In Bed With the Billionaire

by Jackie Ashenden

  Theo was alive. And not only that, he was somehow free. And wanted to see her.

  She didn’t know what had happened to her. Where the strong, fuck-off attitude that had gotten her through the past seven years had disappeared to. Perhaps she’d left it behind in Minnesota, along with Thalia. Because she certainly didn’t feel strong anymore. She felt like she’d been hollowed out, as if all that strength had been drained right out of her, leaving her nothing but a fragile shell. As if anything, even the slightest vibration would shatter her.

  A vibration such as actually seeing him again.

  Which was why she hadn’t immediately contacted Zac. Because she didn’t know if she wanted to see Theo. She didn’t know if she could bear it. She had no idea what he wanted from her, not when her last memory of him was of cold, sharp green eyes and denial.

  Whatever it was, he was somehow free, which made no sense. In fact, the only thing that did make sense was the knowledge that seeing him again would break something inside her. Something that couldn’t ever be repaired.

  If you’re not going to see him again then why are you here?

  It was a pretty good point. Standing outside Eva’s apartment building trying to gather up the courage to knock was probably one of the more stupid things she’d done in her life. Then again, despite the gut-deep knowledge that seeing Theo again would be a bad thing, she was desperate to talk to someone else about it.

  Except she had no one else. She had no friends, and the only other person she could have contacted was her sister, and she’d already walked away from her.

  That only left Eva. Her erstwhile employer. And the woman Temple had delivered into the hands of her worst enemy.

  When Temple had been held in Elijah’s apartment, Eva had seemed to be pretty chilled about it admittedly. But she guessed turning up out of the blue to Eva’s home wanting to chat was another thing entirely.

  Temple swallowed, her hands clenching inside her jacket.

  Maybe this really was a stupid idea. Maybe she should just turn around and walk away. Catch the train to JFK and take the first plane out of here, the way she’d been planning.

  Yet for some reason she stayed where she was, staring at the building.

  Until suddenly the door opened and a small figure came out, pausing on the steps, staring in Temple’s direction.

  Oh, fuck. It was Eva.

  Hot embarrassment flooded through Temple. To be caught hanging around staring at her building like a stupid teenager … God, could this whole situation get any worse? Blindly, she turned to go.

  “Temple.” Eva’s voice came from behind her.

  She started to walk, ignoring the other woman, her face burning.

  “Temple.” There was a certain authority in Eva’s tone. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  Despite everything in her telling her to keep going, Temple stopped. She didn’t turn. “How did you know I was here?”

  “I have cameras on the street. You’ve been standing there for an hour.”

  Temple closed her eyes. Jesus. She was a fucking basket case. “I’m sorry. I just…”

  “Just what?”

  There was no help for it. She was going to have to tell her the truth. “I … wanted to talk to you.” Taking a deep, silent breath, she turned around. “I need some advice.”

  Eva was standing not far away. A familiar sight in her black skinny jeans, black Docs, and black Iron Maiden T-shirt, a black leather jacket over the top of everything. Eva had worn pretty much that same outfit every day Temple had worked for her as her driver.

  Today though Eva wasn’t wearing her beanie, her white-blond hair in a loose ponytail down her back. She was also wearing a necklace, another difference since Temple couldn’t remember Eva wearing jewelry before. It was a small silver padlock on a short chain around her pale throat.

  “Advice?” Eva folded her arms, the look on her face suspicious. “You’ve been hanging around out here for an hour just for advice?”

  This was dumb. She should be walking away, not revealing how vulnerable she was to this woman. How barren and isolated her life was that the only person she could talk to was a former employer she didn’t know very well.

  Eva’s gaze narrowed all of a sudden. “Is this to do with Jericho?”

  Temple blinked. “How did you—?”

  “I’m with Zac. And he tells me everything.”

  “Oh. Right.”

  “So you know he’s alive then?”

  The words made something heavy collect in her chest, and she couldn’t speak. So she only nodded.

  “So this advice…” Eva paused. “Yeah, I still don’t get why you’re here, talking to me.”

  “Because I haven’t got anyone else to talk to, that’s why.” She hadn’t meant to say it, but the words burst from her all the same, and she had to look away, painfully aware of what a pathetic figure they made her.

  “But don’t you have a sister to—”

  “No.” The denial was flat. She wasn’t going to explain to anyone what had happened with her sister. That was one vulnerability too far.

  Eva didn’t press, but her gray eyes were assessing. “Okay then,” she said. “I guess coming here to ask for my advice takes balls. Especially after what you did.”

  Temple shifted on her feet, uncomfortable. “Yeah, well. I’m sorry about that. I was … doing a favor for Elijah and he promised me information about my sister.”

  “I would say no harm done, but of course, there was harm done.”

  Temple didn’t know what to say. She’d done it for Thalia, and maybe a few weeks ago that would have been all the explanation she would have given. Not now, though. “I’m not sure what else I can do,” she said quietly. “I’m sorry. That’s all I’ve got for you.”

  Eva was silent a long minute. “I’d ask you in, but I still don’t like having strangers in my house. It’s nothing personal.”

  “Okay.” Temple shifted again, the rubber soles of her Chucks scraping over the concrete. “No problem.”

  There was an uncomfortable silence, one that Temple couldn’t seem to break. She didn’t know where her courage had gone. She felt like a fool.

  Eva’s steady gray gaze was needle sharp. “What is it then? Come on. I don’t want to stand here in the fucking cold all day.”

  Temple swallowed past the lump in her throat. “Zac said that … Jericho wanted to see me.”

  “Uh huh. So what’s the problem? You don’t want to see him?”

  “It’s not quite that simple.”

  The other woman grimaced. “It never is. I guess you two have a thing happening?”

  A thing. How strange to reduce all that feeling, all that desperate pain, that sadness, into two words. A thing. “I suppose you could call it that.”

  “Right. So he wants to see you, and you…?” She trailed off, raising a brow.

  “I don’t know,” Temple forced out. “I’ve been kind of existing on hope for a long time. Hope that my sister was alive and that I could save her. But now I know she’s alive and happy, I don’t have anything else to hope for. Does that make sense?”

  Something that looked like it might have been sympathy flickered over Eva’s face. “Yeah, I think so. But how does that relate to seeing Jericho?”

  Her eyes were prickling again, fuck it. She blinked fiercely. “If I see him and things … don’t turn out, I’m afraid that all hope will be gone. And if all hope is gone, I don’t know how I’m going to keep going.” She took a little breath. “I need hope, Eva. I need something. And while I know he’s alive out there somewhere, I still have it. But if we meet I’ll know for certain one way or another if he wants me. And if he doesn’t—” She broke off, unable to say it.

  “I get it,” Eva said quietly. “You want the not knowing so then you can hope.”

  Temple nodded. “I guess that makes me a coward, doesn’t it?”

  “No.” Eva’s voice was flat with certainty. “That makes you a survivor.”<
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  Temple’s throat felt thick and sore. God, she was tired of all this emotion. Tired of feeling like all her skin had been stripped off her, leaving raw nerve endings exposed to any breath of wind, every change of temperature. Making her hurt.

  Yeah, she was a survivor. Which meant she needed to protect herself if she wanted to keep being one.

  “But,” Eva went on unexpectedly, “sometimes you have to decide what’s more important. Just surviving isn’t enough, Temple. Believe me, I know. Sometimes you have to reach for more than mere survival.”

  Temple’s breath caught. More. What was more? She hadn’t ever had it.

  You did. With him.

  Eva was staring at her, a strange look on her face. “Do you love him?”

  Instantly the tears Temple had been fighting threatened to overflow, and her voice had vanished yet again. But this was an important question and one she knew she had to answer, no matter how much that revealed, no matter how vulnerable it made her. “Yes,” she croaked. “Yes, I do.”

  There was a curious intensity in Eva’s silver eyes. “Then that’s all the answer you need.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  After moving restlessly around the room Rutherford had taken him to, Theo, unable to keep still, eventually had to make himself sit down in one of the wingback armchairs near the fireplace.

  Christ, it had only been fifteen minutes and already he felt like a nervous schoolboy.

  Rutherford had called him back that morning to say that Temple was willing to meet and offering the use of the study in his Upper East Side historic brownstone as a meeting place.

  Theo hadn’t wanted to see her again in public, not when what he wanted to say to her was so very private, and since he was stuck in a shitty hotel in Hell’s Kitchen, which wasn’t suitable either, he decided to accept Rutherford’s offer.

  He didn’t particularly want to be beholden to the asshole, not when Rutherford had been so keen to kill him, but Temple was one of his lines. And given that nearly a week had passed since he’d had any response to his question, he’d been thinking she’d given up on him and didn’t want to see him again.

  Another surge of restlessness went through him, and he pushed himself out of the chair, moving over to the tall bank of bookshelves against one wall, staring sightlessly at the titles.

  He didn’t know what he was going to say, other than to give her the promise she’d wanted. And to tell her that yes, he’d found his line in the sand. That he’d been prepared to go to prison for his crimes. That he’d been offered a chance in a million, and he was going to take it. Because of her.

  He didn’t have long. MacDonald had allowed him a week in New York to sort out whatever affairs he had to sort out, but then he had to be back on a plane to Paris to begin the next part of his life.

  Having to accept other people’s orders wasn’t something he particularly enjoyed, but at least MacDonald had promised him autonomy in how he went about this clean-up mission. It would be the leaving that would be the hardest. Leaving Temple …

  His chest felt hollow at the thought. It was for the best, though. Because it wasn’t as if he had anything to offer her but his absence. He had no idea how long this mission would take, and anyway, it was clear the CIA had other plans for him afterward. He wouldn’t be coming back to New York anytime soon.

  There was a noise behind him. The door shutting quietly.

  The hollow feeling in his chest yawned wide.

  He turned.

  She was standing by the door, her hands stuck in the pockets of the black leather jacket he’d given her, her chin lifted, big golden eyes guarded. Her hair was loose, the red, roaring bonfire of her curls falling down her back.

  She looked different. The delicate architecture of her face seemed sharper, her skin pale and drawn. And she was holding herself stiffly, as if something inside her had broken.

  So small. So fragile. Vulnerable.

  Had he been the one to break her? Had what he’d nearly forced her to do shattered that indomitable strength of hers? She’d always had it, right from the moment he’d seen her dancing around that pole in the VIP room. A bright, vital energy. But something had happened, and that energy was gone as if a fire had been doused or a light switched off.

  It made something inside of him break too.

  “Temple,” he said hoarsely, halfway across the room before he’d even realized he’d moved.

  But she held up her hand sharply in a “stop” gesture, and he halted as if he’d been shot. “Don’t.” Her voice was thick. “Don’t come any closer.”

  His heart was beating fast. Too fast. “What happened, kitten?”

  “Don’t…” She shook her head. “Don’t call me that either.”

  He ignored that. “What happened?”

  Temple stared at him, her expression rigid, but he could sense the pain seeping out of her anyway.

  “Kitten.” It was a plea this time, because he found he couldn’t stand seeing her like this.

  But she ignored him the way he’d ignored her. “Why are you here, Theo?” The question was so quiet, almost lost under the sounds of the city beyond the windows. “What do you want?”

  He tried to calm the raging thing inside him, that wanted to go to her, scoop her up in his arms, and demand that she tell him what was hurting her. So he could fix it. So he could heal it. But it was difficult.

  Lifting a hand, he ran it restlessly through his hair. “Well, obviously I wanted you to know I was alive.”

  “You didn’t need to see me for me to know that.”

  His hand dropped as he met her gaze. She was looking at him as if he was a loaded gun pointed straight at her, fear a dark shadow in her eyes.

  She’d looked at him with fear before, but never like this. Never as if she was afraid he’d hurt her.

  It devastated him.

  He took a step toward her and she went rigid. “Temple. Tell me what’s wrong.”

  “Nothing’s wrong. Just … stay where you are.” Her shoulders had hunched. “Answer the fucking question. Why are you here? Why do you want to see me?”

  But he couldn’t stay where he was. Something was wrong. She was hurting, she was looking at him like she was afraid, and he couldn’t stand it. The thing inside him was like a black hole, hungry and desperate for her, and he didn’t think he could hold himself back any longer.

  He didn’t know what the feeling was. He only knew he couldn’t live another second if he wasn’t touching her.

  So he ignored her outstretched hand, ignored her desperate protest, ignored the fact that she was backing away without any of her usual grace. He closed the distance between them, reaching out to grab her, gathering the soft warmth of her up in his arms.

  “No,” she gasped and struggled, pushing at him.

  He ignored that too, tightening his arms around her, inhaling the sweet, musky scent that was all Temple, a wave of some intense, raw emotion smashing through him. A deep sense of possession, of satisfaction. Of truth.

  Finally. Fucking finally.

  She twisted, her physical combat skills kicking in. But he just held on as she kicked and struggled, turning his face into her neck. “It’s okay,” he whispered softly. “It’s okay, kitten. I’m here.”

  Abruptly she went limp, breathing fast and hard, the material of his T-shirt in her fists. She didn’t look up, her gaze steadfastly on his chest. Then slowly her forehead tipped forward until it was resting against the cotton of his T-shirt. She made a soft, ragged sound.

  And his heart clenched hard because the sound was a sob and it ripped him in two.

  He lifted her off her feet, scooping her up like a child and carried her over to the armchair he hadn’t been able to keep still in before, sitting down with her in his lap. And she didn’t protest this time, she only held onto his T-shirt and sobbed against his chest like her heart was breaking.

  He didn’t say anything because there was nothing to say. No more words of comfort he could
offer. All he could do was hold her, give her back the strength she had lost, let her know that she wasn’t alone. That she had him.

  None of this was going the way he’d intended, but he didn’t give a shit. Right now nothing else in the world existed but her.

  She had her face buried in his chest, her hands gripping his T-shirt, her shoulders shaking as she wept. So he stroked her hair, then the graceful arch of her spine. Up and down, soothing her. The way he’d done once, long ago, for his little sister.

  Time passed, and he didn’t know how much, but eventually her sobs quieted and she was silent. She didn’t move, keeping her head pressed against him.

  Nothing else mattered but this moment. Nothing else was as important to him.

  Nothing else would ever be this important to him.

  It was time to stop denying that hungry thing inside him. It was time to stop pretending he didn’t know what it was.

  He knew.

  “After I had Dmitri take you away,” he said into the silence, “I went out into the garden. And I found that fucking gun. And I lifted it to my head. I wanted to pull that trigger so much, you have got no idea. I wanted out. I wanted to escape. I just … didn’t want to do this shit anymore.” He paused. “But all I could hear was your voice telling me I was a coward. Telling me if I pulled the trigger, I’d be just like my Dad. Telling me that if you lived with your guilt then I could live with mine. And telling me that there was hope. That there’s always hope, even when you think you can’t see it.”

  She shuddered, her fists clenching in his shirt. But she didn’t speak.

  “But most of all,” he went on, giving her all he could, “I remembered you telling me you loved me. And I realized I couldn’t pull that trigger after all. Because you believed there was something in me worth loving, and if you believed that, then maybe I should too.”

  She was silent, her face turned against his chest.

  He let his hands stroke over her hair, relishing the silky softness of it. “That was my hope, Temple. You gave that to me. You made me aware that there was a choice, and life was one of those choices.” A red curl glowed against his skin as he wound it around his finger, stroking it with his thumb. “I’ve never had much in the way of choices in my life, but you gave that one to me. You made me aware I could take it if I wanted. So I did. I chose life. Because I also figured out where my line in the sand was. And it’s you, kitten. My line in the sand is you.”