Table of Contents
The Producer
Copyright
Dedication
The Producer
GET A FREE BOOK!
A Note About Reading Order
Chapter One - Cole
Chapter Two - Alyssa
Chapter Three - Cole
Chapter Four - Alyssa
Chapter Five - Alyssa
Chapter Six - Alyssa
Chapter Seven - Cole
Chapter Eight - Alyssa
Chapter Nine - Alyssa
Chapter Ten - Alyssa
Chapter Eleven - Alyssa
Chapter Twelve - Alyssa
Chapter Thirteen - Cole
Chapter Fourteen - Alyssa
Chapter Fifteen - Alyssa
Chapter Sixteen - Cole
Chapter Seventeen - Alyssa
Chapter Eighteen - Alyssa
Chapter Nineteen - Alyssa
Chapter Twenty - Cole
Chapter Twenty-One - Alyssa
Chapter Twenty-Two - Alyssa
Chapter Twenty-Three - Cole
Chapter Twenty-Four - Alyssa
Chapter Twenty-Five - Alyssa
Chapter Twenty-Six - Alyssa
Chapter Twenty-Seven - Cole
Chapter Twenty-Eight - Alyssa
Want to know what happens next?
Sneak Peek: The Internet Giant
Chapter One - Onyx
Shit You Should Know
Trillionaire Boys’ Club: The Producer
Aubrey Parker
Copyright © 2017 by Aubrey Parker. All rights reserved.
This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, businesses, events, or locales is purely coincidental.
Reproduction in whole or part of this publication without express written consent is strictly prohibited.
The author greatly appreciates you taking the time to read this work. Please consider leaving a review wherever you bought the book, or telling your friends about it, to help spread the word.
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For my readers.
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THE BURNING OFFER is the first book in my “Trevor’s Harem” series — a hot and suspenseful billionaire’s game of tested limits and forbidden temptations that’s like nothing you’ve ever read before. It normally sells for $2.99, but I’d like to give you a FREE copy. Just click the link below to get it!
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THANK YOU FOR READING!
Aubrey Parker
A NOTE ABOUT READING ORDER
All of the books in the Trillionaire Boys’ Club series are meant to be read as standalone novels. That’s why I haven’t numbered the books: the number really doesn’t matter much for most readers, and I don’t want to imply that it does.
In each book, you’ll read the story of one of the Club’s members and the woman he comes to love. The romance is self-contained and does not require knowledge of earlier books.
However, some readers will want to read the books in the order I wrote them because behind each book’s love story, there is a slowly-building master plot. You don’t have to worry about this “big arc” to appreciate or enjoy any individual book at all, but you may want to see that slow build as it originally unfolded. If that’s the case, you’ll want to start with The Connector — the story of the Club’s founder, Nathan Turner.
The suggested reading order for all of my books — including the Trillionaire Boys’ Club series — is on my website here.
So yes, you may choose to read that way if you’re particular about order … but I promise: this book stands alone just fine, so you absolutely don’t need to.
Happy reading!
- Aubrey Parker
CHAPTER ONE
COLE
I HAVE THIS WAY OF explaining my wealth to people who ask.
Most people don’t, but now that my business dips so deeply into film (and especially since I started producing my own movies), I orbit in Hollywood circles. I talk to a lot of actors. Actors all have complexes, so they feel the need to compete to prove their self worth. Men compare dick size (figuratively, though I’ve also seen it done literally) and women tend to create petty kingdoms, their competition based on who or what they’ve seized control over. And so the actors, of all people, will sometimes ask. They do it sideways — not so much asking me about my money as implying that in the future, they’ll catch up to me and we’ll be peers. As if.
They’ll say, Someday, I’ll have billions. Once the right movie hits and my backend kicks in hard enough.
I try not to laugh.
But one way or another, I usually end up giving them my explanation. Because, see, most people don’t really understand how much a billion dollars is — let alone the $12.8 billion I’m worth. They think they do, but they don’t. I can tell they don’t understand because these people believe they can work their way to it on a project-by-project basis. I’ll do enough movies, they think, and I’ll have that much money.
But that’s not how it works. You can’t just earn your way to a billion. You must create something the world has never seen. You have to be a prophet, so you can see what’s on the horizon — and then knock people over to get there first.
My company is Sage Business Systems, but our primary business stopped being the IBM world of “business systems” a long time ago. I saw the streaming revolution early and got in first. I had Hollywood connections, so I strangled them until I got the business I wanted. We had servers and computer infrastructure to spare, so we got into the media delivery business. Direct to Consumer became our motto. Now I’m making my own films.
Without me, there’d be less in the world. That’s how you become a billionaire.
Imagine the most money you could ever imagine having, I say to those who ask. For most people, that amount is around $10 million. They think they can imagine more, but they can’t. For top-end actors, the figure is closer to $100 million, and that’s only because they tend to own 8-figure houses. Beyond their homes (which, let’s remember, are usually mortgaged and never owned outright), they only have a few hundred grand in assets. It’s cheating, but at least their minds are expanded into the nine-figure range.
To even those biggest thinkers, I’ll say, That’s the most money you could ever possibly imagine … ever, in your life, for as long as you live. Now imagine ten times that much, and that’s a billion.
And they’ll nod and say, Okay, I can imagine it.
But no, asshole, you can’t.
Because first, that hundred million you’re imagining? It’s only in your head. You can’t just 10X your maximum mental picture. It’s your maximum for a reason.
And second, there’s no way to acquire that much. Not for you.
Imagine thirteen times that much and that’s how much I’m worth.
Sometimes they’ll tell me they can still picture it — if they keep doing their stupid bullshit work with that target in mind, one day they’ll be a multi-billionaire, too.
Fools. They have no idea what it’s like to be one of us. What drives a billionaire to do what he or she does is a quantum difference from the motivations of an ordinary person, because we’ve already dwarfed the needs, trials, and tribulations of the hoi polloi. We’ve made them irrelevant. Their greatest desires and goals are a joke to people like me.
We billionaires take a special breed of motivation. We’re numb enough that only extremes command our attention.
Extreme pleasure.
Extremely lucrative deals.
Extreme emotions.
Even extreme pain.
I’m explaining
this to Ben Stone while he punches me in the kidneys. But then he drops his guard and I roundhouse him to the cheek. We really shouldn’t hit each other in the face, but we do. Somehow hitting the body isn’t as cathartic, and both of us need it. People think Ben is all peaceful and Zen because he conducts half his business in the motherfucking lotus position, but this right here is the reason he can. He’s as diseased as the rest of us with ten-figure net worths. He just gets it out in the ring so he can fool everyday people into thinking he can relate to them, and they to him.
“So what?” Ben doesn’t spit blood. I guess I didn’t get him as good as I thought.
“So what is that on the mat behind you?”
Ben turns. He knows better. I hit him in the side of the ribs anyway. Or so I think. But before I can connect, Ben’s somewhere behind me, anticipating my move with a counter of his own. I turn back to see my bell being rung. The world spins. And it’s awesome.
We trade another few blows, and finally the bell rings. It’s on a timer, giving us three-minute rounds. That’s the last of them. Good thing; we’re both beat to hell.
Which was, of course, the idea.
Ben’s broad frame is heaving as he sits and gets a drink of water. I’m doing the same. The room reeks of sweat and testosterone. It’s not a fancy space. It was meant for storage, but I had the ring put in so I could beat up my friends and coaches. The walls are utilitarian: gray metal and exposed ductwork. Light comes from large aluminum cans. Shadows are deep. It’s like we’re in someone’s garage instead of a loft that runs ten grand a month.
“There’s something wrong with you,” Ben says after we’ve caught our breath. He has a small cut above his eye, but that’s fine — he has a rugged image. He isn’t a pretty boy like Ashton Moran. I’m somewhere in the middle, able to span the worlds. I can get scars and still be considered handsome, but I try not to. That’s why we maybe shouldn’t hit the face. But I’ve never been one for living safely.
“Just me?”
Ben nods. “You’re the one who likes boxing.”
“You keep accepting my invites. It keeps you all centered and shit.”
This time, he smiles. “Yeah. I do. But for me this is one option from many. I could just as easily meditate. You apparently need to beat someone up with your time. Or actually, you need someone to beat you up.”
“So now I’m a masochist?”
“Never.” He shifts on the stool, dripping sweat, making his body language open. He’s almost laughing, despite the cut I punched into him. It’s funny. Women never seem to understand it, but sometimes war can turn men into the best of friends. “I’ll use the word Time used, since you seem to like it so much: you’re extreme.”
“We’re all extreme, Ben. Every one of us.”
“Men in general? Or businessmen?”
“Businessmen who qualify for Nathan Turner’s Syndicate,” I answer.
“Oh, come on. Say the words.”
I roll my eyes. I hate the nickname Nathan uses for the seed group meant to kickstart his Syndicate — so much that it’s almost enough to keep me out of it.
Ben has no such compunctions. He loves to push my buttons. “Say it, Cole. We’re special and we should glory in it. Because we’re both good enough to join the—”
“Don’t.”
“—the Trillionaire Boys’ Club.”
“You’re such an asshole.”
Ben slaps his water bottle against mine. “So be it. Cheers.”
And we drink.
“It’s true, though,” I say.
“What?”
“That we’re an extreme breed. That’s what I was trying to articulate — about how most people can’t comprehend what a billion dollars truly means.”
“What does that have to do with being extreme? Jesus, Cole — you sound like a Mountain Dew commercial.”
“Just that the ordinary doesn’t thrill us. Every one of the guys Nathan is looking at for his” — I raise an eyebrow, warning Ben not to say the words — “his club … is a man who’s accomplished what the world deems impossible. Our everyday lives are filled with the unimaginable. The people who truly think about what a billion dollars means? They see it. They see how we’re magical in a way. So far beyond their lives that it’s like we’re another species.”
“That’s really woo-woo, coming from you.”
“You know what I mean.”
We sit for a few quiet moments. Of course he knows what I mean.
“So … what? Are you finally having your mid-life crisis?”
This is a good-natured knock on me. I’m 42, and Ben is still in his twenties. But fuck him. I just beat his ass in the ring, and whenever we’re out together, girls come to me more than him. Young guys have a reputation for being spry, but they’re also stupid and immature. More than one woman has told me that there’s nothing quite like the appeal of a hot older guy.
“I started skydiving when I was your age,” I tell him.
“Proves nothing.”
“I ran with the bulls.”
“Keep going, old man.”
I roll my eyes. I’m not going to argue, because Ben doesn’t mean it. We’re friends, but I’m also sort of like a mentor to him. He jabs, and I jab back. It’s like we never stop boxing — another hobby I picked up in my early thirties just to take on the challenge.
“What’s your point, Cole?”
“That maybe we are another species than the rest of the world.”
“Don’t say that in front of the press. You’ll sound like Hitler.”
I punch him in the side. “Stop being a dick. I’m trying to get real with you. Maybe teach your ass something important.”
“Okay, Obi-Wan. Give me all your wisdom.”
“Don’t deny what I’m saying. Or try to tell me that you don’t see the world as a game that’s become impossible to lose.”
“Is that what you’re doing, with all your big-wave surfing and BASE jumping? Is that why you can’t ski from a lift like a normal person, and need a helicopter drop you at the top of the mountain? Are you trying to prove your immortality? Or are you subconsciously trying to find out if there’s a way you can lose it all?”
“I don’t have a death wish, if that’s what you’re asking.”
Ben shrugs. Fucking kids. I have a whole string of in my day arguments lined up for him, but I’m not about to use them, lest I sound like some codger yelling at kids to get off his lawn.
“I’ve achieved the impossible, and now there’s no challenge. I’m looking for something real enough to matter.”
“Dark. Are you going to start cutting yourself? You know — just to see if you can still feel pain?”
“Fuck off, Ben.”
He shifts again, this time seeming slightly more serious. I’m still half-smiling, but maybe he can tell I’m at the end of my tolerance. He takes a sip from his bottle. “Join the Syndicate, like Alyssa keeps telling you. Then you can be part of something real enough to matter.”
I look over, noticing how he’s carefully avoided that stupid “Boys’ Club” phrase, as if sensing my agitation. The way I understand it, the two groups aren’t the same, even though those of us who know about both use them interchangeably. The Trillionaire Boys’ Club is a group of young, photogenic billionaires with reprehensible personalities whom the press can’t get enough of — but once combined, their net worths still only total one or two hundred billion. It’ll take forming the larger group — the Trillionaire Syndicate — to hit our 13-figure goal.
Still, Nathan needs the Boys’ Club guys to make the group look like something the Old Guard couldn’t afford to miss out on. We need them, but they’re too old to be “boys” and too stodgy to join “clubs” that don’t serve aged port in the cigar room after dinner. They’re ugly and reprehensible, more “stodgy fucker” than “lovable bad boy.”
Once the Syndicate is fully formed, Nathan will need to keep those trolls in the shadows.
“Fair,” I tell Ben.
“So you’re going to join?”
I sigh. I can be honest with Ben, even though I’m still being coy with Alyssa, Ashton, Nathan, and the others. “I’m sure I will. I just can’t make it seem too easy to Alyssa.”
“Why? She works for you.”
It’s true, of course, but it’s also more complicated than he’s making it sound. Alyssa is Ashton’s publicist, and there’s no question she’s the best in the business — the one least afraid of stepping on toes and breaking rules. Alyssa approaches publicity like a long con. Her style is a brew of marketing, manipulation, and outright lies. That mess Ashton got himself into with the college girl? Somehow, Alyssa turned that around even after the couple was caught duping everyone on the talk show circuit. I still don’t know how she does it; she must have incriminating photos of all the right people.
Now she wants to work with me, and I guess I’m letting her. But you don’t choose Alyssa as your publicist. She chooses you, and you find yourself complying even if you don’t mean to.
“I don’t trust her.”
“Then why are you working with her?”
“It’s hard to explain.”
A disapproving look crosses his face. “I’d never work with her. The things people say …”
“That just means she’s good at her job, Ben.”
“You just said you didn’t trust her!”
I’m not sure how to reply. I don’t trust Alyssa. I don’t even really like her. But I do respect her — and, truth be told, I’m just a little afraid of her. Everyone is. She’s 27, and works at The Banner Agency out of Los Angeles, though she lives in Chicago like me. She looks like a model, but radiates an asexual aura that says sure, she’d fuck you … and then bite your head off like a female mantis. Everything about her is wrong somehow. It’s impossible for someone so young to hold such a high-powered, high-prestige position in publicist circles. But as I’ve been telling Ben, “impossible” is a billionaire’s bread and butter.
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