The Barrington Billionaires Collection 1

by Danielle Stewart

  “Mr. West will be in any moment to complete the massage,” the tiny-framed woman sang as she swirled her elbow under Libby’s shoulder blade.

  “Mmm-hmm,” Libby hummed, the blood draining from her brain as she enjoyed the release as stress fled her body like a losing army.

  “Here he is now,” the woman explained and, as her hands left Libby’s back, Libby moaned in protest. “Enjoy the rest of your day.” There was a hint of a knowing smile on her face as she snuck out of the bungalow. Normally Libby would be blushing with embarrassment that someone might know what she and James were about to do. But much of her modesty had been left behind on this trip. There was no point in it. She deserved passion as much as anyone else. Why be shameful about something that felt so amazing?

  Before she could lift her head off the massage table, she felt James’s warm large hands slide from the top of her butt, up her spine, and to her shoulders. Her muscles had been reduced to mush by the steady hands of the masseuse. All she could do was moan now. No words formed in her brain.

  “Are you relaxed?” he growled into her ear.

  “Yes,” she hummed in a voice she hardly recognized. “This has been the best five days of my life.” She regretted the honesty of the words the second they left her lips. She was always worried about putting pressure on James, making this feel too serious. Though her heart was swelling for him, she knew a man like James would feel like screws were tightening down on him if she came on too strong.

  “Good,” he said gently, helping her roll over onto her back. Unlike the masseuse, he didn’t bother methodically holding the blanket to cover her naked body. He did just the opposite, pulling it down and completely exposing her.

  “You think this table can hold both of us?” she asked, grabbing his hand and sliding it down to her wet and ready folds. She’d given up being coy, waiting for him to position her.

  “I don’t plan to find out,” he said, lifting her under her legs and behind her head, carrying her new-bride style out the door of the bungalow that led to the beach.

  “James,” she protested, covering her body. “I’m naked.”

  “I know,” he grinned, looking over her body. “I want to fuck you in the sun. I want to have you in the sand.”

  “But the beach . . . there could be people out here.” She considered jumping out of his arms and hustling back into the bungalow before anyone could see her.

  “There’s no one else on the beach for a mile in either direction.” James squeezed her tightly to him, still cradling her naked body in his arms effortlessly.

  “How do you know?” She made a move to cover her body, but as she looked out in either direction she could tell it looked deserted.

  “Because I just paid a lot of money to have the beach cleared,” he explained as he laid her on a blanket that was being kissed lightly by the waves. On the blanket were two glasses of wine and a plate of fresh-cut, vibrant-colored fruit.

  “You paid people to leave the beach?” she asked, shaking her head in disbelief.

  “No, I paid people to leave the beach and paid a few more people to make sure none of them come back for a while.”

  “You are something else,” she said as she accepted the glass of champagne he was offering her. The sun was setting lower, but the heat of it still beat down on them. The sand below the blanket was hot, cradling her body.

  James unbuttoned his linen shirt and lay down next to her.

  “No fair,” she said, gesturing at his pants. “You can’t have more clothes on than I have.”

  “I’m leaving my pants on because it’s the only thing that’s going to keep me from fucking you while I play.”

  “Play?” she asked skeptically. “What are you going to play with?”

  “I’ve always loved playing in the sand. It’s hot and soft.” He grabbed a handful of the white sand and with his other hand laid her flat on her back. Like it was pouring from an hourglass, he let the fiery sand escape his grip and pile just under her breasts. The tickling warmth ran through her body.

  “So I’m your toy?” she asked, reaching her arms out and clutching at the blanket on either side of her as he spread more sand over her body.

  James took his sand free hand and reached for the plate of fruit. A cube of luscious watermelon perched on his lips as he leaned down and kissed her with the sugary cold fruit ready for her to taste. Everything here was like a high resolution version of the things she’d experienced before. The watermelon from her supermarket in Texas wasn’t this blood red. The sand at the beaches she’d been to weren’t a bit like this cloud-colored pillow.

  “You’re going to like this game,” he assured her as he reached for another fruit, a cut strawberry this time. James ran it over her nipple, the cold fruit sending her back arching. Leaving it on her peak he leaned down and nibbled her and the fruit together.

  “You should take your pants off,” she pleaded, reaching for the button.

  “Not yet. I want to fuck you as the sun sets,” he explained. “I want this day to end while I’m inside you. I want the day and night to start and end with us together.”

  Libby opened her mouth to reply but there were no words to capture what her thudding heart was trying to explain in a frantic Morse code. As James reached for another fruit, she braced her body for more pleasure.

  “Do I get play or just be played with?” she asked, eyeing the fruit and coming up with her own ideas of what she’d do with it to tantalize and tease him.

  “This game might be out of your league, a sweet girl like you.” James took the tart pineapple and ran it across her neck before leaning down and sucking the sweetness off her skin.

  “That sounds like a challenge,” she breathed out through a moan. Grabbing the juicy slices of mango, she took his hand and folded all but his index finger down. Running the mango sensually from the tip down his finger she watched his breath catch in his throat. Libby ate the mango, licking her lips and blinking up at him from under her long lashes. Tugging his finger forward she sucked it into her mouth, running her tongue over the tip as she moved it in and out of her mouth slowly. A groan rolled out of him and his fingers danced down over the sand he’d poured on her and settled between her legs. A finger slid inside her and his thumb slid across her pleasure spot, now slick with her juices.

  “You’ll never make it to sunset,” she challenged after nibbling her teeth down his finger as she released it from her mouth.

  “There’s so much more to this game,” he assured her as he snatched another piece of fruit from the tray and moved his body down hers until his mouth hovered over her eager and waiting core. A cold piece of juicy fruit moved over her folds and his tongue quickly came to lap up the juices, both hers and the fruit’s mixed together.

  Her eyes snapped shut as the sun beat down on her naked body and the gentle waves lapped her toes. James had half his body soaked by the intruding ocean, but he didn’t seem to notice. The only thing drawing his attention was the ever-growing sound of Libby’s pleasure.

  Libby had been wrong. James found plenty to do to keep her body busy until the sun sank low, now just above the horizon.

  He finally slid out of his pants and his hard erection sprang up, as though its patience was finally broken, and it was set free from prison.

  “The sun . . .” he said as the waves took over half of their blanket. The tray of fruit, now half empty was in danger of being swept away, but neither of them noticed as James brought his body on top of her. The water was a welcomed relief to the heat, gently crashing over them as he entered her slowly, accompanied with a gentle kiss on her lips. The sweet taste of fruit mixed with her own flavor made her burn with desire. She never wanted this to end.

  The sun began to disappear, and the tide began to wash over them. They were soaked. The blanket soaked. The fruit tray swept away. James moved slowly inside of her as he brushed a hand across her forehead, moving her damp hair away.

  She came with a shiver. A quiet tensing
that closed in around him. And almost as suddenly and as quietly he met her ecstasy with his own, showering her face and neck with kisses.

  The moon illuminated them as they stood, and James led Libby into the sea. No words passed between them as they stepped out deeper and deeper. She wondered if they would just keep going, walk until their heads went under and never come up. He sank himself down into the warm water and went under like a baptism. When he came up he did look changed.

  Desperate for the same, she dunked her head under, sitting on the ocean floor and her eyes forced open, staring up at the shimmering moon above her. There was a part of her that worried he’d be gone when she surfaced—all of this was just a dream. But his hand came down and plucked her up, pulling her quickly into his arms.

  How could they be silent now? They floated for a while, tangled in each other, just breathing and bobbing with the tiny waves. There was no one in sight. No noise but the lapping of the waves on the shore and their matched breath. It was heaven on earth. Her mind, normally churning and grinding with worry, was blank. Perfectly, wonderfully blank.

  After a while James stood and laced his fingers with Libby’s, leading her back out of the sea, into the bungalow, and wrapping her in a towel. Pulling back the sheets on the bed, he let her slip in and then crawled in behind her. A few times she opened her mouth to speak. To thank him or praise him, but breaking the silence felt equivalent to striking an enormous gong in the quiet of a library.

  They nodded off into a sleep that might as well have been death for how deep and peaceful it was.

  When Libby’s eyes opened again it was still night, but James was awake, staring at her profile. “Why don’t you show this side of yourself to more people,” Libby asked as she planted a firm hand on his bare chest, still mesmerized by the muscle. She was nestled safely under his arm, listening to the rhythmic sound of the waves that were just feet from the door of their tiny private bungalow.

  James looked at her and laughed. “This side of myself,” he gestured at his naked body, waving a hand up and down it. “I find if I go to meetings showing this side of myself, no real work gets done.”

  “You know what I mean,” she huffed, but couldn’t help but laugh. His quick wit was something she’d come to appreciate over the last few days. He could tease relentlessly, and somehow it didn’t bother her but endeared him to her even more. “The last few days have been like nothing I’ve experienced. You seem so calm, so at peace with everything. I wish we could be that way all the time. I wish we could stay here forever, or feel this way forever.”

  “Forever?” James asked, and she couldn’t read his expression. Her heart ceased beating for a moment, wondering if she’d just crossed that invisible line she’d been scared to put her toe over. Had she frightened him with her honesty? There would be no way to know now that his phone was ringing. “Shit,” James said as it rang for the third time, the caller being annoyingly persistent.

  “You should answer it,” Libby said, rising off his chest and grabbing the phone off the table by the bed. The ocean air was pouring in, the smell of salt layering the room thickly. Everything was perfectly perfect. But one phone call could change a lot.

  “What is it, Mathew?” James asked, pulling Libby back down on top of him. She watched his face, the stress-free glow evaporating, replaced with worry lines.

  “You have to put off the meeting a few more days. The OSHA people are just going to have to wait. Tell them I’m out of the country.”

  The word OSHA brought her plummeting from the heavens and crashing into the ground. It was the one thing she’d been trying to put out of her mind, but it kept banging at the door of her conscience.

  “No,” James barked, his body tensing below her. “I don’t want you to take the meeting. They can wait. I don’t care how persistent they are. It’s my meeting. I’m very close to securing what I came here for. I should be back in the office in a couple days. Just put them off.” He hung up and tossed the phone haphazardly off the side of the bed. Libby jumped at the hard clunk on the shabby wood floor.

  “Are you all right?” James asked, his eyes raking over her face. He could see it wasn’t just the noise that had her breath catching in her throat.

  “I need to tell you something,” she croaked. This was news to her. She hadn’t planned to take this moment to do what she’d been dreading.

  “Okay,” he said, drawing the word out skeptically.

  “First, I want to ask you something,” she corrected, sitting up and pulling the blanket over her. “Is this really something?” She gestured between the two of them, referencing their relationship. Hoping he knew what she meant.

  “You’re being weird,” James accused, trying to pull her back down to him, but she didn’t budge.

  “I know,” she agreed, forcefully pulling her hair up and twisting it away from her face. “I know I am. But can you answer me anyway? Is this thing between us something or nothing?”

  “It’s something,” he said, sitting up, staring her straight in the face. “It’s something, Libby.”

  Her face crumpled with tears. “Damn,” she moaned out. If he’d have said this was all just for fun, it would have made this easier.

  “How could that be the wrong answer? Don’t you want this to be more than a fling?” His face twisted in confusion, his hand running up the soft skin of her arm, trying to comfort her tears.

  “I’ve done something that will ruin it all. I need to tell you the truth, but I know it will wreck everything.” Her words bubbled up between sobs.

  He backed up slightly, dropping his hand away from her, bracing for something terrible. “Tell me,” he demanded.

  “I know what the problem with the OSHA reports are,” she admitted, using the back of her hand to pat away her tears, but they wouldn’t stop coming.

  “For God’s sake, Libby,” James shouted, putting a hand over his heart as though he’d just dodged a bullet. “I thought you were going to tell me something terrible. I thought you slept with Mathew or were carrying my father’s lovechild. Dammit.” He laughed a breathy laugh but she stayed stone-faced. “This is just work stuff?”

  “It’s not,” she croaked, dropping her eyes away sheepishly. “It’s more than just work. I know why those reports are not correct. I’m one of the reasons they aren’t.”

  “Tell me,” he said again. But this time he reached for her hand, and his words were much less demanding.

  “My father worked for West Oil. He was killed on a rig, an accident. He wasn’t properly trained. None of the men were. The equipment, it wasn’t right either.”

  “Libby.” James drew in a deep breath, and she could feel him squeeze her hand tighter, though she was mostly numb otherwise. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I wasn’t supposed to tell anyone,” she rasped out. “That’s the agreement my mother made with your father. I stay quiet about it and in return . . .” She couldn’t get the words out. They stuck in her throat.

  “What is it?” he asked, and she took comfort in the fact that his face and tone were still gentle.

  “He would put me on the payroll. I’d get a paycheck from West Oil for the foreseeable future even though I wouldn’t ever work here. I never really stepped into the office before I got that email from you about the staff meeting. I lied. I lied about everything.” She braced for his anger, but it didn’t come.

  “And then you bought that mansion in Miami and have been living the high life?” he asked, smirking slightly.

  “What?” she asked, unable to follow his line of questioning.

  “Libby, I’m sorry you lost your father. I know, from what you told me, it uprooted your life in terrible ways.”

  As if he hadn’t heard her right, she explained further. “I was taking money for a job I never did. I should have told you. I should have done the right thing.” She pounded her fist in her lap punishingly, until he took her other hand in his.

  “You’ve been doing the right thing for ever
yone who needs you. You took that money and have taken care of everyone you could with it. You worked another job, lived a responsible life. I mean, look, tell me why you came to that meeting I called.”

  “I needed to keep things going. I couldn’t lose the money. I couldn’t let everyone down.”

  “Right,” he smiled gently as though she’d made his point. “You weren’t there trying to trick me. You were fighting to keep what you needed. I can respect that. I’m fighting too, if you haven’t noticed.”

  “But,” she gasped, breaking free from his hands, “I lied to you. You’ve been asking what is going on with these OSHA documents, and I had the truth the whole time. What are you going to do now that you know?”

  “That’s a business decision. One that will take time and thought. But this . . .” he said gesturing between them the way she had, “this is still something.”

  “I’m so sorry,” she cried, burying her hands in her face. “I’m so sorry.”

  “Stop, Libby,” he insisted, pulling her hands down from her face. “I’ve told you so many times, stop apologizing your life away. The only reason you fooled me is because I allowed you to. I knew something wasn’t right. I could have dug deeper, done a thorough investigation, but I wanted this. I still want this. But,” he said staring deeply into her eyes, “no more secrets.”

  “But what will you do? Doesn’t this hurt what you’re trying to do at West Oil? How will you—?” He cut into her words with a passionate hungry kiss.

  “All you need to worry about is that you have a job now. A real one that you have earned and are doing well. Whatever else happens I’ll keep you out of it. You’ll be fine, no matter what, I promise.”

  She wanted to protest, insist he get angry. Where was the punishment, the anger that should be there in his eyes?

  “Are you hungry?” he asked, rubbing a hand down her back.

  “James,” she moaned, tilting her head and trying to see deeply into his brain, “I don’t know what, I mean how do we just—?”

  He cut her off again. “Libby the past is the past. Business is Business. But this . . .” He ran his thumb across her pouting lips. “This is something. I’m not letting that go.”