

  She shrugged and backed up a few steps. “Private beach?”

  “Yes. Same as you.”

  Her hair brushed her shoulders as she cocked her head. Tyler fisted his fingers to keep from touching her. After all, there was no one watching now, and he didn’t want to dangle his heart from a limb, only to watch it fall and break.

  “You’re a billionaire,” she said as if he didn’t know. “I can afford this place, and trust me, I’m not a billionaire.” She spoke in a half-coy voice, but she didn’t laugh and didn’t smile.

  “So maybe the first fact you should know about me,” he said. “Is that I don’t care about my money.”

  She scoffed as if he’d just said the stupidest thing on the planet. “Everyone cares about money, Tyler.” His name rolled off her tongue easily, and he wanted to hear her say it again and then again, preferably right before he kissed her.

  “Yeah, okay.” He bent down and scrubbed Lazy Bones, who looked up at him with eagerness in his eyes, like didn’t I do great, Dad? Didn’t I? I brought Tawny to you. I did great.

  “I care about money,” he said. “I guess I just don’t care about throwing it around.”

  Her eyes sparkled as she watched him for a moment past comfortable. “Interesting,” she finally said. “So I called you a couple of times. You didn’t answer.”

  He pointed to the hammock. “Napping. Another fact about me. I lay here every afternoon and listen to the waves as they come into the bay.”

  She turned back to the pristine water, which looked almost black in the fading light. Twilight was Tyler’s favorite time of day. The sunset reminded him that he was still human, still living under the same sky he always had, still breathing through another day.

  “What do they say?” she asked.

  “Who?”

  “Not who.” She pointed to the waves. “What. The waves.”

  “They don’t say anything.” He stepped beside her, maybe an inch or two too close.

  She glanced up at him. “Then you’re not listening very well.”

  So she was one of those existential people. He should’ve known, what with the yoga and all. She sat in his hammock, and he wasn’t sure how he felt about it. He’d only had a handful of people over to his house—Fisher, Marshall, Jasper, the other Hawaii Nine-0 members. They’d stuck to the house, and sharing his hammock with Tawny felt as right as it did wrong.

  “Did you want to go to dinner?” she finally asked.

  “Yeah, we better.” He exhaled as he turned back to the house. “Let me grab a shirt.” As he went, he reminded himself that this was not a date. He could not hold her hand just because he wanted to. Any physical contact had to be because there were people watching. People that needed to be convinced that he and Tawny were engaged. People who could pass the message on to Omar, who would then leave the island thinking Tawny was on her way to wedded bliss.

  Even if that couldn’t be further from the truth. He pulled a light blue T-shirt over his head and quickly wet his hair and pushed it out of his face. “You can do this,” he told his reflection. For Tawny and her safety. To protect her. He could pretend, for her.

  Too bad it wasn’t all that hard to act like he liked her, and the time spent with her was no problem for Tyler at all.

  Chapter Eight

  Tawny wished he’d chosen a more public place. Well, the sushi house was public, but it wasn’t busy. And with only a handful of people in the restaurant—none of whom seemed to care that Tawny and Tyler were there—there was no reason to hold his hand. No reason to cuddle into him. No reason to lean forward and laugh like he’d just told the funniest joke on the planet.

  She knew tons of little tidbits about him and his life now, but for some reason, she didn’t care. So he liked jokes. He took a nap every day. He had a photographic memory—that had been a good source of conversation for half the meal.

  But what she wanted to know—what drove him? Why did he quit playing poker? Sell his company? Why had he chosen Getaway Bay as his new home? How did he think?—she couldn’t ask. At least if she wanted to keep pretending that the feelings rippling through her were fake.

  She’d refused to allow herself to look anything up on the Internet. She knew better than most that anyone could put anything on the Internet like it was true. So she ate her crab rangoons and as many spicy tuna rolls as she could stomach, wishing this date felt real at all.

  The other times she’d been out with Tyler had been easy, casual. This felt like work, and she didn’t like it.

  “Should we go?” he asked, tossing his napkin on the table.


  “Sure. I’m stuffed.” And maybe there would be a reporter or two lurking outside the restaurant.

  He paid and they went out into the beautiful evening. “What are you doing for the holidays?” he asked, his hands tucked safely in his pockets.

  She swung her purse, trying to flirt a little with him. “Oh, probably just going over to Aloha Hideaway for the Thanksgiving feast.”

  “You don’t go visit anyone?”

  She thought about the father she hadn’t seen in two decades. “I sometimes go to Arizona to see my brother,” she said. “But not this year. He’s taking his family on a cruise for Christmas, and I’ve spent more than my fair share on a ship like that.”

  Tyler glanced at her, curiosity on his face. “Oh yeah?”

  “Yeah, before I worked in Cancun—and met Omar.” She waved her hand, realizing she finally had something to thank the man for—forcing her and Tyler together after the gala. “I worked on cruise ships from here to Puerto Rico, Grand Cayman, even did an Alaskan line one.”

  “And you didn’t like them.” He wasn’t asking, and she was learning that he was extremely perceptive, which she supposed fit with his poker success.

  “They were okay,” she said. “Some good tippers. But not everyone eats free on the ship.” She lifted one shoulder in a shrug. “I did it for about six years, so it wasn’t horrible.”

  “Did what?”

  “Taught water aerobics on one ship. Poolside yoga on another. On one line, I had to fill in as the masseuse, even though I’m not a licensed massage therapist.” The memories of her time on the ships wasn’t completely unhappy. “It is lonely work though,” she murmured, realizing too late that she’d said it out loud.

  “Playing poker is a bit like that,” he said, his voice as equally as soft. “Lonely.”

  She wanted to hold his hand so badly, and it took everything in her to just keep swinging her purse. “I imagine so. It’s always lonely at the top.”

  He let several steps go by in silence. “Did you look me up?” he asked.

  “No,” she said, maybe a little too quickly.

  He cocked one eyebrow in challenge.

  “I didn’t,” she insisted. “Like I want to see you sucking face with other women.” The very thought left her cold, though surely a man like Tyler hadn’t had to beg for female attention. He still didn’t. He chose his life of isolation, in a tiny one-bedroom beach house, with a golden retriever for a friend.

  A sense of inadequacy descended on Tawny. He’d met her months ago, and it was clear he wasn’t interested. She clenched her arms across her chest, wishing she could just turn her mind off. Just for a moment.

  They turned a corner, and Tawny paused. A man had just come out of the shop up ahead, and he looked dangerously like Omar. “Hold my hand,” she hissed.

  “What?” Tyler followed her gaze and withdrew his hand from his pocket at the same time Omar turned toward them, a cigar pressed between his lips. He lifted his hands to light it, his eyes never leaving Tawny.

  She threw her head back and laughed as she grabbed onto Tyler’s arm with both of her hands. She leaned into him and sort of dragged him along as they continued toward Omar. She pretended not to see him until the very last moment, and then she startled. “Oh. Hello, Omar.”

  He grunted and sized up Tyler, apparently finding him a bit too tall, or too muscular. Something, because Omar didn’t normally back down from a fight.

  “Still here?” Tyler asked, his arm tightening against his side, keeping Tawny right next to him.

  “That’s right, hombre.”

  “What do you do on the island again?” Tyler asked.

  “None of your—”

  “Avocados,” Tawny said. “How long will you be here, Omar?”

  He glared at Tyler for another moment. “I don’t know. Could be a while.”

  Tawny sighed like his presence on the island was frustrating—because it was. But another part of her was secretly glad that she and Tyler would need to continue their charade until he left.

  “I’m surprised you can leave your empire in Mexico,” Tyler said.

  “You left yours in New York City.” Omar seemed to sense that he’d won, because he smirked and walked away, his ridiculous white shoes a slap in the face to life on a Hawaiian island.

  Tawny waited until he turned the corner, and then she carefully slipped her hand out of Tyler’s. “He’s…I can’t believe I ever dated him.”

  Tyler turned back the way they’d been going, and they passed the cigar shop Omar had come out of. “Why did you?”

  “Date him? Oh, I suppose I thought he was handsome, and he threw his money around, and brought me drinks at work. That kind of stuff.”

  Tyler nodded. “So you like it when a man dotes on you.”

  “It doesn’t hurt. And you forgot the handsome part.” She tried to play off the conversation as nothing while she searched for why she had dated Omar.

  “I brought you a drink at work.”

  “And you’re handsome.” At least this flirting was real.

  He paused at the next corner and gazed down at her. Something resided in his eyes that she couldn’t identify. But it was intense and strong and when he opened his mouth, she almost expected him to blurt out that he wished their relationship was real.

  Instead, he said, “We should head back.”

  The next morning, three men attended Tawny’s beachside yoga class. It was obvious none of them had so much as bent over to touch their toes in a while, and not just from the stark farmer’s tan on the one guy’s biceps.

  All three of them lingered after the class, like they had some deep, burning question about connecting to Mother Earth or how they could increase their flexibility.

  She knew who they were, and she lifted her hand and said, “No comment, guys,” before any of them could speak.

  “Come on,” the dark-haired one said, frustration in both words. “Give us something.”

  “What do you want to know?” Tawny shouldered her bag. If they wanted to talk, they’d have to walk with her, because the sun shone hot that day.

  “Have you set a date?” a blond man asked, tapping on his phone like crazy.

  “Nope.”

  “Why don’t you wear a diamond ring?”

  “It’s getting sized,” she said in a monotone. She’d answered that one before.

  “Why hasn’t anyone on the island seen you two together before the gala?”

  Tawny stumbled in the sand and almost went down. “How should I know?” she asked, her voice acidic. “It’s not like we took selfies and flashed them for the world to see.”

  “But even the regulars,” he pressed, a little weasel-faced man with hair the color of dirt. “Mo at Two Coconuts, the valet at Sweet Breeze, where both you and Tyler visit quite often. They were all as surprised by the engagement as we were.”

  Tawny’s heart froze for a moment and when it burst out of the ice it had been encased in, it pumped three times as fast. He’d spoken to Sterling? What had the valet said about her? An internal groan almost touched her vocal chords.

  “I gotta go, guys. It was fun chatting. Please don’t bother me at work again.” She skipped Two Coconuts, though she had been planning to stop for a drink. Mo. She shook her head. What had he said?

  Probably nothing, she told herself as she put her duffle bag over her shoulders like a backpack and bent to unlock her bicycle. He had a business to run; he didn’t have time to gossip about nothing.

  Which was exactly what Tyler and Tawny had had before the gala. Nothing. And how long would it be before those three reporters figured that out?

  When she got home, she dialed Tyler’s number, wondering if he’d be in from surfing yet. He’d told her he liked to go out first thing in the morning and surf until the waves died. She had no idea when that happened, and if there was one thing she knew about Tyler, it was that he didn’t keep to a schedule.

  Sure enough, the call went to voicemail, and
she said, “I think we have a problem. Call me back when you get this.” She let her bag fall to the floor. “Oh, and I need a diamond ring ASAP. Maybe we could go this afternoon?”

  She nodded to herself and hung up, hoping the waves died really, really soon.

  Chapter Nine

  Tyler let the waves wash him in and out, in and out, like breathing. He loved being in the ocean, loved the kiss of sunshine on his skin, loved listening to the waves. And today, he was actually trying to hear what they were saying.

  He couldn’t quite make out any words, but by the time he finally stood and took his surfboard back to shore, every muscle in his body had calmed. He showered, fed Bones, and picked up his phone.

  Tawny had called, and her message erased all the peace he’d managed to find in the ocean that morning. He didn’t have much on his schedule, honestly, so a plan started to form in his mind.

  They’d been telling everyone that her ring was getting sized, and he didn’t want to go into any jeweler and try to explain the situation now.

  So he called Jasper, who worked in the diamond industry and could hopefully get Tyler a private meeting with someone on the island. Someone who could be discreet.

  “It’s a bit early, don’t you think?” Jasper yawned, and it sounded like he wasn’t too happy Tyler had called.

  “Early?” Tyler glanced around but he didn’t own a clock. “I have no idea what time it is.”

  “Well, I work in the middle of the night. Belgium is on a twelve-hour time difference.”

  Guilt sliced through Tyler. “Sorry. Um, I just have a quick favor. Can you meet me at your shop? I need….” Wow, he couldn’t even say it. “I need—” He exhaled and told himself to just say it. “So you’ve probably heard I’m engaged, and I need a ring pretty much yesterday, and I need to be able to go into the front of the shop and act like I’m picking it up after waiting for it to get sized.”

  It sounded so stupid coming out of his mouth. To Jasper’s credit, he just gave one long hiss as he blew out his breath. “You got engaged?”