Monroe: The Dynastic Collection: An Alpha Billionaire Romance

by Cynthia Dane

She expected all of it, but knowing it was about to become a reality? That it was something she would never be able to walk away from and still be the same woman in the end? That was frightening.

  “It’s all right,” Monroe said, sensing her trepidation. “Remember that I love you. We’re doing this because we love each other. Because it’s the right thing to do.”

  Alice flipped over the first page. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Acting like I have anything to worry about.”

  “So you trust me?”

  “I should be asking you that.” Alice showed him one of the terms on the second page. “After all, you’re the one with everything to lose from this arrangement.”

  “Your love is the only thing I mind losing.”

  Alice grinned. “Then it’s settled. I’m cleaning you out ten years from now.”

  “A whole ten years. That’s more than some men get.” Monroe kissed her forehead. Then her ear. Then her shoulder. With any luck, Alice would make it through another page before she was asked to get on her knees. She hoped it wouldn’t take that long.

  ***

  “I am satisfied,” Alice’s lawyer said. “My client is also satisfied.”

  “Then it’s settled,” Monroe’s lawyer replied. “I daresay, this is the easiest time I’ve had with you.” That was directed at Alice’s lawyer.

  “Because your client wants to shoot himself in the foot. Who am I to say no?”

  Monroe had already signed the primary document. He flashed a wicked grin at his fiancée across the table.

  You’re an idiot. Alice carefully signed the document as if her penmanship would be judged. I love you, and I know you’re doing this for me, but you’re an idiot.

  She touched the collar around her throat. Did it clash with her orange sundress?

  ***

  “Is that tender?” the doctor asked as he pressed upon Alice’s stomach. “Tell me yes,” he mouthed.

  “Yes. It’s very tender, doctor.” Alice sat up. “I haven’t had a period in two months. Have I told you that yet?”

  “Yes, Ms. Culver, I believe you have.” Monroe’s favorite doctor, who could be paid to say anything on any form, smiled at her. “I’ll have to run a blood test, but by all accounts, I think I’ll be able to tell you the results that you and Mr. Monroe want so much.”

  “How lovely!” Alice swung her legs over the side of the table. “I’ve always wanted to be a mother.”

  ***

  The situation was unfortunately simple: Alice couldn’t be seen in any high profile places, so when she went to New York, she flew commercial and kept her shopping to the boutiques the middle class considered upscale.

  To Alice, the dresses she thumbed through on the racks were made of the finest quality and romantic. Set aside those romantic notions. Okay, maybe a little romance. Was it a terrible thing to giggle as she pulled a discount Dior dress off the rack? The bargain!

  “That one would look so beautiful on you,” the salesperson said behind her. “Would you like to try it on?”

  Alice held up the strapless cocktail dress to the mirror. “I think so.”

  As she slipped into a fitting room, she received a text from her mother. “Are you still visiting tonight?”

  Of course Alice was. She wouldn’t go to New York and not visit her parents on Long Island, right? Besides, this was her last chance to see her family before everything officially changed. For all of them.

  ***

  “Dee!” Alice dropped her shopping bags and jumped into the woman’s arms. “I was hoping it would be you!”

  “Ah, shucks. When Mr. Monroe calls me to come back to work for you, I ain’t gonna say no. You’re fun, ma’am.”

  “Please. Alice.”

  They parted. Dee was back in her bodyguard uniform and all felt right in Alice’s world. Well, minus the part where she now needed a bodyguard more than ever. “You’re back at work in time. Tomorrow’s the big day.” Every time Alice thought about it, her heart fluttered and her stomach exploded in anxiety. That was normal, right? Everyone got cold feet.

  ***

  Under Monroe’s watchful eye, Alice rearranged her paperwork she kept in a safe in the hotel room.

  “As soon as your name is attached to that account, it will be all yours,” he said, stroking her long hair. The leash coiled from Alice’s collar to his other hand. A kiss touched the top of her head. “All the money I put into it will be rerouted through five different countries. I’m not saying it’s totally untraceable, but it won’t be easy even if someone is looking for it.”

  “You take such good care of me.”

  The leash tugged at her throat. Alice wasn’t done with her reorganizing, however. “I’ll start putting money into it as soon as the paperwork goes through. It’s all yours, my love. Pay your bills, invest, do whatever you want.”

  “I will, sir.”

  He stopped her chore long enough to tip her head back and kiss her. Alice almost fell beneath his spell for the second time that day – but there was work to do! So much to do. Tomorrow was a big day.

  ***

  “You sure you don’t want to invite your friend or even your mother?”

  “No,” Alice said after endless consideration. “They wouldn’t understand. Let’s save it for the real thing.”

  Monroe agreed. The fewer people who knew, the better.

  “You’re sure you want to use that ring?” He meant his mother’s wedding ring.

  “What better trinket to send a message to your father?” Alice had few pleasures to indulge in. Her fiancé and the look on Russell’s face when his whole world crumbled were two of them.

  “You’re more sadistic than I ever gave you credit for, my love.”

  “Takes a sadist to know one.”

  “Touché.”

  ***

  The judge stepped out of his chambers and shook Monroe’s hand. “Look at you! Thought for sure you were bullshitting me when you called me last week.” He shook Alice’s hand as well.

  Monroe kept a protective arm around Alice’s midsection. The Dior dress kept riding up her thighs, damnit. “I trust that your reelection campaign is going well?”

  “With your donation? Of course.” The judge gestured to the podium at the front of the room. Julia and Dee already stood there, dressed in Sunday best. Julia pulled out a handkerchief and dabbed her one good eye. It was that sort of thing that gave Alice strength today. “Shall we?” The judge’s voice was as ominous as the seven trumpets heralding the Apocalypse.

  “You’re beautiful,” Julia said to Alice.

  Dee blushed when asked if she was Alice’s witness. “Guess so,” she said.

  This wasn’t how Alice imagined this day when she was a little girl. But, she reassured herself, Monroe had promised a proper ceremony as soon as his father was taken care of.

  “Alice,” Monroe whispered, clasping her hands and gazing into her eyes. She was liable to drown in that amber. Not a bad way to go. Suck me into your gravity again, my love. “Promise me that this is what you want.”

  She nodded. “I want to be with you forever, Damon. I don’t care how we achieve that.”

  This monumental moment should’ve been given more care, but they didn’t have time for ostentatiousness or full-page spreads in the papers. One day. When this was all over and they could be normal again.

  Well, as normal as a couple with billions of dollars at their disposal could be, anyway.

  ***

  “We don’t have much time,” Monroe warned, closing the door behind him. “I paid the guy to give us this room for a whole ten minutes, and I have a meeting at five.”

  Alice was still coming down from her nerves. Her hand touched her stomach. Settle down, butterflies. Nothing has really changed. “Does it have to be like this?” Something sparkled in Monroe’s hands. “What’s that?”

  “Unfortunately, it does have to be like this. Our state has rather strict if not archaic laws about such things. I don’
t want there to be any loopholes.”

  “Admit it,” Alice tried to coolly say as he presented her with a silver box. “This is turning you on.”

  “Maybe a little. Open it.”

  Inside was a pair of silver bracelets, suspiciously looking like fancy handcuffs. He would. Each one was engraved. Together they announced his name.

  Alice held out her wrists. Monroe clasped a bracelet around each one. Part of her ensemble, she supposed.

  “Exquisite,” he said with a kiss to her fingers. “Now bend over, my love. We don’t have much time, and I’m only half-erect.”

  She wanted to laugh. Instead, she giggled awkwardly, her nerves besting her. “Does our first time without…” She couldn’t even say it. “Have to be like this? It’s not romantic at all.”

  “Don’t worry, precious.” Monroe drew her into his arms. Already she felt a million times better. Yes, this is how it’s meant to be. Her skirt pulling up and her underwear falling down with only a few quick motions. “That doesn’t have to start today. Our first time doing that will be much more romantic, I promise. You can stop your medication tomorrow.”

  Already he was making concessions to that huge contract she signed a few days ago. That’s how Monroe was, though. Anything to get under her skirt!

  ***

  Alice rode the elevator up with no one but Dee to accompany her. To be sure, the security downstairs was not pleased to see either of their faces. Russell had made sure they were no longer welcomed here.

  Too bad.

  The doors opened to the carefully controlled chaos that was Monroe Industries’ main office. Straight ahead was Alisha, the colorfully clad receptionist who sat at her floating desk and barely gave Alice any thought as she approached.

  Alice stared at the embossed letters hanging above Alisha’s head. MONROE they screamed at her. That’s right. Don’t forget that.

  “Good afternoon,” Alice said with all the strength she could muster. “Could you do me a favor and send a memo to the whole building?”

  The receptionist balked. At least she turned it into a cordial laugh. “And what should I tell the whole building, ma’am?”

  Alice produced a copy of her marriage license. “That I, Alice Marie Monroe, now own half of everything you see here.”

  Suffice to say, the receptionist was speechless.

  REIGNED

  Prologue

  Marriage had been good to Damon Monroe thus far. Granted, it had only been a week since he took a wife down at the city hall, but it had been a fantastic week.

  Alice was everything he had been searching for. Of course, she was beautiful. How could that not be the first thing he noticed about her the night they met? The similarities to that simple drawing that stole his breath years ago were uncanny.

  But Alice Monroe – and how good it felt to call her that – was not a mere beauty who made her husband feel like he was in paradise every time they shared the same air. She was charming. Funny. Sharp as a tack, even if she didn’t give herself enough credit. So what if she didn’t have a business degree? Damon may have come from a world where everyone had at least a Master’s in Business, Economics, or Rhetoric, but he also knew the power of experience. He hadn’t hired the Clayborns to be his dual assistants because they had the paperwork and pedigree. He hired them because their combined résumé was at least five miles long.

  Damon plucked a new frame from its box, careful to not smear his thumbprint all over the crystal façade. A recently printed photo was ready for placement: Alice at their wedding ceremony.

  They both agreed that having a secret marriage at City Hall was not ideal for either of them. Damon had promised his bride that there would be a proper ceremony, complete with hundreds of guests and millions of dollars of trimmings, as soon as things settled down. There was no time to fuck around with guest lists and wedding planners when half the company was against him marrying Alice to begin with.

  They can’t say shit now.

  Damon placed the photograph next to the one of him and his mother. Alice had brought Damon together with his mother Julia, whether that was her intention or not. I thought my mother had abandoned me. What else was he supposed to think when she disappeared after the divorce, never to be heard from again? Damon had heard the occasional things here and there. That she had become a crazy hermit. That she had been in a terrible accident that scarred her face. Both of those things were true. What Damon hadn’t known, however, was that the reason Julia disappeared and became disfigured was because of the one man they shared.

  Russell Monroe. Julia’s ex-husband and Damon’s father.

  Every time he thought about the truth regarding his father, a red shade claimed the room.

  He tried to kill my wife.

  Damon had to be careful with the documents now in his hand. It would be too inconvenient to have new copies sent over because he tore them in an unrelated rage.

  “Mr. Monroe,” came Alisha the receptionist’s voice on the intercom. “Your fa…”

  The office door flung open. Damon turned around before he was forced to.

  Never before had he seen his father this angry at him. Not that Damon was surprised, but that didn’t make it any less… strange. Oh, he had seen his father angry before. At investors. At business associates. At the stock market. 2008 was a hard year for all of us. At his own son? Damon had always been the model son to his father. He went to the right schools. He studied the right amount, and in the right fields. His internships were fostered between his father and a close friend who owned a company of a similar size and legacy. Damon Monroe had done everything right. Everything but marry the right woman.

  Russell had not been privy to that particular information. Which was a part of Damon’s plan… the word had only begun to spread two days ago. Just the right amount of time for it to reach Russell in Beijing and for him to get on his plane as soon as possible.

  “Tell me it’s a joke!” Tall and lean Russell Monroe was a freak of nature when he was in the midst of losing his mind. His charcoal suit crinkled with every erratic movement. His steel gray hair, peppered with the black it used to be, looked as if it had been pulled at the roots for the whole twenty-hour flight from Beijing. His visage, though… that was what unsettled Damon the most. Wide eyes. Frothing mouth. Fire burning within the amber people often mistook as being the source of Damon’s own eye color. Even I thought that until I looked into my mother’s eyes for the first time the other day.

  “Good afternoon, Father.”

  Damon knew it was coming. Since meeting his mother and opening his memory to events from so long ago, he knew his father was capable of it. Here it came now. Damon did not move or try to stop it. He wanted to feel his father’s fist clock him on the cheek. He wanted to experience the sting his mother had felt more than once. And I felt more than a few times as a child.

  However, no amount of bracing could fully prepare him for the sheer amount of force behind his father’s right swing.

  “Jesus!” Russell shook out his hand and marched to the other side of his son’s spacious office. Damon lowered his left hand, his wedding band the only thing standing out among a sea of red. “Jesus Christ, Damon.”

  “Could say the same to you, Dad.” Damon gripped the edge of his desk. The blowback from the swing had knocked over both photos on his desk. “Take it you’re back from Beijing?”

  He was being cheeky, knowing full well that it would only enrage his father more. Yet whatever energy Russell used in that punch was now gone, and all that was left was a bitter shell of a man the north side of sixty. Russell chomped on his lip as he stared out at the cityscape beyond the office windows. He often called such a view his kingdom.

  Damon had done something to upset the delicate balance of that so-called kingdom.

  “Fuck Beijing,” Russell murmured. “I stormed out of a meeting with the Lis as soon as I heard such wonderful news.”

  “Sorry you couldn’t be there.”

  “Sorr
y? Are you sorry about what you’ve done? Still time to get an annulment.” Russell turned, hands on his bony hips. I realize more and more that I am my mother before I am him. Damon was a Monroe in name and ambition only.

  “Hence why we decided to take care of matters while you were gone. Didn’t want to bother you with something you didn’t approve of.”

  “Fucking hell, Damon. Do you understand what you’ve done?”

  “Yes.” He leaned against his desk, hand protectively covering the two photos. “I married the woman I love.”

  “Whom you have known for as long as you’ve known what you’re having for dinner.”

  “You’re the one who told me I would know.”

  “Fantasies. I told you fairy-tales because you had no woman to do it for me.”

  “Yes, speaking of such…” Damon had been waiting for this moment. “My mother had some very interesting things to say about that.”

  “Your… mother.”

  “She’s done fairly well, considering what you put her through. I’d ask why you let me believe she didn’t want me, but I have a pretty good idea now.”

  “Your mother!”

  “You remember her, I’m sure. She’s the woman you nearly beat to death and then scared into hiding by having one of your goons set her on fire. Like you had some lovely associate set my wife’s apartment on fire.”

  There was a lot for Russell to latch onto in that statement. Would he rage at the accusations? Would he go on a diatribe against Julia Johnson, the crazy ex-wife who was rumored to abuse her son? A rumor I’m sure he fostered. Or would he insist that Damon had been poisoned against his father?

  Of course not. There was only one thing Russell Monroe cared about right now.

  “Your wife.” Russell wandered away again, walking off the anger building inside of him. “Jesus Christ. Your wife.” Maybe if he called upon the Lord’s son often enough, he would appear. “That whore is not your wife!”