An I.O.U. from a Billionaire

by Olivia B. Dannon

  “What the hell do I need four suitcases for?” She gasped. “I’m not moving in for crying out loud.” Following the sound from her phone, she discovered a fifth small bag behind the others where her phone was inside the open outer pocket.

  It stopped ringing as she pulled it out. The caller ID said Wainwright Innovations Corporation. Maybe someone looking for Liam? They have Hansen’s or Evelyn’s number. Joan turned with her phone in her hand and made it three steps toward the bed before the phone started ringing again.

  Wainwright Innovations Corporation again? “Hello?”

  “Good morning, Ms. Taylor this is Agatha, Mr. Wainwright’s Executive Secretary.”

  “Good morning.”

  “I am sorry to bother you but you have a call from an Amanda and Mae? They insisted you would want to speak with them.”

  Joan hesitated. “Okay. Why are they calling you?”

  “Mr. Wainwright arranged for your calls to be routed through me so I can screen your calls.”

  Joan rubbed her forehead with her palm. “That can’t be fun for you, I’m sorry.”

  “No need to be sorry. I’m happy to be of assistance to you, Ms. Taylor.”

  “You can call me Joan. You’re stuck answering my phone and I’m sure my parents and sister have been giving you an earful.”

  “Last night they did call several times. As it wasn’t an emergency and because I reassured them of your safety, I did not patch them through.”

  I’m sure my dad loved that.

  “Just patch my family through, it’s fine. I don’t want to miss calls from them.”

  “Of course. Shall I patch through your call with Amanda and Mae?”

  Joan nodded and then remembered she was on the phone. “Yes, thank you.”

  “Right away.”

  There was a click and a buzz before Amanda’s voice came over the line. “She said she’s patching us through, just wait, Mae. Chill.”

  “Hi,” Joan said.

  “You’re not coming back until next week?” Mae demanded.

  So, I’m on speaker. Great.

  “That’s right. I’m planning a wedding, so….”

  “Mae, close the door,” Amanda said. “What the hell are you talking about, Joan?”

  “It’s complicated. Don’t worry about it. It’s still in keeping with the original… thing that Mae came up with.” I am so not good at speaking in code.

  “Why is she talking like that?” Amanda asked.

  Mae made a raspberry sound. “How should I know?”

  “You have me on speakerphone. I don’t want some reporter or eavesdropper misconstruing anything.”

  “One day in the Wainwright mansion and you’re already paranoid?” Amanda laughed.

  “Just… yes. There was a picture in the news of me in my PJs yesterday.” Their lack of surprise was telling enough. “You saw it.”

  More silence greeted her.

  “Is there naked pictures of me? What?”

  “You tell her, Mae. I just can’t.”

  Joan groaned. This couldn’t be good.

  “Someone printed out hundreds of copies of that picture and put them up all over the break room.”

  Someone my ass. Earl is such a jerk.

  “Is anything… important showing?”

  “No,” Amanda responded quickly. “You’re just in short shorts. Well, and the outline of your figure is pretty clear. Your nightshirt is pretty thin, hun.”

  “Yes it is. Did you take them down?”

  “Yep, and I borrowed my sister’s nanny-cam in case Earl somebody puts them up again.”

  Joan cannonballed onto Liam’s bed. “Yes! You two are amazing. Have I told you that?”

  “Not nearly often enough.” Amanda laughed.

  “Now dish! I’m dying over here.”

  Joan closed her eyes even as she smiling. “Dish what? About his house? It’s his father’s house.”

  “You spent the night with Liam. You’d have to be a zombie not to have….”

  “Yes.”

  “Yes?” Mae and Amanda squealed in unison.

  Noises that anyone else would have taken for sounds of a struggle or emergency, Joan recognized as her two best friends pulling out chairs and squealing nonsensical exclamations. “Was it camera lens fantastic?” Mae asked. “I bet it was. I’m single and need some food for my fantasy muse, tell me everything.”

  Joan had the visual of the “camera lens” they were referring to in her mind’s eye. Just thinking of him like that had her skin heating up. “I’m not about to describe the photo lens, you’ve already got all you need to know on that, but I will say….” She smiled down at her naked legs. “It was a night unlike any other. I’m talking the best sex I’ve ever had. Ever. I don’t think it’s possible to top in my future.”

  “Because of the camera lens?” Amanda asked.

  Joan laughed. “No… well it did help I guess but it was… like we couldn’t get enough of each other. It was raw and wild. Passionate.”

  “Oh my gosh… that’s amazing,” Amanda sighed.

  “No. No, it isn’t. I’m sorry but you’re talking passion now? Joan. You haven’t forgotten what this is all about, have you? You don’t get Liam. It’s not real.”

  The happiness she was feeling drained from her like the air out of a balloon. Joan pulled the sheet down over her legs. “I know. I know. I’m not stupid. I know how this ends. You’re the one who told me to live it up while I could, Mae.”

  “Yes, absolutely. You just don’t sound like you’re remembering the plan. Has he paid the money yet?”

  “He said he’s going to do that today.”

  “Good. Keep your head on straight. There’s an end game here….”

  Joan exhaled loud enough into the mouthpiece that it cut off Mae mid-rant. “Yeah. Thanks. Your plan has worked out great so far. Look, I’m… I didn’t get a lot of sleep. I gotta go.”

  “Way to go, Mae.” Amanda growled.

  “I just don’t want her getting hurt.”

  Joan wasn’t about to wait while Mae gave Amanda the long list of reasons why Joan would be a fool to fall for Liam. She already knew she wasn’t the right caliber. After all, Liam hadn’t even slept with her after they’d been together. He left and told her he was going to pay the hospital.

  I so feel like a prostitute right now.

  “I love you guys. Okay? I’ll talk to you later. Bye.” She rolled onto her stomach becoming aware of the soreness between her legs. Of course that brought up images in her mind of how she’d become so sore.

  Damn, why didn’t I push for more than one time?

  “Joan? Are you up, dear?” Fran chirped like a songbird through the door as she knocked.

  Joan fell sideways off the bed in a miscalculation of where the bed ended and let out a grunt upon her tangled landing.

  Don’t let her come in here and find you naked.

  “Are you all right?” Fran’s voice sounded closer as if she were already leaning on the door, ready to enter.

  “Yes. Fine, just getting dressed.” The sheet was pulled tight like a tent from the bed to the floor with Joan right up against the bed. “Do you want me to meet you downstairs when I’m finished?” She held her breath.

  “Sure. I’ll meet you in the sunroom for breakfast.”

  “Sounds good.” Joan sagged into the floor realizing that she was rolled up in the sheet with her legs and left arm bound beneath the sheet, and her right arm bound from her wrist down and stuck in the bent position of holding the phone to her ear.

  “You’ve gotta be shittin’ me!”

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Rejected. Used. Lacking. Yes, lacking, that’s what this feeling is.

  Liam massaged his temples trying to ease the tension. He wanted bourbon to mellow out his ragged nerves instead of the hot coffee he was drinking much too fast.

  His jaw was sore from clenching it for the past hour. Joan was all he could think about and her easy dismissal. His
confusion clearing away was leaving him in a dark mood.

  Women like Joan are the reason I don’t get let myself get attached. Stupid is what I am for thinking she was different.

  Liam embraced the fire of anger. It was easier to be angry than to wallow in the stench of rejection. Safer too. He wasn’t a loser who fell apart when a woman tried to gouge out his heart with her spiked heels. He was a man of action. A man of ice.

  “Are you ready to talk?” Evelyn asked as he set down the nearly empty coffee cup.

  Liam’s eyes snapped up to hers. “Why wouldn’t I be? Talk. Where is Alise?”

  “Right. Alise. I contracted a private investigator through the company attorneys.”

  “Yes, you’re very smart. Where is she? Where did they find her?”

  Evelyn set her iPad down on her lap and folded her arms. “You’ve been acting like a complete ass ever since I picked you up. Two coffees down and you’re still not any better. Since I am not fishing for compliments, I don’t need any ‘I’m awesome and I know it, I could just continue to ignore you,’ but we both know you have something to get off your chest.”

  “I don’t have anything to get off my chest. What are you my therapist now? I asked you a question. Where is Alise?”

  Evelyn picked up the iPad. “Very well,” she said in that tone women use when they’re actually saying, “we both know I’m right,” no matter what words come out of their mouths.

  “The PI found footage of Alise getting into a taxi outside of the benefit. The taxi service reported dropping her off somewhere in the city of Scottsdale. It’s an affluent neighborhood. Her known acquaintances are being cross-referenced but if you know of someone Alise might contact in Scottsdale….”

  Liam felt a huge wave of relief. At least Alise wasn’t lost somewhere in downtown Phoenix on the wrong side of a gun. She was hiding from him with a friend.

  Women.

  “This is why people aren’t getting married anymore.” Liam interrupted Evelyn. “Women. They just run off to punish you. They take their sharpened talons, open up a wound, and pour on the lemon juice.”

  “Are we still talking about Alise?”

  Liam looked out the window pressing his lips together. “Just making an observation is all. Go on.”

  “Okay. So, is there anyone that Alise knows in Scottsdale?”

  “Genevieve. She’s trying to trick Westley into marrying her but he’s smart. He’s wicked smart, is what he is.”

  Evelyn nodded as she tapped the iPad.

  “They act like they aren’t all about money, as if your prestige isn’t what matters, but when you let them in and you’re stupid enough to believe that they actually see you and not the money, that’s when they strike.”

  She put the iPad down in her lap. “Do they know you opened up? Are they aware that as far as you’re concerned, the scheme you hatched can be altered? That it’s malleable?”

  “Of course. They know. After sex like that it’s obvious.”

  “So there was sex. I thought you got shot down the way you’re limping around like a kicked dog.”

  Liam straightened in his seat. “I am nobody’s dog to kick.”

  “So, then she’s like that girl Cole went to see. She’s using you.” Evelyn shrugged. “Kick her to the curb and be done.”

  Liam pulled the door shut when the driver started opening it for him. “She is nothing like that conniving, heartless snake. We are using each other. She needed my help and I owed her. Now I need her help.”

  “Then, you owe her again and this sounds a lot more like a business deal than a sharp talon woman on the hunt for a man’s ego to scratch.”

  “It was business.”

  “And now?”

  Liam was quietly thinking of the farewell Joan gave him this morning. Wrapped in nothing but his bed sheets, she’d smelled beautiful. Her hair a mess from their lovemaking, getting him all soft and gooey like no smart man should ever let himself be and then stomped on his vulnerability.

  Evelyn caught his arm as he reached for the door handle. “Tell her how you feel, Liam. She’s not a mind reader. If it’s not business anymore you have to say so.”

  “Sex wasn’t just sex. It was… us coming together because it was undeniable. She was there. Joan knows that. She doesn’t want to continue anything with me.”

  Evelyn narrowed her gaze. “She said that?”

  “She said that she’s going to be gone in a few days and this will be over. Pretty clear, isn’t it?”

  “You described the sex like it was attraction, hormones, and the like. You got to bed her and be done. Isn’t that what you were doing with Alise? And Sharon before her, Jasmine before her and—”

  “Yes, Evelyn, but I’m not done with Joan.”

  “You’ve never had trouble telling women before when you want more. Why is Joan so different?”

  Liam shook his head at Evelyn. “You know. You’re not as smart as you think you are.” He opened the door and got out. The security team made a path for them through reporters and whoever else that was clogging up the sidewalk. Once they were in the building he was stuck standing with Evelyn while they were being body scanned by the building security team.

  “It’s not the damn fairytale you all think is happening. I’m not Cole. Some kid who thinks he’s found the one when I don’t even know the person.”

  “Okay. Then what is it?”

  The second set of security doors opened and Liam crossed through them taking long steps to gain distance from Evelyn. Normally she was quite an asset. He often counted on her level-headed, well-rounded, and thoroughly thought out opinions. Today, however, she was striking out.

  His executive elevator stood open holding the CFO, COO, and CTO of Liam’s company. Liam wasn’t in the right frame of mind to have financial figures and statistical facts shot at him from Beck, progress reports on current operations from the COO, nor did he care to hear about the latest technical security from the CTO. Changing course, he headed for the staff elevators.

  “Mr. Wainwright? It’s this way.” Evelyn trailed after him.

  “I own this building. I can’t ride my own elevator?”

  To her credit, she didn’t say anything else, not even as the doors closed them in in the over-cramped elevator with a questionable smell. The woman on his left was open mouthed staring at him. The wad of white masticated gum made her teeth look gray in comparison and did nothing to hide her garlic breath.

  “Is there something you’d like to say or are you just going to keep staring at me?” Liam growled at her. The eyes on the woman already overly large, not unlike the Japanese anime characters, bulged at him. “Option two then?”

  An elbow jab from Evelyn on his left caught him in the ribs.

  Liam faced forward. Apparently, he wasn’t supposed to talk to his own employees now either?

  “Ramona, you look beautiful today,” Evelyn said and the woman seemed to regain herself.

  “I’m so sorry, Mr. Wainwright. It’s such an honor to meet you. I’m so embarrassed.”

  “Don’t be embarrassed. You’ve just given his very fragile ego the boost he needed,” Evelyn said.

  The men against the wall behind Evelyn were either staring anywhere except at Liam or trying to suppress a grin. The elevator stopped and everyone got off on the second floor, even some of the senior managers that he recognized who had no business on floor two.

  Everyone but Evelyn and Liam.

  As soon as the doors closed Evelyn jumped in. “You’re acting like a spoiled little boy, do you know that?”

  “You do realize you work for me, right?”

  “You’re not done with her?” she said using air quotations. “Joan is a person, not a milk carton to be used and disposed of, and your choice to use the words you did were deliberate. You can’t convince yourself that Joan isn’t amazing. I’ve watched you face down financial giants and climb in status because of your hard work, intelligence, and courage.”

  Liam turn
ed toward her, his arms folding. “Kissing up now isn’t going to undo—”

  “I’m not finished.”

  Now it was his mouth that was dropping open.

  “You are brilliant and fearless when it comes to business, but you’re a coward when it comes to matters of the heart. You care about Joan. That’s why you’re mad. You want her to make this easy for you, to come to you begging to be your plaything. She won’t, which by the way is one of the reasons you like her. You want her to take all the emotional risks because you are too afraid.”

  “Don’t stop now, Miss Cleo, I can’t wait to hear you predict my future.”

  Evelyn inhaled through her nose. “You worked to build your company even though it was very likely you’d fail. You didn’t let pride stand in your way. Why would you not put the same effort into winning the woman you’re in love with?”

  “I am not in love with anyone. My business is my love. If you’ve been paying attention you should know that.”

  “And that’s why you were a total dick to poor Ramona?”

  Liam mashed the button for the top floor again. “She was staring at me like a fish out of water.”

  “Fine. You aren’t in love. My mistake.” The elevator dinged and the doors opened on the top level. “You have an executive staff meeting in less than ten minutes.” Evelyn exited the elevator heading in the direction of her own office.

  Agatha stood and approached with four folders. “Good morning, Mr. Wainwright. How are you today?”

  “Fine.”

  “I’m glad to hear that.” She handed him the reports on the testing of his latest invention. He’d been waiting weeks for them and now that he had them, Liam didn’t feel like opening them. “I heard your wedding will be this weekend. That’s quite romantic of you, Liam.”

  Liam barely heard what Agatha was saying. Evelyn had never spoken to him like that before. If she was willing to become angry with him did that mean she was right? “Do you think I act like a dick?”

  “Who said that you were?”

  “Why does it matter who said it?”