Tempting the Billionaire (Love in the Balance)

by Lemmon, Jessica

  Tempting the Billionaire

  Jessica Lemmon

  New York Boston

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  Table of Contents

  A Preview of Hard to Handle

  Newsletters

  Copyright Page

  All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher is unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at permissions@hbgusa.com. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

  For my husband, John, who has always believed in me and my abilities. You are a shining example of a hero. You’re right, babe, this is “our” book. I love you.

  Acknowledgments

  Thanks to God, who knows my heart and has seen fit to “throw open the floodgates” on my behalf. You are truly awesome!

  Thanks to:

  My agent, Nicole Resciniti, for believing in me and working so hard to help my dream become a reality!

  My editor, Lauren Plude, your love for this book is humbling. Thank you for championing me and for taking a chance on me. Who knew I could edit at lightning speed?!

  Everyone at Grand Central who had a role in publishing this book, thank you for your hard work.

  My critique partners: Jeannie Moon who offered helpful fashion advice for Shane such as “Black is for undertakers,” and “Lime green? Really?” And for suggesting the electric wine opener—it led to a great scene. Michele Shaw, for staying up waaaay past your bedtime to read for me. I still owe you a few dollars for the clichés.

  Best friend extraordinaire by day, highly fashionable beta reader by night, Niki Hughes, you ROCK! KnowhatImean?

  “Daddio” Terry Long—seeing you proud makes me proud…I make no promises on the yacht.

  Mom (Melodie) and Ted Brewer—for supporting me in all I do…sometimes, quite literally. ;)

  Fellow writers at the OVRWA, for never being short on advice and support. And a special shout-out to Melissa Landers for helping me with that darn query letter!

  Fellow leaders, consultants, and customers I met while in PartyLite—without each and every one of you, I wouldn’t be who I am today. Thank you.

  Friends and family, online and off, for your constant cheerleading. There have been a million tiny moments, a thousand kind words, hundreds of retweets and “likes,” and all of them are stored in my heart.

  My husband, John, who is awesome enough to get mentioned both here and in the dedication. You not only stood by me while I chased my dream but celebrated it as if it was your own. Here’s to many, many more celebrations and life-changing moments together.

  Last, thanks to you, dear reader, for taking a chance on a new author. The idea of my book being published started out as a very big, very faraway dream. That journey officially started in 2010, and now you’re holding that dream in your hands. May Shane and Crickitt find a permanent spot in your hearts, and on your “keeper” shelves!

  Chapter 1

  Oscillating red, green, and blue lights sliced through the smoke-filled club. Men and women cluttered the floor, their arms pumping in time with the throbbing speakers as an unseen fog machine muddied the air.

  Shane August resisted the urge to press his fingertips into his eyelids and stave off the headache that’d begun forming there an hour ago.

  Tonight marked the end of a grueling six-day workweek, one he would have preferred to end in his home gym, or in the company of a glass of red wine. He frowned at the bottle of light beer in his hand. Six dollars. That was fifty cents an ounce.

  The sound of laughter pulled his attention from the overpriced brew, and he found a pair of girls sidling by his table. They offered twin grins and waved in tandem, hips swaying as they strode by.

  “Damn,” Aiden muttered over his shoulder. “I should have worn a suit.”

  Shane angled a glance at his cousin’s T-shirt and jeans. “Do you even own a suit?”

  “Shut up.”

  Shane suppressed a budding smile and tipped his beer bottle to his lips. It was Aiden who dragged him here tonight. Shane could give him a hard time, but Aiden was here to forget about his ex-wife, and she’d given him a hard enough time for both of them.

  “This is where you’re making your foray into the dating world?” Shane asked, glancing around the room at the bevy of flesh peeking out from the bottom of skintight skirts and shorts.

  “Seemed like a good place to pick up chicks,” Aiden answered with a roll of one shoulder.

  Shane tamped down another smile. Aiden was recently divorced, though “finally” might be a better term. Two years of wedded bliss had been anything but, thanks to Harmony’s wandering eye. Shane couldn’t blame Aiden for exercising a bit of freedom. God knows, if Shane were in his shoes, he’d have bailed a long time ago. This time when Harmony left, she’d followed her sucker punch with a TKO: the man she left Aiden for was his now former best friend. At first Aiden had been withdrawn, then angry. Tonight he appeared to be masking his emotions beneath a cloak of overconfidence.

  “Right,” Shane muttered. “Chicks.”

  “Well, excuse me, Mr. Moneybags.” Aiden leaned one arm on the high-top table and faced him. “Women may throw themselves at you like live grenades, but the rest of us commoners have to come out to the trenches and hunt.”

  Shane gave him a dubious look, in part for the sloppily mixed metaphor, but mostly because dodging incoming women didn’t exactly describe his lackluster love life. If he’d learned anything from his last girlfriend, it was how to spot a girl who wanted to take a dip in his cash pool.

  He’d only had himself to blame, he supposed. He was accustomed to solving problems with money. Problem-free living just happened to be at the top of his priority list. Unfortunately, relationships didn’t file away neatly into manila folders, weren’t able to be delegated in afternoon conference meetings. Relationships were complicated, messy. Time consuming.

  No, thanks.

  “I can pick up a girl in a club,” Shane found himself arguing. It’d been a while, but he never was one to shy away from a challenge. Self-made men didn’t shrink in the face of adversity.

  Aiden laughed and clapped him on the shoulder. “Don’t embarrass yourself.”

  Shane straightened and pushed the beer bottle aside. “Wanna bet?”

  “With you?” Aiden lifted a thick blond eyebrow. “Forget it! You wipe your ass with fifties.”

  “Hundreds,” Shane corrected, earning a hearty chuckle.

  “Then again,” Aiden said after finishing off his bottle, “I wouldn’t mind seeing you in action, learn what not to do now that I’m single again. Find a cute girl and I’ll be your wingman.” Before Shane could respond, Aiden elbowed him. “Except for her.”

  Shane followed his cousin’s pointing finger to the bar, where a woman dabbed at her eyes with a napkin. She looked so delicate sitting there, folded over in her chair, an array of brown curls concealing part of her face.

  “Crying chicks either have too much baggage, or they’re wasted.”

  Says Aiden Downey, dating guru.

  “Drunk can be good,” he continued, “but by the time you get close enough to find out, it’s too late.”

  Shane frowned. He didn’t like being told what to do. Or what not to. He wasn’t sure if that’s what made him decide to approach her, or if he’d decided the second Aiden pointed her out. He felt his lips pull into a deeper frown. He shouldn’t be considering it at
all.

  A cocktail waitress stopped at their table. Shane waved off the offer of another, his eyes rooted on the crying girl at the bar. She looked as out of place in this crowd as he felt. Dressed unassumingly in jeans and a black top, her brown hair a curly crown that stopped at her jawline. In the flashy crowd, she could have been dismissed as plain…but she wasn’t plain. She was pretty.

  He watched as she brushed a lock from her damp face as her shoulders rose and fell. The pile of crumpled napkins next to her paired with the far-off look in her eyes suggested she was barely keeping it together. Grief radiated off of her in waves Shane swore he could feel from where he sat. Witnessing her pain made his gut clench. Probably because somewhere deep inside, he could relate.

  Aiden said something about a girl on the dance floor, and Shane flicked him an irritated glance before his eyes tracked back to the girl at the bar. She sipped her drink and offered the bartender a tight nod of thanks as he placed a stack of fresh napkins in front of her.

  Shane felt an inexplicable, almost gravitational pull toward her, his feet urging him forward even as his brain raised one argument after the next. Part of him wanted to help, though if she wanted to have a heart-to-heart, she’d be better off talking to Aiden. But if she needed advice or a solution to a tangible problem, well, that he could handle.

  He glanced around the room at the predatory males lurking in every corner and wondered again why she was here. If he did approach her, an idea becoming more compelling by the moment, she’d likely shoot him down before he said a single word. So why was he mentally mapping a path to her chair? He pressed his lips together in thought. Because there was a good chance he could erase the despair from her face. A prospect he found more appealing than anything else.

  “Okay, her friend is hot, I’ll give you that,” Aiden piped up.

  Shane blinked before snapping his eyes to the brunette’s left. Her “hot friend,” as Aiden so eloquently put it, showcased her assets in a scandalously short skirt and backless silver top. He’d admit she was hard to miss. Yet Shane hadn’t noticed her until Aiden pointed her out. His eyes trailed back to the brunette.

  “Okay,” Aiden said on a sigh of resignation. “Because I so desperately want to see this, I’m going to take a bullet for you. I’ll distract the crier. You hit on the blonde.” That said, he stood up and headed toward the bar…to flirt with the wrong girl.

  The platitude of only having one chance to make a first impression flitted through Shane’s head. He called Aiden’s name, but his shout was lost under the music blasting at near ear-bleeding decibels. Aiden may be younger and less experienced, but he also had an undeniable charm girls didn’t often turn down. If the brunette spotted his cousin first, she wouldn’t so much as look at Shane. He abandoned his beer, doing a neat jog across the room and reaching Aiden just as he was moving in to tap the brunette’s shoulder.

  “My cousin thought he recognized you,” Shane blurted to the blonde, grabbing Aiden by the arm and spinning him in her direction.

  The blonde surveyed Aiden with lazy disinterest. “I don’t think so.”

  Aiden lifted his eyebrows to ask, What the hell are you doing?

  Rather than explain, Shane clapped both palms on Aiden’s shoulders and shoved him closer to the blonde. “His sister’s in the art business.” It was a terrible segue if the expression on Aiden’s face was anything to go by, but it was the first thing that popped into Shane’s head.

  The music changed abruptly, slowing into a rhythmic, techno-pop remix that had dancers slowing down and pairing up. Aiden slipped into an easy, confident smile. “Wanna dance?” he asked the blonde.

  The moment the question was out of his mouth, the scratches and hissing of snare drums shifted into the melodic chimes of the tired and all-too-familiar line dance the Electric Slide.

  Aiden winced.

  Shane coughed to cover a laugh. “He’s a great dancer,” he said to the blonde.

  Aiden shot his elbow into Shane’s ribs but recovered his smile a second later. Turning to the blonde, he said, “He’s right, I am,” then offered his hand.

  The blonde glanced at his palm, then leaned past Shane to talk to her friend. “You gonna be okay here?” she called over the music.

  The brunette flicked a look from her friend to Shane. The moment he locked on to her bright blue eyes, his heart galloped to life, picking up speed as if running for an invisible finish line. Her eyes left his as she addressed her friend. “Fine.”

  It wasn’t the most wholehearted endorsement, but at least she’d agreed to stay.

  Aiden and the blonde made their way to the dance floor, and Shane gave his collar a sharp tug and straightened his suit jacket before turning toward the brunette. She examined him, almost warily, her lids heavy over earnest blue eyes. He’d seen that kind of soul-rending sadness before, a long time ago. Staring back at him from his bathroom mirror.

  “That was my cousin Aiden.” He bumbled to fill the dead air between them. “He wanted to meet your friend.”

  “Figures,” the brunette said, barely audible over the music.

  He ignored the whistling sound of their conversation plummeting to its imminent death. “She seems nice. Aiden can be kind of an ass around nice girls,” he added, leaning in so she could hear him.

  She rewarded him with a tentative upward curve of her lips, the top capping a plumper bottom lip that looked good enough to eat. He offered a small smile of his own, perplexed by the direction of his thoughts. When was the last time he’d been thrown this off-kilter by a woman? Let alone one he’d just met? She shifted in her seat to face him, and a warm scent lifted off her skin—vanilla and nutmeg if he wasn’t mistaken. He gripped the back of the chair in front of him and swallowed instinctively. Damn. She smelled good enough to eat.

  She dipped her head, fiddled with the strap of her handbag, and Shane realized he was staring.

  “Shane,” he said, offering his hand.

  She looked at it a beat before taking it. “Crickitt.”

  “Like the bug?” He flinched. Smooth.

  “Thanks for that.” She offered a mordant smile.

  Evidently he was rustier at this than he thought. “Sorry.” Best get to the point. “Is there something you need? Something I can get you?”

  Her eyes went to the full drink in front of her. “I’ve had plenty, but thanks. Anyway, I’m about to leave.”

  “I’m on my way out. Can I drop you somewhere?”

  She eyed him cautiously.

  Okay. Perhaps offering her a ride was a bit forward and from her perspective, dangerous.

  “No, thank you,” she said, turning her body away from his as she reached for her drink.

  Great. He was creepy club guy.

  He leaned on the bar between the blonde’s abandoned chair and Crickitt. Lowering his voice he said, “I think I’m doing this all wrong. To tell the truth, I saw you crying and I wondered if I could do anything to help. I’d…like to help. If you’ll let me.”

  She turned to him, her eyes softening into what might have been gratitude, before a harder glint returned. Tossing her head, she met his eye. “Help? Sure. Know anyone who’d like to hire a previously self-employed person for a position for which she has little to no experience?”

  He had to smile at her pluck…and his good fortune. Crickitt’s problem may be one he could help with after all. “Depends,” he answered, watching her eyebrows give the slightest lift. He leaned an elbow on the bar. “In what salary range?”

  * * *

  Crickitt scanned the well-dressed man in front of her. He wore a streamlined charcoal suit and crisp white dress shirt. No tie, but she’d bet one had been looped around his neck earlier. She allowed her gaze to trickle to his open collar, lingering over the column of his tanned neck before averting her eyes. What would he say if she blurted out the figure dancing around her head?

  Two-hundred fifty thou’ a year? Oh, sure, I know lots of people who pay out six figures for a new hir
e.

  “Well?” he asked.

  “Six figures,” she said.

  He laughed.

  That’s what she thought. If this Shane guy were in a position to offer that kind of income, would he really be in a club named Lace and hitting on a girl like her? Why hadn’t he hit on someone else? Someone without a runny nose and red-rimmed eyes. Someone like Sadie. But he’d rerouted his friend to talk to Sadie. Why had he done that? She smoothed her hair, considering.

  Maybe you’re an easy target.

  He saw her crying and wanted to help? It wasn’t the worst pickup line in the world, but it was close.

  Crickitt instinctively slid her pinky against her ring finger to straighten her wedding band but only felt the rub of skin on skin. For nine years the band had been at home on her left hand. She used to think of it as a comforting weight, but since Ronald left, it’d become a reminder of the now obvious warning signs she’d overlooked. The way he’d pulled away from her both physically and emotionally. The humiliation of scurrying after him, attempting to win his affections even after it was too late. She lifted her shoulders under her ears, wishing she could hide from the recurring memory, the embarrassment. Fresh tears burned the backs of her eyes before she remembered she had a captive audience. She squeezed her eyes closed, willing the helter-skelter emotions to go away.

  When she opened them she saw Shane had backed away some, either to give the semblance of privacy or because he feared she would burst into tears and blow her nose on his expensive jacket. She could choke Sadie for bringing her out tonight.

  Come to the club, Sadie had said. It’ll get your mind off of things, she’d insisted. But it hadn’t. Even when faced with a very good-looking, potentially helpful man, she was wallowing in self-doubt and recrimination. She could’ve done that at home.

  “What experience do you have, Crickitt?” Shane asked, interrupting her thoughts.

  She tipped her chin up at him. Was he serious? Either his half smile was sarcastic or genuinely curious. Hard to tell. The temptation was there to dismiss him as just another jerk in a club, but she couldn’t. There was an undeniable warmth in his dark eyes, a certain kindness in the way he leaned toward her when he talked, like he didn’t want to intimidate her.