Tied to Him

by Tia Siren

  Before long, Mr. Novak was bloodied and beaten. His strength had been bested easily by the only person who knew how to make me happy. I was seeing, again, the reason why I had always been so close to him in my youth.

  Good people were hard to find, so sometimes you found a bad one who knew just what you need.

  I tucked the book into my pocket and made my way toward the road. Rex seemed to be enjoying himself with his punching bag. After about five minutes of Mr. Novak taking a beating, I saw one of the club members come out with a length of rope tied around his torso.

  The group dragged him back to the motorcycles and tied the other end of the rope to the bike.

  I gave Rex a kiss on the cheek as he rode off down the street with Mr. Novak in tow.

  Unfortunately, the ride didn’t last as long as I would had hoped.

  9.

  “Celia Murphy?” chimed the voice of the officer.

  I stood up and walked over to the holding cell bars.

  “You’re free to go,” he said.

  I walked out to the lobby of the police station. A good portion of the club was there waiting, but not Rex.

  “Celia Murphy,” said the old woman behind the desk, “your marriage license is in order. Here’s your certificate.”

  I laughed at how droll she made the whole proceeding sound. If Rex were here to see this, he’d probably laugh about it too. I was his now and forever.

  “Will Rex be out soon?” I asked.

  The officer who had led me out was sitting at the front desk. He looked at me in disbelief.

  “You do know we caught him dragging a man behind a motorcycle down Main Street at highway speeds, right? I wouldn’t be surprised if he ends up locked up for the rest of his life.”

  “Naw. He’ll get out. He always does,” I said.

  I was contacted later that day by drug enforcement officers. The information I had and the bodies I’d left were more than enough to convince them that I had just been fighting for my life.

  It took a while, but I finally managed to convince them to let Rex go. Mr. Novak had survived and was in critical care at the local hospital. I felt completely free of my dumb mistake.

  In the end, I felt sorry for my friend Jimmy who got stuck in a mess he couldn’t dig himself out of. But, some good did come from the whole situation. I got my man back.

  We saddled up outside the police station, and I leaned over and gave him a kiss on the cheek.

  “You know, we’re married now,” I said.

  “I think I want a divorce,” Rex replied. “You’re just too much trouble.”

  We both laughed, and everything felt right. As we drove down the open road, as I had so many years ago, I felt free.

  *****

  THE END

  BILLIONAIRE BOSS Romance – He’s the Boss

  Carl Johnson screamed as he looked below him and realized how small everyone looked. He was hanging by his ankles from scaffolding around a half-built apartment block in downtown Los Angeles.

  “It's around a hundred yards to the ground. Don't do it, Carl. Don't do it to the poor emergency services. They've got better things to do than scrape pieces of you from the sidewalk,” Ryan said. “Now, I'm going to ask you one more time about the contract. Who gets first refusal?”

  Carl closed his eyes and prayed that the two enormous men holding him wouldn't suddenly take even more of a dislike to him and let go. He had a wife, three kids, and a new grandchild that he absolutely adored. “Put me down, Ryan. This isn't the way we do business. You're not a murderer.”

  Brave guy, Ryan thought. “There's a first time for everything, Carl. You promised to sell this place to me once it was finished. Now that someone has made you a better offer, you've gone back on your word. That's not nice.” Ryan nodded to one of the men, and he let go of Carl's left leg.

  “Jesus,” Carl screamed. He was now hanging by his right leg, and the man holding him was beginning to breathe hard. “Okay, Okay. It's yours. Please pull me up.”

  “Pull him in,” Ryan ordered. The two men heaved him back over the rail and threw him into the building. Ryan stood over him and noticed he'd wet himself. “Don't do that again, Carl. I hate heights,” Ryan said.

  The building was still very much a shell, and the only way down was the constructor's lift, down the outside of the building. The door was made of mesh, and as they descended the wind whistled around them.

  Down on the sidewalk, Ryan felt in his jacket for his cell phone. It seemed like it was the hundredth text he'd received that morning. Cindy again, he said to himself. When would she leave him alone? He'd made it perfectly clear to her he only wanted to fool around, not get into a long-term relationship. Most women understood what he wanted, but not Cindy. She'd just lost her husband to a heart attack, and maybe he shouldn't have taken her to bed while she was in such a fragile state. He'd seen her across the room at an art exhibition given by one of his clients in San Francisco. Her beauty and vulnerability had turned him on. In her state, she hadn't taken much persuading to come to his hotel room. She'd needed a shoulder to cry on, a man to love her and tell her she would feel better soon. But he didn't want her, and she'd have to be told to stop contacting him.

  “Where to, boss?” the chauffeur asked. He'd been waiting in the Rolls Royce since dropping Ryan off to do his dirty business with Carl.

  “The Towers,” Ryan replied. The Towers referred to Mathewson Towers, a huge office block in LA that Ryan owned. His company occupied the top three floors of the ninety-eight-floor building. The rest was a hotel and offices. “I've got a radio interview at two,” he added.

  A bit later, once Ryan was up in the Towers, his sixty-year-old secretary entered his office.

  “Hi, Mr. Jacobson. Kelly Cruz is here. I put her in the boardroom,” Steffi said.

  “Thanks, Steffi. Do I look okay?” he asked.

  “As handsome as ever,” she said.

  “You're a great liar,” he added. Steffi was his backbone, the woman who organized his days, looked after all his correspondence, and made sure his thousand-dollar suits came back from the dry cleaners on time. But disaster had struck: she'd decided to retire. She was the one employee he knew he couldn't do without. He'd offered her a huge increase in salary, even offered to pay off the tiny bit of mortgage she and her husband still had on their detached house. But tired after years in the stressful environment Ryan adored, she wasn't to be swayed.

  Why the hell he'd agreed to do an interview for a radio show he had no idea; it wasn't his thing. He hated the media. He was a real estate guy, a developer, someone who had to make unpopular decisions in the name of making money. The media was always on his case. He knew what he was; he didn't need telling every day.

  The boardroom was the most luxurious room in the whole building. When Ryan entered the room, he was pleasantly surprised. Kelly looked just like her photos. When she'd sent an e-mail requesting an interview, Steffi had shown him a photo of her on the Capital Radio website, and he'd immediately said yes to her request.

  “Kelly, hi. Nice to meet you.” He shook her hand.

  “Mr. Jacobson, thanks for agreeing to the interview.”

  “You're the first ever.”

  “Interview?”

  “Yes. I don't like the media much.”

  “Well, I hope you like us,” she said with a smile.

  She was Ryan's type: a glitzy blonde dressed in a business suit and heels. “I'm sure I will.”

  “Shall we just start? If you want to stop at any time, just hold up your hand and I'll halt the recording.”

  “Sure. Go right ahead,” he said, taking a looking at her breasts as she reached behind her to pick up the microphone. She put it on the highly polished table and cleared her throat.

  “Today we're in downtown LA with real estate mogul Ryan Jacobson. Thank you for agreeing to see us, Mr. Jacobson.”

  “My pleasure, Kelly.” He took a look down at her bronzed legs and wondered how she got them so smooth
looking.

  “A lot of people know you as the secretive billionaire businessman. Perhaps you would tell us how you got started.”

  “Sure. Well, I went to construction college and learned how to build, and then I worked for a real tough guy called Jake Inchmore as a young apprentice. He clipped my ears a few times, I can tell you. I learned a lot from him.”

  “And when did you start your own business?”

  “As soon as I knew what I was doing. I was very grateful to Jake for teaching me all he knew. You know, the day I told him I was leaving to set up my own company, I was terrified of what he'd do to me, but he was really supportive and pleased I had some entrepreneurial spirit.”

  “You certainly do.”

  “The company you have built has seen a good amount of controversy, hasn't it?”

  “In what way?” he asked.

  “Well, your core business is buying apartment buildings, doing some refurbishing and increasing the rents drastically. There have been a number of high-profile cases where your company has evicted old people and families with young kids—people who couldn't pay the new rents.”

  “I knew it. I fucking well knew it. I'm the dumbest businessman in this whole godforsaken city. I thought you were different; that's why I invited you here. But you're just the same as all the others. Now get the hell out of my office.” Ryan swiped his arms over the table and knocked the microphone onto the floor.

  “That's the first and last time, Steffi. Never again,” he said as he walked past her desk. “Bloody media. And don't say I told you so.”

  “Well, I did,” Steffi said. “If she hadn't been so good looking, you would never have agreed to the interview.” Typical Ryan, she thought. He was a great businessman but a sucker for a pretty woman. She couldn't remember the number of times she’d had a tearful lady on the phone asking after his whereabouts.

  Ryan slumped into his giant leather desk chair and looked through his e-mails. There was one from Alina telling him she would arrive in LA around eight that evening. She told him she would take a cab to his home and not to bother sending a driver.

  “Steffi,” he shouted. Steffi arrived in his office with a notepad. “Alina's coming this evening. I'll bring her to work in the morning. How long do you think you'll need to hand everything over?”

  “I think I can teach her all she needs to know in a month. After that, she can have my phone number and call me if she needs to know anything.” Steffi looked at Ryan and noticed how tired he looked.

  “You're not overdoing it, are you?” she asked.

  “What makes you say that?”

  “You look tired.”

  “I am tired, tired of people who don't keep promises. This morning we had to hold a guy over the edge of a building and threaten to drop him.”

  Steffi laughed. “You have a wild imagination, Mr. Jacobson.”

  If only she knew the real truth, he thought. “I'm going home. If you need me, you know where I am.”

  The black Rolls Royce drove to Beverley Park and pulled into a gateway. The security guard came out of his hut and opened the gate. As Ryan's car passed, he waved and closed the gate.

  Ryan loved his home. At just thirty-five, he was the youngest resident in the area. At an average price of thirty million dollars, the houses in the immediate area were owned by business people and Hollywood stars.

  Getting out of the Rolls, he pulled out his cell. “Party time,” he shouted into in. “Spread the word. Starts at seven. Let's make it a pool party.”

  When he walked into the house, he was greeted by John Frazer, a man he'd hired in London. John was one of the few real butlers the world still possessed. “John, it's pool party time. Starts at seven. Can you organize?”

  John was tempted to roll his eyes in disgust, but Ryan paid him ridiculously well to turn the other cheek. “Of course, sir. Leave it to me.”

  *****

  “Hi, Mom,” Alina said. “Yes...yes...yes. Mom, don't worry. I'm fine. Nothing to worry about. I'll be there soon. Yes, Mom, the flight was great. What? Yes. Of course I've got enough money.”

  “Moms, huh?” the young man sitting next to her on the train said.

  “Yeah. She's worried about me.”

  “First time away from home?”

  “Yes. I suppose it is. I went to college in New York, but I lived at home because it was so close.”

  “Where are you headed?”

  “To downtown LA. My first job.”

  “Wow. Such a long way from home too,” he said, looking at her. He really liked what he saw. Her long legs were covered by a pair of faded jeans that showed off her slender thighs. Her white blouse had one button too many open, and he got a glimpse of her lacy bra with its overflowing contents.

  “Yes, it sure is a long way from home, but I'm looking forward to it.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “I'm going to be PA to a real estate dealer. I'm so excited. I never dreamed I would get the job.”

  “Was there a lot of competition?”

  “Well, if I tell you the name of the guy, you'll know the answer.”

  “Go on then.”

  “Ryan—”

  “Jacobson,” he said.

  “How did you know?” she said.

  “He's famous. Not for the right reasons either.”

  Alina turned her head to him. He was about her age but dressed older. He was wearing a tweed jacket and a pair of highly polished black shoes. “What do you mean by that?”

  “He's got a reputation for treating tenants poorly.”

  Alina had no idea whether that was true or not. All she knew was that she was terribly excited about the future. It had started with an ad she'd seen in the national press. She'd never heard of Ryan Jacobson or his company, but she wanted a job, and she'd always wanted to work in the warmth of California. When someone told her Ryan was a billionaire businessman, the likes of which America had never seen, she'd consigned her hope of success to the trash can. A week later Steffi had called and told her Ryan would be in New York and wanted to talk to her. He'd interviewed her at the St. Regis, where he was staying in a fifteen-thousand-dollar-a-night suite.

  She'd worn her best dress and a pair of really chic but extremely uncomfortable heels. She was sure she'd made a fool of herself when she'd shaken his hand, because she’d just stood open mouthed with her hand in his, unable to say anything. It was the moment Alina found out what a powerful aphrodisiac the combination of good looks and wealth could be.

  Her interview went by in a flash, and she knew she hadn't listened to him as well as she should have. His blond hair, bronzed skin, angular jaw, and dazzling blue eyes had prevented her from doing so.

  “Why would he treat tenants poorly?” she asked.

  “He buys buildings and increases rents. Then he kicks people out if they can't pay.”

  Ryan didn't seem like that kind of guy, she thought. He'd been pleasant to her, more like a friend than a potential boss.

  “Well, here's my stop,” he said. “Good luck.”

  Alina began to think about Ryan. Was she perhaps on her way to work for an ogre? Maybe he was rich because he was ruthless. Maybe he even broke the law.

  The taxi stopped outside the gates to Ryan's mansion at ten past eight. The security guard had drifted off to sleep and didn't see the beautiful young lady peering through the railings. There was no bell or intercom, so she waited. After a short time, she picked up a small stone and threw it at the cabin. It hit the window, and to her horror cracked it. The guard woke up with a start and ran out, brandishing a baseball bat.

  “What the hell are you doing?” he shouted. “Look, you've broken the window.”

  “Sorry. I...didn't mean to. I thought maybe...you were...”

  “I'm calling Mr. Jacobson.” He assumed Alina was late to the party. Ryan and his friends often invited beautiful women like her to their parties. “Mr. Frazer, there's a young woman at the gate. She threw a stone at my cabin and
broke the window.”

  It wasn't a stone. It was a tiny pebble, she thought. How the hell did the window break? It must have been wafer thin. She hadn’t meant to. Then she imagined Ryan coming down the driveway and telling her off. She'd only been at the house for a couple of minutes, and already she'd caused trouble. Not a good start, young lady, she told herself.

  When she saw Ryan, he was walking down the driveway dressed in a pair of white chinos and a navy blue shirt. From his point of view, she looked like a prisoner behind bars. She was holding the bars of the gate, looking at the huge security guard on the other side. He was standing with one hand on his hip, the other swirling the baseball bat in eager anticipation.

  “Open the gate and let her in,” Ryan shouted. “And put the baseball bat down. What do you think you're going to do with it? Hit a defenseless young woman?”

  The guard reluctantly opened the gate and let Alina in. Ryan shook her hand. “I'm sorry about this,” he said. “Just bear with me a moment.” He turned to the guard. “Why do you think the window is cracked?”

  “Because the lady here threw a stone.”

  “Correct. But why?”

  “Er...” The guard began to think of an excuse.

  “Because you were asleep, asleep on duty. This is not the first time, is it? I pay you good money to look after the place, and all you can do is sleep.”

  “Sir, I'm sorry. It won't happen again.”

  “Darn right it won't. You're fired. Take your things and leave.”

  Alina gasped. It was all her doing; she certainly hadn't meant to get the poor man fired. “Mr. Jacobson, it was my fault.”

  “No. You did what anybody would have done: try to wake the guy up. No, I've had enough. He's history.”

  Alina wasn't going to argue anymore, but she felt desperately sorry for the security guard. Where she came from it was extremely difficult to get a job. Little did she know that in LA, the man would have another job the next day.

  “Here, let me take you bag,” Ryan said.

  “It's heavy, I'm afraid.”

  “Do I look like a weakling?” he asked. No, he certainly didn't, Alina thought. He looked strong and fit. His shirt was open, and when he picked her bag up, she saw his bronzed chest bulge slightly. “Heavy?” he joked. “Light as a feather.” She looked at him shyly. In the soft evening air, Alina could smell his aftershave. It made her want to put her head to his chest and breathe in the real scent of him. Jesus, stop it. He's your boss. You've only been here a few minutes, she told herself. But it would be fun, wouldn't it? Imagine him, so rich and handsome, on top of you, kissing you. She tried to banish the thoughts she was having, but they kept coming back, each time with Ryan more naked than before.