Shopping for a CEO's Wife (Shopping for a Billionaire Book 12)

by Julia Kent

  “He’s really out of control. I’ve already spoken with him once. I’ll do it again.”

  “I’m so sick of this. So tired.”

  Josh and Carol beat it, leaving us alone. Tears well up in my eyes. I’m not surprised. The screen goes blurry and I wonder if Mom is about to become a paparazzi target in her own right. Before, she was involved tangentially, through her connection to me.

  Being connected to James so directly carries its own weight.

  Andrew holds me, his hand touching the small of my back with a grazing gesture that shoots tingles up to the base of my skull, the sensation spreading until I’m one big warm muscle that breathes for the sake of him. It’s not a sexual feeling, but more one of being able to breathe fully. I’m connected to someone else, back in focus even as I feel every ounce of emotional pain.

  “You know what I do when I get too overwhelmed?” he asks, rubbing my back as I cry on his shoulder.

  “You have sex with me.” Sniff.

  “I was about to say ‘go swimming,’ but if sex is an option...” As he chuckles, his chest vibrates.

  “Andrew, I’m really not in the mood.”

  “For sex, or swimming?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Hey. Hey,” he stresses. “None of this is acceptable.”

  “No. It’s not.”

  “I’ll put a stop to Dad. I promise. Tomorrow, I’ll talk to him. But until then, I have an idea.”

  I sniff. “Does it involve your father and an Arctic ice floe?”

  “No, but it does involve water.”

  Chapter 10

  “Why are we here again? Not that I mind.” In full daylight, the house is less magical but more regal, on a slight incline that seems more daunting during the day. Andrew practically carried me out of the office, down into the private parking garage, and now we’re snaking our way up the driveway to the Weston house, completely alone.

  No security team. Or, at least, if they’re protecting us, they’ve camouflaged themselves well.

  “I wanted to come to a place where no one will bother us. Dad’s not here. The estate manager is in Boston, talking to the real estate agent. I know we’re alone for at least a few hours, and I want it that way. When we came here for the cocktail party, it was too much. Too many people, too many social conventions -- ”

  “And you had a goal.”

  He grins. “And I had a goal. One we met.”

  “You just want to hang out here?”

  “I want to explore.” He picks up my hand and kisses it. “With you.”

  No valet. No servants. No guests. Andrew parks the Tesla right up against the house and we get out.

  “It’s even more beautiful in broad daylight. How many rooms?”

  He shrugs. “No idea.” His hair falls back off his forehead as he looks up at the top of the house. “It was just home as a kid.” The four-car garage is to our left and I look at it with new appreciation, the stretch of dormered windows above now known to be where someone lives.

  “The estate manager lives there?”

  “It’s more of a part-time job these days. Mostly keeping the place going. Dad explained more about it to me. He said he’s downsizing.” Andrew frowns, his face filling with concern. A light breeze passes between us, brushing my hair against my nose, interrupting the moment. By the time I tame my hair, he’s back to neutral, as if the emotion has been noted, processed, catalogued and filed away in an archive.

  But still preserved.

  “It’s not about money, is it? He’s not having financial problems, is he?”

  “Actually,” Andrew says. “Since you brought it up – he is.”

  “Oh!”

  “And he’s selling his Back Bay home.”

  “Wow.”

  “So he’ll be moving in with us in his penniless, infirm condition. Do you know how to change bedpans?” he asks dryly.

  “Andrew!”

  Hearty laughter is all I get.

  He gets a snowball to the face. It’s what he deserves.

  “Don’t start something you can’t finish,” he warns, eyes tracking me as he bends down to scoop a pathetic handful of snow from the dwindling piles at the edge of the driveway.

  I scream and flee.

  Thwack!

  The man has good aim, I think as the middle of my back gets pelted.

  Twice.

  I thump my way up to the front porch, a long, wide affair that has ten rocking chairs tucked under the overhang. Cracker Barrel entrances look Lilliputian compared to this.

  I try the door as Andrew descends on me, two snowballs in hand.

  Locked. Damn.

  “I’ll trade you sexual favors for a snowball reprieve!” I beg.

  “That’s all it took? Hitting you with snowballs? I can get sex whenever I want if I threaten you with spherical precipitation?”

  “You can get sex whenever you want without the snowballs.”

  I get a hot kiss in response, my body warming up and relaxing. Serious conversations make me feel helpless, because I can’t start chains of events to fix problems when we talk. Action comes later. In the moment, as problems unfurl, all I can do is experience my emotional reactions, and that’s a form of prison you can’t escape.

  Until you act.

  He fishes around in his front pocket and pulls out a key ring as we break apart, easily opening the door.

  “No remote security system?”

  “Dad’s old-fashioned. We have an alarm and video cameras, but he still wants a key.” As we enter the house, the feel of it is so different compared to the other night. Homey and warm, the place is still cavernous, but with just the two of us here, it feels less like a place for a corporate social gathering and more like what it is to Andrew.

  A home.

  I soak in the details I couldn’t absorb before, like photographs and paintings on the walls, fine rugs and hand-embroidered silk pillows that have a distinctly Chinese feel to them. Andrew walks with purpose to the large fireplace and opens the flue, beginning to build a fire with layers of engineering. By the time he lights it, I’m looking at the books in a pile next to the couch.

  “No one has read those in ten years. Dad just put them there for show.”

  “What are they? Harvard Classics?” Cracked leather and faded lettering, the burnished leather smooth with age, catch my eye.

  “No. First editions. Mostly Conan Doyle.”

  “As in Sherlock Holmes?” I peer at the worn titles. “Baskerville” stands out. A small wooden case is next to the stack, brass hinges polished to a high finish. I undo the clasp and open it, finding a beautiful old white pipe, cardamon and a tangier scent mixed with old pipe smoke transporting me back to James’ office at Anterdec.

  “Dad’s pipe,” Andrew says unnecessarily.

  “Ivory?” I touch it, then withdraw my fingers as if it’s tainted.

  He just shrugs.

  “Original Sherlock Holmes editions? These must be rare.”

  “Dad liked to collect them when we were younger.”

  “Your dad leaves first edition Sherlock Holmes books sitting around as a status symbol next to ivory pipes?”

  “Are you really surprised? You know my dad.”

  “No. I don’t know him, actually.” I pause. “And you don’t know mine.” The words are out before conscious volition kicks in.

  Andrew stops his work on the fire and turns to me, slowly. “Leo.”

  “Yeah.”

  “You don’t talk about him much.”

  I shake my head.

  “You can, though.”

  “I know.”

  “Do you want him to walk you down the aisle?”

  Do I want my father to walk me down the aisle? Of course I do.

  Do I want Leo to walk me down the aisle? Because that’s a completely different question.

  Tears fill my eyes. “I want the father I wish I’d had to walk me down the aisle. It’s like your mother – you wish she were
here, right? To see you get married.”

  His voice is thick with grief as he responds. “I do. I miss her most when I imagine our kids. She loved children. Mom would have been so excited to have grandchildren.” He looks at me. “But my Mom isn’t alive. Your father is.”

  “He’s dead to me.” In prison.

  “I know. And yet...he’s not dead. That’s got to stir up feelings for you.”

  This got intense fast. The room chills, as if ghosts of the past whip through the air, stealing heat.

  “Do you remember that day last year when we had a date and you gave me an envelope filled with research on Leo?” It’s a rhetorical question. Of course he does.

  “You were really angry. I crossed some line I didn’t know was there. I’m sorry.”

  I wave the words away. We’ve been over this before. Operationally, what Andrew did was fine. He thought he was helping, researching my father’s location after being told he’d ‘disappeared.’

  I knew all along he was in prison for vehicular homicide. Drunk driving eventually catches up with people who do it, but the ultimate price is paid by the innocent victims who receive the fatal end of their behavior.

  “He gets out in less than two years,” I ponder. “He refused to see me the one time I tried. When I say he’s dead to me, I mean it. Not because I hate him, but because he chose to reject me. I can forgive someone for putting me in danger if they apologize. I can forgive someone for being mean if they’re contrite. Leo apologized to me for putting me in danger when I was little. That day he got so drunk at a Red Sox game that he lost me in the crowd was forgivable.”

  “It was?” Andrew’s tone makes it clear he wouldn’t – won’t – forgive.

  “Believe it or not, yes. What isn’t forgivable is the rejection that came years later when all I wanted was an hour of his time. Sixty minutes. The letter I sent making the request was friendly. Not effusive, but pleasant. And he said no.”

  “His loss.”

  “Yeah. I know. But it’s my loss, too. I’m a bride walking down the aisle without a dad’s arm.”

  “Pam had to be a mother and a father to you.”

  “And she did a damn fine job, but it’s not the same.”

  “No. It’s not.”

  “Mom shouldn’t have to fill that role. Leo made choice after choice to screw up. Two people died in that drunk-driving car crash. I refuse to call it an accident, because it wasn’t. An accident is something that happens without intent. Climbing behind the wheel of a car drunk isn’t an accident. Especially when you keep doing it.”

  “Neither is drinking so much, you lose your kid at Fenway Park.”

  “You would think that would have been enough to make me hate him and never want to see him again.”

  “He’s your father. We have complex relationships with our parents.”

  “Even when they’re assholes.”

  “Especially when they’re assholes.” He pulls a canister of long matches out from a small cabinet built into the mantel of the giant stone fireplace. The sudden burst of color as he lights the match is a rainbow of sulphur. Crushed newspaper and kindling slowly ignite. As he replaces the matches, he turns to me with a sad smile.

  “I love you so much. I know this hurts you, and I wish I could take the pain away.”

  I reach for his hand. My body is so heavy, pressing into the ground like gravity intensified. My bones float to the edges of my skin, dragged down by this reckoning with the past.

  “I love you, too. That’s how I feel about your mother. I know you ache to see her, and I wish I could change the past. I would have loved meeting her.”

  “She would have gotten along so well with you. You’re different, but...”

  “How? How are we different?”

  “Mom was more forthright. You’re quieter. You’re both pragmatic. You get shit done. Mom hated dithering.” His upper lip curls in a smirk. “That’s one thing you both have in common with Dad.” He looks at the fire. “That’s going to take a while before it burns down enough to be good. C’mon. I want to do something.”

  “Again? Having sex in your bedroom at the cocktail party wasn’t enough? We christened your bed.”

  “I was thinking more along the lines of a baptism.”

  Leading me to the back of the house, Andrew pulls me through the glass doors to his lap-swimming pool, a fifty-meter-plus line of enclosed solarium that runs the width of the back of the house. All of the windows are extremely fogged over. As we step into the sanctuary, a blast of humid heat wallops me.

  “I thought you said James wasn’t heating the water.”

  “Dad isn’t the one who did this. I did.” He kicks off his shoe, removes his sock, and dips his foot in. “Try it,” he urges.

  I do.

  “It’s like a jacuzzi!” I marvel. Steam rises off the long sheet of water.

  “I came here yesterday and picked the perfect temperature.” Eyes locked on mine, he reaches for the hem of his sweater and peels it off, leaving a button-down shirt that he begins to undo.

  “I didn’t bring a suit,” I protest.

  “Neither did I.”

  “Then how can we – oh!” Processing what he’s suggesting takes me more seconds than it should. “Skinny-dipping?”

  He’s naked already.

  The man is a CEO, a champion-level swimmer, and undresses the way I would run toward a free sample truck at a chocolate festival.

  Before I can really appreciate the beauty of his naked body, all slick lines and hard muscle in the daylight, he dives in, barely a tiny splash signifying his actions. The dive is the kind you see on sports coverage during the Olympics, except he’s gloriously naked, so practiced and athletically graceful that for a second my mind needs to catch up to what my eyes just saw.

  Andrew breaks the surface halfway down the long, narrow pool and grins at me under a very wet head. “Come in! It’s amazing!”

  “You’re amazing.” I look around nervously. “You’re sure no one’s here?”

  “Positive. Don’t worry. Even if we’re caught, it’s no big deal. It’s just a little nudity.”

  “Hello? Biggest fear ever?” I point to my chest. “Remember my dream of being naked in public?”

  “And you overcame that at Declan’s wedding.”

  “I didn’t overcome it! I had no choice!”

  “Amanda, shut up and strip down.”

  I pretend to be offended, but for some reason, his words are turning me on. I can’t admit that to him, though. “Is that how you talk to all your fiancées?”

  “Every one of them.”

  “I’m surprised they stick around.”

  “Oh, I think they like it.”

  I freeze in mid-motion, my pants around my knees. Our eyes meet and he’s serious. The words aren’t what matter – it’s being told to relax. To let go. To join him in the water, free of clothing and burdens, devoid of convention and formalities.

  He’s not just giving me permission. He’s insisting. Demanding.

  Ordering.

  “You’ll pay for that,” I caution, finishing my impromptu striptease by hopping gracefully on one foot like a flamingo on a pogo stick. Finally naked, I wrap my arms around my breasts and begin to shake. It’s not cold in here. Not one bit. I’m not sure why I’m shivering.

  “Get in and come collect from me,” he teases.

  I look at the water. I look at him.

  I pinch my nose.

  And I jump.

  The water reminds me of the spa at Litraeon, the Anterdec resort on the Las Vegas Strip. In the spa there, the zero-entry indoor lagoon was designed to take all your cares away, with water treated to rejuvenate.

  This is so much better.

  “Is this what being in the womb was like?” I say aloud as I tread water. Andrew swims back to me, arms flying with perfectly aligned precision, his swift appearance barely giving me a chance to admire his form.

  “Competitive swimmers have to keep the wate
r cold, or we’ll overheat during practices and meets. I’ve never cranked up the heat like this. I need to do it more often.” He stands, the water stopping at his chin. I tentatively stretch my feet down in the water and can’t touch bottom. Sensing this, Andrew moves closer, guiding my legs to him, wrapping me around him like a morning glory vine seeking sunlight.

  “Mmm, I like that,” he says, kissing my neck.

  I let go of his shoulders and lean back, trusting him to stand there so I don’t dunk under. Weightless, my breasts bobbing against the water, little waves tickling my nipples, I stare up at the domed ceiling, a large fan making lazy circles above us.

  My ears go underwater. The muted sounds of echo and kick, of hands waving to keep me afloat, fill my senses. My legs unwind from him and soon Andrew’s next to me, on his back, our feet brushing against each other, hands connecting like seaweed in the tide.

  Drained of tension, I let the pool water buoy me, spine unfurling, shoulders dropping down. My breathing slows and I become one with the hot steam that billows like kind spirits coming to visit, waiting their turn for love and attention.

  Powerful hands reach for me, my legs lowered into the water, my head up as Andrew pulls me to him, his kiss so slow and open. We spend eternity in that kiss, the water its own dimension, all thoughts of my father, his mother, the paparazzi, the enormous wedding, and all the thin strands of complication I need to track floating away, watching from a distance. One by one I release them, like balloons in a thick bunch, the weight of their pull almost enough to drag me into the sun.

  But when you let them go, they fly away, each on its own journey, leaving me with peace.

  “I love this,” he says, eyes serious, searching mine. “Love being here. Being here with you. You’re the only woman I’ve ever brought here.”

  “Swimming?”

  “No. Home.”

  “No high school girlfriends?”

  “None. By the time we got serious enough to think about having them meet Mom and Dad, we broke up.”

  “I’m the first woman you’ve brought home?”

  He nods, reaching up to brush his hair off his face. “Yes.” One deep breath changes the air between us, pushing steam out of the way, his face clear. “And the last.”