She's Mine: A Billionaire Second Chance Romance

by Kira Blakely

  “What do you do?” she asks. “Do you have a job?”

  “I’m a personal assistant,” I tell her.

  “A servant?”

  I frown. “No. More like a secretary but with—”

  “A glorified maid,” she says.

  I have to admit, she’s starting to get on my nerves.

  “I assist Grant in administrative matters,” I explain.

  “So you work for him?”

  “Yes.”

  “And yet you slept with him.” She stops and turns to me. “Have you no shame?”

  Her words feel like a slap in the face, stopping me in my tracks. I want to retaliate but I’m not sure I should, plus I can’t seem to think of anything to say.

  She gives another snort.

  Why the…?

  Then she continues walking. I follow her reluctantly, more slowly, taking deep breaths to calm myself down.

  She’s an old woman, Abby, even though she is a bitch.

  As we pass by a room, I catch a glimpse of some maids looking in my direction. As soon as our gazes meet, though, they look away, some of them even scurrying off like rats.

  I wish I could scurry off right now.

  “How many men have you been with?” Mrs. Ainsworth asks, not done with her questioning. “Have you ever been with child?”

  This is not an interrogation. It’s an inquisition. And I’m done.

  “I would rather not discuss such insignificant matters,” I tell her. “After all, we are strangers. I hope you don’t mind.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  Finally, we reach the parlor room, a spacious room that has nothing but chairs of all shapes and sizes, floor-to-ceiling windows, and glass doors leading to the garden. Mrs. Ainsworth sits on the divan, and I sit on the curved wooden stool with the velvet cushion. Shortly after, a maid enters with a silver tea cart.

  And here I thought they didn’t make such things anymore.

  The maid pours Mrs. Ainsworth a cup of tea from the pot then as she is about to pour another, Mrs. Ainsworth stops her.

  “Abby will not have tea,” she says. “Get her a glass of water. After all, she’s thirsty.”

  I stand up. “Actually, I’m not thirsty. I’d rather have some fresh air. Would you mind if I take a walk in your garden?”

  To my relief, Mrs. Ainsworth shakes her head. “Not at all. Please enjoy.”

  Pushing the glass door open, I step into the garden. I follow the stone path and heave a sigh of relief as soon as I’m far from the house. I swear Grant’s grandmother is suffocating. The farther away I am from her, the better.

  I sit on a bench, breathing in the fresh air and enjoying its caress on my face, willing it to soothe Mrs. Ainsworth’s slapping comments and erase her snorts from my mind. After just a few minutes, I feel better.

  I may have had a rough morning, but I’m still in London and a whole magical adventure still awaits me.

  Suddenly, I hear a twig break. I turn my head, smiling as I see Grant.

  “Ah, there you are.” He smiles back, planting a kiss on my hair before sitting beside me. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”

  “I thought you were with your grandfather. What happened?”

  “He was his usual charming self.” He places his arm around me. “He said he wasn’t dying or anything close to that, and that I should just leave.”

  “Wow.”

  “What about you? I thought you were with my grandmother.”

  I place my hand on his lap. “She’s her usual charming self, too. Very charming.”

  “That’s her all right.” Grant chuckles then reaches for my hand. “Let’s forget about them, shall we? Let’s leave this miserable place and go have fun.”

  I nod. “I’d love that.”

  I place my arm in his once more as we get off the bench, a wide smile on my face as we walk down the stone path. That smile vanishes, though, after a few steps, when a maid is standing in our way.

  A maid with a villainous expression and a knife in her hand.

  What the hell is wrong with this place?

  “Easy,” Grant warns her, standing in front of me. “You might hurt yourself with that thing.”

  “No, I won’t.” She lifts the knife. “But I’ll kill you with this thing.”

  She must be mad. This place must have driven her mad. And the thing is, I don’t blame her.

  “Listen,” I tell her. “We don’t mean you any harm. If there’s anything we can do to help you, we—”

  “Quiet!” she scolds me, pointing her knife at me. “This is not about you. It’s about him.”

  “Me?” Grant’s eyebrows crease.

  “You’re Grant Ainsworth, right?”

  “Grant Herbert,” he corrects. “But I think you have the same person.”

  “You slept with my mother,” the maid accuses. “She was a maid here, too, long ago. Her name was Emily.”

  “I’m sorry.” Grant shakes his head. “I don’t remember.”

  The maid points the knife at him. “You seduced her and you slept with her and because of that, my father left us.”

  I blink. Grant did all that?

  “Put down the knife,” Grant tells her, his hands raised. “And we’ll talk.”

  “I don’t want any talk. I’ve waited a long time for this. Now, you die.”

  She lifts the knife and starts rushing toward Grant and me. Out of nowhere, Roger jumps out, pinning her to the ground before she can reach us. Quickly, he disarms her, tossing the knife aside.

  Wow. I knew Roger was skilled, but seeing it with my own eyes sure is something.

  “I’ll take care of her,” Roger promises, pulling the maid to her feet. “Or, rather, Oliver will.”

  The maid, however, isn’t done. She struggles, and when she realizes it’s to no avail, she shouts at Grant.

  “You’ll pay for what you’ve done! And as for you…” She turns to me. “You better run away from this man while you can. He has a heart of stone like his grandfather. He’s just using you, and he’ll ruin your life, too.”

  “All right, that’s enough.” Roger hauls the maid away. “I don’t usually hit women but don’t tempt me.”

  They leave. I heave a sigh of relief.

  “Are you all right?” Grant places a hand on my back.

  “Yeah.” I nod, placing my hand over his. “It’s a good thing Roger’s around. Is it true, though? Did you really seduce her mother?”

  Grant shrugs. “I did seduce a handful of maids, though. It was the only way for me to be able to do things without my grandparents’ knowledge.” He touches my cheek. “I’m not proud of it, though, and I definitely promise that it will not happen again.”

  I nod, believing him. And I’m not mad at him. After all, when I decided to accept him, I decided to accept all of him, including his past and his mistakes.

  Something else bothers me – the fact that that maid, whatever her name was, and Lindsey said the same thing. They both said Grant was just using me.

  I glance at Grant. I can tell that he cares about me. Even so, my deeply rooted fears can’t help but rear their ugly heads, my instinct kicking in.

  What if he is just using me?

  ***

  The question still bothers me days later in spite of all the fun I’m having with Grant around London. One evening, while Grant is out drinking with some old friends, I place a call to Lindsey from the hotel suite.

  “You’ve reached Lindsey Holland. Please leave a message.”

  I wait for the click, shifting the receiver to my other hand and putting the other on my hip. “Hi. It’s Abby. I’m calling from a hotel in London and I—”

  “Hey!” Lindsey picks up the phone. “How’s London?”

  “Good,” I answer, sitting on the edge of the bed.

  “But you don’t feel the same way, do you?” she asks, picking up my lack of enthusiasm. “What’s so wrong that you need me and not the app?”

  “Well, your app
actually said for me to get answers so here I am.” I take a deep breath. “I just have one important question. Is there something you and Grant are hiding from me?”

  “What?”

  “I’m not accusing you and Grant of having a relationship other than your business partnership or anything. It’s just that I’ve been thinking and putting little bits together, and I think I’m feeling paranoid.”

  “Your female sense is tingling, and it’s telling you something’s off.”

  “Yeah. Exactly.”

  “Well, what do you think we’re hiding?”

  I shift the receiver back to my other hand. “When we first met, you firmly believed that Grant was using me and then there’s the fact that I caught Grant saying once that you were his idea. What’s up with that?”

  Lindsey sighs.

  “Please tell me.” I slide down to the carpet, pulling my knees to my chest. “We’re friends, right?”

  “All right.” She takes a deep breath, and I hold mine. “Grant wanted my apps from the start. He called me up to make the offer. I said no, but he wouldn’t take that for an answer. So I challenged him. I told him if he could make a woman fall in love with him, then I’d consider his offer. You won’t believe the women he started sending me. He claimed they were in love with him, but I saw right through them. I didn’t only turn them down, I turned them against him. I never thought he’d be able to send me a woman who was really in love with him.”

  “And he sent me, didn’t he?” I place my hand over my chest, which suddenly feels tight. “Well, he made me think it was my idea but he was actually grooming me for it all along.”

  “I’m sorry, Abby, but hey, Grant ended up falling in love with you, too, so it doesn’t matter, right?”

  I don’t answer. The end justifies the means just doesn’t cut it right now.

  “Abby?”

  “I’ll talk to you soon,” I say, not feeling like talking anymore. “Thanks. Bye.”

  “A—”

  I hang up, dropping the phone on the carpet as I bury my face in my arms.

  I knew it. Even so, I can’t believe it. Grant tricked me. He did try to use me just like he used the mother of that maid, all those other maids, and all those women before me. Just like all those men used my mother.

  Suddenly, the memories of that first week I came to work for him rush back. No wonder he was acting all weird then. He was desperate to make me fall in love with him. And then I turned him down and he took a different approach, making me believe first that he was in love with me.

  And I fell.

  I fell in love with him.

  I fell into his trap.

  I throw my head against the edge of the bed, running my hands across the sides of my face.

  How could I have been so blind?

  But he fell in love with you, too. He fell into his own trap.

  Did he?

  Just then, I hear a beep from Grant’s laptop on the table, letting me know that he has a new email. Since I manage his emails, I have access to his account. Out of habit, I check what came in, my eyes growing wide and my heart seemingly shrinking as I open one attachment of the message after another, all of them files of different women between twenty-two and thirty, all of them beautiful and from rich families.

  Each click feels like a piece of my heart falling off until finally, when I’m done, there’s nothing left.

  There’s nothing left of me.

  Grant doesn’t love me. He used me and now that I’ve fulfilled my purpose, he’s looking for the next target, already having files on the candidates.

  Just like he had a file on me.

  For a while, I don’t move, frozen in front of the computer as my tears fall on the keyboard. Then, like a racer who’s just realized the gun has gone off, my body jolts into action. In a blur, I change my clothes and gather my things. Not even bothering to make a goodbye note, I leave.

  There’s no need for goodbye when something never really started.

  I was just passing by.

  And now, it’s time for me to go.

  Chapter 12

  Grant

  “Abby’s gone.”

  The moment I entered the room, I felt something was wrong, the hotel bathroom slippers lying inches from each other on the floor and the robe a heap on the couch. Now, after searching the room and finding no sign of Abby or any of her things, I know what’s wrong or rather, what’s missing.

  Abby.

  She left. In a hurry. And judging from the pile of used tissue in the garbage can, she was upset. Since the phone receiver was on the floor, it must have something to do with that last conversation she had.

  The question is… who was she talking to?

  “I should have stayed at the hotel,” Roger says, frowning.

  I shake my head, looking at the handset in my hand. “Something tells me you wouldn’t have been able to keep her from leaving.”

  I press the redial button, my jaw clenching when I see an overseas number on the small screen. And not just any overseas number.

  Lindsey’s.

  My jaw clenches. I thought something was bothering her. I thought it was just something that had happened at the mansion. I should have known it was something else. I should have known a smart woman like her would not be kept in the dark forever.

  Not that I was planning to keep her in the dark forever. I was going to tell her someday when it no longer mattered, when we’ve been together for a long time, when I’ve become more certain that I wasn’t going to lose her.

  And now, I’ve lost her.

  I toss the phone on the bed and take mine out from my pocket, calling her.

  “The number you are dialing is…”

  I end the call then go over to the table where my laptop is, thinking of getting information on which plane she’s trying to get on in hopes of catching her before she’s on it.

  In front of the table, I pause.

  Wasn’t the lid of my laptop open earlier?

  Lifting the lid, I see the wet drop on the keyboard. A tear. Quickly, I open the minimized window, feeling like throwing the mouse in my hand when I realize that it’s the message from my grandfather, the one with all the profiles of the women he wanted me to choose from for my wife.

  “Fuck.” I beat my fist against the table, ignoring the pain.

  “Fuck is right,” Roger says as he looks at my screen. “Your grandfather sure has a knack for complicating things, doesn’t he?”

  “I’ll go after her.” I head toward the door. “I’ll go to Heathrow and look for her. I’ll pay people to help me find her if I have to.”

  “Grant, wait.” Roger places a firm hand on my shoulder. “I know you want to make things right, and I really hope you do but you can’t do it right now.”

  I turn around to face him. “Why not?”

  “Because there’s something more important you should do.” Roger points to the screen of my laptop. “Even if you talk to Abby now, it won’t change the fact that your grandfather still wants you to marry someone of his choosing, which means the two of you still can’t be together. If you’re going to chase after Abby, you have to make sure first that nothing will get in your way.”

  “What are you suggesting? That I talk to Grandfather? There’s nothing for us to talk about. I’m not going to marry someone he chooses for me.”

  “But if you don’t, he’ll disown you,” Roger reminds me.

  “Then let him disown me.” I turn toward the door. “He never thought of me as his grandson anyway.”

  “And what about your promise to your mother?”

  I stop in my tracks.

  “You did promise her that you weren’t going to turn your back on your grandfather, didn’t you?”

  I clench my shaking hands into fists, remembering when she lay on the hospital bed, a few days before her death.

  “I know your grandfather is selfish and proud. I know that better than anyone. But he did have a heart once. He loved me once
, and he was kind and happy then. I can’t win back that love anymore but you can. Promise me that you’ll try. That you won’t let him die cold and lonely. Only you, Grant, can undo what I have done.”

  And I did promise her. I gave her my word that I’d try.

  If Grandfather disowns me, I’ll never have the chance to fulfill my promise. But what should I do? If I follow my grandfather’s wishes, I’ll never see Abby again. I’ll never be with her again.

  “Fuck!”

  I bow my head in anguish, beating my fists against the wall.

  If only I knew what my mother was asking of me then, I wouldn’t have made that promise. I can’t turn back time, though, and she’s gone, which means I can’t ask her to release me from my promise, from this sentence to a lifetime of suffering.

  Mom, how do I get out of this mess you got me into?

  ***

  I ask her that question again as I visit her grave the next day, a bouquet of white roses in my hand.

  I didn’t sleep all night, knowing that each moment, Abby was getting farther and farther away from my reach. I wanted to chase after Abby but I couldn’t just yet. I’ve tried to think of a way to resolve my dilemma but I couldn’t. I know how stubborn Grandfather is. He only let me start my own company because it was my mother’s wish. I know he’s angry that my company is succeeding and so he wants to ruin my happiness. He can never stand seeing anyone happy.

  He was kind and happy then.

  In truth, I do feel sorry for him. And I want him to acknowledge me, to be proud of me. That’s one reason why I wanted for my company to succeed so badly. Yet, he’s asking too much of me now.

  “You do understand, don’t you, Mom?”

  She doesn’t answer, of course, and I have to try and think of what she’d say if she was still alive.

  What would she say? What would she do?

  I can’t think, though. We barely saw each other before she got sick. I don’t even remember what she looked like then. I only got to know her after, and she only spoke of sad things then, and she hardly did anything.

  “What should I do, Mom?”

  Kneeling, I place the bouquet on her grave and as I do, I notice the small words written at the bottom of her tombstone. I almost forgot they were there since the print was small and the blades of grass obscured the words. No doubt that was my grandfather’s intention since he didn’t want those words in there.