The Billionaire's Bidding

by Barbara Dunlop

  “What are you thinking?” he asked.

  She grinned. “That I’m married to the best-looking man in the room.”

  He glanced around. “Okay,” he said slowly. “But the other guys are mostly over sixty.”

  A waiter in a pristine white jacket approached. “Mr. and Mrs. Garrison. I am Peter, the restaurant manager. The chef was delighted to hear you would be dining with us tonight. He has asked if he might present some additional entrée suggestions?”

  Alex stood up and shook the waiter’s hand. “Good to meet you, Peter. Please, tell the chef we would be delighted to hear his suggestions.”

  “Very good.” With a smile and a nod, Peter retreated, only to be replaced by their cocktail waiter.

  “Champagne?” Alex raised his eyebrows in Emma’s direction.

  “For our wedding night?” she asked with a stupid, sappy grin. But she couldn’t help it. It was still Saturday and, if the expression in Alex’s dark eyes was anything to go by, they were about to spend a glorious night together.

  He nodded to Emma, then turned to the waiter. “Cristal Rose? The ninety-six?”

  The waiter nodded sharply. “Excellent.” Then he swiftly removed their red and white wineglasses and left the table.

  Alex reached for her hands and took a deep breath. “So, you want to talk about this? Or do we just let it happen?”

  She let the warmth of his touch penetrate her skin. “The champagne?”

  He shook his head, stroking his thumb over her rings. “No. Not the champagne.”

  “Let me see.” She tilted her head. “The chef?”

  “No. Not the chef.”

  “Your inability to steer a catamaran?”

  “Hey.”

  “You nearly took out those two tourists.”

  “Their dive to the left was incredibly sudden.”

  “They were scattering in terror.”

  Alex paused, then he sobered. “May I assume your redirecting the conversation means you just want to let it happen?”

  His words sent a shiver through her, and she leaned forward, lowering her voice. “I’m not even sure what ‘it’ is yet.”

  He gave her fingers a gentle squeeze. “I am,” he said softly.

  An unaccountable panic burst through her belly. “Don’t—”

  “I won’t. Not tonight.”

  “Mr. and Mrs. Garrison,” Peter interrupted. “May I present Chef Olivier.”

  Alex released Emma’s hands, and she tucked her hair behind her ears as the wind picked up another notch.

  Alex got to his feet. “A pleasure,” he said to Chef Olivier, shaking the man’s hand.

  “The pleasure is mine,” the chef replied.

  “Are you cold?” Peter inquired of Emma. “Shall we close the shutters?”

  “Please, don’t,” said Emma. There was something wildly beautiful about the pounding rain, the distant lightning, and the crazily undulating palm fronds. There was a potent storm brewing out on the Pacific, and a potent storm brewing inside her. Both were frightening, unpredictable and exhilarating all at the same time.

  Eleven

  “I want to say it,” said Alex, propping himself up on one elbow in their huge four-poster bed.

  “You can’t say it,” Emma responded, her sun kissed breasts glowing a golden honey against the stark white sheets.

  “But I mean it,” he insisted. He’d realized hours ago that he was madly, passionately, incredibly in love with his wife.

  She reached up to place her index finger across his lips. “You promised.”

  He drew her fingertip into his mouth, turning the suction into a kiss. “Bet I can make you say it.”

  She shook her head in denial, but he knew that he could. The right kiss, the right caress, the right whisper in her ear, and her secrets were his for the taking.

  It wasn’t ego. It simply was.

  He feathered his fingers up the length of her thigh.

  “Don’t,” she gasped.

  He smiled. “Say it.”

  “Play fair.”

  “All’s fair in—”

  “Alex.”

  He moved his hand and kissed the tip of her nose. “I’m just messin’ with you.”

  “Well, I don’t like it,” she said tartly.

  “Sure you do. At least give me that.”

  Her mouth twitched in a reluctant half smile.

  The telephone next to the bed jangled in his ear.

  He swore out loud.

  “What time is it?” she groaned, covering her ears in time for the second ring.

  “Around one,” he said, picking up the receiver before it could vibrate his eardrums a third time. “Yeah?”

  “Where the hell were you?” barked Nathaniel.

  “Dinner. The beach. Why?”

  “Because you’re about to lose half a billion dollars, that’s why.”

  Alex sat up straight, his brain shifting gears faster than a Formula One driver. “What happened? Where are you?”

  “David happened. And I’m still in New York.”

  “David?” asked Alex.

  Emma sat bolt upright. “What about David? Is Katie all right?”

  Alex held up a finger. He wasn’t trying to be dismissive, but he needed to hear what Nathaniel had to say.

  “David, that slimy, underhanded son-of-a-bitch, is attempting to sell the Kayven Island Resort.”

  Alex reflexively glanced around. “Huh?”

  “Please, cousin, tell me you’re a director of McKinley Inns. Tell me the paperwork is done. Tell me Emma and Katie don’t still have control of that company.”

  Alex’s gaze shifted to Emma.

  “What?” she asked.

  “Alex?” Nathaniel prompted.

  “The lawyers are drafting right now.”

  “Are you telling me nothing’s been signed?”

  “Only the loan to McKinley.”

  “Shit.”

  Alex’s tone was harsh. “What the hell is going on, Nate?”

  “Cranston’s flashing a power of attorney signed by those two women.”

  That didn’t make any sense. None at all. “Hang on.” Alex covered the receiver.

  Emma was watching him with an impatient look of confusion.

  He kept his voice even. It had to be a mistake, or maybe a forgery. “Nathaniel says David Cranston has a power of attorney.”

  She drew back on the bed, shifting the covers away. “For what?”

  “Did you sign anything for him?”

  She shook her head. “No.” Then she stopped shaking and her eyes narrowed. “Wait. There was one thing. An authorization to redecorate a bed-and-breakfast in Knaresborough. It’s a tiny little place. Nothing important.”

  Alex returned to the phone. “She says all he can do is redecorate some bed-and-breakfast.”

  “It’s not redecorating. And it’s not a bed-and-breakfast. The man is authorized to sell any and all McKinley properties. He’s cutting a deal with Murdoch and DreamLodge. For an obscene commission.”

  “How do you know—don’t answer that.” Alex went back to Emma. “Did you read it carefully?”

  Her eyes went wide, and her face paled.

  “Did you read it at all?”

  “We’d already talked about it…” Her features pinched, and her hands fisted around the blanket. “With the wedding and all…I signed so many stacks of paper.”

  He let out a pithy swearword.

  “Yeah,” said Nathaniel. “Now you’re catching on. You get your ass on a plane.”

  Alex glanced to the rain battered window and the pitch black beyond. “Can you stall?”

  “I’ve already put his entire legal team on retainer, had them declare a conflict of interest, and forced him to find new attorneys. You don’t want to know what that cost me.”

  “Did you talk to Katie.”

  “Hell, yes.”

  “Can she stop it?”

  “Not without Emma.”

  Alex c
losed his eyes and willed the wind and rain to stop. “We’ll be there as soon as humanly possible.”

  “Get here now.” The line went dead.

  Alex set down the phone.

  “Alex?” Emma whispered hoarsely.

  He stared at her. There was no easy way to say this. “David is trying to sell the Kayven Island Resort.”

  She blinked back in silence. “Why?”

  Alex’s stomach clenched to walnut size.

  Why?

  Because its value is about to rise to half a billion dollars.

  Sorry I forgot to mention that before you married me.

  Emma understood the words “trying to sell Kayven Island.” It was the meaning that eluded her.

  David was redecorating in Knaresborough. And, as far as she knew, hadn’t had anything to do with the Kayven Island property.

  “Why would he do that?” she repeated into the rain-dotted silence. She got that something was wrong. But she couldn’t get the puzzle pieces to connect inside her head.

  “For a big, fat commission from Murdoch.” Alex raked a hand through his hair. “Why didn’t Katie see—”

  “Back up,” said Emma, clambering off the bed and shrugging into one of the hotel robes. “Murdoch?”

  Alex’s eyes went hard as granite. “Murdoch bribed David to find a way to sell him Kayven Island.”

  “He wanted it that bad?” Sure it was a nice resort, but it served a small niche market. It commanded steep rates, so it was often half empty. Nobody was getting rich off Kayven Island anytime soon.

  A muscle clenched near Alex’s right eye. He grabbed his boxers and retrieved a pair of slacks from the closet. “We have to get to the airport.”

  “In this?”

  “It’ll let up eventually. As soon as there’s a break in the ceiling, we’re taking off.”

  “But what did Nathaniel say?”

  Alex seemed completely serious about heading for the airport, so Emma discarded the robe and pulled on a cotton dress.

  “Just what I told you,” said Alex.

  “You haven’t told me anything.”

  Keeping his back to her, he moved around the room as he spoke. “David duped you and Katie into signing a power of attorney that somehow allowed him to make a deal on Kayven Island. Nathaniel is trying to hold him off, but we need to get back to NewYork.”

  Emma watched his furtive packing. “What aren’t you telling me?” Was it a done deal? Had they already lost the resort?

  “Nothing.”

  “Has the sale gone through?”

  “No.”

  “Because if it has, it wouldn’t be the end of the world.”

  Alex froze.

  “It wouldn’t,” she repeated. “As long as David got a decent price.”

  Alex pivoted to face her. “Your employee, your sister’s boyfriend, is trying to defraud your company and you’re saying it’ll be okay as long as he got a decent price?”

  “If you’re afraid to tell me it already happened, you—”

  “I’m not afraid to tell you it already happened. It didn’t already happen.”

  “Then why are you acting so weird?”

  “I’m not acting weird. I’m acting normal. Acting weird was earlier.”

  His words hit Emma like a sledgehammer, and she staggered back. Was that it? Had the kinder, gentler Alex been an illusion? Was he mad now because he thought she’d made a mistake?

  She supposed she had made a mistake. But Katie had—

  Katie.

  Katie would be devastated.

  Emma went for the phone.

  But as she reached for the receiver, Alex latched on to her wrist.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Calling Katie.”

  “You can’t do that.”

  Emma glared up at him. “Yes, I can.” This wasn’t some random whim, this was her sister’s life.

  “Emma…”

  “Let go of me, Alex.”

  “We have to talk.”

  She tried to shake him off. “We can talk on the plane.”

  “We have to talk before you talk to Katie.”

  The look in his eyes sent a shiver of fear through her body. She almost couldn’t bring herself to say the words. “Is she hurt?”

  “No. No. She’s not hurt.”

  Emma shook her arm, and Alex let her go.

  “Then what the hell is going on?” she asked.

  Alex squeezed his eyes shut for a second. “There’s something about Kayven Island you don’t know.”

  “But Katie’s not hurt?”

  “Katie’s fine. I think she’s with Nathaniel. No, I know she’s with Nathaniel. He won’t let her out of his sight until we get back.”

  Emma’s fear cranked back up. “Is she in some kind of danger?”

  “Emma, listen to me.”

  She closed her mouth.

  Alex took both her hands in his. “The local government is putting a cruise ship dock on the island.”

  “What island?”

  “This island.”

  “So?”

  “So, that’s why Murdoch wants the resort. That’s why he’s willing to bribe David.”

  “Because the value will—” Emma stopped.

  She got it. In a blinding flash she understood exactly what had happened to her.

  “Alex!”

  “I wanted it, too,” he confessed.

  No kidding. She yanked her hands from his, stumbling back against the bed.

  “You kept this from me?”

  “Yes.”

  “You…You…I could have sold it to Murdoch.”

  Alex nodded.

  “And then I wouldn’t have had to marry you.”

  He nodded again.

  She raised her fist, battling a split second temptation to pummel his chest. “And you didn’t tell me?”

  “It was business.”

  “Business?”

  “I knew what I knew, and I did what was best for my company.”

  The fight suddenly left her.

  Of course he’d done what was best for his company. He’d never pretended to do anything different. He’d even warned her. He’d suggested she do the same.

  And she thought she had, she thought she was. But Alex had been working against her all along.

  “And you have the nerve to criticize David?” she challenged.

  Alex gritted his teeth. “I am nothing like David. David’s a con artist and a criminal.”

  “Yeah,” Emma agreed. “Just look what he did? He romanced Kayven Island out from under Katie.”

  Emma had never felt like a bigger fool in her life. She might be stuck with Alex for better or worse, but that didn’t mean she ever had to speak with the man again.

  “And wasn’t that reprehensible of him?” she ground out in a parting shot, then turned away and cut him out of her life forever.

  Emma forcibly tamped down her troubles with Alex as soon as she saw Katie’s stricken face.

  They were in the McKinley offices. It was six in the evening. She wasn’t even sure what day.

  “Oh, honey,” she crooned, drawing Katie into an embrace.

  Alex and Nathaniel immediately put their heads together and began talking in low tones.

  Katie hiccoughed out a sob. “I’ve made such a mess.”

  “It’s not your fault.” Emma shook her head, then shot Alex and Nathaniel a look to ensure they kept any stray opinions to themselves. “The only thing you’re guilty of doing is trusting too much. We were coerced and lied to by criminals.”

  Katie swallowed. “I should have guessed—”

  “Guessed what?” asked Emma, her gaze still boring in on Alex’s profile. “That a man could make love to you one minute then stab you in the back the next?” Emma hadn’t guessed that, either. But she’d know better next time.

  Alex spared her a fleeting glance, his expression neutral. She wasn’t even sure her words had registered. Not that her condemnation would
mean a thing to him anyway.

  “The important thing is to fix it,” she said, switching her attention to Katie, pulling back and striving for a look of reassurance.

  Katie gave a shaky nod, her gaze darting nervously to Nathaniel, and Emma worried what the man might have said before they arrived.

  “We have to both sign a revocation,” said Katie. “The lawyers…”

  Alex stepped forward. “The lawyers have it drafted, and they’re waiting across the hall.”

  Emma refused to look at him. “And then what?” she asked Nathaniel.

  Alex gave a frustrated sigh.

  “Then we make certified copies and have a sheriff waiting to serve it to both Murdoch and Cranston first thing in the morning.”

  “And that’s it?” asked Emma.

  Nathaniel shrugged. “That’s it.”

  She turned to Katie. “See? It’s going to be fine.”

  Katie shook her head, mutely blinking back tears, and Emma felt like a heel.

  “Hey, I know you’ll miss him.”

  Katie’s face crumpled, and Emma pulled her back into her arms. Then she motioned for Alex and Nathaniel to leave. The papers were ready. All it took was their signatures before the start of business tomorrow. She could afford to comfort Katie for a few minutes.

  The door snapped shut behind the men.

  “I’m such a fool,” said Katie.

  “You’re not a fool.”

  Emma had made a much bigger mistake. And, while they could recover from Katie’s, Emma’s was permanent. Alex would soon own half of their business, and there wasn’t a single thing they could do about it.

  Katie pulled back, a funny expression coming over her face. “If it wasn’t for Nathaniel, we’d have lost millions.”

  “If it wasn’t for me, we’d have made millions.”

  Katie shook her head. “That was just business.”

  “You’re defending Alex?”

  “He could have had our loan called and cut us out completely.”

  “Or he could have been honest.”

  “He was honest. He gave us the choice between a hostile takeover or a merger. We took the merger.”

  A merger? That’s all it was to Katie?

  Then Emma forced herself to regroup.

  Yes, that’s all it was to Katie.

  Katie didn’t know about Kayven Island. She didn’t know that Alex had tried to seal the deal by pretending to fall for her. She didn’t know that he’d been willing to coerce some friendly sex out of his bride of convenience before they got down to the business of flipping her resort for half a billion bucks.