Impossible (to Resist) Boss: Billionaire Romance

by Arabella Quinn

  Jason sucked in a breath.

  >Is that all you did? It can’t be. No one would get fired over that!

  Almost a minute ticked by while he anxiously waited.

  >That’s all, I swear. Crazy, right? If you knew him you’d know- that was more than enough for him!

  His mind was spinning furiously. What had he done?

  >Do you miss him?

  Seconds ticked by. He couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t move. He felt like his heart was in his throat. Finally, her reply popped up.

  >Yes, I do. A lot :( Goodnight Jane.

  Chapter 25

  The start of the weekend used to be so refreshing. Now, it just gave me too much time to think – to dwell on the past. After I left work, I stopped off at the local bookstore; I needed something new to read. I couldn’t bear to read my beloved romances anymore. All those happy endings just made me sick to my stomach.

  I browsed the aisles, first selecting and then rejecting several titles in the ‘Chick Lit’ section. I needed something darker. I made my way over to the ‘Thriller’ section. I picked up a book titled The Tempest. The cover depicted a stylized image of a girl with a dark and raging storm surrounding her.

  I flipped the book over and read the back of the cover. It was a psychological thriller and the twisting plot sparked my interest. I wasn’t usually a fan of such dark material, but I was in the mood to try something different tonight.

  After dinner, I got cozy on the sofa and settled in to read my new book.

  It’s Friday night when my life changes. There is no big announcement. There is no warning. It just happens on an ordinary Friday night.

  I am out walking down by the lake with my dog, Harley, who is finally doing his business after a lot of fooling around. A strong gust of wind whistles through the trees and blows down my neck and under my flimsy jacket. Icy fingers caress my neck and leave goose bumps trailing up and down my spine. I wait shivering; holding my dog waste bag, ready to jump into action as soon as Harley has completed his task.

  I scan the rapidly darkening park and realize it has emptied. Besides the long gone jogger, I haven’t seen anyone. I mutter under my breath for Harley to hurry up while I peer into the gloomy forest. The strong gusts of wind are robbing the trees of the remaining dried brown leaves that had clung stubbornly to their branches. The naked branches of the trees sway in the wind, beckoning with bony fingers for me to enter the darkness beyond.

  I flip off the trees and wait for Harley with ever increasing anxiety. Darkness has always made me jittery. Twilight descends like a suffocating blanket on the park. Harley has finished, so I scoop up his waste and twist the bag closed.

  “Okay, Harley. C’mon boy.”

  Harley is staring down the path toward the back of the park on high alert. I tug more insistently on his leash. A low growl erupts from him. Now the fear that was hovering in the back of my mind kicks into full gear.

  “Let’s go Harley. Now!” I am demanding as I yank the leash firmly.

  Harley lets out a high-pitched squeal and starts backing up slowly. He is clearly spooked by something, which does nothing to calm my frayed nerves. For all my skittishness, you would think I would own a big dog, a protector. But Harley is a jet-black cocker spaniel. Not exactly a viscous attack dog.

  Just as Harley decides that it’s better to cooperate and leave, I hear a sound. Faint at first, but rapidly growing louder. Harley barks nervously. Harley and I start running away from the noise toward the park entrance. A quick calculation in my head makes me realize that even at a full sprint, I couldn’t make it to the street in less than five minutes. I race along full tilt, panic rising, as I hear the sound behind me rapidly gaining ground. Someone is thundering up the path behind me, much faster than me. I hear gasping and wheezing.

  A man moans, “Help me!” I don’t stop. “Please, help me.” The man let’s out a long keening sound. Still, I continue to run as if the Devil himself is nipping at my heels.

  Suddenly, a hand clamps down like a vice on my shoulder, halting my momentum and spinning me halfway around. I fight to keep my balance as I stifle a sob bubbling up through my throat. I am vaguely aware of Harley’s frantic barking as I take in the man’s haggard appearance all in a millisecond.

  The first thing I notice is his panicked, wild eyes. He is panting from exertion, much like myself. Very quickly I see a large gash oozing blood over his right eyebrow. It matches the dark blood stain below his left shoulder which is rapidly spreading on his dirty t-shirt. I am desperately searching for the cell phone in my pocket, which I can’t seem to locate.

  “You’re hurt. Let me call 911,” I manage to squeak out.

  The man is fearfully looking over his shoulders as if someone is right on his tail. I hear nothing, but terror coils in my belly.

  “No. There’s no time. It’s too late for me. They’re coming.” The man is rambling, but he has let go of my shoulder. Harley is staring down the path behind us, whimpering.

  “You’re bleeding….” I could think of nothing else to say.

  The man turns back to me and blinks as if seeing me for the first time.

  “Take this. Hurry.” His voice shakes with urgency. “Don’t let them get it. You’ve got to run! Remember the Tempest.”

  He pulls at my arm and forces something into my hand. I instinctively wrap my fingers around the object in my palm. He is simultaneously darting looks over his shoulder and pushing me away. “Please, you must hurry! They’re coming!”

  The man shoves me one last time and then wildly thrashes through the weeds and vanishes into the shadows of the forest.

  A yelp from Harley breaks me from my confusion. I lift my cement feet and run as fast as my wobbly legs will carry me. I run…

  I let out a surprised squeal when my phone rang. I checked the caller ID before answering. It was Becca.

  “Hey, Becs.”

  She sounded out of breath and slightly frantic. “You’ve got to help me!”

  Immediately concerned, I bolted up from the couch and started pacing. “What’s wrong?”

  “I’m stranded!” I heard a muffled sound in the background. “My car broke down. I’m out by the harbor somewhere. The towing service my insurance takes can’t get here for hours. Lils, I’m nervous. It’s creepy and there are some shady characters around here – I don’t want to wait here for hours. Can you come get me?”

  The last thing I wanted to do was leave my little apartment. It was chilly outside and getting dark, but there was no way I’d leave Becca stuck in that situation. It was a no brainer. She’d do it for me too, in a heartbeat.

  “Of course. Where are you?”

  She gave me the address from her GPS and then begged me to hurry before clicking off.

  I followed the directions on my phone, fighting the Friday evening traffic in the city. It wasn’t until I was almost through the city that I realized Becca was somewhere south and at least 30 minutes outside of the city.

  Wanting to double-check the address she gave me, I called her. Her phone went straight to her voicemail. I left her a message to call me back and then continued following the directions, growing increasingly worried. The traffic lightened and soon I was hurtling down a highway. What was Becca doing all the way out here?

  I tried calling her again twice, as I made my way, but she never answered. I exited the highway and followed the mostly empty back roads heading east toward the bay. The address she gave me eventually led to a long driveway that disappeared into the woods. A battered sign read ‘Little Harbor Launch’. It didn’t seem like the right place.

  I let my car idle at the side of the road in front of the sign while I looked around for Becca. The place was eerily empty. She still wasn’t answering her phone. I sent her a quick text even though I thought her phone battery must have died:

 
  She had said something about a harbor, but what would Becca be doing at some rinky-dink
boat launch in the middle of nowhere? I checked the address she texted me just before I had left and re-entered it into my GPS app. A few seconds later, I confirmed that I was at the right place.

  Even though the place was giving me goosebumps, I wasn’t about to leave Becca stranded. I pulled my car onto the narrow drive and started heading down the long lane through the woods.

  After about a mile, the dark woods opened up to a wide clearing where there was a surprisingly big parking lot situated near the edge of the peninsula. I pulled into the public launch area, taking note of the three parked cars that remained in the big lot, just as the sun was starting to set. None of the cars looked like Becca’s.

  I got out of my car. The place was quiet; it seemed deserted. In all likelihood, the owners of these three cars were still out fishing. Where was Becca? I decided to walk closer to the water and take a look around for her.

  I scrambled down a path to the water’s edge. There was an empty boat tied up to the dock. I looked along the shore to my right and then to my left. There was a person, about 50 feet away from me, heading my way. He was backlit by the setting sun, but from his size alone, I could see it was a tall man and definitely not Becca.

  I thought about asking him if he’d seen Becca, but as I watched him striding closer, something about his appearance was disconcerting. He was wearing ratty, ill-fitting clothing – a loose and tattered looking white long-sleeved shirt and old-fashioned looking brown cloth pants. He had a bandana wrapped around his head and what I had first thought were sunglasses turned out, as he got closer, to be some kind of bandage covering one of his eyes.

  He looked like a seedy character. He even walked with a slight limp. Daylight was rapidly fading and I was out here alone with this strange man. He would reach me within minutes. I realized that it had been dumb to leave my car.

  I turned around and wildly began scrabbling back up the bank toward the parking lot. My foot slipped and I slammed my knee hard on a rock. Fearfully, I glanced over my shoulder. The strange man was now jogging along the shoreline, heading my way quicker than I expected.

  All I could think of was to run. I made it to the top of the bank and ran toward the parking lot. Why had I parked so far away? I started running across the lot, fear fueling my legs with energy. When I looked back again, the man had already crested the bank and was running my way. There was no mistaking it. He was after me.

  A tiny shriek escaped my lips. I tried to extract my car keys from my pocket as I ran, but that only slowed me down some. My heart was beating frantically. I was petrified. I wasn’t going to make it in time.

  He yelled out something, but it just sounded like the deranged shouts of a madman.

  Finally, I was able to tear my keys from pants pocket. I clicked on the key fob to unlock my door. Five more feet…

  I had just reached my car when a hand grabbed my shoulder. I spun out of his grasp and tried to kick him in the nuts. He was lightning quick. He blocked me.

  “Lilliana!”

  My hand was already in position to launch a throat punch. Did he just say my name? My fist catapulted forward ready to strike with force. His reaction was too fast. He snapped my arm off its intended target with his forearm.

  “Lilliana!”

  My knee was already lifting to connect with his balls when awareness caught up with me. He was calling my name. I recognized his voice.

  “Jason?” I must have looked as bewildered as I felt.

  He had been standing in a defensive crouch blocking my counter-assault; slowly he relaxed his pose and smiled. “Not Jason. Captain Kaine.”

  “What?” My heart was beating franticly. First, from the crazy adrenaline rush and now, from seeing Jason so unexpectedly, I thought I might be having a heart attack. My lungs gulped in some air.

  “Captain Kaine. I’m a pirate.” He bowed jauntily.

  He looked ridiculous. He was crazy if he thought that his absurd get-up looked anything remotely like a pirate. “You look more like Captain Kangaroo.”

  He frowned and looked down at his clothes. “You don’t like it?”

  “Umm…I don’t get it. Why are you dressed like that and why are you here?” I eyed him warily.

  “Well…” He cleared his throat and then spoke with a terrible pirate accent, “I mean, Arrr. Ye ask too many questions, lassie. I’m here to kidnap ye.”

  My mind was racing with too many thoughts all at once. What was going on here? I had no idea, but even in his weird costume, he looked devastatingly handsome. I was feeling that familiar pull of attraction again.

  The way he was looking at me was drawing me in. There was a warmth in his eyes. He was genuinely smiling. In fact, he was so happy, it looked like happiness was physically spilling out of him.

  “Did you say kidnap me?” Butterflies fluttered in my stomach. With just one smile, he was pulling me back under his spell.

  “That’s exactly what I said.” There was a mischievous twinkle in his eyes. “I’m going to take you away from here and lock you up as my prisoner. And I’m not going to let you go until I convince you how wrong I was. Until you take me back.”

  Was I hearing this right? “I don’t understand. Take you back? What are you talking about?” A jolt of excitement shot through me.

  Jason tapped his foot impatiently. “We can do this the easy way or the hard way. You can trust me and let me kidnap you, or you can fight it. And then it’ll get interesting. It’s your choice.”

  My mouth opened, but I was speechless. Before I could think up a response, Jason picked me up and threw me over his shoulder so that the top half of my body was hanging down his back. “Becca said you were a sucker for pirates, but you don’t seem too impressed.”

  “Becca! What about Becca? I can’t leave her here. Wait a minute…”

  Jason laughed. “She’s at a bar downtown. Give me your car keys. I’ve got it taken care of.”

  I handed over my keys to him. He left them in my car and then began carrying me toward the boat dock.

  “Is that your boat tied up?” A feeling of anticipation was building. I didn’t know what was going on exactly, but something had obviously changed. Everything in my world suddenly felt right again. Being in Jason’s arms, or tossed over his back, felt right.

  “That’s the sturdy vessel that’s going to take this captured booty,” he smacked my ass playfully, “to my hidden lair for some old-fashioned persuasion.”

  I couldn’t help but laugh at his horrible pirate impersonation. “And how exactly do you plan to persuade me?”

  “Well, my little landlubber, I’ll do naughty things to you until you beg for mercy.”

  “I don’t break easily.”

  We had reached the boat. Jason put me back down on the ground. His voice grew more serious, “promise me you won’t.”

  I melted into his arms. When we kissed, it felt like I was home.

  Chapter 26

  Jason led Lilliana into the multi-million dollar cabin he had borrowed for the weekend from a friend. “There’s only two other residences on this island and neither are occupied right now, so we have plenty of privacy. It’s fully stocked with all the food we need, so we don’t have to step foot outside all weekend if we don’t want to.”

  She was standing in front of the massive fireplace in the great room, gazing out of the floor to ceiling wall of windows that overlooked the water. It was too dark outside to see much of anything. “This place is amazing.”

  They’d kissed before getting on the boat and he’d held her close the entire 40 minute boat ride to the island. The kiss had confirmed everything that he’d been thinking for the past five days since he’d learned the truth. Their chemistry was off the charts flammable. He wanted her more than ever.

  While he’d sunk to the depths of hell when he’d thought she betrayed him, now he knew that being together with her was the pinnacle of heavenly bliss. He loved her; they were meant to be together.

  Now he just had to convince her of that. He
could see in her posture that she was still guarded, but he knew from her response to him that she was aroused. She could no more deny their attraction than he could.

  She looked at him tentatively. “We’re here for the weekend? But, I don’t have any stuff with me. No toiletries. No clothes.”

  He couldn’t keep from grinning. “You’re not going to need any clothes.”

  Her eyes widened. “Oh.”

  She was so gorgeous; it was all he could do to keep his hands off her. He wanted to strip her down and have his way with her on the plush bearskin rug in front of the fireplace.

  “I know you must be confused, but I am aching to get to the pirate shenanigans. So, I’ll give you 15 minutes to ask questions before I have my way with you. Then after, I’ll explain everything in detail if you want.” He pointedly checked his watch.

  “I am confused.” She smiled shyly. “How is this happening? You were so mad at me. You fired me…”

  He took a step closer to her. “Take off your shirt and I’ll answer your question.”

  He held his breath while he watched the internal struggle play out on her face. She started unbuttoning her shirt. “Okay. Tell me.”

  “Travers set you up. He framed you as the person who was leaking proprietary information to our competitors. I was too stupid to figure it out.”

  She slipped her shirt off and dropped it on the floor. “You thought I was leaking information? That’s why you fired me?”

  Jason felt his cock tightening as he stared at her perfect breasts looking luscious in the pink lace demi-bra. “Take off your pants and I’ll tell you.”

  She kicked off her shoes and then very slowly began inching her pants down her hips. After a few wiggles and shakes, he realized that she was deliberately putting on a show for him. Finally, she revealed her matching pink panties.

  He moaned appreciatively. “Travers had some ‘proof’ that he showed me that morning in Miami. I couldn’t believe it was true. But, then you admitted to it.”