How Not To Be Seduced By Billionaires (Books 1-3)

by Marian Tee

  It was over between us.

  When his gaze drifted towards Drake, I held my breath. And then Constantijin slowly made his tense posture relax, managing a wry smile as he gazed at me.

  We turned away the same time. George and Drake looked at me in understanding silence.

  With an awkward shrug, I muttered, “It’s just…one of those things.” I wanted to sound breezy but failed.

  George squeezed my hand. "It’s going to be all right, Yanna."

  I could only answer with a smile because these days I just didn’t know. Keeping my heart safe didn’t feel right or wrong. It just felt nothing.

  When George and I walked back to our office, having parted ways with Drake, he suddenly pulled me back by the arm.

  In the act of twisting the knob, I let my hand fall away as I gazed at him questioningly.

  “Yanna, it’s been more than a month.”

  “Yeah. I know.”

  “He’s told you he loves you.”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “So doesn’t that tell you something…about you?”

  I started rubbing the sides of my temple because my head suddenly hurt. “George, I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  Pulling on the collar of his checkered polo, a sure sign that he was about to say something he didn’t want to say and I didn’t want to hear, George muttered, “You still haven’t left his apartment.”

  “But why would I when---oh.”

  The threat that was supposedly hanging over my head didn’t exist – had long stopped to exist. It stopped being a threat the moment Constantijin said he loved me. And I…I made myself forget that because I was a coward, too.

  George squeezed my hand. "It's time to make a choice, Yanna. You can't keep punishing him forever."

  I blinked the tears away, not wanting to break down again at work Oh God, I was so stupid. I had pushed Constantijin away, but I couldn’t bear to let him go, and both of us were suffering because of it.

  “I…please tell Charli I had to go.” And then I was running out of the office.

  When I got home, I took out my suitcase, throwing them open on the floor. Then I started dumping my clothes into them, and every dress that fell into the suitcase made me cry harder because I felt so stupid.

  It was a struggle to pull the heavy suitcases through the doorway. They weighed, like, a ton, probably because I also had my manga collection in them. Grunting at the effort I was exerting, I pulled the door open and with one last mighty shove, I finally managed to push them out.

  I breathed a sigh of relief.

  “Yanna?”

  “Holy shit!” I think I jumped several feet off the ground when I heard Constantijin’s voice. It took more than a moment to get my breathing back in control and make myself turn around to face him.

  He stood by the doors that led to the fire exit, panting a little, but there was a small, beautiful smile playing on his lips. And I found out why he was smiling when he said wryly, “Holy shit, huh?”

  My eyes started getting itchy again. He remembered that, too?

  Then his gaze fell to the suitcases behind me and he sucked his breath, looking like somebody had stuck a knife in his chest.

  There were so many things I wanted to say to him, but coward that I now was, I mumbled, “W-what are you doing here?”

  “George,” was all he said, his gaze still on the suitcases.

  Just seeing him look so hurt made me feel hurt, my chest constricting so badly I just knew. Oh dear God, I loved this man so, so much. I started to speak, to explain what I just realized and what I knew I wanted to do, but he beat me to it.

  “Yanna?” His voice broke at the end.

  My tear ducts broke with it. I tried to smile but couldn’t. “Yeah?” And then I was gasping because Constantijin was suddenly standing next to me, holding my shoulders as he forced me to walk back. When my back hit the wall, his fists hit the surface with it, making me jump.

  “Constantijin!”

  “Yanna, what else can I fucking do to make you believe me?” The anger burning a light in his eyes slowly died as I gazed up at him, crying silently, trying to find the right words to put an end to all this.

  “Is this really it?”

  As I visibly struggled to speak, he cursed, making me flinch.

  "God, Yanna, do I make you that sad? Can you never forgive me?"

  I tried to make him understand, but all I could choke out was “No.”

  He paled, and it was his turn to struggle to speak. “I…I understand. I have no one to blame but myself but please…please.” His voice turned hoarse. “Please don’t leave.”

  I could fear his fingers moving, his hands unclenching and clenching at each side of my face. Yet they never touched me, as if he couldn’t make himself to. “I don’t think I can bear it if you leave, Yanna.”

  Oh, God.

  “Constantijin, it’s not---”

  “Just don’t leave.” And then he was on his knees.

  “Oh my God. Get up, please.” I tried pulling him up but he had turned into immovable stone, his beautiful face a portrait of despair. “Let me explain, okay?”

  “I don’t need you to explain how I fucked up, Yanna,” he said in a dull voice. “But you need to hear me explain.” He dragged a long, hard breath in. “I know you finally realized my threat was fucking bullshit.”

  I cried harder. His English had gone to hell, and his Dutch accent made me understand only half of what he was saying. It was one sign after another knocking on my heart, telling me to see what I should have seen all along.

  “Now you are leaving the first chance you get, but you need to give me just one fucking chance!” Constantijin shouted the last word as he gazed up at me in agony. “Just don’t leave. Anything you want, even if you want to have a fucking boyfriend and I’m the man you date on the side---”

  That he would say something like it, promising something that was almost like what his father had to go through when Marge wasn’t herself --- it sent me to my knees, too. “Constantijin, no,” I whispered.

  He grabbed my hand and pressed it to his cheek. “Yes,” he said brokenly. “If that’s what it takes to keep you with me. I love you that much.”

  I didn’t need to hear him say those words. I already knew it the moment George made me open my eyes to the truth. But when I did hear him say it, my world - which had been revolving in an uneven degree for quite some time – found its rightful place back.

  Everything became clear. The right path - the yellow brick road everyone was looking for - showed up like a street of gleaming gold and it led directly to Constantijin.

  My life was with Constantijin, my very own billionaire, the man who could hurt me a billion ways but could love me in a billion ways more.

  No matter what happened, I loved him and I was going to be happy with him, unhappy without him.

  I felt more than saw his hands trembling as they went to stroke my hair. "Please Yanna, please don't cry."

  After a while, I finally managed to control my tears. I leaned back and smiled at him tremulously. "I wasn't going to leave."

  He looked like he thought I was demented but too afraid to show it. "So what are the suitcases for?"

  I choked back a teary giggle. I tried to pull away, but it only made him pull me into his arms, his lips touching my hair, kissing my forehead, erasing the trail of tears on my cheeks. "Stay a second more, Yanna," he said gruffly. "Please. I missed this."

  But I stubbornly pulled away. I almost felt guilty at the look of devastation in Constantijin's eyes but he had to let me go, just for now. I needed him to see me clearly when I told him the truth.

  “Constantijin, I was not leaving. I was moving back in with you.”

  It took him several moments to react.

  His face became grim. “So the things I did,” he said slowly.

  “Yeah,” I said with a wobbly smile.

  “The whole desperate, emasculating act---”


  I winced, but I couldn’t stop smiling shakily. “Yeah.”

  His Dutch accent very strong, he said, “There was no need for it at all?”

  “Sorry, but yeah.”

  Constantijin was silent for a long time. I started to lean back, wary of the possibility he’d freak out on me, when he spoke. “It’s fine.”

  “It…is?”

  The softest and loveliest smile touched his lips. “I still mean every word.”

  Unable to help it anymore, I threw myself in his arms, causing Constantijin to lose his balance. His laughter and my giggles mingled in the hallway as he fell to the floor, grunting when I landed on top of him heavily.

  He looked up at me, the uncertainty in his gaze making me cry harder. Alyx would kill me when she found out how much I cried in the past half hour but right now – it didn’t matter what she’d think, what anyone would think. I almost lost the one man I was destined to love in my entire life. And now I had him back. I was so, like, going to cry a billion buckets if that meant I’d have Constantijin forever.

  His body tense under me, he said hoarsely, “Does this mean you forgive me?"

  A nod was all I could manage, the tears rending me speechless.

  "And that---" His voice was uneven, as if he was unsure of believing what he was hearing. "You're coming back. Is that it, Yanna?"

  Shit.

  Bracing my hands on his chest, I pulled myself up as fear struck my heart. “Are you panicking again? You've begged me to come back and now that I did, are you panicking again and regretting what you asked me to?" Oh God, if I was right, I was, like, going to die – but not if I didn’t kill him first.

  Constantijin’s silvery eyes blinked, and then he was laughingly hauling me back down to him, one hand gripping my hair in a familiar way that brought more tears to my already aching and tired eyes. He pulled me down for a kiss that wasn’t sexy at all, not with my tears making the taste of my lips salty. But he was kissing me like a starving man, and the promise his lips made my toes curl all the same.

  Woozy did not even cover how I felt when he finally released me.

  “Yanna, I love you.”

  “That’s sweet, Constantijin, but that’s not what I want to hear right now.”

  He raised a brow.

  “Promise me you won’t have stupid panic attacks again.”

  Constantijin laughed.

  I tugged his hair. “I mean it.” I tried not to return his crazy happy grin, the kind I knew I used to have all the time in the past. But it was impossible. He was as irresistible as ever.

  He reached up to kiss my nose. “I promise.”

  God, Constantijin Kastein – the sexiest man alive in the world – was feeling so in love he had to kiss…my nose. It was so adorable I had to kiss his back. Then I tested the waters and asked, “Cross your heart?”

  “Cross my heart.”

  I giggled. “Pinky swear?”

  His eyes narrowed. “Yanna, I love you more than anything else in this world but do not push it.”

  Epilogue

  How (Not) to be Seduced by Billionaires…

  And How to Make Them Fall in Love Instead

  There is no lesson, no key to your billionaire’s heart, no cage to keep him yours.

  You just love him.

  One Month Later

  “How long are you going to punish me?” Constantijin demanded from the opposite side of the table, which right now wasn’t the far end. He was just seated across me, close enough for me to have my feet propped on his leg under the table. I was in no mood to have another shouted exchange. The last time we did that had us popping lozenges like ecstasy pills the next day.

  Shared laughter from his parents spilled out of the iPad screen, and Constantijin looked at them with a scowl. “And you two are really enjoying this.”

  It was the first night of our honeymoon – even though we weren’t even engaged. Both of us knew we were going there, so we thought it wouldn’t matter if we had the honeymoon first. Well, okay, it was just a private vacation. But I preferred the tone ‘honeymoon’ over Constantijin’s ‘fuck week’. I mean, really? Fuck week?

  Daria had been so happy that Constantijin and I were back together she and Nik booked us a week-long stay for the presidential suite of The Raj Palace Hotel. It had four floors, a terrace with stupendous views of Jaipur, and the most glorious pool. But the best thing about it was that it even had its own freaking museum.

  The moonlight shone behind us, reflected by the ornately designed surface of the vast table Constantijin requested management to move outdoors from the dining area.

  “But you do look so adorable when someone’s forcing you to eat what you don’t want,” Marge admitted with a chuckle.

  Taking my feet off his lap, I stood up so I could bend over and feed him another spoonful of Hunt’s pork and beans – the ultimate classic example of canned food.

  “Poor baby,” I said with mock sympathy even as I fed him the last spoonful from the bowl. “See? You ate it all. That wasn’t so bad, was it?”

  He didn’t say anything, but his silver eyes shot enough sparks to speak volumes. Then he smiled. “Now, sweetheart, I don’t think it’s fair I'm the only one being fed. I think it’s your turn.”

  I blinked. “R-really?” That was awfully nice of him.

  “Oh, yes, starting with my cock---”

  I sent the iPad flying, all the way to the pool. “Constantijin!” God, his parents were probably drowning in laughter now.

  “But I meant it.” And then he started after me, the look in his eyes causing me to scramble out of my chair. I tried to run after his reach, but laughter slowed me down, and he easily caught up to me.

  “Constantijin!” I shrieked when he actually slung me over his shoulder and ran all the way up to the palatial bedroom that was ours for seven wonderfully long nights.

  He threw me on the bed. I flipped around, intending to escape, but I sort of froze instead when I saw Constantijin slowly stripping his clothes off.

  White unbuttoned polo, shrugged out of the way and discarded on the floor, leaving his sleek hard chest naked.

  My throat went dry.

  His khaki pants went off next, leaving him in his briefs. He was sex on legs, perfect in every way I could only thank my lucky stars he had been a smart twenty-one year old when he refused to be Calvin Klein’s underwear model. God, if he had – I would totally have to be sharing this – all of this – with innumerable women and that would have been hell.

  The briefs were gone now, and seeing him stroke himself with sensual leisure made me forget all about escaping. I wanted to be his. I wanted him to feed me his cock. I wanted all of him.

  “Do you want this, Yanna?”

  I bit my lip.

  Smiling wickedly, “You know how this will go, Yanna. You have to say the words.” He gave his cock a longer, firmer stroke. “Sweetheart?”

  “Yes,” I choked out. “I want it.”

  “Then I’ll feed it to you.”

  My heartbeat sped up as he came nearer and nearer and I couldn’t stop myself from whimpering when the bed finally dipped as he rested his weight on one knee then another.

  “Ah!” A little scream escaped me as he suddenly pushed me on my back and splaying my legs wide open so he could stare at my sex up close.

  “But before I feed you---”

  I almost shot out of the bed when he exhaled, the air coming out of his mouth a caress that made me close my eyes in the exquisiteness of it.

  “I have to ready you first.”

  And then he was licking me, sucking on my clit, tongue thrusting in and out of my sex. A part of me wanted to throw him off, to give me a reprieve from the dizzyingly heated sensations that coiled around my body and electrifying every inch of it.

  But the other part of me was greedy and wanton, making me moan as I clutched his head and push it down. I wanted him to kiss me harder, to lick me faster, to---

  “Constantijin!” My orgasm took
me by surprise as he clamped my clit between his teeth with gentle pressure.

  As my body shook with the tremors of my release, I was barely aware of his hands moving to encircle my waist. And then he had me flipped on my stomach, and Constantijin stroking my folds. The movement was slow and gentle, but it went back further and further until I realized what he was about to do.

  “No!” With my body stiff with shock and fear, it was a greater struggle to get Constantijin off me.

  But he only chuckled, pressing me back down as he crawled over me.

  “Constantijin…”

  “This is the mouth I want to feed, Yanna.”

  My eyes flared wide at his calm admission. Did he not know---oh my God, did he---no words were not enough to explain how I was so not ready for this.

  “No, I don’t think---”

  “Yanna,” he said in that soft, accented voice I found so irresistible. “Trust me in this. It will be good.”

  Trying not to hyperventilate, I forced my body to relax even as fear continued to leech blood off my face. I covered my mouth with one hand in an effort to keep it shaking. When I had just a bit self control, I blurted out, “I’m scared.”

  “Trust me.”

  I let him lift my hips up so he could wet his cock. My eyelids fell closed in breathless terror, mingled with excitement, as I felt him sliding his cock outside my other hole, wetting it.

  Then it was in, just one finger, and I squeezed my eyes more tightly shut, face screwing up in pain. But Constantijin didn’t stop thrusting his finger in and out in slow and steady strokes the same time his other hand went under my hips to play with my sex. He found my clit with impressive speed, alternately pinching it in rhythm with the thrusts of his finger.

  “Good?”

  “No,” I gasped out.

  He chuckled. “It will be soon, I promise.”

  Would it? But the pain was so intense that I could only gasp, trying to focus on the strokes of his fingers on my clit.