Billionaire's Curvy Arrangement

by Annabelle Winters

  Finally, at the four-month mark, when I was pregnant like a porcupine, everything came to a head and popped like a pimple in the sun.

  “I’m calling in some favors with rich friends,” I’d said to Hayes. “We’re almost out of cash, and we’ve got a baby on the way.”

  Hayes had taken my phone and held it away from me. “What are you going to tell them?” he demanded.

  “The truth,” I’d said. “That I’m broke and pregnant and need help.”

  “You have help,” he’d said. “You have a husband.”

  I’d snorted as I looked up at him. “How’s the job search going, Dear Husband?”

  Hayes’s expression went dark, and he ran his fingers through his hair. “I’m too well known in corporate circles. Executives are freaked out because they have no fucking idea why Hayes Henley is asking for job interviews. They assume it’s some kind of trick or that I’m an IRS informant trying to get some dirt on them to save my own ass. Then they just stop the process from going forward and stop returning my calls. And the rumors have spread. People think I’m either a criminal or a loser. I’m basically an outcast. Nobody wants to even be in the same room as me. No way they’re gonna give me a job. Fuck, even Ingram isn’t answering my calls or emails! It’s crazy!”

  “So get a job outside the corporate world,” I’d said.

  He’d glared like I was speaking Greek. “Like what? Plumbing? Construction? You think I know how to fix a sink or mix concrete? I have no fucking experience outside the corporate world, Hannah!”

  I’d thought a moment. “You have a lot of experience being served by waiters,” I’d said. “You could be a waiter.”

  Hayes looked like he was gonna explode. “Over my dead body,” he’d growled. “Why don’t you be a fucking waiter?!”

  I’d gasped at the comment, and immediately Hayes came over and apologized. I’d smiled, but at some level the comment affected me. It didn’t make me angry—not at him, at least.

  I’d looked down at my pregnant belly, and I realized that I was sitting on my ass and assuming my only options were to call some rich friends for a handout or yell at my husband to get a job. What the fuck kind of person was I?! Pregnant women around the world work demanding jobs all the way through their pregnancies. And here I am assuming that I need to be coddled and swaddled like I’m the baby! No way. No fucking way.

  “You know what?” I’d said. “I will be a waiter. There’s an Italian place around the corner. Come on. We’ll both apply. It’ll be fun.”

  At first Hayes refused, but I dragged his ex-billionaire ass down the block that very day. By the end of the week we were both in black aprons and black slacks and working hard to memorize the daily specials. All that talk about calling our rich friends for a loan or handout was gone, and soon we were getting a kick out of working with our hands and legs, seeing the looks of delight on customer’s faces, feeling all warm and fuzzy when we shared our tips with the chefs and dishwashers, the valets and doormen.

  Of course, at about the six-month mark things got hard again. The initial excitement about doing jobs we’d never dream of doing was wearing off, and we were forced to learn what it meant to grind out a living, paycheck to paycheck. We learned how to sacrifice and save, pinch every penny and squeeze the toothpaste tube until it was dry. There were times we came close to saying screw it, let’s just call some old millionaire friends and get a few hundred grand wired over. But we didn’t do it. We didn’t break. We didn’t crack.

  And now, nine months into this game, as we’re on the cusp of bringing new life into the world, becoming Mother and Father ourselves, I look up into Hayes’s green eyes and smile.

  “It’s time,” I say, glancing over at the go-bag I’ve kept ready for the past two weeks. “Ready, Father?”

  “Ready . . .” says Hayes, swallowing hard and nodding, “ . . . Mother.”

  9

  ONE YEAR LATER

  ORLANDO, FLORIDA

  HAYES

  “Mother’s in the restroom,” I say with a grin as the hotel receptionist stares at the giggling triplets that I’ve plonked on the wide wooden reception counter as I check us in.

  This is the first vacation we’ve had as a couple—well, as a family, I guess. We saved up for it, putting away our tips and working extra shifts. Even then we hesitated, waiting until we knew what the new health insurance rates were gonna be before splurging our vacation fund to go to fucking Florida, of all places.

  I smile in disbelief as I look around the hotel lobby. It’s a local hotel with a pool smaller than the Jacuzzi I had in my mansion. But for some reason I can’t wait to get the triplets in their oversized floats, see Mother on the inflatable raft, be Father splashing everyone as he paddles his family around the pool.

  Less than an hour later I’m living that dream, the smell of overchlorinated pool water feeling like perfume to my nose, the giggles of my one-year-old triplets Hodge, Harriet, and Helen sounding like music to my ears, my hand slyly rubbing my wife’s ass underwater making me feel like the luckiest motherfucker in Dixie.

  “I love you, Hannah,” I whisper, stopping the family parade right in the middle of the pool so I can kiss my wife and cuddle my kiddos.

  “Woof!” comes the familiar sound from the side of the pool, and I turn to our dog Hood, who drove down with us. We never did fix the lucky bastard, and boy did the guy take advantage of the reprieve. He corralled a hot little bitch (hey, that’s a biological term . . . ) and took her doggy-style (also the proper term . . .) right in front of that classy Italian joint. Seven puppies, and we only managed to give away four. That’s good, because our used minivan is full enough with our rapidly growing family.

  10

  HANNAH

  “I’m still full from dinner,” I say, carefully closing the door to the bedroom. We have a mini-suite—just one bedroom and a small lounge. The kids and dogs are in the bedroom, which means Father and Mother are on the pull-out couch.

  “Soon you’re gonna be full from me,” whispers Hayes, grabbing my wrist and pulling me onto his lap.

  I smile as he kisses me, his busy hands quickly finding their way down the back of my sweatpants. “You’d think that becoming a Father would teach you to behave,” I say, moving naughtily on his lap as he gets hard beneath my soft ass.

  “I’ll teach you to behave,” he snaps back.

  “Oh, is that the game we’re playing now?” I say with a fake eye-roll. “Where everything I say gets flipped into a snappy comeback?”

  “I’ll flip you into a slappy comeback,” Hayes says with a grin.

  “OK, that totally doesn’t make any sense,” I say. “What does that even—”

  But I swallow my words as Hayes grabs me by the hips and lifts me clean off his lap. Then he tosses me into the couch face-first, and before I know it I’m draped over his lap, my ass up in the air, my sweatpants and panties pulled down over my bare bottom!

  “Does it make sense now?” Hayes whispers, lovingly kissing my bare ass as he caresses my thighs, getting me wet and hot immediately as I breathe heavy and prepare for what’s coming.

  “Yes,” I moan as Hayes fingers my cunt just enough to get me riled and ready. “It makes sense now.”

  “Good girl,” whispers my bad-boy husband who was once a billionaire but is now the best waiter in town (only because I got promoted to hostess and no longer wait tables . . . ).

  His hand comes down on my rump with swift firmness, and I gasp at the wonderful sting of his skin on mine. I’ve been horny like a college sophomore since we got in the pool and Hayes kept rubbing my ass and pussy under the water like the dirty daddy he is. Now I’m ready for anything, and Hayes knows it.

  He spanks me again, rubbing my ass before giving me a third set of tight smacks. Soon he’s spreading my asscheeks and rubbing my rear hole between spanking sessions, and by the time he lifts me off his lap, I know Hayes is so hard it’s gonna be a rough, dirty ride down the Florida panhandle.

 
“Remember this?” he whispers, holding an unmarked tube in front of my nose. It takes me a moment before I recognize it as the all-natural lip-moisturizer that was in my bag two years ago.

  “Ohmygod, you are not gonna use that in my . . .” I start to say before trailing off as Hayes’s thumb circles my asshole and his long fingers lube me up. He’s in me before you can say “panhandle,” and I have to stuff a napkin into my mouth to stop from screaming loud enough to wake the kids. As is it the dogs are getting suspicious in the other room.

  Hayes takes me silently from behind, and I know he’s looking around this crappy hotel and grinning like an idiot. I am too, I realize. This feels strangely beautiful, like it’s so starkly clear that the outside world doesn’t mean as much as our inner world, that family makes your life rich, passion makes it fun, and love makes it forever.

  And as we collapse together on the scratchy couch, laughing and panting like stray dogs who don’t care where their next meal comes from, I hear two beeps.

  It’s our phones, I realize as Hayes kisses me.

  Both our phones.

  Beeping at once.

  I’m about to push Hayes off me, but I don’t. Nothing can make this moment more perfect, and I don’t wanna know what those messages say. I no longer care who Mother and Father are, if they approve or not, if they’re criminals or crazies, fairies or freaks, angels or demons.

  I no longer care because we’ve already won the game.

  The game of freedom.

  The game of family.

  The game of forever.

  

  EPILOGUE 1

  MOTHER AND FATHER

  “Did they see the messages?” Father asks.

  “Yes, eventually,” Mother says.

  “And what did they do?” Father asks.

  “What do you think they did?” Mother asks.

  “Did they really do what I think they did?” Father says.

  “You already know they did,” Mother says.

  “Good,” says Father.

  EPILOGUE 2

  HAYES

  “Good grief,” says the Chairwoman for Charitable Giving. “Is this real?”

  I hold Hannah close and nod. She nods too. Then our triplets who can barely stand somehow manage to nod together. Finally our dogs nod. (That’s a joke—they’re dogs, for heaven’s sake.)

  The Chairwoman for Charitable Giving leans closer to the donation check, squinting so hard I hold my breath and prepare to catch her eyeballs if they pop out of her head.

  “Is that a B?” she says in a half-gasp. “B for . . . for . . .”

  “Billion,” I say. “B for Billion. The Big B, we call it in some circles.”

  We wait a few more minutes to make sure Madam Chairwoman doesn’t drop dead of shock, and then we walk out of the downtown office of the Foundation to which we just donated our entire combined net worth. Millions and billions, dollars and cents, rubies and emeralds, property and possessions. Every last bit of it.

  It wasn’t easy, mind you. We stared at the messages from Mother and Father for a long time before calling the banks and confirming that what was once lost had now been found. A miracle, they said. Sure, we said. Maybe a miracle.

  Or maybe just another game.

  And this time we aren’t playing.

  After all, what’s the point of playing when you’re already won?

  

  EPILOGUE 3

  INGRAM

  “I lost?!” I shout into the phone even though I know it’s just a recording being played over and over again.

  You lost the bet, drones the voice on the line. Now your assets are frozen, your bank accounts wiped, property seized, safety deposits locked. Better luck next time.

  I hang up and stare at the phone like it’s a three-headed demon that’s about to eat me alive. I was standing outside the door while Hayes did whatever he was doing with that curvy chick when the call came in.

  The caller-ID said “Mother and Father”—which is strange, because not only are my parents dead, but I never called them Mother and Father. What am I, a weird member of the Royal Family?

  On a whim I’d checked one of my accounts, and when I kept getting a “No account matching that login” message, I freaked the geek out and called my accountant.

  Now, for the last hour I’ve been making calls to anyone I can think of in a position of power. I’m calling in every favor, getting the FBI and NSA and everyone in between to stop these hackers from siphoning away my life’s work. Maybe it’s the Russians. The Chinese. Hell, it could be the fucking Canadians, for all I know!

  My phone beeps again, almost making me jump out the window. It’s one of my government contacts. He wants me to forward him the call log from Mother and Father. I do it immediately, relaxing a bit as I tell myself that it’s just a prank, maybe even that idiot Hayes fucking with my head.

  I’m about to head back to the private room and yank that grizzled old bastard out here, but then my phone beeps twice. My heart almost stops when I see two messages from Mother and Father.

  You lost the bet. Better luck next time, says the first message.

  Better luck next time, says the second message.

  The repetition is weird, and I think for a moment. Clearly they want me to focus on the repeated sentence. Better luck next time? Better luck on the next bet? Are they implying I’m going to get another chance to win some bet that gets me my money back?

  I feel a tug at my sleeve, and when I look I see a plump kid staring up at me. He’s got a hundred-dollar bill crumpled tight in his left hand. In his right hand he’s got a note. He hands the note to me and runs out the door, joining a group of his friends, all of whom seem to know that someone gave their buddy a hundred bucks to deliver a message.

  I unfurl the note and read it. Then I snort. For sure this is someone I know fucking with me. What are we, like twelve years old?

  Bet you can’t get the woman in red to marry you by sunset, says the note.

  “First of all, why would I want to marry some woman by sunset,” I mutter to myself. I’m about to toss the note away, but then I decide that maybe the FBI can pick up prints off it or something. I slip it into my pocket, and when I look back up, a flash of color catches my attention.

  It’s a woman in red, and she just walked into the Club,

  My neck hairs stand up on end as I furiously try to figure out what’s going on. Is she behind this thing? Is she in on it? Is this pure coincidence?

  I hang back against the bar and take a look at her. Beautiful black hair. Gorgeous brown skin. Luscious red lips. And an ass that could keep me hard for a year.

  She walks past me and stops at the bar without even looking at me. I look her up and down shamelessly, trying to get a sense whether she’s expecting me to talk to her. That might give me a clue that she’s involved and not just a victim of the same twisted prank that’s got me all messed up.

  She totally ignores me, and I’m about to say something when I happen to look down at her left hand. She’s got a ring on, and although at first I assume it’s a wedding band, when I take another look I know it’s not. I glance down at my black titanium ring, the membership key to the Society.

  It’s the same ring.

  Now I don’t know which way is up, and my mind spirals out of control as I think about that message.

  Bet you can’t get the woman in red to marry you by sunset.

  The phrasing triggers something in me, and I realize that one of my first major successes on my road to the Big B was the result of some asshole betting that I couldn’t do something. Is the person behind this someone I knew back then? Someone who knows me? Knows me well enough to know what makes me tick, what gets me going, what drives me to take risks and achieve what seems impossible?

  The woman’s perfume fills my nostrils as I debate myself. But I’m smart enough to know that there are too many unknowns to sort out without more information.

  And right now the only way to get more in
formation is right here, right next to me, wearing a red dress.

  So I clear my throat and look over at her. But before I get a word out she speaks.

  “My name’s India,” she says, her exotic brown eyelashes making me want to get down on one knee and explore the foreign land beneath that dress.

  “Ingram,” I say with a nod and a half-smile.

  “I know,” she says. She blinks, and for the first time I notice that she’s not as cool and composed as I thought. She’s exquisitely put together, but I can see she’s stressed about something. “They told me.”

  “Who told you?” I say. “Never mind that. I already know who told you. What else did they say?”

  India takes a breath and flashes a scared smile. “They said you were going to ask me a question.”

  I stare in shock. “Did they tell you what the question was gonna be?” I say softly.

  India shakes her head. “No. But they told me what my answer needed to be. They told me that no matter what you asked me, I had to say yes.”

  

  FROM THE AUTHOR

  Enjoying the game, I hope!

  Ingram and India’s story comes next in BILLIONAIRE’S CURVY BET!

  Love,

  Anna.