Rival: A Billionaire Romance Novel

by Amy Hoxton

  The contract was drafted and ready to be signed the following day.

  Her elegant, albeit rushed signature sealed the deal a few minutes after she arrived, and thus ended my quest for a new secretary. Most people in my position would never hire somebody with close ties to a direct competitor, but after seeing how she reacted after I told her what truly happened at the fundraiser, I was sure Lucy wouldn’t interfere. Besides, Reynold’s company would need more than insider knowledge to get back to what it once was.

  I was tempted to send a message to the old man, but knowing me, it would have probably given him a heart attack. I ultimately decided against it, at least for the time being.

  Having Lucy take care of my schedule and other tedious tasks was truly a blessing. The girl was quiet as a mouse but always busy with something, tapping into an invisible energy source that apparently had no bottom. Additionally, she’d worked in a coffee shop before, which automatically made her more than qualified for the position she held.

  Her presence made things easier for me, and kept them interesting. My normal work life resumed as intended, though we both had to get used to it at first.

  That soul sucking job took up most of my time. Micromanaging and overseeing incompetent assholes I can’t even remember why I hired in the first place was a process that eroded my sanity and humanity bit by bit. I was surprised I still qualified as a human being. Yet there I stood. Some days were better than others, sure. The only constant was the happiness that pervaded me once I set foot back into my house. I lived alone, in complete freedom. Away from all the corporate bullshit I was forced to deal with in a daily basis, and most importantly away from the useless drones I surrounded myself with.

  It surely had its downsides, though. Despite what some would say, I still had a soul and was more than a rich asshole — though sometimes I had trouble believing it.

  Being alone in a giant house can lead to a host of wildly different emotions to spawn in one’s chest. Setting most of them aside, miraculously enough without the aid of the ever present scotch, all that remained was misery. The kind that longed for company but knew it would never come.

  Things were meant to be that way, and in time I got used to it. Perhaps more than I should have, even.

  Love was ephemeral at best, lasting one night at most or two in some extreme cases. I still remember making the “Hottest 10 under 50” list on a popular women’s magazine and being violently thrust under the spotlight.

  It happened right after I seized control of the company, too. Perfect fucking timing. All of a sudden I had money and power, but no one to share them with. Suitresses — and even suitors, which I didn’t care for — were abundant but only temporary.

  I won’t lie and say I used to be a paragon of morality, that couldn’t be farther from the truth. All of those women that came to me pretending to be my one and only were just acting and hoping to be convincing enough to make me fall for it. It never worked, though I have to give them credit where credit was due: the orgasms were real.

  That was just about their only saving grace.

  Life went on, one way or another. Even pursuing meaningless sex lost its sheen after a while, something I never thought would happen.

  It’s crazy how life works out, sometimes, thrusting people into positions they never even wanted to begin with.

  Strangely enough, Reynolds senior hadn’t called me yet. I was torn, both hoping he would just to laugh in his face while simultaneously wishing he’d forget my number altogether.

  His poor daughter, trapped in the belly of the beast. He must have blown a gasket or two after hearing she went through with it.

  I felt the weak buzzing of my cellphone against my thigh. A sardonic smile shone on my face as I saw the caller’s name. Reynolds. I took a deep breath and answered, ready to gloat, though he apparently had different plans.

  “You watch yourself there, boy,” He declared, his voice shaky but still somewhat imposing. “You don’t know what you’re dealing with,” He continued.

  “Mister Reynolds I assure you, Lucy is in good hands! You have nothing to fear,” I replied, stifling a laugh.

  “Alexander, you better not touch a hair on her head or so help me God I will—” I cut him off right then and there. The gaskets had officially been blown, I almost heard the explosions from my office.

  “Francis, you have nothing to fear. Your grandkids will be beautiful, I’m sure of it.” With that, I hung up on him. I poured myself a scotch to celebrate, as I chuckled quietly to myself.

  I understood his deep seated need to protect his daughter. Anyone would. Still, Lucy was old enough to make her own decision, and she chose to work with me.

  Her father’s opinion on the matter hardly mattered, from what I could gather. I liked her already, even though I knew I would need to be extremely careful around her — at least for the time being.

  Chapter Five

  Lucy

  Working at Harris Electronics was radically different from what I had imagined. It couldn’t beat Shaw’s when it came down to coffee, but damn near everything else was naturally better.

  I thought I would miss it after I inevitably left, but not all that much. My contract had an expiration date, six months from the signing. I was conflicted about it, although I’d wager it was a perfectly normal reaction after what Harris told me.

  My dear father used me as a poker chip without even so much as calling me to ask if I’d be okay with it. I wouldn’t have been, but that was far beside the point. He went behind my back and even tried to hide it, the bastard.

  Granted, Harris may very well have been lying about it. God knows people in his position aren’t paragons of honesty and integrity, and working in close proximity to him opened up a window that could let me peek directly into his life.

  I quickly came to realize he wasn’t just an asshole for the sake of being one, but rather out of necessity. He still tried to tone it down with me, yet often times it only made things worse.

  Any job can be stressful enough, I can’t imagine how much pressure he was constantly under. However, even in the most extreme cases Harris seemed to keep his woes bottled up inside of him.

  I essentially worked for a seething ball of rage that could easily destroy anything it touched, but somehow managed not to.

  At first, I found myself admiring his self restraint. It hardly lasted, though. I quickly realized his emotions — and that destructive anger, more specifically — were kept under tight wraps. Or rather, on the rocks.

  He offered me a drink when we first met, saying it was his second of the day. The clock hadn’t even struck ten. His liver probably looked like a war zone, though organ damage notwithstanding, the man’s issues laid elsewhere.

  I didn’t even dare talk to him at first, unless absolutely necessary.

  As time went on and I settled into the job, however, boredom hit me like a ton of bricks. Some days were absolutely frantic whereas others felt like time itself stopped existing.

  No meetings, no deliveries, no schedules to make sense of or calls to reroute. Browsing the internet kept me busy for a while, but even that didn’t last too long. In those moments I envied Brianna and her Instagram addiction. At least it kept her entertained.

  Most of those days blended in together. I got used to the routine quicker than I thought I would, even if the first month was a slog.

  Harris spent the vast majority of his day holed up in his office doing God knows what. We rarely even saw each other. His work ethic was as strong as the alcohol he chugged. In before me, out after. Every single day.

  I must admit it got pretty lonely in there, at least for me. I couldn’t tell if Harris enjoyed solitude or not, though I imagine he did, to an extent. He was a weird one, Alexander. My desk was near his office door and I could never hear a peep coming from within. Just an eerie silence that was sometimes broken by my own accidental noises.

  It was almost oppressive at first, that silence.

  It
took Harris at least a solid month before he mustered up the courage to come out of his office. I legitimately jumped when I heard the doors to his office swing open, revealing the man himself behind them. Laughing quietly, glass of scotch glued to his hand.

  “Did I scare you?” He snickered, leaning against the wall.

  I shot him a glare that could have killed him on the spot, but played it off. “Yeah, kinda. Not much to do today,” I joked, the shock of adrenaline subsiding.

  “Then why am I even paying you?” I detected a hint of sarcasm in his words, yet I still felt like they had an edge of truth to them.

  “You won me, remember? I’m sorta stuck here.” My retort hit a tiny bit too close to home. The words flew right out of my mouth, breezing past the filter that usually prevented me from saying things I shouldn’t, or flat out getting fired.

  Alexander wasn’t fazed, at least externally. “Oh come on, Lucy! You still chose to sign that contract, didn’t you?”

  “But I…” The words died in my throat. He was right, though the tone of smug superiority was starting to annoy me already.

  “You could have walked out at any time. But that would make daddy happy, wouldn’t it?” If the discussion was hitting close to home, that sentence burst through my front door. My stomach sank for a split second, and rose back up to bring forth all the bottled up stress and troubles I kept locked away deep within me.

  “I see why you needed a secretary,” I hissed, throwing professionalism out of the window hoping it would drag Harris along with it. I wanted nothing more than to tell him what I really thought about him, right to his stupidly handsome face. I also needed to keep my job, and insulting my boss would probably throw a wrench in that.

  Alexander disappeared back into his office, leaving me with a few words spoken with a hint of dejection in his voice. “You were right about me the first time.”

  Perhaps Harris was an asshole through and through, but his assumptions weren’t too far off. That’s what truly hurt about his words, the fact that deep down he was right and he knew it.

  Part of me wanted to work at his company exactly because I knew my father hated every second of it.

  We hadn’t spoken all that much ever since I began working there. He didn’t approve of it, despite it being his fault.

  That very same night I came home to find Brianna on the phone, ordering food for the both of us.

  The look on my face gave away the fact that it hadn’t been a great day. Brianna was quick to notice it, and went straight for the wine cooler without even saying a word.

  “You could file a complaint against him!” She suggested, taking a small sip. “A gross old man harassing his secretary, it wouldn’t exactly be the first time.”

  I shook my head. “He owns the company. And me, by extension.” Perhaps I added a bit of drama to it, but the base concept was sound.

  “So what? It still counts!” She yelled, hoping to better deliver her point.

  “Oh come on, Bree! He just said a couple mean things, it’s not like he touched me or anything!” I was starting to get exasperated, and even the wine didn’t help.

  “That’d be fucking awful,” She grimaced.

  Brianna didn’t know the full story, which made me chuckle. “I wouldn’t say that.”

  She cocked an eyebrow and tilted her head slightly to the right. “Really, bitch?”

  “Really,” I replied without batting an eye. “Look him up, name’s Alexander Ha—” She cut me off, lunging towards the table to grab her phone.

  “Harris, yes I know,” She murmured, her fingers tapping away at the screen.

  I had a stupid, knowing smirk on my face. She was bracing for impact, already cringing as the picture loaded. Watching Brianna’s reaction made me burst out laughing. Brianna turned to look at me, a puzzled expression on her face.“This is your boss?!”

  “Bree, meet Alexander. Bit different than what you thought, huh?” I nudged her, just as she glued her eyes back to her phone.

  She glanced at me as she scrolled down, loading more pictures of him.“I see why you wouldn’t mind him—”

  “Keep it in your pants, woman! He’s a jerk,” I admonished her. In honesty, jerk would hardly cut it.

  She shrugged and threw her phone onto the couch, to her side. “Maybe. But still, damn.”

  Alexander Harris was perhaps a product of his own surroundings, but I couldn’t say that with certainty. I didn’t know him all too well, and besides, he was my boss. I doubt many can claim they have a good — or even decent — relationship with their superiors.

  Brianna was somewhat right, though. He was an extremely attractive man, and I’ll freely admit I caught myself thinking about him in less than puritan ways, in more than one occasion.

  Despite having the body a Greek God would kill for, Alexander was still the type of man one couldn’t build anything significant with. I had been burned before, just over two years prior to my return to New York.

  Charles. I met him at a bar after class, which should have already raised at least some suspicions. I couldn’t see the red flags and wasted far too much time chasing what I thought was happiness.

  I remember my friends telling me there was something off about him, but I wouldn’t listen. It took me some hard evidence to realize what was happening.

  Charles would always leave his phone face down on the table, and bring it with him everywhere he went, even to the bathroom. I didn’t think much of it, but in hindsight, what was happening was obvious.

  He forgot his phone once, and as shameful as it is to admit it, I snooped. I never claimed to be a perfect person, after all, and curiosity got the best of me.

  It was only then I realized he had been cheating on me for months.

  Needless to say I was heartbroken. My friends took care of me and little by little things got back to normal. I dove head first into my studies, focusing on nothing but achieving the best possible grades I could.

  Just below the surface I was a mess. Between my obligations and the stress, the diluted depression and even a host of other things I can barely describe, I had an ever roaring storm of chaos weighing me down.

  I got better, eventually. The process was so gradual I can’t pinpoint when or how it started, it just crept up on me. I woke up one morning and experienced a singular moment of clarity, or perhaps some sort of epiphany that dispelled whatever curse had been called upon me.

  Those wounds disappeared, but their scars remained. I vowed to focus on myself and stay away from toxic people. It worked for some time, but being near Alexander reset my progress back to the starting line.

  I planned on leaving Harris Electronics as soon as I could, meaning I would have to wait the end of the contract.

  It would look good on my resume, and with some luck, I could probably even get a recommendation letter from Alexander himself if I ever needed one.

  I had no idea what I would do after leaving the company, though. Part of me wanted to climb the corporate ladder, another wanted nothing to do with it and wished to go back to Shaw’s.

  The word conflicted doesn’t even begin to describe my state of mind in those days. It didn’t last long, for better or worse.

  My phone rang, or rather buzzed, on a sunny Saturday morning. My face lit up as I saw Shaw’s round face appear on the screen, and I answered right away.

  Right off the bad I noticed something was up. His voice sounded dull and weary, not even remotely bright and commanding like it always was. The reason behind it was simple, and wiped the smile seeing his face on the screen put on my face.

  Deep down I knew that moment would come, I just didn’t think it would be so soon. Shaw was neck deep in debt, and the only way out was selling his shop.

  I wanted to help, I really did. There was nothing I could have done, however, short of winning the lottery.

  We said our goodbyes and he hung up the phone. My life was taking a turn I would have never seen coming just a month before, and I can’t say I
was too happy about whatever the future held.

  Shaw’s closing meant I didn’t have much choice in the matter: all I could do was stay at Harris Electronics until the next disaster stormed through my life, provided Alexander would even allow it.

  I sat in silence for a while, eyes slowly sweeping the room as I noticed a thin layer of dust on the television set.

  It had to go.

  Chapter Six

  Alexander

  I stared out of the window in my office, watching New York’s never ending traffic. No matter the hour, those streets were always a deadly jungle that could swallow people up at any given second.

  Nothing ever stopped. Nothing could be stopped, though I found beauty in stillness. I guess that the main reason behind my obsession with art, paintings to be precise.

  Photographs, too, but they just weren’t the same.

  I remember the day I pushed those double doors wide open for the first time and looked around that massive open space.

  Empty, like it had been for some time after my father died. I spun around, taking in the size of my new office and all the space I could fill to make it mine. I never did, it felt like a waste of time.

  All I managed to bring up was a sturdy easel, which I kept near the window. No canvas on it just yet, a permanent reminder of what I wanted to go after. Alas, business leaves little time for personal pleasure. I was aware of that before accepting the position — not that I had a choice in the matter. I’d seen it time and time again with my old man, and promised I would be different. I vowed to avoid stepping into the same traps that littered the path somebody else had carved out for me and instead hit every single one of them.

  Oh, but I tried. Time and time again I would try and fix what, and sometimes who, I broke. A fruitless effort, that was. Nothing but a waste of time and energy that can’t be allowed in a world in constant motion.