Taming the Bad Boy Billionaire Bundle

by Sierra Rose

  “That’s what I thought too.” She sounded furious. “But lo and behold, I get a call this morning, and guess who’s on his way over?”

  “Barry?” I asked wisely.

  “Oh, get out.” She kicked at me with a slippered shoe as I grabbed for a yogurt on my way past the kitchen. Missed! I’d have to swoop around for another pass.

  “Oh—and don’t forget to take our car. You need to drop it off at the shop at lunch to have it ready by the time you get out.”

  Our car. That was generous of her. It was her car. Her car that her parents had gotten her, but she promptly deemed as ours. In the first two weeks, we’d trashed it like teenagers, filling it with music, candles, food, makeup, clothes—basically every bit of junk you could imagine. Now it was running on fumes. Little bits of it spitefully falling away a week at a time. Good news was, I supposed we could realistically live off what was inside if we ever got desperate.

  “Yeah.” I yanked on my shoes, making another grab for the yogurt. “What’s wrong with it again?”

  “I don’t know.” She waved a hand dismissively and returned to her smoking eggs. “It’s the timing belt, the ignition fuse, the spark plugs—one of those. Whatever it was the nuns stole in The Sound of Music.”

  “Got it.” I rolled my eyes. “That’s what I’ll tell them.”

  I was halfway out the door when she whirled around, flinging curlers and bits of egg everywhere. “Bex?” she called. “What...what do you think he’ll think of me?”

  My eyes swept the chaotic room and landed on my panicked friend. “He’s going to think you’re a multi-tasker.” I heard something hit the other side of the door as I hastily pulled it closed. “That’s a good thing!”

  Still chuckling at my cleverness, I opened the top of my hard-earned yogurt only to realize I’d forgotten a spoon.

  “Miss White.”

  I froze with one foot still in the air—a cartoonish image of guilt.

  Teller Hamburg (real name), aka my landlord, strolled casually out of his office on the second floor. His pointy little rat face was the portrait of “unassuming,” but I was sure he had been waiting in there for me.

  “Miss White,” he smiled greasily, eyes sweeping me as he got closer. “I’ve been trying to get hold of you for days, but we keep missing each other.”

  “Imagine that,” I murmured, hugging the wall as I tried to inch past him.

  With a flourish I could tell he’d practiced, he pulled out a weighted sheet of faded cream paper and dropped it into my hands. I brought it to my nose for an automatic sniff.

  “Is this parchment?”

  “It’s your eviction notice.”

  My mouth fell open as I scanned quickly through the document. Sure enough, due to a month and a half of back rent and “blatant impertinence,” I was being asked to leave. My face reddened as I stuffed the notice angrily into my purse.

  “Blatant impertinence?” My eyebrows rose dangerously.

  Hamburg smiled. “Legally, I can’t throw you out for that. But as long as I had you on the back rent, I saw no need why I shouldn’t slip it in there as well.”

  “This is just for me. What about Amanda?” I demanded. “We share the apartment; you can’t just kick one of us out!”

  “Miss Gates has never once been late with her rent check. It’s only you, Miss White.” He took a step closer, eyes widening ominously. “All alone.”

  I shoved him back with a distasteful grimace. In my first week of living here, I’d politely declined a dinner invitation. Ever since, it had been a full-on Cold War.

  “Don’t worry,” he grinned. “I’m sure you can live in that piece of shit car of yours.”

  Don’t think I haven’t thought of that.

  I smiled sarcastically and pushed past him down the stairs. “I’ll deal with this later. Some of us have actual jobs to get to. You know...not just creeping in the halls waiting for—”

  The door slammed shut, and my voice trailed off. It was for the best. I was running out of things to say anyway. The eviction notice burned heavy in my heart as I trudged across the lot to the car. How was I going to magic this away? How was I going to come up with two months’ rent in ten days? Amanda could ask her parents to help me, sure, but I didn’t want to take money from them. Then again, half of my paycheck this month was already going to fix this damn car.

  I yanked open the door and slid inside—closing my eyes and leaning back hard against the cracked leather seat. It smelled like curdled coffee and putrid french fries. Perfect.

  Well...I’d just have to think of something. I always did.

  I tossed the open yogurt in the back and held my breath as I turned the keys, praying that Amanda had been wrong and the “broken thing” was not the ignition fuse.

  THEY PUKED ON ME AT work. They laughed at me at the car shop. And after seven hours of staring at my eviction notice, I was beginning to think that even the cosmic forces were having a bit of a chuckle.

  Having had my lunch hijacked by what turned out to be a leaking coolant system, I was absolutely starving by the time I finally pulled into the lot back at my apartment. I hopped out of the car with kitchen tunnel-vision, hoping there was still some leftover Chinese I could heat up before heading out to my open casting in thirty minutes. Amanda was no doubt already there, saving our place in line. Either that or her breakfast date with Barry had gone better than expected, and I was about to get evicted from my apartment twice in one day.

  I was so wrapped up in these thoughts; I didn’t even notice the dark outline of the man until it was clear he was following me. My breath caught in my chest as my hands snaked down into my purse. I was too far from the apartment door to run for help. Too far from my car to double back again. My heartbeat thundered. Okay, I had to admit, I was scared shitless!

  This cannot be happening. You have to be getting this wrong.

  But the man obviously had me in his sights. I walked as quickly as possible without breaking into a run, but still he was gaining on me.

  Take a breath. You’ve rehearsed this a million times in your head. You know what to do.

  I slowly, deeply filled my lungs—keeping my eyes on something steady. The echoing footsteps grew louder, but it wasn’t until I could actually feel the warmth of the person behind me that I pulled out my pepper spray and opened fire.

  ...right into Marcus Taylor’s eyes.

  Chapter 9

  “For goodness’ sake!”

  His hands flew up to his eyes. My hands flew up to my mouth. What did I just do? I wasn’t super close so he didn’t get the full blast, thank goodness. I don’t think that much got into his eyes, but enough to sting some.

  Shit! I’m an idiot! “I’m sorry! I’m so sorry!”

  He stumbled a few steps back, clutching at his face.

  “I thought you were an attacker!” I dropped the pepper spray.

  “You’re the attacker! I’ve never met anyone with such a violent streak!”

  He pressed his fists into his eyes and cursed. Despite my guilty panic, and despite the fact that I had no idea how he’d found me here at my apartment, I resisted the urge to bolt. He was obviously hurt, and I couldn’t just stand there. My medical training kicked in, and I gently tried to pry loose his hands. “Here, just let me see.”

  “Take your hands off me, Rebecca!”

  Guess he wasn’t thinking my name was so beautiful now.

  “I’m trying to help—I’m a nursing assistant.”

  “I’m familiar with the Westwood facility. I’ve seen you there before.”

  It seemed like a simple enough answer, but in fact, it raised a hell of a lot more questions.

  I leaned back on my heels. “And how did you know I work there?”

  “I saw you there last month. Remember the big meeting and all that Chinese takeout?”

  “All those suits? Yeah, I remember.”

  “Well, I was there. I saw you pushing an elderly lady who was crying. You were hugging he
r and consoling her, and I thought it was so moving. It really touched my heart. It was genuine and sincere.”

  “Her husband had just passed away. My heart went out to her.”

  “You were very compassionate.”

  “I bet you’re not thinking that so much now.”

  He laughed.

  I led him blindly to the curb by my car and calmly lowered him down so we were both sitting. Once he was relatively subdued, I hastily rummaged through the backseat, emerging a moment later with a clean shirt and a bottle of Aquafina.

  “Here,” I offered, soaking the hem and gently tugging on his wrists. He resisted for a moment, but finally lowered them—letting me dab the skin around his eyes. After a few seconds, the corner of his mouth twitched. I kept dabbing the skin until the inexplicable smile was too much to ignore. “What could possibly be funny right now?”

  “It’s just a dangerous precedent we’re setting, that’s all.”

  I couldn’t help but grin myself. “Not for me, apparently. Just for you.”

  “Just wait,” he warned, “your time is coming.”

  I tugged a little harder than necessary on his hair as I tilted his head back. “Now try to keep your eyes open,” I advised. “We want to rinse off as much of this as possible.”

  With exceedingly delicate hands, I tilted his head back still farther and poured the remnants of the bottle up over his face. Little trickles snaked through his hair, streaking it silver in the light before pooling in incriminating circles on the sidewalk.

  He’d shut his eyes almost immediately, but pried them open when I was finished, looking at me for bloodshot approval. “Well?”

  “You survived,” I said. “In my professional opinion, you’re going to be just fine. You’re lucky I sprayed from a distance. It could’ve been much worse. And I really want to apologize again. I’m so sorry I got spooked. I will definitely have to buy you a cup of coffee. But not now because I’m running late.”

  I had thought about Marcus Taylor a lot since we had first met in that coffee shop. But after he propositioned me, I didn’t have the same respect for him. I wasn’t some whore. But after Macing him, the least I could do was buy the guy a cup of coffee. I owed him that much.

  “Is this what I have to do to get you to buy me a cup of coffee?” he said in a joking tone.

  I smiled. “I guess the other guy at the coffee shop had it much easier.”

  He made a disgruntled huffing sound, somewhere between a snort and a scoff. “I’m sorry I’m making you late.”

  “It’s fine.”

  He took a breath to slow the quick back and forth before it got out of hand. “I came here to apologize, firstly, for startling you at my party. I’m sorry if you got the wrong impression.”

  I said nothing, chewing nervously on my lower lip.

  He shook his head, wiping his eyes with my shirt. “I don’t get it. Why are you so jumpy?”

  For the first time, I rallied to my own defense. “You try being a girl living alone in this city. See how jumpy it makes you.”

  “Touché,” he said mildly. Then his eyes flickered up curiously. “Do you live alone?”

  I didn’t see the harm in telling him. He was already here. “Just me and my roommate, Amanda. And Deevus, of course.”

  “Who’s Deevus?”

  “Our three-legged cat.”

  He absorbed this as best as one could. “Why did you name him Deevus?”

  I frowned as I tried to remember. I honestly couldn’t tell you, was what I should have said. “Long story,” is what ended up coming out. “So what’s the second thing?”

  “The what?”

  “The second thing,” I said. I didn’t know what the hell this guy was doing here, but I had a casting call to get to, and more pressingly, my blood sugar was dipping dangerously low. If he didn’t start talking soon, I might have to resort to cannibalism. “You said that firstly, you wanted to apologize... What’s secondly?”

  “Secondly,” he eyed me carefully, “I wanted to talk to you about that proposition I was trying to bring up before. Except I don’t want to get kicked. Or stabbed. Or pepper sprayed. Or drowned. Or—”

  I held up my hands. “You’ve made your point. And as long as there is no prostitution involved, you should be okay. Scout’s honor.”

  A little smile crept up on his lips.

  I nudged him. “You’re not going to offer me a million dollars for one night like Robert Redford did, are you?”

  “Boy, Robert Redford is getting cheap. I would’ve offered at least double that amount.”

  I playfully slapped him. “I was talking about the movie, Indecent Proposal.”

  He winked. “I know. I was trying to lighten the mood up.”

  I smiled. “I get that. But after I’ve kicked you and Maced you, shouldn’t you be running for the hills, getting as far away from me as you possibly can?”

  “I would normally, but...you’re the only one who can possibly pull this off.”

  “Me? Really? So what am I supposed to pull off?”

  He studied me appraisingly for a moment, then seemed to decide it was safe enough to continue. “You remember Mr. Takahari? The old Asian man from the party?”

  “The one who said you usually have three girlfriends?”

  He faltered for a second but quickly recovered himself. “Yeah, well, that’s kind of exactly what I came here to talk about. I have a bit of an image problem. And I desperately need to impress him.”

  I pictured the confrontation outside the coffee shop and couldn’t help but grin. “An image problem? No, you don’t say.”

  “Rebecca, hush,” he commanded. He then returned to his story with an exasperated sigh. “Well, it’s never been a real issue before; I keep my work and private life separate. But lately, it’s starting to trouble some of our bigger investors.”

  With that, he launched into a dismally boring explanation with facts and figures, dates and times, statistics and stock portfolios. I tried to stay focused, but after only a minute my mind wandered back to the immediate problem of feeding myself. I was sure there was something left in my car.

  I twisted around and pulled open the door, glancing back frequently with the occasional polite nod to show I was still listening. Still being the operative word. How the hell did I end up sitting on the pavement listening to this guy talk about Wall Street conundrums while I slowly withered away? Was there still some minute degree of bad karma I’d yet to be subjected to? Eviction, vomit, car troubles, starvation, now this? Hadn’t I suffered enough? Wasn’t there some worse offender that could take up some of the—oh, Cheetos!

  With another “tuned in” nod, to which I added a concerned frown to be thorough, I grabbed the bag out of the car and started munching. Not bad. A bit stale. Definitely a few days old. But cheesy and delicious. In my present state—I’d take it.

  He eyed the bag with distaste but kept talking as I snacked happily away. “So in short, if I don’t get this public image thing turned around, I’m going to be losing an unseemly amount of money.”

  I rummaged around in the bag and resisted the urge to roll my eyes. First step in fixing your image problem: limit your use of the word “unseemly.”

  I crunched a Cheeto. “Well, that sounds like quite the unseemly problem.” Crunched again. “So why are you here?”

  His face lit up as much as it could with the burns. “You’re my solution.”

  The crunching came to a pause.

  “If you want me to kill someone, you’ve really taken this ‘violent life’ metaphor to a whole other level that I’m not really comfortable with. I swear to God, I’m really not that violent.”

  “No, you don’t understand. I—” He paused for a moment before he snatched the bag of Cheetos out of my hands and threw it into the grass behind us.

  My mouth fell open in shock. “Hey!”

  “It was offensive,” he said simply. “Now, for my solution.” He twisted slightly to face me as if he want
ed to present himself in the best possible light. “I want you to be my girlfriend.”

  I blinked.

  “Act,” he clarified quickly, “I want you to act like my girlfriend.”

  My lips parted in surprise, but I could honestly think of nothing to say. Bill Gates had come to East Hollywood to ask me out on a fake date? Finally, when I decided that this wasn’t a joke and he was really asking, I leaned back against the curb.

  “Why in the world do you think I would want to do that?”

  He cocked his head to the side with a sharp grin. “You didn’t have any problem doing it before.”

  “That was different!” I exclaimed.

  “How?”

  “One night. One person. One lie.” I slapped my index finger repeatedly against my palm as if to pound the point through his thick, lovely skull.

  Did he honestly come down here today thinking I would just leap at the opportunity to defraud an entire company of shareholders? Somewhere between the dancing and the mix-up about the peacock, we’d gotten seriously offtrack.

  “And I’m just asking you to do it one more time,” he said in a way he obviously took to be charming. “Listen, there’s a huge charity gala on the seventeenth, and I’d really—”

  “The answer is no.” I cut him off. “I’m sorry.”

  Much as I’d love to go running around the city fake dating my own fifty shades of playboy, I had a life to get back to. I had an apartment to keep and an acting career to heave off the ground. I didn’t have time for fake relationships. Heck, I didn’t have time for real ones.

  “Furthermore, I’m late,” I said. “But I will buy you a cup of coffee like I promised.”

  Only five minutes to get to the casting. I got my feet and tugged open the door to my car, inadvertently releasing a small avalanche of papers and hats. A crimson blush colored my cheeks as he knelt down to help me gather them in silence. One paper, in particular, seemed to catch his eye, but what with me carefully avoiding his gaze, it was hard to tell which one.

  He didn’t seem particularly upset when I refused to help him. He didn’t seem at all put out to be left behind in the parking lot. He didn’t even question why I kept a collection of scratched Bob Marley CDs inside a tattered béret. He just handed me back everything he’d gathered and stuffed his hands deep inside his pockets.