The Billionaire Affair

by Parker, Ali

  “Yeah?” Stephanie was sitting on the arm of the couch in my office, her lips pulled into a soft smile.

  “Oh, yeah,” I said, leaning against my desk. “Making fun of all the ways the tabloids got it wrong was one of his hobbies.”

  “You’ve gotta laugh about it I guess, to keep sane. It has to be better than the alternative.”

  I very nearly gawked at her. She was exactly right, though very few people would’ve put it together that well, that fast. “That’s what we used to say. I miss that about him, the way he looked at the world.”

  When I was younger, aggravated by the lies the press told about my family or me, Jack was the one who pointed out the funny, the downright ridiculous and the amusing about their stories. As I learned to let it roll off of me, to not give a fuck, he was also the one who stressed how important it was we stayed in touch with what people were saying about us.

  “If he turned that into a hobby, I bet there’s a lot more you miss about him,” Stephanie said, gently prodding me to keep talking. And so I did. I told her about some of the things I missed, the exploits we used to get up to that never made it to the press.

  I was surprised with myself for talking so openly about my brother with a borderline stranger. Even with my father, we barely spoke a word of it after Jack was buried. He was laid to rest beside our mother, who died when we were young.

  My dad and I stayed at the gravesite a little longer than the rest of the people who attended his funeral, saying our quiet goodbyes. At the wake, we listened to stories shared about him by his friends and business acquaintances, but we didn’t join in the reminiscing.

  After that day, we only mentioned him in passing sometimes. It felt good to talk about him, think back on the good memories. So much of the time I only resented him for leaving me to this life—where I had to fill Jack’s shoes.

  Stephanie listened to my memories, sweet and kind. We laughed at our misadventures, and as I’d come to expect from her, inserted bits of her own humor into her comments.

  “It’s not easy to lose the people we love.” She spoke when I fell silent, really thinking about my brother for the first time in a long time.

  I sensed from the way the humor in her eyes fell to the wayside that she spoke from experience. “Who was it for you?”

  “No one died,” she said quietly, her eyes turning down. She played with the hem of her dress, twisting it around her fingers before lifting those ice blue eyes back to mine. “They’re alive, but I lost my parents a couple of years ago.”

  I frowned, not quite understanding. “Are they sick or something?”

  She shook her head, her gaze darting to the skyline behind me as though she couldn’t say what she had to while looking at me. “They abandoned me because I wasn’t like them. I haven’t heard from them since.”

  “What happened?” It was my turn to listen now, and as another surprise, I actually wanted to hear what she had to say. I wanted to know what happened to her, how she was still so sassy and full of life when I could see the weight of her parents’ abandonment weighing heavily on her shoulders.

  She shrugged, still not quite meeting my eyes. “I come from a family of strict rule followers. I’m an only child, but my parents, their siblings and my cousins, they’ve all got these massive sticks up their asses.”

  I gave a little snort of laughter, which earned me a smile before she continued. “None of them ever put a toe out of line. I’m not exaggerating when I say they have bathroom breaks scheduled.”

  “Sounds tedious.” I knew a little something about having a family member like that. MJ could account for every second of my father’s day. I got the feeling her story was about to take a darker turn though, it had to given how she’d started it.

  She nodded. “Tedious is one word to describe it, I suppose. Oppressive, boring, predictable, mundane. There are some more words for you.”

  I wouldn’t say it out loud, but Stephanie didn’t strike me as fitting that mold at all. Since the moment I met her, she surprised me, kept me on my toes. “Thank you. At least now I know I shouldn’t get you a thesaurus for your birthday.”

  She flashed me a dry smile. “Nope, I’ve got one of those. Pretty sure when I was born there was a dictionary, a thesaurus and the consolidated works of the greatest philosophers of our time in my nursery.”

  “Your parents are studious then?”

  Stephanie raised her eyebrows. “Pretentious is what I prefer to call it, but whatever you want to call it, it doesn’t change that neither of them ever wasted time reading me a book they didn’t think would further me somehow.”

  “So no ‘Cat in a Hat’ for you?”

  “Dr. Seuss actually has many developmental—” She cut herself off, pursing her lips. “Dr. Seuss, yes. Fairytales? They had no use for those.”

  “Don’t those also have moral lessons and whatnot?” I tried to think back to what our nanny used to tell us when she read to us, but I never really paid much attention to her.

  Stephanie nodded. “Yes, but there are other ways to teach kids those lessons in my parents’ view. Fairytales are way too fluffy and enjoyable for them.”

  “They sound like a delight.”

  She sighed. “They’re lovely people unless you don’t meet their standards or fit their mold.”

  “And you didn’t?”

  She tapped her nose with her pointer finger. “Well done. I didn’t.”

  “But you have a degree in business from NYU. What rules could you possibly have broken that were so heinous they abandoned you?”

  “It’s not the degree, it was the way I got it.” Her blue eyes grew as she started shaking her head. “Wow that came out very wrong. Not the way I got it—I got it the way everyone else does. I studied and passed all the exams.”

  “What was their problem then?”

  Exhaling deeply, her jaw turned hard. Talking about this was difficult for her. “Their problem was that in high school and more so in college, I realized there was more to life than following their very set rules. You could say I discovered not following the rules was way more fun.”

  “You and I are very much in agreement on that one.” In a way, Steph’s story reminded me very much of my own. I was the wild child too, the one who stepped outside the box.

  Fuck, it was still hard for me to breathe in this box I’d been stuffed into after Jack’s death. “Life starts at the edge of what’s expected for you.”

  She nodded her agreement. “Turns out, not following the rules also means you don’t study as many hours as what’s expected of you.”

  I could see she was getting to the painful part now. There was a shadow in her eyes and her shoulders hunched like she was trying to make herself smaller. Wrapping my fingers around the end of my desk, I tightened my grip, bracing myself.

  “My grades started slipping. I didn’t do so well. I still graduated when I was supposed to, but my antics in the years between leaving home and graduation were too much for them. They dropped out of my life completely. They told me it was my fault, and they refused to put up with a child who disrespected them by shirking their values.”

  “And they just walked away?” I white-knuckled the table. I didn’t understand how parents could walk away from such a special girl. Whether or not she got into trouble, she was smart and driven, funny, witty and completely authentic. Her own person all the way. Who walked away from someone like that?

  Smiling sadly, she closed her eyes for a second instead of nodding. “They did. I haven’t seen or heard from them since.”

  When she opened her eyes, there was a vulnerability in them that made me feel like someone punched me in the gut. Along with that, I suddenly realized how intimate this conversation had gotten. Shit. Not good.

  I caught sight of the clock behind my office door again, shocked when I saw the time. We spent more than an hour talking. Pushing up off my desk, I went to grab the files I needed for my next meeting. “We’ve got work that needs to be done. I
should get to my meeting.”

  She glanced down at her watch and jumped up, apparently as startled by the time as I was. “Absolutely.”

  Grabbing the envelope with her credentials I gave her earlier, she walked to the door between our offices. I walked with her to her desk, making sure she had what she needed to get started. “You should find everything you need to access all our systems in that envelope. If you have any trouble, call the IT department. Their extension is in there as well.”

  “Thanks, I’m sure I’ll be fine.”

  I knocked twice on her desk and turned to leave. “I sent you an e-mail with everything I need done today. As soon as you’re logged onto everything, it should come through. If you need anything else though, just give me a call.”

  “I’ll do that, or I could wait until you come back. I should manage until then.”

  I shook my head. “I’ll be attending meetings just about the rest of the day. Take an hour for lunch whenever you want, I only ask you give me a heads-up first.”

  “Sure thing, boss.” She smiled, sinking into the cream leather office chair I had brought up for her. Turning it from side to side, she wiggled and tried to hide her widening smile.

  Get the fuck out of here, Williams. You have work to do. I chided myself when I realized I could very easily spend another hour just watching her get settled in.

  Chapter 21

  STEPHANIE

  “Good morning, secretary,” Jeremiah said, popping his head into my office as he did every morning when he got to work.

  I lifted my hand in a small wave, smiling. Ever since the slut/secretary comment, he seemed to enjoy putting a slight emphasis on the word secretary. “Good morning, boss.”

  One corner of his lips kicked up, and he rested his shoulder against my doorframe. “Any fires I need to know about before I go in there this morning?”

  “Not a one,” I assured him, enjoying the bit of playfulness between us. One week into my new job and Jeremiah and I were settling into a comfortable routing, our morning exchanges being part of it. I was getting adjusted to working for him, though I didn’t think I would ever get adjusted to how he gave me something to appreciate every morning.

  This morning, it was his forearms. His navy blue shirt was rolled up to just below his elbows, the color setting off his lightly tanned skin perfectly. I still had to ask him how he managed to look tanned when he spent so many hours at the office.

  Sinewy muscle roped from his large hands and disappeared under his sleeves, a few noticeable veins joining in on the ripple of the muscle when he moved. Having a morning hit of eye candy every weekday was a definite pro to having such a sexy boss.

  Not that I spent a lot of time contemplating his sexiness. Who me? Never.

  The judgmental part of my subconscious harrumphed and rolled her eyes at the part that was wiping drool from the corner of her mouth. Jeremiah cut my inner war short when he smiled, flashing his brilliant pearly whites. “If you go get coffee from the break room, snag me a hazelnut cappuccino from the machine, would you?”

  I snapped my fingers to my forehead in a quick mock salute. “You got it.”

  Who would’ve thought the cocky billionaire from the papers, the man who commanded boardrooms as soon as he walked into them—my subconscious might’ve drooled a little the first time I witnessed the control he exuded when he was in action—would have a weakness for flavored coffee? I certainly wouldn’t have guessed it.

  It gave me a thrill to learn these tiny details about him, something to hang onto when the asshole in him came out to play. Which did happen from time to time.

  “Thank you,” he said with much more enthusiasm than was necessary. “I’ll be in my office all morning.”

  “I know, I keep your calendar.” I teased him lightly. I couldn’t help it. Our relationship was strictly professional on both ends, but we got along surprisingly well.

  “Oh, yeah.” He snapped his fingers, shooting me a quick wink. “I knew I was forgetting something.”

  “Ha ha,” I replied, standing up from my chair to go get our coffees when he went into his office. I loved that damn chair. It was like heaven to my back and butt. Like sitting on a cloud. No matter how many hours I spent sitting in it, I never tired of it.

  Aisha, one of the other girls who worked on my floor, was in the break room when I got there. She smiled when she saw me, sliding over in front of the coffee machine to make space for me beside her.

  The machine was a favorite among the people on my floor. It made everything from sweet tea to hot chocolate, to filter and flavored coffees. It was glorious.

  “How’re you doing over there at the boss man’s office?” Aisha asked, waiting for the machine to fill her cup with her selection. The strong, bitter smell and the color of it told me it was espresso.

  “Still going well,” I said, motioning to her cup. “Another late night?”

  She nodded, a flush rising on her cheeks. “It was, but it was so worth it.”

  I laughed, cocking my hip against the counter the machine stood on to get comfortable. Aisha started seeing a new guy recently, and it was adorable how in love she was. “Details, woman. I need details.”

  She opened her mouth to start talking when the door banged open, and Josh, a flamboyant, fabulous guy who was one of the architects on Jeremiah’s mall project walked in. He swept his eyes from me to Aisha and back again. “I smell gossip. What did I miss?”

  “Aisha had another late night with her lover last night. She was just going to tell me about it.”

  Josh clapped his hands together and looked like he was about to start jumping up and down with excitement. “I knew now was the perfect time to come get some coffee. Don’t let me interrupt you, sweetheart. Tell us all about how he—”

  Aisha giggled, clapping her hand over his mouth. “I definitely don’t want to hear the end of that sentence. I’m not telling you anything about how he did anything if you’re going to do your Josh thing and turn it all dirty.”

  “Are we not getting the dirty details?” He feigned innocence but winked at me. “Maybe we should talk about Stephanie’s love life instead then. Steph would give me all the juicy details, wouldn’t you?”

  I shrugged, shaking my head. “I don’t have any juicy details to tell, so you’re stuck with Aisha for now.”

  He sighed, chuckling. “Fine then. I’m waiting for the clean details, Aisha. Time to spill the beans.”

  Laughing and shaking her head at Josh’s playful exuberance, she told us all about her date the night before. I watched the two of them, thankful to have people like them working on my floor.

  I started chatting with them on the day I started, but it felt like we’d known each other much longer than a week. The same could be said for most of the other people I was getting to know at work. I got along with everyone I met here, which had surprised me at first.

  Neil popped in a few days after I started and told me everyone liked me. He attributed it to my “sweet nature” and “sense of humor.” I thought it was because I wasn’t as snotty as Jeremiah’s previous secretary had apparently been.

  I talked to Josh and Aisha for a couple of minutes, then went to take Jeremiah his coffee. He was on the phone when I entered and motioned for me to set the cup down on his desk. I noticed his chair was angled so he would be able to see the view at least a little in his periphery.

  It wasn’t the first time I noticed it. The man seemed to love staring out at the city and the bright blue sky. Not that I could blame him. I did the exact same thing in my office.

  I was doing just that the following day, looking out my window while coordinating deliveries for construction material with one of the contractors Jeremiah was working with. Then, I heard the voice of the one person in the company I knew didn’t like me.

  Jeremiah’s father. “Is he in?”

  “Please hold,” I hurriedly told the contractor, then muted the phone and turned to face the titan in the flesh. I hadn’t been form
ally introduced to him, but he didn’t seem interested in knowing who I was aside from being the gatekeeper to Jeremiah’s office.

  “Mr. Williams.” I greeted him, pulling up Jeremiah’s schedule on my computer even though I knew it by heart. “He is in. I’m not sure if he can take a meeting though, let me check.”

  To my surprise, the man nodded curtly and started firing off orders to the older woman standing behind him. Mary Jane, or MJ, was as feared and well-known in this building as Jance Williams was.

  After noticing the contractor hung up, I put in a quick call to Jeremiah, anxious for being in such close proximity to his father. The man was larger than life. He started out as an oil mogul and built the company from the ground up, expanding into just about every industry there was.

  It was impressive but intimidating as all hell when he was staring at you. His eyes were the same color as Jer’s, but where Jer’s were warm and often filled with amusement once you got to know him, Jance’s were frigid and seemed to look right through you.

  “Your father’s here. Do you have a minute for him?” I asked Jer when he answered his office line.

  He sighed heavily. “Sure, it doesn’t really matter whether I do or not. Send him in.”

  I set the phone down and cleared my throat. “He’ll see you now, Mr. Williams.”

  “About time,” Jance muttered and strode past me, firmly shutting Jer’s office door behind him. MJ was gone when I looked up again, presumably back to their corner of the castle.

  Really not up to hanging around when Jance was close by, I opted to take my lunch break to escape him. Hopefully, he would be gone when I got back. The man made me seriously uncomfortable.

  I fished my phone out of my purse and returned a text from Tiana. She asked earlier if I was free for lunch, and we quickly arranged to meet at a coffee shop down the road.