by C. C. Piper
The thing was, on the night we eloped—scam that it turned out to be—for the first time ever I felt like I was being seen for who I was rather than as a billionaire. Clearly, that’d been a false assumption. How was it that I felt more upset about my vanishing delusion of true love than I was about the money? It made no sense.
I regarded Emma, her posture tall and proud despite the insane situation she’d landed in. She wore a Guns N’ Roses t-shirt, blue jeans, and Converse sneakers. In her ears were a pair of silver stud earrings while on her wrist was that same leather cuff bracelet. Again, I noticed the swirling black tattoos along her left arm with the hint of red ink right at her shoulder. The was the single most gorgeous woman I’d ever laid eyes on. I craved her. Yearned for her.
Not because of how stunning she was but for another reason altogether.
She’d been the only woman in years to make me quit feeling so goddamn alone.
I was lonely. And I must’ve been feeling this way for a long time for her to light such a fire within me upon first glance. Emma Morris had given me a fleeting glimpse into a wondrous and hopeful future of joy and happiness. Then, she’d torn the possibility of that dream completely away.
That was why I was angry at her.
“So,” I began, grateful my voice came out even and neutral. “You couldn’t wait to deplete my fortune like any decent gold digger? Instead of merely shopping with my credit cards, you decided to cut out the middleman and go straight for my emergency cash. Pat yourself on the back. That was a genuinely ballsy maneuver.”
Her hands were in her lap, fingers intertwined and knuckles white. She was nervous. Maybe this was pure pettiness talking, but the realization brought me a jolt of savage satisfaction.
“I’m sorry.” Despite her apparent tension, her voice stayed as steady as mine. “What happened wasn’t what I planned.”
I arched an eyebrow at that. “What, you just woke up and decided to steal fifty-thousand dollars on a whim?”
“No,” she blurted out. “I mean… yes, in a way. Kind of. Things got out of hand.”
I narrowed my eyes at her, assessing her carefully. “How did you get the safe open?”
That had been impressive and something I’d been trying to wrap my head around for the past seven days.
Emma shrugged. “I’m good with locks.”
I found myself gaping at her. What was she? Some Dickensian pickpocket? I’m good with locks. Who says such a thing in real life?
I took a deep breath and scrubbed a hand down my face, stroking the whiskers of my short beard.
“Look, I’m sorry.” She leaned forward, her hazel eyes wide and earnest. “I never wanted to… I didn’t intend for everything to go down the way it did. Marrying you, I mean. And stealing from you. That’s not how the night was supposed to go.”
I examined her. This woman didn’t strike me as a run of the mill thief. Once I’d started questioning her, Emma’s features had grown pinched and her skin colorless. She had the look of someone who was frightened, but there was more there. She seemed on edge and agitated. Her body language and demeanor reeked of one emotion above all others.
Desperation.
Still, I did my best to maintain my most reliable poker face. I sat back and observed her. “Incidentally, what was the plan? How was the night supposed to go? Enlighten me.”
She gulped visibly. I almost felt bad for her. I reminded myself that no matter the reason, this woman had toyed with me in the most unforgivable way imaginable.
“You were supposed to be an eighty-year-old sugar daddy.”
I blinked. “What?”
She blushed, redness flowing into her face like spilled paint. “I mean, I’d planned to find an elderly gentleman and talk him into offering me the money. But then you came along.”
I would’ve been lying if I said that wasn’t a blow to my ego. “And you thought I would be a more gullible target than someone at the beginning stages of dementia.” It wasn’t a question. Her train of thought from that night was painfully obvious.
She clenched her jaw. “No.” It came out as a near growl. “That’s not what happened.”
“Then what happened?” I demanded. Fed up.
“I don’t know,” she snapped, eyes flashing. “You weren’t in the cards. You or…”
“A wedding ring?” I spat bitterly.
“Hey, I returned that ring.”
“Yeah, thanks so much for that, by the way. That more than makes up for deceiving me.” And for sawing open my heart.
Silence hung between us for a moment before she closed her eyes and went on in a more controlled voice.
“I didn’t plan any of that. And I never meant to feel something for you. That was real. I didn’t know what to do with those feelings, and then everything escalated into—”
“Enough,” I shut her down. I didn’t want to continue this conversation, at least not in the direction it was going. I was sure if I did, I would lose my resolve. So I brought it back to business. “Where is the money?”
She hesitated. I didn’t know whether she was thrown by my abrupt change of direction or if she’d become afraid. “I… I don’t have it.”
I snorted mirthlessly. “I know you’re not traipsing around with that much cash in your purse.” I stood, determined to end this joke of a conversation. “Let’s go get it.”
Emma froze in her chair, eyes as round as saucers.
“No, you don’t understand. I don’t have it. It’s gone.”
“What do you mean, it’s gone?”
“It’s gone,” she said again. “I… spent it.”
I did a double take. “You spent it,” I repeated, my voice purposeful and slow. “You spent fifty-thousand dollars in one week?”
For all her bravado, she now dropped her gaze. “Yes.”
“On what?”
“My brother.”
I hadn’t seen that coming. I decided right then and there that I was done being jerked around. I wanted answers, and I wanted them now.
I spoke with an unusual amount of sternness as I addressed her. “You’re going to explain what you’ve done with my money and why you set out to steal fifty-thousand bucks from me in the first place.”
“My brother got into some trouble.”
“Trouble?”
“Yes. I had to pay his way out of it.”
I waited for her to go on, but she didn’t. “And what? That’s it? You stole from me because you couldn’t get a bank loan or something?”
“The bank wouldn’t loan me that kind of money,” she admitted, and the pinched lines of her expression told me she’d already tried.
“Whoever he owes wouldn’t give him the chance to finance, I take it.”
She blew out a loud breath. “No.”
Listening to Emma’s story elicited three reactions within me: shock, fury, and concern. And all of them seemed to be battling it out for the title.
Concern won, of course. No matter how hard I tried to fight it, no matter how Mauricio attempted to “harden my shell” or Richard prompted me to be “more discerning and cautious,” I couldn’t seem to ignore people when they were suffering. Especially, not a woman. Emma didn’t go into much detail, but when she told me her brother was in trouble, I believed her.
Still, I wasn’t a complete moron, regardless of how naïve I’d been so far where Emma was involved.
While I’d gone to culinary school and had completed my MBA to boot, I’d also been fascinated enough by psychology to make it my minor. That decision had proven useful to me in business negotiations more than once, particularly in scenarios where I needed to read someone. Scenarios like the one I faced now.
Too bad I’d been so inebriated when I met her. If I’d stayed sober, maybe I wouldn’t be sitting here wondering how my life had been flipped upside down.
I analyzed every move Emma made as she spoke, taking note of the nuances of her body language. I noticed her taut muscles and the tension that stiffened
her neck and spine. I took in her slightly hunched shoulders and the fact that she could no longer seem to meet my eye. I evaluated the anxious way her fingers drew designs on the table. I heard the catch in her voice as she mentioned her brother.
She wasn’t lying.
I let these thoughts bound around my skull for a few minutes, comprehending at last what needed to be done.
“All right,” I said. “Here’s what we’re going to do about what you owe me. You’re going to become my companion.”
She peeked back up at me then, head tilted to one side. “Your companion?” she repeated, her voice echoing against the hardwood floors.
“Yes.”
“I’m not a prostitute, James.”
Good to know.
“That’s not the sort of duty I’d ever ask of you. This won’t be about sex.”
“What will it be about?”
What I envisioned might be unorthodox, but if she agreed, we’d both get some of what we wanted, even though it would ultimately still be a compromise. “Here’s my offer…”
6
Emma
“I need a date,” he said.
Whatever I’d been expecting for him to say, this wasn’t it. To be fair, none of this was going as I would have wanted it to go.
“For a certain event?”
“For my life.”
“Excuse me?” Was he kidding?
Leave it to me to find the one devilishly attractive billionaire who’d gone all the way around the bend. Seriously. This entire fiasco was both cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs and too sad for words at the same time.
I was going to be required to pay off my debt in “companionship.” Yet, it was better than prison—jumpsuit orange was not my best color—even though it came across as dicey as hell. The Wish Maker and her club, as James had explained, was the clandestine organization responsible for tracking me down. How nice of them.
He’d kept all his information about that weirdness nice and vague, but as I understood it, until my debt was paid, this club would serve as the point of contact between James and myself. They would pick me up, drop me off, and ultimately, make sure I upheld my end of the bargain. And that bargain was all about giving James certain blocks of my time over the next five months.
“One month for every ten thousand taken,” James had told me.
Five months of dinner and a movie—which he would pay for—to keep him from pressing charges against me? Who wouldn’t take that deal?
There was one catch. No one else could know that this wasn’t an authentic relationship. If anyone asked, I was supposed to say James was either my boyfriend or husband. And since I’d come out on top of all of this, I wasn’t about to object to that specific parameter.
Then, he’d said, “One drunken night wasn’t enough to get to know you, and I want that chance.”
I just wanted to put all this behind me.
Having no other choice, I agreed and was driven back to the grocery parking lot.
Once I arrived home with a bag of groceries and my best attempt at a nonchalant attitude, Evan fired off question after question at me.
“Why did it take you over three hours to buy chicken, potatoes, and string beans? Where the hell were you, Em? Dinner’s gonna be late now.”
I hurried to put the food away and help with the meal. I’d gone on radio silence because I’d either have to lie to my brother or break the rules and tell him the truth.
And since I sucked at lying, neither one was likely to work.
It’d been a whole additional week before an unknown number texted me.
“Mr. Carter requires your presence at dinner tonight. A car will be by to pick you up at eight o’clock.”
It was 4:30 in the afternoon. I immediately bristled. Wasn’t I going to get any kind of notice? I had a life. I had a job. I had an at-risk brother to keep an eye on. Was I going to have to drop all that without a second thought every time “Mr. Carter” decided he was lonely?
I knew I was. He’d explained his requirements thoroughly. “You’ll be like an escort, the upscale kind that has zero sexual expectations.”
I supposed escorts didn’t get much notice either.
I chose a simple black dress, then applied concealer under my eyes to hide the bags that had taken up permanent residence when I’d started my freelancing career. From there, I added a touch of tinted lip balm to finish the look. I was a barebones kind of girl in the cosmetics department.
I accessorized with understated silver jewelry to go with the long silver chain around my neck bearing my parents’ wedding bands. I always wore that chain in remembrance of them, as well as my thin leather cuff bracelet.
The cuff had been a gift from Evan after I’d moved back home following Mom and Dad’s car accident. For a moment I paused as painful memories assaulted my senses. Evan had only been sixteen, and for days I’d had trouble getting him to eat or sleep. He’d be silent and sullen for long periods of time, then would lash out in verbal bursts of vitriol towards me.
Talk about the worst of times.
A few months afterward, I’d believed everything to be equaling out, but instead, my brother got involved in some questionable activities. I found drug paraphernalia in his room and caught him gambling in casino parking lots despite him being underage. Even though I did everything I could to squelch this behavior, I had to work to support the two of us, which severely limited my ability to monitor him.
And now, six years later, here I was, still doing what I could to keep him out of hot water. Only this time, I’d managed to dunk myself in some of my own.
The car James sent came at eight o’clock sharp. I’d never been more grateful that Evan had been out for the night. I prayed I wouldn’t have to say anything to my neighbors, either. If my little escort arrangement ever got out, the gossip might be heard by my brother. I couldn’t afford for that to happen.
I stepped into the car to find none other than Blondie’s friend at the wheel. He glanced at me from the rearview mirror, his dark eyes sparkling with something that smacked of disdainful amusement. I instantly disliked him.
“Good evening, Ms. Morris,” he greeted me in an astoundingly high-pitched voice.
“How about that,” I smarted off. “This one speaks, too.”
He didn’t seem offended. In fact, he shot me a grin before motoring down the street.
Less than an hour later—Kevin, he’d said his name was—had applied some strange sorcery that allowed him to get from Henderson to downtown Las Vegas in twenty-five minutes flat.
We’d arrived at Iron Gate, a famous high-end restaurant known for not being on the radar of tourists. Never in a hundred years would I have thought I’d get to set foot in this place. It was a favorite of local businessmen and celebrities. Typically, it wasn’t a location meant for mere mortals such as myself.
Until tonight.
I did my best not to openly gape as I followed the host through the resplendent but crowded rooms to the outside area in the back. I’d heard the Iron Gate described as something resembling a movie set, but I never quite trusted the hype. As it turned out, the hype didn’t do it justice.
I took it all in while simultaneously fighting the urge to stare in awe the moment I was past the French doors leading to the courtyard. Designer oak tables and pitch-black industrial chairs surrounded a bright copper fire pit with crackling orange and yellow flames decorating the center of the flagstone floor.
Wisteria and ivy snaked upward and curled around wrought iron pillars and beams to create a natural ceiling. Paper lanterns and strings of lights were strewn all over. On the opposite side of the yard, by one of the red-brick walls that encircled it, stood a spiraling black metal staircase that led nowhere and whose steps were lit with burnished aluminum lanterns holding ivory candles.
All tables were empty except for the one where James waited. When he saw me, he stood up wearing a gray tailored dress shirt that brought out the blue in his eyes and followed the lines of
his broad shoulders and torso in all the right places.
I swallowed, my throat suddenly dry. If circumstances had been different, a date with this man would’ve felt like a fantasy come to life. Things being as they were, however, it was more of an obligation than a dream.
I put one foot in front of the other and joined him. I was thankful I’d worn my heeled boots to add some grit to the black sheath dress; they made me feel self-assured and maybe even a bit like a badass as I marched forward.
He pulled the chair out for me, something nobody had ever done, and I barely managed to keep my eyes from going wide. I also wouldn’t have been caught dead admitting to the warmth that barreled through me at that kind and chivalrous gesture.
Were my standards really that low?
“Thank you for coming,” James said with a smile that was both sexy and sincere, resuming his seat across from me.
There was nothing more dazzling than a James Carter smile, with those perfect teeth and firm lips. Lips I’d caressed with my fingertips. Lips I’d kissed. He also smelled like sandalwood and fresh cotton, and abruptly, I remembered he’d worn the same scent the night we met. I wanted to lean over him and sniff at the scruff covering his chin, then suck on his neck until I left my mark.
God, what was wrong with me? I cleared my throat.
“Just fulfilling my part of our agreement,” I told him, doing my best to stay aloof when my traitorous body was telling me to do something altogether different.
His smile faltered for a split second, but then he said, “May I order you a drink?”
“I’m capable of ordering my own, thanks,” I sniped out.
Okay, that’d been ruder than I’d meant for it to be. Seemed I was going from one extreme to the other. Trying to regain my equilibrium, I looked around. The outdoor dining area was still empty of patrons except for our table.
“It’s weird,” I spoke up again, trying to find some middle ground. “I thought this place would be packed at all times.”
“It is.”
I refocused on him, comprehension dawning on me. “You reserved the entire outside area, didn’t you?”