by Ember Flint
How could he brush off in such a way something that evidently dreadful for me and define it as such?
An issue is when your car breaks down, when your favorite pair of boots get lost or you call a patron in the coffee-shop you’re working in a stingy asshole for leaving you a fifty cent tip and even expecting some extra-service for his generosity and you almost end up losing your waitress gig over it.
Those are issues, minor stuff, but losing one’s home?
That’s not an issue, that’s a fucking catastrophe and that stupid preppy-looking jerk should know that, considering his line of work.
So I was ranting, screaming —possibly breaking a rather costly-looking little vase that was standing oh-so-temptingly on the edge of his desk— and then I was being hauled out of there by those two mindless gorillas only to end up finding myself face to face with Cash Stone, absolutely gorgeous in his dark and extremely well-fitted tailored suit, hot, impossibly tall and built.
He looked like a huge, glowering walls of bricks, his piercing blue eyes boring into mine, under black locks in need of a little trim —and yet at the same time sexy as hell— his deep baritone and menacing scowl making those two rude guards tremble and shrivel and sending my heart on a wild ride.
And then he was talking to me, his voice low and calming, his delicious woodsy cologne surrounding me like a cloud of aromatherapy, his warm hand burning a hole on my lower back and finally his kiss.
That had been just, wow.
There are no words.
And now here I’m am —starting to feel like I stepped into the twilight zone— completely confused and a bit shocked, sitting rigid as a board on the edge of a rather plush sofa in a lavishly decorated enormous suite, on the last floor of the biggest resort in in the Stone Luxury Resorts and Hotels chain —I remember reading an article on that on the Austin Chronicle, the reporter kept going on and on about how great Mr. Stone was for honoring his hometown by opening in it the biggest resort of his worldwide chain.
So basically my entire mind is in the middle of a big ‘What the fuck?’ session right now.
And to top this all off, I was told by some lawyer —a Mr. Jamison Trent, I believe— while he was driving with me here in a limo —a fucking real limo— that I would be meeting his boss later here.
I glance at the display of my watch and I sigh I don’t know how I feel about this and I don’t know what to think about Cash wanting to help me save my ranch, but I don’t have much choice right now.
I bite my lower lip and then I start to chew on my nails, but then I force myself to stop, Grams always said it’s a terrible habit.
I have to be strong, keep the nerves at bay, be poised and relaxed.
Easy, right?
I sigh, covering my face with both of my hands, my curls cascading around me and muffling my groan.
God, who am I kidding?
I’m about to meet Cash Freaking Stone and this after that kiss he gave me.
What should I say?
What should I ask?
What does he want from me?
We couldn’t be more different even if we tried, I’m just a normal person with a shitty life and he owns everything he has in sight.
Besides the Resorts chain thingy, Cash is the owner of his family’s huge ranch, of Stone Oil, he is sitting on the board of the fucking bank that is trying to ruin me and he is the CEO and president of an international conglomerate with God knows how many divisions —I think I’ve heard there are over a hundred of them for sure.
He probably did not know I existed before this morning, even if my ranch since recently does border Stone Ranches on the farthest East boundary.
A couple of months ago, Cash bought all sixty-five thousand acres of land belonging to Grey Ridge Ranch from my neighbor —all corn fields and pastures for his cattle and the Thoroughbreds and Quarter horses he breeds— and englobed it in his holdings, effectively making our ranches confining, but I doubt he knows that.
I’m just a girl that has to struggle every day to make ends meet and he is a freaking billionaire, the nearest thing to American Royalty one could ever see, his blood is practically as blue as his eyes and he wants to fix my problems for me. Why?
I can’t help but feel a little wary of his motives, yet at the same time I can’t shake off the certainty that Cash would never hurt me, it was in the way he held me, the way he kissed me.
Every touch of his hands, every word from his lips, ignited a fire inside of me and the way he looked at me only made it blaze even more, but at the same time he made me feel as safe as I’ve never felt before, being in his arms was exciting, daunting, thrilling, but most of all it felt like being home.
I replay in my head the way he looked at me so intensely this morning, the way his eyes seemed to almost caress over my skin and I shiver, feeling a disconcerting pulse between my legs as my heart starts to beat a little faster.
Damn, the guy is hot!
Powerful, commanding, direct and forward, all qualities that appeal to me, but there’s more to it.
There’s something else that pulls me to him.
Something that I know, something in his deep, mystifying eyes. There was an ever present sorrow dousing them and that is something that I can recognize quite well, something I’ve seen in the mirror more than once.
No matter how rich he is, I can tell that life has sent him his share of lemons to squeeze, in that at least we are the same.
Chapter 5
CASH
“Hold on, Jamie, Carson’s here too,” I say over the phone as I lean against the leather backrest.
I connect the cell to the limo’s speaker system and raise the privacy panel to isolate us from my driver.
“Go, ahead, we’re listening.”
My lawyer clears his throat and I can hear papers shuffling in the background.
“Well, I looked into Miss Murphy’s personal and financial matters as you asked, Cash. It turns out she is the sole owner of Silver Bridle Ranch, down in Silverbrook City, it borders your lands actually.”
I raise my eyebrows at that little bit of information. I didn’t know we were neighbors.
“It does?”
“Well only since you bought off that Grey fellow at least.”
I nod, realization dawning on me. “So she’s on the East border?”
“Exactly…”
“And what are we talking about here?” asks Carson, uncrossing his legs and leaning forward on the opposite seat.
“About eighty-thousand acres. They grow crops but don’t sell too much of it, using it mainly to support themselves. There are, or at least there were about twenty hands on the payroll. They mostly breed cattle and horses. They did quite well when her maternal grandfather, Dominic Murphy, was alive, there’s rumor that their horses were very fine, but then he had a stroke, died almost on the spot.”
“So she has her grandfather surname. What about her father?” I ask.
Jamison coughs a little. “Hang on… let me check.”
I hear the sound of his fingers rapidly running on a keyboard.
“Not in the picture, never was. She had a sister, different father, again not in the picture.”
I brush my mouth with the back of my hand, frowning. “Go on, what else you got?”
“Well when Mr. Murphy died the ranch took a serious hit, they had to ask for a second mortgage, it was okay for a while, they got refinanced by the bank on their first one and they managed to keep everything together, then their grandmother, Julie… can’t remember her maiden name, died as well about six years ago… heart attack.”
“How old was Aria?” I ask, dreading the answer. She must have been quite young.
Again I hear some noise in the background, this time it sounds like Jamison is printing something. “She was fourteen, her sister, Alma, barely eighteen.”
“What about their mother?” inquires Carson, a pensive look on his face and his
pack of Marlboro bouncing on his knee.
“Long gone I’m afraid. Jenna Murphy was a junkie. She died very young, I believe she was twenty-eight and she did a fair bit of travelling and wasn’t in Austin when she passed. Doesn’t seem like she was much of a mother for her little girls. A heroin overdose… Aria was two and her older sister six year olds, so their grandmother’s death left them alone in the world, as far as I can see.”
I huff a breath. “Fuck…”
“Yeah, the older sister must have been something. She dropped out of college in the first year and took care of Aria and of the ranch. They were in the green for some time and then Alma was diagnosed with cancer two years ago and passed away last autumn, about eight months ago.”
I close my eyes, sighing deeply, feeling my heart squeeze over and over for her.
Death and sorrow have been practically her shadow since she was a little girl, just like they have been mine, or maybe worse even, ‘cause she knew the people she has lost, she must feel a great deal of pain and rage along with the loneliness and hollowness that I feel.
“That’s a really terrible situation,” Carson’s comment brings me back to the present.
I don’t need to ask any more questions to know what happened, I can imagine only too well.
“So they spent everything they had to save her life, but couldn’t, fell behind with the mortgage payments and now the bank is going to take the ranch from her,” I surmise.
Carson makes a non-committal kind of grumble.
“That’s exactly what happened, Cash. She is so indebted, I don’t know how can she even start to find her way out, which is a pity really,” Jamison says.
I hear him look through some more papers. “She seems to be quite bright. Finishes high school a year earlier. Got accepted in the best universities, only based on her grades.”
“How the fuck did you manage to gather this much info on the girl this fast?” asks Carson with a surprised grin.
Jamison chuckles a little. “Well there’s nothing you can’t find on the internet nowadays and whatever door I could not open myself, was practically ripped from its hinges whenever I used Cash’s name.”
I shake my head. “Anything else, Jamie?”
“Uh… it appears she wanted to study animal science, horse breeding and reproduction, she has an interest in genetics and embryo transfer in particular, but of course she put everything aside when her sister got sick. She has been managing the ranch ever since and had to take one or two odd jobs as a waiter to make ends meet, not that it’s making any difference. She doesn’t have a very hopeful future ahead, I’m afraid.”
Hell no!
My mind rebels against that notion.
She will have everything she wants and more. I’ll make sure of that.
She has suffered more than fucking enough. This ends today.
I can’t explain why I care so much, but I do.
Can’t pinpoint the reason why, but I’m crazy about her even if I was in her company for less than half an hour.
If I was a normal guy, I’ll simply tell Aria I like her a lot, maybe take her on a date or some shit —by the way, thank God she is twenty: I would have made myself sick waiting for her to be the right age—, but I’m not a normal guy.
I’m a fucking billionaire and people only see that.
No point in telling Aria I’d like to know her better, have something with her.
She seems like a sweet, responsible kind of girl, but she’ll never see anything but my cash anyway, just like everyone else.
This doesn’t mean I won’t be able to have her if I want her and fuck do I want her!
My cock, which has not cared much to jump into the fray whenever in the presence of a hot-looking woman, has stubbornly decided it no longer remembers how to settle-down.
I’ve been hard and ready to fuck since I saw her this morning, all traces of fatigue and indifference to the other sex completely wiped out from my head.
I see Carson looking at me expectantly and I realize I still got my lawyer on the phone.
“Jamison, you’re still there?”
“Yes, Cash. Do you need anything else?”
I sigh, pick up the cell again and disconnect it from the speakers.
“I do. I want you to call FFC bank, cover Miss Murphy’s debts and acquire Silver Stone Ranch from them immediately. I want this to be dealt with within the day. Call me back as soon as you get the ball rolling. I want you to get started on this ASAP.”
Before Jamison can agree or protest, I hang up the phone and turn to look out the window.
Carson’s laughter makes me do a double take.
“What?” I bark.
He smiles slowly. “Nothing, it’s just that you’re been very kind with the little spitfire, I was just thinking about your motives. I can see they’re not selfless: if you wanted to be her knight in shining armor you would have paid her debts, but left her the ranch, instead you’re acquiring it yourself. I find it interesting.”
I level him with a hard look. I’m too fucking tense, I’m in no mood to be teased right now.
“I never said I meant to be the hero here. I do want to help her, but I do have my motives, you’re right.”
“Care to share them with me?”
I shrug. “I simply realized you were right about me needing a wife, an heir for SCI and she is what I want.”
I can see Carson’s eyebrows shoot up his hairline.
“Well, fuck me. That is the last explanation I would have thought about, considering your opinion on this matter only this morning, son.”
I glare at him. “I changed my mind.”
He chuckles. “You sure did, Cash and I’m even glad you came to the same conclusion I did, but you know very little about this young lady. Wouldn’t it be better to at least date her for a while before you commit?”
I shake my head. The thought of waiting irks me. I want her now in every sense of the word.
“I don’t really see the point in waiting when I’ve made up my mind already. Plus, it won’t make much of a difference and you know it. They only see the scads of money and nothing else, isn’t this the reason why you married four times and ended up childless and single after all the drama? It’s not like she is going to fall madly in love with me just because I wine and dine her a couple of times. I think it’s much better to see this as nothing more than a business deal and treat it as such.”
Carson shakes his head. “Maybe it could be only a business deal with another woman. I mean, a woman you wanted to just bang, but I can see that you like this Aria a little too much for this to work, Cash.”
I sigh. “Well that won’t be a problem, because I don’t plan to tell her.”
Carson scoffs. “That’s really a bad idea, Cash.”
I look away and back to the passing scenery. “I don’t have a better one.”
Carson sighs. “I worry for you, you know. I wish things had turned differently in your life. I wish I had done better by you…”
I turn to look at him again. “What the fuck are you talking about? You did just fine.”
He looks down and at his open hands. “Just fine is not enough. I loved your grandfather as if he were my own dad. He took care of me and made me feel like I was part of the family, not just the son of the alcoholic stable manager and Conrad was a brother to me and I promised him I would take care of you and Cooper if something happened to him, but I was nothing more than a guardian to you, I didn’t know how to be a father since I had never had a real one myself. I thought I would make more damage than good if I tried. I just focused on protecting your fortune like a fucking hawk against the sharks trying to get a bite off of it or to gain control of the conglomerate while you were small, but I’m disappointed with my inability to teach you that sometimes you should just trust people, give them a chance to get close.”
I laugh at Carson incredulously. “Are you channeling Molly or something?
You taught me to be tough and see through phony people and that’s all I needed to survive in this world. Of course I’d like for things to be different, but we both know it’s not going to happen, Carson.”
He shrugs his shoulders and sighs. “I sincerely hope you know what you’re doing, Cash.”
I start to answer when my cell goes off.
It’s Jamison again. This guy is annoying sometimes, but he is definitely worth his weight in gold. I pay him a ridiculously high salary and yet sometimes I feel like I should give him a raise anyway.
“Jamie, any news?” I ask.
I hear him take a sip of something —probably tea, the guy couldn’t be more of a freak about that beverage if he were a born Brit.
“I did as you asked, boss, and I started the acquisition process on Miss Murphy’s ranch.”
“Very well. Make sure everything is ready by tonight at the most.”
“Anything else, Cash?”
I smile to myself. “Actually there is: I want you to draw up a contract for me.”
“Uh, sure. What kind?”
“A prenup,” I state simply and I hear Jamison spit out his tea and then some sort of commotion in the background.
Carson starts to laugh silently, holding his forehead with one hand, his body shaking.
“Come again?” squeaks my lawyer.
I sigh, rolling my eyes.
“Calm down, Jamie. I didn’t ask you to hire me a hitman for fuck’s sake. It’s just a marriage contract.”
I hear him gulp. “I… I… alright, then. I’ll start working on it tomorrow and—”
“No, I want you to do it now. Have it ready for me to go over before my meeting with Aria.”
My lawyer clears his throat. “Okay. A… a prenup it is then. Between you and?”
I laugh outright. “Aria Murphy. Jamison do pay attention, please.”
Carson by now is howling with laughter.
For a long minute there’s nothing but silence on the other side of the line.
“Jamie?” I ask, shaking my head. I’m starting to get fed up with his shock.
“I just, I mean… we are friends aren’t we, Cash?”