by Eva Luxe
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Epilogue - Three months later
Lucky Charm:
An Irish Billionaire Fake Fiance Romance
Copyright (c) 2018 by Eva Luxe; All Rights Reserved.
Cover by Cosmic Letterz.
Published by Juliana Conners’ Sizzling Hot Reads.
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Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Hazel
Chapter 2
Hazel
Chapter 3
Hazel
Chapter 4
Hazel
Chapter 5
Hazel
Chapter 6
Liam
Chapter 7
Liam
Chapter 8
Hazel
Chapter 9
Hazel
Chapter 10
Liam
Chapter 11
Liam
Chapter 12
Hazel
Chapter 13
Hazel
Chapter 14
Liam
Chapter 15
Hazel
Chapter 16
Liam
Chapter 17
Hazel
Chapter 18
Liam
Chapter 19
Hazel
Chapter 20
Hazel
Chapter 21
Liam
Chapter 22
Liam
Chapter 23
Liam
Chapter 24
Hazel
Chapter 25
Liam
Epilogue - Three months later
Hazel
Mountain Billionaire
Mountain Daddy:
Snow Job: Stranded with a Possessive Billionaire
Nanny Wanted: A Virgin & Billionaire Secret Baby Romance
Baby Wanted: A Virgin & Billionaire Romance
Don’t Say a Word: A Bad Boy Secret Baby Romance
Don’t Forget About Me: A Second Chance Amnesia Romance
Don’t Stand So Close: A Brother’s Best Friend Romance
Don’t Stop Believing: Bonus Novella
Don’t Come Around Here: A Bad Boy Next Door Romance
Subscribe to Eva Luxe’s List and Luxurious Reads, and receive an extended epilogue to this book, which is bonus content exclusively available to subscribers, as well as a free steamy romance story “Corrupted,” which is also exclusive to newsletter subscribers.
Click here to sign up!
Chapter 1
Hazel
Fridays at work are always the best of days as well as the worst of days. The best because the work week is almost over. The worst because time seems to crawl even more slowly while I’m watching the clock closer than I usually do.
At 4:30, I send a message to my best friend Brittany like I usually do on Fridays, through the law firm’s chat app, Slack. She works here too— in fact, she’s worked here longer than I have and she’s the reason I got the job.
30 min to HHD, is what my Slack message says.
“HHD” is an inside joke of ours, because on the surface it stands for “happy hour drinks,” but, to us, it also stands for Hell Hole Departure. We can never wait to exit the building so that the work week can turn into the weekend.
At least that’s how it usually is, but Brittany must be working hard lately trying to climb the corporate ladder. She hasn’t responded to my Slack messages all day and I don’t know if it’s because she’s afraid a partner will see our banter, or if it’s because she’s busy working on some litigation cases that have heated up. I try to stay away from those, because, unlike Brittany, I’m not hankering for any more responsibility. Responsibility translates to more work, and I just do this gig to pay the bills, not because I want to be some rising star legal assistant.
Brittany, though, has risen from legal assistant to paralegal here at the firm, and she has plans to go to law school. I have to admit she’d make a great attorney because she can be a real bulldog. Or shark. Or whatever predator lawyers are usually compared to. Me, though, I’m too ADHD to survive law school and too nice to be a lawyer. I’d probably want to pass a plate of cookies to opposing counsel during a trial, and ask them if we can’t all just find some way to compromise and work things out.
At 4:45, I think about, but resist Slacking Brittany again. Part of me wonders if the partners are gathered in her office, strategizing some big part of their upcoming trial, and is worried that they’ll see it if I send her a message saying, “let’s get out of here already!” Another part of me is feeling guilty about being such a bad employee, and telling myself I need to take this job more seriously, like Brittany does.
I have to talk myself out of the guilt by reminding myself that I put in a good forty hours a week and sometimes I even go above and beyond the call of duty. Like the time I ran home to let Melissa Garber borrow a pair of my hose because she had gotten a very obvious run in hers the day she had a big hearing to argue, and she and I are the only ladies in the whole firm who can’t buy size “regular” tights because they’re too small, but also can’t buy “tall and curvy” because we’re certainly not tall. We need something more along the lines of “short and curvy.”
Since I had a whole stock of hose I’d special ordered from Plump Princesses when I first started this job— and since I’d given up on wearing them a long time ago because they’re annoyingly uncomfortable and all we assistants do is sit behind a desk all day, where no one can even see our legs— I’d raced home on the subway, raced back while carrying the whole box along with me, and donated them to her cause. I’m all too familiar with the scenario of needing an extra item of clothing and not knowing where to get it due to stores not carrying my size, so, sparing the second year lawyer the embarrassment of having to show up in court pantyhose-less was the least I could do.
By the time I next look at the clock, it’s only 4:55. Damn it. Five long more minutes left.
I’ve always been told that time passes more slowly when you watch the seconds tick by, but it’s hard not to when your only other option is doing soul sucking work. By 4 pm on a Friday, most of the work is done anyway, since the partners are on the golf course and the associates have taken their work home with them, so they can at least be in the comfort of their own studio apartments while getting in the rest of their required weekly billable hours—which will take them all weekend to do. (I have no clue why anyone would want to be a lawyer. I’m always asking Brittany, but her answer includes power, status and Coach purses— three things I’m not familiar with in the least.)
So, due to the lack of said soul sucking wo
rk or enough time to start on it even if I’m given it, Friday afternoons are always the most boring of all. I used to pass the time by filling up the pages of my sketchbook, but I got a bit suspicious of a veteran co-worker popping his head into my cubicle every time I cracked it open, so I resorted to just watching the clock. I don’t know if he was trying to get a good look at my drawings or if he was planning to rat me out to my supervisors, but this job pays my bills, so I chose to stop drawing at work so as not to risk my regular paychecks.
Finally, it’s five pm. Time to walk myself through those spotless glass double doors and head home. I hastily gather my stuff from my tiny desk and speed-walk towards the exit. A flurry of co-workers whiz by me— everyone else is as anxious to head home for the weekend as I am, and I can’t blame them. A few work friends bid me farewell, but I only respond with a quick head nod, afraid that if I talk to them, one of them might ask me if I have a spare moment this weekend to summarize a deposition or transcribe a letter that a partner dictated.
Right when I’m almost to the door, I notice Brittany but she doesn’t notice me. She’s walking down a hallway opposite from the one I’m in that leads to the exit. She’s being led by a hand extending out from a suit jacket sleeve— all I can make out about it is that it’s a man’s hand. The poor thing must have been called to a meeting by a partner, which can only mean she has to work this weekend on some last minute urgent project. Better her than me, I guess, since she’s the one who dreams of litigation stardom and I just want to get home to a bubble bath and my cat Lucy.
I decide to keep going, because she’s undoubtedly too busy for me to interrupt by saying goodbye. Plus, it doesn’t matter whether or not I say goodbye to her right now because I'll be seeing her this weekend— at least, that is, if whatever new project she’s probably being given right now won’t take up all of her time. So, I keep moving forward, towards freedom. Once I’m out of the building, I step out of my heels, quickly replace them with the much comfier ones I carry with me in my bag, and sprint towards the subway stop. Free at last. At least until Monday morning rolls around.
Chapter 2
Hazel
It’s only been a year since I started working at the law offices of Horowitz and Chau, and I’ve already adopted the habit of gleefully speeding away from that beige prison. As I get onto the subway and it takes me further and further away from the Hell Hole, my heart grows lighter, but the intensity of its beating doesn’t waver a bit. I have a hell of a weekend coming up: a double date with my boyfriend Scott, as well as Brittany and whatever guy Brittany is currently bedding.
She’s got a revolving door of square-jawed hunks at her disposal so I’m hoping she brings someone who’s not as much of an empty-headed model as the last guy she brought to our double date. Maybe someone I can even talk about art with.
I love Scott but he’s not too keen on checking out my drawings. As a matter of fact, he hasn’t been too keen on much in my life lately. But I can’t entirely blame him. Whenever he comes home, he looks so worn out from work. He’s been working these bizarrely late shifts, so it’s not hard to imagine why he hasn’t been interested in much as of late.
I can’t say it doesn’t bother me to have such a distant boyfriend, but once he goes back to his regular daytime shifts, things should return to normal. Maybe he'll even model for me again. He’s not a fan of having pictures taken of him but sometimes he lets me draw him while he watches TV or cooks. He’s even let me draw him naked a few times.
A kid beside me starts crying and his mom hands him a coloring book. Good idea, I think. Coloring always calms me down, too. I reach into my messenger bag so I can start working on the details of my last Scott-modeled live sketch. I reach into the bag, but can’t feel the spirals that hold the sketchbook together. Acting fast, I dump out all the contents of my bag onto the seat next to me and find that my sketchbook isn’t with me.
Damn it. I must have left it behind.
The last thing I want to do after work is go back for any reason whatsoever, be it overtime, work party, or any other goddamn thing. But there’s no way I’m going a whole weekend without adding to my spiral bound collection of art. That sketchbook is as much apart of me as my nose is.
I quickly scoop all of the items back into my bag and jump off the subway at the next stop, only to wait for the one coming in the opposite direction and get back on again. Somehow, the subway ride away from the office seemed much shorter than this begrudging but necessary ride back. Now the intense beating of my heart isn’t from the excitement of the weekend but from pure frustration. Once I’m off the subway again, my disgust for the building I work in comes to a peak as I walk towards the doors I was so eager to run through earlier. I grip the door handle and try jerking it towards me, to no avail.
People usually leave the building on Fridays rather quickly but to have everyone out already must be some sort of new record today. Just my luck. I have a key in my messenger back but it’ll be a pain to find and fish out. I remember how Brittany was being led down the hall by a partner when I left, and figure she might still be in the office working on whatever new project has been assigned. Looking at the Slack app on my phone, I can see that the light beside her name is green, indicating that she is still at work and online.
Whew. I try calling her so that she can let me in, but I get nothing. After three attempts, only her voicemail has answered me each time.
I know Brittany sees my number on her phone— she doesn’t ever put it away, even in front of supervisors. At first I thought that she could get away with that sort of thing because she’s been here at the firm longer than I have, or maybe that other people were afraid of being bitched at by her by suggesting she put away her phone. But then I realized that the aura she gives off says she doesn’t give a shit— or maybe even that she’s an important, powerful person who must have her phone on her at all times— and so no one else really cares.
I try to give Brittany the benefit of the doubt, thinking that maybe she’s surrounded by partners in the middle of a heavy planning session and can’t possibly take a call right now despite doing it many times in the past. But deep down I know that she knows I wouldn’t be calling unless I really need something— usually I just Slack or text— and I can’t help but think that even though I love Brittany, she’s been such a bitch lately. And she’s a real monster when she’s bitchy.
Just like she was a couple days ago. For some reason, she was super mad at me for asking her to our monthly-ish double date. I was excited because it had been longer than usual since our last get together, but she was so insistent on being left alone, she even raised her voice at me. I wasn’t even able to get her to agree to go at first. Scott took the phone from me and walked into the living room while I calmed down by myself. Being a fast-talking broker in the finance and sales world, Scott is the persuasive type and he got her to tag along even though I was no longer that excited about having her join us after, being yelled at.
And now I’m just pissed. Brittany is inside and not letting me in. Could she still be unreasonably upset with my double date invitation?
I hadn’t even let her in on why I had wanted to have this double date so badly, because it was a surprise. I wanted to celebrate my love for both Scott and Brittany with portraits I spent hours painting these past couple of days. Then after dinner, when I’d reveal these paintings, I’d suggest going dancing like how we used to, back in the day.
Brittany and I used to go out and do it all the time and then when I first started dating Scott, he would come too. Those first days of our three-person friendship were spent dancing, eating, and talking endlessly. But now we all seem so out of touch and far away from each other, so, I’ve planned this weekend as my way to rectify that situation.
But now, I’m starting to wonder if all that time was even worth it. Maybe Brittany is too busy working, just like Scott has been, and neither one of them have time to see me anymore. Perhaps that’s a sign that I should focus on my
own career more.
But as I gaze at the ugly brown building in front of me, I think, no way, fuck that. If my theory that Brittany and Scott are too busy with their career to have time for me is correct, then I’ll just have to make new friends, or have more cozy nights at home with Lucy, and if worse comes to worse, I’d rather be bored than a workaholic for The Man.
Chapter 3
Hazel
Enough waiting. Time to take matters into my own hands.
I set my bag down on the ground and kneel down so I can dig through it and find my office key. Once I do, I slide it in, turn it and get inside the damned building. I’m pleased to find that none of my colleagues are as big of workaholics as I’d feared—I guess Brittany must be the lone ranger, still holed up in her office and so busy working that she forgot to check Slack for my messages and her phone for my calls.
The lobby is lit up, but the hallways have half the lights turned off. It’s almost spooky.
As I head towards my cubicle to retrieve my sketchbook, I hear a chair squeaking repeatedly. Due to a distinctive squeak from a wheel I know is defective, it sounds as if it’s my chair. I stop and consider things for a moment. The only theory I can conjure up for what could be making my chair squeak is that one of our janitors is taking a break. But why on my chair?
As I walk closer to my cubicle and come around the corner where I can see a full view of it, I find a few things on the floor. My sketchbook. My mousepad. Scott’s pants. Brittany’s lacy panties. And lastly, my office key, after I drop it out of my hands.