MATCHMAKER (A Billionaire Bad Boy Romance)

by Bella Grant

  She tried to think of things to say, but nothing seemed appropriate or worthwhile so she stared at the passing lights of the city.

  He pulled into the parking garage of his building and took the spot closest to the elevator. She stood by while he keyed in the code. She noticed it hadn’t changed. He trusted her to get into his home at any time. She hadn’t even wanted him to know where she lived. It wasn’t the same, though. She’d offered her heart to him, and he’d politely sidestepped it.

  The elevator climbed to the 99th floor. Nearing the top, Sterling slammed the emergency stop button.

  “I can’t do it.”

  “You can do it.”

  “I can’t go up there. Can’t see her like that. Knowing it’s the end. Jesus, I shouldn’t have even left her for this long. Maybe the vet can fix it.”

  Cherise knew how much time and money he’d thrown at the dog. Making her comfortable, helping her try to regain the use of her back legs, fighting age and biology and German shepherd genes the whole time.

  “Sterling, she’s tired. You know she’ll fight as long as you ask her to, but she needs to rest.”

  “She doesn’t want to eat anymore.”

  The statement broke Cherise’s heart. For all her limping around and moving slowly, Ambrosia always attacked her meals with gusto. The idea of the dog not eating sealed, in Cherise’s mind, that it was time to say goodbye.

  “I can’t. I really can’t. And I don’t know what the alternative is.”

  “Listen to me.” Cherise took his face in her hands. He wouldn’t make eye contact. She couldn’t handle seeing his eyes red with tears like this, threatening to spill over. “You’re her whole world. She trusts you to make this decision for you.”

  “I can’t kill her.”

  Cherise let out a long breath. “You’re not killing her. Age is killing her. We all grow old, and we all die. Think of the life you’ve given her. Can you imagine any dog who’s been as loved as she is?”

  Now he met her gaze. “No.”

  “Then call her vet, and make it so her life is good all the way to the end.”

  “She can’t even get out to go to the bathroom. She can’t walk. At night, she cries.”

  Cherise knew full well it was much easier to stand in her shoes and tell someone it was time to put his dog to sleep. It sounded like Ambrosia’s time had come days ago, but hearing that wouldn’t help Sterling.

  “Let’s go see her.” Cherise reached for the emergency stop button. She waited for Sterling to nod before she pushed it.

  When the elevator doors slid open to Sterling’s apartment, a sense of wrongness overcame Cherise that Ambrosia didn’t come to greet them. She lay on the couch, but still managed to perk up at the sight of her master.

  Sterling fell to his knees on the floor beside her and took her in his arms. Ambrosia, like most German shepherds, was a clingy dog who liked to be by her master. Not being able to follow him around must have been agonizing to her.

  Cherise gave her head a gentle pat, then went to the window while Sterling sobbed into the dog’s fur.

  Where was Jenna? She should be here. Not for the dog, but for the man.

  Cherise felt hot tears in her eyes and a burning at the back of her throat as she thought about the dog’s demise.

  She went back to check on them, and started to cry when Ambrosia licked her hand. Sterling thrust his phone at her. “I need you to do it.”

  She didn’t argue. The number was in there under vet, and Cherise did her best to adopt her rusty personal assistant persona, saying she was calling on behalf of Sterling Waters.

  The woman on the other end cut her off. “Does he want me to come?”

  The care and compassion in the vet’s voice, that she knew her patient and knew the situation so well that all Cherise had to say was Sterling’s name, made Cherise start to cry. “Yes, please.”

  “I can be there in an hour.”

  “Thank you,” she managed, and hung up.

  Once upon a time, Cherise thought she wanted to be a vet, and this, right here, was why she’d decided it would be easier to study people’s brains and how they worked. Around each other, people put up walls and were guarded. One of the richest men in the world sobbed openly over his dying dog. Something about animals brought out the best in people, brought their hearts into the light, whether they wanted them there or not.

  Sterling couldn’t marry Jenna.

  She put one hand on his back, and her other hand on Ambrosia’s leg.

  They cried until the vet came, and Brad Chadwell showed her in.

  STERLING

  There was nothing left. Only emptiness. Grief gnawed at him from the inside, eating his mind, his heart, his guts. He knew he should eat something. Every thought he had made him think of Ambrosia. What would it be like to eat something without her big brown eyes hoping expectantly he’d share?

  And Jenna. Her tone. Like this wasn’t the most important moment of the last twelve years of his life. When he told her he thought it was almost the end, she’d just responded with a stony silence. So he told her he was fine, and he’d handle it on his own.

  Cherise had fallen asleep on the leather chaise lounge, curled around a pillow. Black dog hairs clung to her sweater, and he almost lost it again. As if he had it together to lose…

  His throat hurt from crying, and his eyelids felt like sandpaper.

  He remembered his father, rambling around the house like a zombie after his mother was killed in the drunk driving accident. Sterling had been eight, and his father had called a cab to the office because he had important work to do on a Saturday night. His mother decided she’d stay at the party and drive home when she was done. They’d had a fight about it. She told him he was married to his work and needed to get his priorities straight. Sterling had been home with the nanny.

  He was supposed to be asleep, but the nanny’s worried tone on the telephone woke him, and he’d crept from his room to watch her pacing the kitchen, bound to the wall by the phone cord.

  The hosts said she’d left hours ago. His father snapped at the nanny, saying she was probably trying to teach him a lesson.

  The police came to the door, and Sterling saw it all as they explained to the nanny what had happened—a car ran a red light and impacted the driver’s side of his mother’s car at almost fifty miles per hour. She was dead before the EMTs arrived. The nanny took this all in with poise and grace and called his father back while the police officer waited. Like a scared mouse, Sterling crept out to talk to the officer while the nanny got on the phone.

  From across the room, they heard Mr. Waters snap at her for disturbing him again. She told him what happened in a clear, professional tone.

  After a long pause, the nanny said, “All right,” and hung up.

  When she turned back to the living room, she saw Sterling there, hovering beside the officer. Only then did she start to cry.

  Everyone kept telling Sterling how brave he was. How he was such a big boy for not crying. If Sterling had a son, and if the same thing happened, he’d want the boy to cry, to feel. It was too easy for those muscles to go numb, and later, to die.

  Tonight’s events proved they hadn’t died in Sterling.

  But he could let them. It would be easy to. He’d say goodbye to Ben soon enough—the idea jabbed into him like a hot knife. He couldn’t feel those things again; he didn’t know if he could bear it. After that, he’d make excuses that he was too busy for another dog.

  No pets. No family. He didn’t think he could marry Jenna. He couldn’t marry anyone. It looked like he wouldn’t be getting sole ownership of Bachmann Entertainment Group, after all. He’d climb; he’d drive. He’d get some new tattoos. He’d go to Africa. And he’d work.

  When he died, all his billions would go to fifteen-hundred personally selected dog rescues throughout the United States.

  Sterling wondered how his life would be different if the results of Cherise’s pregnancy test had been differen
t.

  She’d asked him a long time ago, when they first met, if he wanted kids. Back then, the answer was an emphatic no, but now, thinking about how close he’d come with Cherise, he started to have second thoughts.

  He couldn’t imagine them with Jenna.

  Sterling’s mind battled with itself. He could only imagine the feelings of loss he felt over Ambrosia would be dwarfed by losing a child. By losing a wife. And everyone dies—everyone abandons you, eventually.

  Cherise opened her eyes in the chair and stretched. He hoped she hadn’t noticed that he’d been staring at her, lost in thought.

  “How long have you been standing there?” she asked.

  He looked at his watch. He didn’t know. It was almost four o’clock in the morning, though. He sighed and couldn’t remember ever feeling this low or broken.

  “I should get you home.”

  “Have Brad take me.”

  “Nah, I’ll do it.”

  “Are you okay to be alone?” she said.

  “As in am I going to kill myself over my dog? No. I’m fine.”

  Cherise laughed, a sarcastic bark of a laugh that didn’t mean good things. “You’re the farthest thing from fine I’ve ever seen.”

  “I’m probably going to take a few days. Go hiking somewhere warm. Drop off the radar.”

  “Okay.” She didn’t sound convinced. “You’re not going to do anything crazy or self-destructive?”

  “Not unreasonably so.”

  “What’s that mean?”

  “It means I have too much work to do, and at the risk of sounding like a dick, I’m too important to get to wallow or do something really stupid.”

  “You sound like a dick a lot of the time.”

  Sterling laughed, and it surprised him. It snuck out of him, and then he clamped down on it and looked back out the window at the sleeping, snowy city. He didn’t want to laugh. Didn’t want to think good thoughts or happy thoughts in a world without Ambrosia, a world where he didn’t dare to open his heart to a human.

  “Let’s get you home,” he said.

  Part of him wanted her to argue—wanted her to suggest he shouldn’t be alone, that he needed her… Something. But she nodded and told him okay. She made it easier, at least.

  They didn’t speak as they rode down the elevator together. He drove her home in his Hummer, and she kept her eyes on the snowy roads outside. He pulled up in front of her apartment building.

  “You like it here?” he said.

  “It’s all right,”

  “Are you happy?”

  “Sterling… Get some rest, okay?”

  “I’ll try.”

  She got out, and he watched her use her key to get inside. Not even a doorman.

  He sat in the idling car, not sure what to do next. He couldn’t go home. At this hour, the whole place would be empty, and without Ambrosia… The idea clawed at him. He couldn’t go. He did a U-turn in the street and headed for the airport.

  CHERISE

  Cherise’s phone rang six times while she was working the next night, but she didn’t recognize the number, and the caller didn’t leave a message. When she’d finally gotten off her shift at ten, exhausted from not sleeping the night before, her phone rang a seventh time, and she picked it up.

  “What?”

  “Cherise?”

  “Who is this?” She wasn’t in the mood for any kind of games or any kind of bullshit. She was tired and grumpy. Watching Sterling’s pain the night before left her feeling raw and overly sensitive. She’d screwed up a man’s tall skinny macchiato earlier and he’d shouted at her, and she’d almost cried in front of everyone.

  “It’s Jenna.”

  Ugh. Possibly the last person in the universe she wanted to deal with. She strapped on a happy voice and said, “Hey Jenna, what’s up?”

  “Have you seen Sterling?”

  Cherise thought about lying, but it wasn’t worth it. Had Sterling even talked to her today? Had they spoken yesterday when he made the decision about Ambrosia?

  “I saw him last night. I went over to be with him while the vet was there.”

  “Oh. I know he thought she might.”

  Jesus, so he hadn’t talked to her? She never knew how to phrase it. “Ambrosia passed last night.”

  “Oh.”

  Had they even been talking? Cherise should tell Jenna about screwing Sterling. Should tell her about his inability to love anyone.

  “His dog died, and now he’s vanished,” Jenna said. “Jayne called me at lunch asking if I’d seen him.”

  “He told me he was going to go somewhere and go hiking, but I assumed he didn’t mean today.”

  “Do you know where he went?”

  “No idea.”

  “Why did he tell you and not me?” She sounded wounded, like a petulant child.

  “I think because he knew I was fond of Ambrosia.” The idea that she wouldn’t see Ambrosia again still hit her hard, a nasty stab in the chest.

  Jenna let out a huff. “Well, if he talks to you, tell him Ben’s in the hospital. He certainly doesn’t seem to have any interest in talking to me.”

  “Ben’s in the hospital?”

  “They think it was a stroke. Jayne called me this evening. She hasn’t heard from Sterling either.”

  “No one has. I guess he wanted off the grid.”

  “Well, his selfish little trip may mean he doesn’t get to say goodbye to his mentor. I don’t know how you put up with him, and I understand now why you quit. He’s emotional and unpredictable.”

  Emotional was hardly the word Cherise would use to describe him, and it certainly felt like the loss of his dog was a pretty appropriate time to become distraught.

  “I don’t understand him.”

  “He’ll be back. Just talk to him.”

  “How?” Jenna was as emotionally dead as Sterling was.

  “You guys will figure it out.” Cherise wanted the conversation to end immediately. “I gotta go. If I hear from him—which I totally don’t expect to—I’ll tell him to call you, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “And be gentle with him about the dog. She was his whole world.”

  Jenna made a displeased sound. “Well, I’m just glad you haven’t heard from him either.”

  They said goodbye. Cherise went to the cabinet where she kept her paperwork and pulled out the folder Sterling gave her when she’d started working for him. His emergency cell phone number. The one he explicitly told her never, ever to call. She dialed it.

  She knew it was just her imagination, but the ringing seemed farther away than usual. She imagined the call being transferred through satellites and across continents.

  For all she knew, he was just in his apartment, not answering the line.

  “Cherise?” He sounded someplace far off, his voice tinny and distant.

  “Sterling, you have to come home.”

  “I can’t. Not yet. I’m not ready.”

  Cherise took a deep breath. “I heard from Jenna today. Ben’s in the hospital. I don’t know any more than that.”

  The silence through the phone lines spoke volumes. “It’s going to be at least a day before I get back. I’m in Tanzania.”

  She didn’t bother asking him what the hell he was doing in Tanzania. “You should probably call Jenna.”

  Another pause. “I know. I don’t think I can keep seeing her. I think it’s over.”

  Cherise reminded herself it wasn’t her problem. It was her job once, but she had quit. Now, her days involved making coffee and thinking about becoming a student again. Not her problem. She hated the way her pulse elevated, how the idea of it excited her.

  “Will you come with me to see him?”

  “Me?”

  “He really likes you. He told me how smart he thinks you are. How much he respects you.”

  She thought about her time in Dominica. She didn’t think she’d done much of anything to deserve Ben’s respect. She’d fucked both his protégé
and his assistant within twenty-four hours.

  “I’ll come.”

  “Thank you.” The gratitude in his words flowed to her across the Atlantic.

  “Get back as soon as you can. I didn’t get many details, but it sounds serious.”

  “This was stupid of me.”

  “How were you to know he’d get sick now? Take care of yourself, Sterling. Be kind. You’re allowed to make mistakes.”

  “Too bad I’m not making mistakes. I’m just fucking up. I’ll call you when I get in tomorrow. Thank you for reaching out. I needed to know this. I can’t imagine what I would have done if you didn’t have this number. Coming home… Whenever I decided to… To find out he was sick. Or worse. Jesus. I’ll see you soon.”

  Cherise was left staring at the phone. He was going to break up with Jenna. What did that mean for her? She paced the floor of her small apartment, mind racing. She chided herself for even thinking of such a thing. Selfish. Stupid.

  She still wanted him. Still delighted in the sound of his voice, the memory of his hands on her skin.

  She got into bed and pulled out her vibrator. Setting it to the lowest setting, she imagined Sterling coming through her door. In her fantasy, he told her he loved her, he wanted her, he needed her. Cherise drifted between sleep and awake, using her memories to build a fantasy where Sterling wrapped her in his strong arms and carried her to her bed. He pulled off his bright purple tie, vivid against a black shirt, and used it to cover her eyes.

  He pulled back one arm, then another, and tied them to the bedposts with a silky rope. Then he took her right ankle, then her left, and spread her before him. Bound her. All was stillness, and Cherise started to wonder if he had left. The room was static, save for a warm sea-scented breeze blowing in from an open window.

  Something touched the curve of her neck by her ear, and it took her a beat to identify it as a feather, gently caressing and tickling. Sterling dragged it across her collarbone, between her breasts, then down across her flat stomach. He pulled it away before reaching the mound of her pubis.