by Sierra Rose
But just as the pressure inside me was getting almost unbearable, he let out a wild cry and threw back his head. Just the sight of him sent me right over the edge as well, but his lips came down over mine to stifle my scream. Absorbing it into himself instead.
We stayed there for a moment—kissing, frozen, and shivering in the aftershocks—before he rolled off of me and landed beside me on his back.
“That was...worth the wait.”
I had to commend him for even talking. I could hardly catch my breath.
“Abby?” He rolled onto his side, beaming uncontrollably as he trailed a finger in a casual figure eight around my breasts. “I’m going to need to do that from now on, alright?”
A peal of breathless giggles erupted out of me, and I pressed a pillow over my face.
“Part of your daily routine?”
He pulled down the pillow with a grin, kissing the tip of my nose.
“Between cups of coffee, I think. I might need to power up with coffee.”
I bit my lip and grinned back at him.
“Nick...you drink a lot of coffee.”
He nodded firmly.
“That’s the point. Between every single cup.”
My heart soared just thinking about it. Then, with an impulse I couldn’t control, I wrapped a hand around the back of his neck, and pulled him down for a sudden kiss.
Then another. Then another.
When I was finally satisfied, I released him—leaving him breathless and confused. He pulled back in surprise, looking me over with a little half-smile.
“What was that for?”
“...because I can.”
I beamed back with unadulterated joy, realizing, even as I said them, that the words were true. That for however long a time, this beautiful, charismatic, golden god of a man was mine.
An expression I’d never seen before froze Nick’s face for the briefest of moments, before his eyes lit up with a euphoric glow.
“You shouldn’t have said that...”
Just like that—he was out of bed in a flash. Flipping on a pair of lamps as he left me on the bed and headed out into the hall. I propped up on my elbows and stared after him in shock.
“Where are you going?”
He glanced over his shoulder with a wink.
“I’m going to get some coffee...”
YOU KNOW THAT MOMENT that comes right in between having an amazing dream and waking up? That suspended moment where you vaguely know things are too good to be true, but for the time being, you can’t bring yourself to care? Like if you close your eyes for just a second more, you can find your way back. Extend it just a little longer. Find a way to make it last.
...then you open your eyes, and the whole world comes crashing down?
Yeah. That was happening to me.
For the second time in my life, I opened my eyes to see Mitchell Hunter standing over me. Arms folded. Jaw clenched. Towering over the foot of the bed.
I jerked awake with a gasp, pulling the sheets up to my chin in the same motion. While I had fallen asleep on my back, Nick was passed out on his stomach. When he felt me move, his arm tightened automatically around my waist in his sleep.
It was then that I realized Mitchell was staring at me.
“Nick,” I whispered, trying desperately to pull myself to a sitting position while keeping my sheet at the same time, “Nick—wake up.”
Much to my horror, he mumbled in his sleep.
“You know the rules...coffee first.”
I blushed as red as a fire engine, while Mitchell painfully closed his eyes. A second later, and after several sharp kicks from me, Nick finally blinked open his eyes.
“Good morning.” He gave me a sleepy smile, still not registering much of anything around him. “You know, I could have sworn that—DAD!”
He jumped in his skin like someone had shocked him—reaching automatically for the sheets just as I’d done. Then, for the first time in his life, he did something that neither I nor his father had ever seen him do before.
“Turn around!” he demanded, throwing a protective arm in front of me. “Have you lost your fucking mind—she needs clothes!”
I froze, staring at him in shock.
How many times had I walked in on him and some girl in exactly this state? How many times had his father? How many nude pictures were plastered all over the internet of him and some random woman in the throes?
And yet...did he just defend my honor?
For a split second, even the great Mitchell Hunter was thrown. He froze in shock, just as I had, then turned around for exactly three seconds—just long enough for me to grab a robe.
“I see the two of you have decided to fully commit to this professional arrangement,” he said dryly, when he turned back around. I blushed a million shades of scarlet, but for one of the first times, Nick held his gaze. “That actually makes this next part a little easier.”
“Next part?” Nick repeated, sensing trouble not far ahead. “What are you talking about?”
If only he hadn’t asked.
“I just got a call you see, from a cameraman working for the Post. It seems he has a flash drive with some rather incriminating photos of my son in a boxing ring. Not boxing.”
His blue eyes swept over me. “I’m assuming the woman in the photos is you?”
An unnatural chill fell over me, bowing my head to my chest. “Yes, sir.”
“You’re in public relations for goodness sake. You get him out of these sticky situations all the time, yet, you join him on this one? How could you sink to his level? You should’ve stopped him and demanded he take you to a proper location. Having sex in public is unacceptable. Steady girlfriend or not! This won’t help our cause!”
“Nobody was there.”
“Doesn’t matter.”
“It was the heat of the moment. And I know that’s not a very good excuse, but it’s the truth. I swear it will never happen again, sir. Nothing like this has ever happened between us, I assure you of that. We were nothing but friends, and then things recently changed.”
“Nick hit on you when you were first hired and you stayed strong. I had high hopes he could never taint you. But two years later, he did it. Did he keep chipping away at you, little by little?”
“No, not at all.”
“Then how did he break through your titanium armor? At first, I thought you two were pretending to date. But it’s real?” He shook his head. “And having intimacy in public when anyone could take pictures and sell them to just about any trash magazine? Nobody should know that better than you and Nick. How the hell do I keep my son out of trouble? Out of the spotlight? Hiring you was supposed to stop this kind of shit.”
I’d never felt so low. Never. “I’m so sorry.”
At this point, even Nick had the decency to look ashamed. Yes, he was in a relationship like his father had commanded, but the entire point had been to clean up his image for the company. Having sex on the floor of a boxing ring was hardly what the board had in mind.
Mitchell rewarded each of us with a long look.
“Fortunately, I was able to reason with the man and obtain the flash drive for myself.”
Both Nick and I blinked up in shock. But it was Nick who asked the question.
“...how?”
“By promising him an interview,” Mitchell replied. “Every news cooperation on the planet will be fighting for the inside exclusive on the wedding. I promised it to him.”
Nick and I both started nodded in automatic compliance, but then stopped at the same time, frowning at the one word that didn’t fit in with the rest. Again, Nick took the lead.
“I’m sorry,” he shook his head blankly, “whose wedding?”
Mitchell’s lips curled up in the darkest smile I had ever seen.
“Yours.”
To be continued in book 3
Book 3
The Billionaire’s Temptation
Part 3
Sierra Rose
/> Copyright 2016 Sierra Rose
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.
Visit the author at: www.authorsierrarose.com
Chapter 1
THEY SAY YOUR WORLD can change in a single instant. A single moment in time, after which nothing will ever, ever be the same. Blink, and you miss it.
My world changed with a single word.
Yours.
Nobody moved. Not me. Not Nick. Not even Mitchell—who was still staring down at us like a spider who’d caught two unsuspecting flies in his web. We just stayed there, for some indeterminate amount of time, in a state of paralytic shock.
The room was cold, and the two of us were still completely naked under the sheets, but at the moment, I don’t think either one of us gave it a second thought. We just lay there, frozen, staring up at Mitchell like at any moment, he would crack a sudden smile and explain the real reason he was standing there. Because it couldn’t be what he’d said. That couldn’t be happening.
Finally, after a full minute of silence, a strange smile began spreading up the side of Nick’s face. It never quite reached his eyes, but it hovered there nonetheless—like it was waiting to be swayed either way.
“Something funny, son?”
Nick’s head jerked once, but the smile remained.
“You’re joking...you can’t be serious.”
There was a long pause, and the smile became more and more strained. After a few more seconds, it was more of a grimace than anything else.
“I assure you,” Mitchell replied evenly, “I have never been more serious about anything in my entire life.”
It was at this point, that I wanted to crawl into a hole and die. I could not believe this was happening. I could not believe that we had somehow found ourselves in this situation.
We just had to step into that boxing ring...
But Nick wasn’t giving up so easily. In his mind, he’d faced worse than this before. He’d been out on a ledge before. He’d dealt with the publication of naked photos before.
Granted, his father had never been quite so directly involved.
“My wedding,” he repeated. That smile was gone, and there suddenly wasn’t an ounce of humor on his face. “And whom might I be marrying?”
It hit me like a knife in the gut. He hadn’t even connected that it would be me.
Mitchell’s eyes flickered between the two of us, before returning to his son with a sickening little grin. “Why you’ll be marrying Ms. Wilder, of course. At least, that’s what I told the Post. I thought her the most logical choice at the time. Unless you’ve been boxing with anyone else lately that I should know about.”
It was like my throat had entirely shut down. I couldn’t say anything. I couldn’t even speak. For one of the first times in his life, it seemed like Nick was having the same problem.
Although that didn’t mean he wasn’t going to try.
“Dad...come on.” He tried to sound as reasonable as possible, but a note of panic had strained the edge of his voice—betraying his true feelings. “This is insane. Of course I’m not going to marry Abby just to—”
“—just to get your hands on a photograph of the two of you rolling around naked on the floor?” Mitchell interrupted coldly. “Just to stop the publication of yet another humiliating mark on the family name just three short months before this merger?”
A heavy weight descended in the pit of my stomach. The accompanying wave of nausea was soon to follow. As I gazed up at Mitchell in a daze, I suddenly wondered if he had seen it.
“I don’t give a fuck about your merger,” Nick snarled. The initial fear and shock had been replaced with a fiery temper—the one and only thing he’d gotten from his father. “As if it wasn’t enough that you asked me to stage a relationship just to appease the board, now you’re actually asking me to—”
“No, Nicholas. I’m not asking.” Mitchell’s eyes flashed dangerously, as he reached down and began turning something over in the pocket of his coat. “I’m telling you that this is what’s going to happen. The announcement has already been made. This is not a request.”
I was vaguely aware that he was speaking. Vaguely aware that with every word, a little more of my freedom was being chipped away right in front of my eyes. But for the moment, my every attention was focused on the rhythmic motion inside his jacket pocket. On the hidden thing he was turning over again and again in his hands. I wondered if it was the flash drive.
Nick obviously wondered too, because his eyes dilated with an almost predatory look, as the muscles in his body tensed. It was easy to see, as he had yet to find any clothes, and for a split second, I was terrified he was going to wrestle it away from his father right then and there.
As father and son locked eyes, Mitchell’s mouth twisted up in a little smirk.
“I’ve made copies.”
The air in the room dropped another ten degrees.
He’d made copies?! Had I just heard that right?!
Blackmail. I knew we were being blackmailed. To be honest, having worked so long in public relations, I wasn’t entirely unfamiliar with the concept. Every now and then, I would get a client in a similar position as Nick’s. A client who had to promise an interview, or a sit-down, or some other casual sacrifice in order to keep information they didn’t want shared kept quiet.
I just never would have imagined that Mitchell was the one blackmailing us.
The man had hired me. I’d worked with him for two years. In that time, I’d attended three of his weddings. Sat in the courthouse for three of his subsequent divorces. I’d traveled with his son around the globe, and considering Nick’s whimsical proclivities, I’d done a damn good job of keeping him out of trouble. I’d gone to family luncheons. To baptisms. To holiday parties.
And he was blackmailing me?
There was a sudden movement on the bed, and my eyes flickered sideways to Nick. A wave of guilt welled up in my stomach, as I remembered the much more relevant connection.
He was blackmailing his son.
“You made copies,” Nick repeated, not an ounce of inflection in his voice.
Mitchell never blinked.
“I made copies.”
Well that settled it. Mitchell Hunter was the devil himself.
“This is ridiculous,” Nick muttered, trying desperately to sort his thoughts. “You’re not going to actually...” He saw the look on his father’s face and switched tactics. “Look, I’m sorry, alright? Abby and I got a little...carried away. I should have known better than to risk anything out in public. I sincerely apologize—it won’t happen again.”
As much of an olive branch as his son was extending, Mitchell merely shrugged.
“At this point, it doesn’t much matter if it happens again. In fact, given that the engagement has gone public, people might actually enjoy the fact that you two can’t keep your hands off each other.”
Engagement.
I paled just hearing the word, while Nick lost his temper—once and for all.
“There is no engagement, because Abby and I are not engaged!” he shouted. Without thinking it through, he almost sprang again from the mattress—only to again remember the fact that he wasn’t wearing any clothes. “What the fuck entitles you to try and make those sorts of decisions for other people?! You can’t just—”
; “Can’t?” Mitchell repeated dangerously. He took a step forward, leveling his son with his eyes. “Do you really want to get into a discussion of what I can and can’t do?”
The room fell deathly quiet, as the two men stared each other down.
I wanted no part of it. I wanted no part of any of it. As much as I appreciated the fact that Nick was trying to fight this, as hard as he was trying—it was no use. Our fate was already sealed. It had been sealed ten minutes ago when Mitchell first walked into the room.
Perhaps we had stood a chance. Perhaps there was a way around this. But all that changed the second that Nick threw a protective arm around me, and yelled at his father to turn around.
That was it—right there. That was the ballgame.
Because that was the moment, that Mitchell discovered a terrible truth. The truth that finally, after all these years, he had leverage over his son. Finally, after all these years, he’d found a person that Nick cared about more than himself.
Me.
“If you do this,” Nick murmured, in a voice just a chilling as his father’s, “there will be repercussions. I swear it.”
Mitchell’s eyes glittered with a bemused smile.
“A threat, Nicholas? You really think it wise to threaten me?”
“No one’s untouchable,” Nick fired back, never breaking his gaze. There was a fire simmering deep in his eyes. A fierce loathing that darkened every inch of his lovely face. “Not even you. My life’s an open book to the public. You still have some secrets.”
It was a bold strategy, but one that was based upon a fundamental flaw. It wasn’t just Nick’s life and reputation that Mitchell was threatening. It was mine.
Nick might have been too furious to think it through himself, but I wasn’t the only one who saw the fatal error in his plan. Mitchell cocked his head to the side with a smile that sent chills running up and down my arms.
“Careful, Nicholas.” His fingers tightened into a fist—closed around that dreadful flash drive in his pocket. “I need only to make a single phone call, then the picture is on every website, and billboard, and magazine cover to your darling public’s delight.”