Trillionaire Boys' Club: The Producer

by Aubrey Parker

  “Just go and do your work, Onyx.”

  “And if something happens?”

  “Don’t let it.”

  “But the press …”

  “They’re like bees, Onyx. The press is only a problem if you make them one. And that’s more likely to happen if you act like you’re doing something wrong.”

  It’s imperfect advice, and Onyx will definitely have no idea how to implement. But that’s okay. I’m not his publicist. I only kept two clients: Cole and Ashton Moran. The rest of my duties are as company owner. I’m on the ground only as long as I want to be, and strategize from higher up the rest of the time.

  Cole alone gives me more than enough publicist work, what with the Ross thing slowly taking shape. I’m trying to be friendly. Onyx’s new publicist will handle whatever comes along, and she doesn’t have to be in Inferno to do it. These billionaires are so spoiled. Always wanting special treatment.

  “Well,” he says. “Okay. If you say so.”

  “I do. Good luck, Onyx.”

  And we say our goodbyes.

  A hand slides along my side from behind, circling my waist. I’m hugged backward into a wall of man, smelling his fresh, clean scent.

  “Hey, I’m working here.”

  But Cole doesn’t back off. He pulls me tighter against him and kisses my neck, then turns me around. “Did I say you could work right now?”

  “You’re not the boss of me.”

  Cole plucks the phone from my fingers and drops it onto a small table behind him. “I am right now.”

  “What if I say no?” But I’m smiling. I can’t help it, staring into Cole’s eyes and admiring his steamy, brooding look. If you didn’t know him well you’d take it for arrogance.

  But it’s not.

  It’s only Cole. I know that now.

  “Then you’d have to be punished.”

  I bite my lip. “Well. We can’t have that.” I’m suddenly tingly, my skin flushed. I really shouldn’t work off-hours. I just took a phone call stark naked. Who does that?

  “I have other things I need you doing.” He looks down. He’s naked too, and stiffening between my legs.

  “Is it always about sex with you?”

  He takes my left hand in his right, then holds it up as if to show it to me. The stone on my ring finger catches the light. When he gave me that ring, he didn’t call it an engagement. We’re too new even at two months, and both of us think getting engaged would be stupid. So he called it an internship, said I’d need to prove whether I could handle the position — just as he’s on trial from my end, to prove whether he can handle his.

  But the joke’s on him. Because in this little back-and-forth, I’ve already won.

  I got a ring. He got nothing.

  Well, not nothing. Which is the point I already know he’s about to make.

  “It’s just about on-the-job performance.” Again he looks down, now rock hard.

  I take Cole in my hand and slowly stroke him. “Tell me again that you love me.”

  “I love you, Alyssa. It’s not always about sex.”

  I roll my eyes. I know he means it, same as always. Same as when I say it. But ours is an odd relationship, and it’s taken getting used to.

  Turns out it fits, and both of us love it.

  I want the job. So does Cole.

  Still I get to my knees, roll my eyes up at him, and say, “Liar.”

  WANT TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?

  (Read on for a sneak peek of The Internet Giant)

  The story of the Trillionaire Boys’ Club continues in The Internet Giant.

  SNEAK PEEK: THE INTERNET GIANT

  Continue reading for a sample chapter of the fourth book in the Trillionaire Boys’ Club series:

  The Internet Giant

  CHAPTER ONE

  ONYX

  I IMAGINE A THOUSAND THINGS in the pause between initiating the call and its ringing.

  The pause is too short for thoughts, but I have them anyway.

  I, better than most people, know there are no wires between my phone and my partner’s. Our voices are sent by satellites, connections made by computers that my company controls and those we’ll direct eventually — especially if Anthony Ross has half of his way. But I still think, as it rings, of a connection working westward toward the coast: a small telecommunications animal, foraging (appropriately enough) for food.

  And I think of Aiden, who might be happy with what I’m calling to discuss, or disgruntled. To the world, Aiden is either a philanthropist hero or a bastard. Which face he presents (and which one the cameras captures) depends on the day and his mood. Between us, I’ve always been the more press-friendly. Everyone knows the Forage guys are a matched set. On one hand there’s Aiden: genius, brooding, temperamental, easy to ignite into fits of anger. And then there’s me: usually the good cop to Aiden’s bad — but also a bigger cad, beneath the gloss, than the public gives me credit for. Nothing proves that more than where I am now, doing what I’m doing.

  And lastly I think of Mia: a field of ideation that’s much more than just a single thought. I imagine her as she used to be: sweet, innocent, trusting, not yet jaded. I remember our passion. I think of the hard times — for her, anyway. For me, they were glory days.

  And, lastly, I think of my own thoughts of Mia: meta-reflections that I suspect are kin to regret.

  I’m not sure what the sensation really is. Hell, maybe I do regret what I did to her. It’s not in character for the wealthy and powerful Onyx Scott to suffer regret (especially now that Aiden and I have joined the Syndicate), but I suspect I’ve felt its cousins all the same.

  Mia with her soft brown eyes.

  Mia with her looks that should have been plain … but never struck me that way at all.

  Mia, and how fervently she must still hate me, all these years later.

  The ringing stops, the connection made.

  “Are you in Inferno Falls?”

  My reverie snaps. I look at the phone. I forgot I was holding it until Aiden’s voice was in my ear.

  “Yes,” I say.

  “Good. Are you settled?”

  “I’m at a hotel. The LeGrande.”

  “You aren’t going to stay there long, are you?”

  “I think Forage can handle the tab, Aiden.”

  “I’m thinking of appearances. You’re supposed to be in the Falls scouting for the Forage Education group. Managing the temporary team.”

  Yes. That’s what I’m supposed to be doing, according to the story we told my public relations girl, Alyssa. She’s only working with a single client these days. I thought we would come to Inferno together. Once here, and after signing Forage’s cast in iron NDA, I’d have told her the truth.

  I wish she had come. I could really use someone well-versed in dealing with the public to advise me. Instead, I’ll have to do this on my own — and it’s bound to get ugly.

  “I’m a transient,” I say.

  “Like a drifter?”

  “Like a—”

  “I know what you meant, Onyx. It was a joke. You sound defensive. Keyed up. Long day?”

  I smile, but it’s not like Aiden can see me. The idea that anyone in my circle could have a “long day” in the sense that most working stiffs use the term is laughable. Yes, I’ve technically had one, but it began with a personal training session in our executive gym in Seattle, moved on to a 90-minute massage, then a breakfast that had to cost a grand, considering Canlis had to open special off-hours so that Nathan Turner and I could discuss Syndicate business.

  I hopped on the Forage jet after my final cup of coffee, then flew across the country while sipping champagne, took a Bentley to the hotel, and let Hunter Altman, who’s in town working with some local band, buy me a suit. He isn’t being generous; he’s trying to catch up. Despite being one of the first billionaires Nathan tapped to join his absurdly named “Trillionaire Boys’ Club,” Hunter seems to feel junior among the other members, and eager to prove his wealth.
And it’s not like dropping eleven grand on a suit means much to any of us.

  I smiled. I thanked him. And now I’m having this call in my penthouse suite in the city’s best hotel.

  Oh, yes. Another exhausting day in Billionaireland.

  I don’t feel like answering. Instead I say, “I’ve got a line on a rental in the hills, same neighborhood as Mason James.”

  “Am I supposed to know who that is? Is he another of Nathan’s Syndicate prospects?”

  I almost laugh. It shatters my pattern. Then I do, because “shatters my pattern” is the sort of mind game bullshit that made Anthony Ross so famous. This conversation isn’t about Ross … yet … but I can’t help but snicker.

  “No, he probably only has a few million. It’s just that … well, when I lived here, he was the rich man on the hill. All the kids knew Mason James.”

  “Rich, huh?” Aiden says in his most condescending tone — the one that makes me feel like he might be thinking of getting a few million dollars in cash, dropping the pile in a pail beside his toilet, and using the bills to wipe his lily-white ass.

  “It’s a nice house. Don’t worry. It’ll seem to everyone like I’m planning to stay a while.”

  “And to Mia?”

  I sigh.

  “You’ll need to furnish it, you know. Make yourself look at home. If she gets the impression that you’re the least bit—”

  “This isn’t about Mia.”

  “This is all about Mia.” Aiden situates himself on the other end, then slowly resumes, as if I’m defective rather than half of the best-known pair of Internet geniuses in the world. “Lying to yourself will do you no favors.”

  I don’t want to hear this. We agreed on a few things before I came to Inferno — one being that Aiden couldn’t tell me how to do what I’m here to do. This was to be my way or nothing. We agreed to keep it between us, recruiting help from people like Alyssa Galloway if possible, and only after locking them down with ironclad nondisclosures. Alyssa was the only person I’d have trusted for this. I’m on my own without her. So unless Aiden wants to fly out and embarrass both of us while trying to handle it, he’ll accept what I say as gospel.

  “Don’t tell me what I think, Aiden. And don’t tell me how my own head works.”

  “I’m just—”

  “You’re just sitting in Seattle, while I’m here. I’ve got a few jobs, and you damn well know it. There’s Forage Education—”

  “Harper will manage the Education group,” Aiden interrupts.

  “Harper is plenty competent but he’s never run a team this big, and it’s not established. There are too many unknowns.”

  “It’s not the COO’s job to manage one little divisional team.”

  “Which is why it’s just one of the reasons I’m here,” I counter. “But it’s still part of it, and you know as well as I do that Education matters to our future. I mean, hell, if you’ve got this whole ‘indoctrination’ idea—”

  Aiden cuts me off, finally satisfactorily annoyed. He once suggested — offhand, surely as a joke — that one of the things we could offer Ross’s grand plan was a bit of false history a la George Orwell’s 1984. “Forage is the new Ministry of Truth,” and all that … and Orwell didn’t even know there’d be an Internet, where history would be a giant wiki with no paper evidence to burn when it contradicted the past’s previously preferred version.

  Aiden had been spouting off when he’d said it, as he often does. I’m sure he doesn’t plan to manipulate records as a way of folding Forage into Ross’s plan — being the big, planet-saving philanthropist the world sees him as — but that hasn’t stopped me from jabbing him with it when he gets superior and starts pissing me off.

  “Obviously I didn’t mean that,” he snaps.

  “I’m just pointing something out. If you did want to indoctrinate anyone and/or change the way people see the past, Education would be the perfect place to start.”

  Aiden makes a small grumbling like sound.

  “Beyond that, there’s just Anthony Ross,” I say.

  I can almost hear Aiden mouthing words, desperately wanting to respond. We both know I wouldn’t have moved to Inferno for half a year or more on the off-chance that a rumor about a potential visit from Anthony Ross might turn out to be true, but right now I fucking dare Aiden to say so.

  I pick up my own ball, now that his complaints are silenced. “If Ross visits, I’ll find a way to talk to him,” I continue, my voice now calm. “If he doesn’t, I’ll find other ways to present our case. My presence in Inferno has nothing to do with it.”

  “Except that you are in Inferno Falls.”

  “Back to my old stomping grounds,” I agree, ignoring Aiden’s implication.

  Just say it, Aiden. Just say that if I don’t intend to use my old relationship to possible advantage, I’ve moved across the country for nothing. Just tell me that, Aiden. Tell me that if I wanted to “just talk” to Anthony Ross, I could have picked up the goddamn phone. Ross is in the Syndicate. We both are. Ross’s plan is the most likely candidate for what the Syndicate will do with its pooled wealth, so the table is set for a discussion. Point that out, Aiden. Point it out and tell me I’m a liar or on a fool’s errand — I dare you.

  But for now, Aiden says nothing.

  “I assume you’ll survive without me?”

  “It’s Seattle,” he says. “I have an umbrella and I can afford coffee. I think I’ll manage.”

  I consider another jab, but I might as well quit while I’m ahead. Aiden isn’t the kind of guy you push. Even as partners, we sometimes cross swords; one-upping him further right now isn’t worth it.

  We hang up with mostly cordial goodbyes.

  I set the phone aside, then slip my graphite-and-gray calfskin Fendi billfold from an interior blazer pocket. The row of cards when I open it is a gallery of the inaccessible. Most people have never seen buying power like mine, with colors of the credit rainbow that the larger population isn’t even aware of.

  I reach behind the cards, into a pocket, and withdraw a small piece of glossy paper that doesn’t match the wallet’s luxury at all.

  It’s a photo, worn fuzzy and cracked at the edges. It shows an awkward black teenager with a pretty white girl, eyes wiser than her eighteen years. The couple is dressed in rented finery, looking as awkward as any prom-going teens ever have.

  In the picture, I’m wearing a blue bowtie and matching vest over my tuxedo shirt, beneath my bright white jacket. It’s an awful combination, and the tux doesn’t fit well. Mia, by contrast, is radiant, wearing a dress that matches my tie and vest, but with a cut that perfectly suits her. It’s a plain dress — not ostentatious (like many of the other promgoers) or slutty (like the rest). It’s the sort of thing a First Lady could wear to a gala— if she was bold and had Mia’s legs.

  “I was over you a long time ago,” I tell the photo. “I was a kid back then. I don’t do regret. I’ve made my bed, and I’m happy to lie in it. I owe you nothing, Mia Stover. Maybe I hurt you. But that’s life, and I have nothing to apologize for.”

  The photo doesn’t respond.

  Did you enjoy this sample chapter? Be sure to pick up your copy of Onyx’s book — TRILLIONAIRE BOYS’ CLUB: THE INTERNET GIANT — available now!

  SHIT YOU SHOULD KNOW

  I’m way ahead of you in this story, even if you’re reading these books as soon as they come out. I write pretty quickly and I have a plan for this series that I’m really eager to get to. That’s lit a fire under me.

  So yeah. I’m ahead and that means I know stuff you don’t. It’s annoying, but that’s my super-secret privilege as the author. And sure, it’s a ballbuster for me to talk about the future of this series when you haven’t read it yet, but I’m doing it anyway. I figure I owe it to you, as a faithful reader, to let you know what kind of epic shit lies ahead of you.

  I mean … given the epicness of the shit in question, that’s only fair.

  See, although the Trillionaire Boys
’ Club books are meant to be readable as standalones (yes, you’ll appreciate them on a deeper level if you read in order, but it’s nowhere near necessary), the book you’ve just finished is definitely “third in a series.” If you care about the Syndicate’s larger storyline as much as the stories of the couples in each book, you’ve probably noticed that it’s building to something by now. And so as much as I say, “Oh, they can be read as standalones,” you’re probably similarly saying, “Yeah, yeah, Parker. That’s bullshit and you know it.”

  So, okay, fine. I’ve got a grand plan and maybe you really SHOULD read in order.

  (I can tell you that, right? You’re reading my author’s note. Only the truest fans read the author’s notes, and I can speak straight with my truest fans.)

  And maybe this story — read in order — really is starting to ramp up. Maybe it really is steamrolling toward something big.

  In book four (which you know if you looked at the last page is called The Internet Giant — Onyx Scott’s story), you’re going to start to see the machinations of the Syndicate members as they reach to implement their “grand plan.”

  In book five, those plans ratchet up a big notch. You’ll see the duplicity and backstabbing that starts to occur as the plan rises toward its rollout.

  But in book six? Holy shit.

  Just go ahead and start anticipating book six (The Guru) right now.

  Because …

  … well, again: HOLY SHIT.

  There’s a bit of a long, involved backstory here that I’ll tell you one day (not just yet), but for now the important things are 1) I’ve had an amazing project simmering on the back burner for a LONG TIME that I’ve been trying to find a way to tie into my “main body of work” and 2) ever since the Trevor’s Harem books, I’ve had a way in mind to do exactly that and have been subtly working toward it.

  Here’s how it began: