ALL THAT HE WANTS (Volume 1 The Billionaire's Seduction) (36 page)

“I’ve been up 72 hours before during a touch-and-go acquisition, closed it successfully, and finished with an off-the-cuff investment presentation in front of 300 of the wealthiest people in the world. I thrive on stressful situations.”

“Well, whoop-de-doo for you, but I’m here now and the buyout thing’s off, so there’s no more stress. So I doubt you’re thriving anymore.”

“No, right now I’m deliriously happy and hopped up on adrenaline.”

I gave him a wry smile. “You always know exactly what to say, don’t you?”

He grinned. “It’s what I’m good at.”

“But promise me… when you come down off your ‘deliriously happy’ cloud of hopped-up adrenaline, we’ll stop and you’ll get in the limo and let Johnny drive us to Vegas.”

“I promise.” He took my hand and kissed it again. “I got you back… I’m not going to do anything to endanger that again.”

“Awwwww… but I don’t want you endangering yourself, either, so
call Johnny.
”

Connor sighed and slipped his cell phone out of his suit jacket pocket. “Yes, dear.”

Johnny was
piiiiiissed.

I couldn’t make out exactly what he was saying, but whatever it was, he said it loudly enough for Connor to make a face and hold the cell phone away from his ear.

It sounded like Charlie Brown’s teacher’s
wah-wah-wah-WAAAH
crossed with a fire-and-brimstone preacher.

Connor let him vent for a few seconds, then said, “I’m getting on 10 East… you can find me, I’ll be the maroon Lamborghini Aventador.”

More
wah-wah-wah-WAAAAH.

“Yes, fine, okay, I’ll drive under the speed limit so you can get to me… jeez, man, I don’t know who’s worse, you or Lily.”

Things quieted down on the other end as Johnny asked something in a lower tone of voice.

Connor smiled. “Because she’s with me.”

Silence. Then Johnny said something else, and Connor pulled the cell away from his ear and hit a button for speakerphone.

“Lily?”

I smiled. “Hi, Johnny.”

“You made him call me, didn’t you?”

“Yes.”

“Thank you. At least SOMEBODY’S brain is working right.”

“Hey,” Connor warned.

“Where’d you get the car?”

“I called Frank D’Agostanzo.”

“Who’s that?” I asked.

“Owns an exotic car dealership in Beverly Hills,” Connor explained. “He gave me a loaner.”

I looked around, stupefied. “
This
is a
loaner?”

“With an option to buy.”

“Wait…” I said as I struggled to do the calculations. “You would’ve had to have called him at, like,
six in the morning
or something.”

“I’m a regular client.”

“Oh, well,
that
explains it,” I muttered sarcastically.

“Why can’t you be like normal rich people and just FLY to Vegas in a private jet, huh?”
Johnny asked.

If I hadn’t been virtually brain-dead from sleep deprivation – and if I actually had the kind of lifestyle where ‘private jet’ and ‘Vegas’ could appear in the same sentence while referring to
me
– I might have thought of that earlier.

“Yeah!” I agreed.

“I want to drive,” Connor said. “I need to clear my mind.”

“You’re going to clear your mind completely when you nod off, flip the car, and shear off the top of your skull.”

“Ew,” I winced.

“Little much, don’t you think?” Connor asked.

“No. Lily, don’t let him be stupid, okay?”

“Too late,” I teased.

“True.”

“Et tu, Brute?” Connor scowled at me.

“But if he gets tired, you make him stop and let me take over, you hear me?”

“He already promised me.”

“Alright.”
There was a pause.
“Lily?”

“Yeah?”

“It’s good to talk to you again.”

I smiled. “You too, Johnny.”

“I’ll see you guys soon. And Connor, I SWEAR TO GOD, if you go one MILE over the speed limit, or start feeling sleepy and don’t pull over – ”

“I know, Mom, you’ll take away the keys,” Connor said in a deadpan voice. “Love you too.”

Johnny grunted in exasperation, then hung up the phone.

Connor took the on-ramp to the 10 East. (By the way, just as a little aside, LA folks call their highways ‘the’ blah-blah. Like, ‘the 10,’ ‘the
101,’ ‘the 405.’ Like their freeways are one of a kind or something. I know, I thought it was stupid too, but then six months after I got here, I was doing the same damn thing. When Connor told Johnny he was getting on ‘10 East,’ I almost pointed it out… then decided to keep quiet.)

As promised, he kept the car in the far right lane and did a few miles under the speed limit.

“Look, there goes an 80-year-old woman,” Connor lamented as an Oldsmobile sped past us.

“It’s the little old lady from Pasadena,” I murmured sleepily.

“More like the little old lady from the Encino Retirement Home,” Connor said bitterly. “I can’t believe I said I would – ”

I cut him off. “Well you
did,
so keep your promise.”

He sighed.

As the road (and miles of cars) stretched out before us, I asked, “Why Vegas?”

“Why not Vegas?”

I shrugged. “No reason, I guess. I just didn’t see you as a Vegas kind of a guy, that’s all.”

“What, not a gambler?”

“Oh, you’re
that,
alright. No, I mean… leisure suits, sleazy gangsters, showgirls with pineapples on their heads…”

“I think your idea of Vegas is a bit dated.”

“Yeah?”

“Like, from a bad 1970’s movie.”

“Yeah, yeah,” I muttered.

“It’s more like Disneyland now, all cleaned up for family consumption.”

“Really?”

“Mm-hm.”

“So are you a Disneyland kind of guy, then?”

He smiled. “Not really, no.”

“‘Cause we could just go down to Anaheim. It’s only thirty minutes away.”

“Only if we can have sex on Space Mountain.”

I laughed. “Somehow, I don’t think the House of Mouse would approve.”

“Come on, just think of it… us going at it as we sped through the dark…”

“With little kids on the ride? NO.”

“Ugh, that’s sick,” he scowled. “No, we’d be the only ones on there.”

“And how would that happen, exactly?”

“I know a guy.”

“Who runs the Space Mountain ride,” I mocked him.

“Who runs the company.”

Touché.

I sighed. “I’ll bet you do. Although maybe we ought to make it Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride.”

Connor laughed out loud, then shook his head. “Nope. Space Mountain.”

“Okay, you obviously have a Space Mountain fetish, so I take it you’ve been to Disneyland.”

“One of my companies rented it out for their employees.”

“Why aren’t I surprised…” I muttered. “So why are we going to Vegas, when you obviously want to go hump on Space Mountain?”

He grinned. “I have some urgent business that cropped up there.”

My half-lidded eyes suddenly opened wide. “Oh my God, I almost forgot – what happened at the meeting?”

Connor looked grim. “A whole bunch of unpleasantness.”

“Like what?”

“Shouting, recriminations, accusations of bad faith, threats of lawsuits, you name it.”

“What kind of lawsuits?”

“Oh, Westerholtz believes I never had any intention of buying out Exerton, and that I used the buyout to do corporate espionage by looking at his files.”

My stomach turned as I imagined my role in all this. “Does he… does he have a case?”

“I pointed out that corporate espionage doesn’t usually include asking the CEO of a company for confidential files and getting full cooperation. When he said he’d only agreed because he’d assumed it was a done deal, I said that was a very bad assumption. Our conversation ended with him screaming, and me suggesting that the Board of Directors might want to rethink his position as CEO.”

“You didn’t,” I gasped.

“Oh, don’t worry about Westerholtz, he’s as thick as thieves with Exerton’s Board. We researched that one thoroughly. No, all the shit’s going to roll downhill to his favorite whipping boy – and your favorite boss, Herr Klaus. Not that he doesn’t deserve it.” Connor glanced back at the cardboard box I’d crammed in the little shelf behind the Lamborghini’s seats. “I’m guessing it didn’t go so well between the two of you.”

“Ha!” I said, not laughing at all, just shouting ‘ha’ like you might say
wait’ll you get a load of THIS!
Then I told him, blow by blow, what had happened from the moment Klaus returned from the meeting.

Connor’s eyes got angrier and darker the more I told him – until I reached the line about
You’re a shitty boss, Klaus – but you’re a shittier human being.

Now it was his turn to look at me in shock. “You didn’t.”

“I did.”

He broke into a huge grin as he turned back at the road. “Well done. I’m proud of you, Lily.”

“I guess all your advice finally sunk in.”

“Took awhile,” he teased.

I smacked his arm playfully. “It was the first morning I’d seen him since I met you, jackass!”

“Hey, I’m drivin’ here!” he shouted playfully. Then he added, in a normal tone of voice, “Tell me what happened after that.”

I finished the rest of the story, including
You can’t fire me, you asshole, because I quit.

Connor howled with laughter.

“Yeah, well, then he towed my car, so I guess he got the last laugh,” I said glumly.

“I’ll have my people take care of your car. Plus, you’re now in a Lamborghini headed to Vegas with me, and Klaus – if he doesn’t lose his job – is going to be demoted and/or continually harassed for several years by everyone at Exerton. He’s a walking punchline now. Even if he moves to another company, I can guarantee you the story will follow him around like a bad odor. So, tell me again who got the last laugh?”

“Huh… okay,” I conceded. Then I added, “Plus I got a $50,000 bonus.”

I said it coolly – not happy or giddy. It was kind of like an opening move where I was inviting him to respond.

“And there’s that,” he agreed in a neutral tone of voice.

I laid my head against the headrest and gazed at him in silence for a few seconds.

“I don’t want your money, you know,” I finally said.

“I know,” he answered quietly.

“I want you to take it back.”

“I told you, it’s a gift. If you don’t want it, donate it.”

“How’d you even get it into my account?”

“I saw the checks on your desk in your apartment. Memorized the routing number and the account number.”

My mouth dropped open. “Do you have a photographic memory or something?”

“Not really, just a talent for remembering numbers. You’ve seen it before.”

It was true – the first night we’d met, he’d memorized a phone number off my cell with a single glance.

“And my bank just took the money, just like that? No questions asked?”

His mouth quirked up a little at the corner. “I know a guy.”

I sighed in annoyance. “I’m sure you do. But – ”

“Can we please not talk about the money?” he asked, a little irritation in his voice.

I assumed Connor never asked for anything, and it bothered him to do it now. I got a little defensive. “Why not?”

“Because talking about money was how I fucked up in the first place,” he said darkly, “and I don’t want to do it again. So please – let’s not talk about it, okay? Just donate it, or do whatever you want with it… but from here on out, let’s just not talk about it.” He paused. “Please.”

I sat there watching him.

I fucked up in the first place, and I don’t want to do it again.

My heart swelled. I felt like I might cry.

“…okay.”

“Thank you.”

He said it, not like he was exasperated, but like he was thankful.

Then he reached for my hand, held it to his lips, and kissed it softly, over and over.

Maybe it was how much of his emotions he’d shared – even subtly – with me over the last 15 minutes. Maybe it was the way he’d opened up. Maybe it was that all my sadness had finally washed away and been replaced with joy.

Or maybe it was because the hottest man I’d ever seen was kissing my hand.

Whatever the reason, despite how exhausted I was, I was getting a little turned on.

“You keep doing that,” I murmured, “and we’re going to have to turn around and go to Space Mountain.”

He laughed. “I didn’t realize you had the stamina to do that in your current state.”

“I don’t think I do. I’m about to fall asleep right now.”

He placed my hand back on my lap. “You should. Tilt the seat back. Take a nap.”

I made a little disappointed sound, like
Awwwww…

“I tell you what we’re going to do when we get to Vegas,” he said in a low, seductive voice.

“Yes?” I yawned.

“We’re going to check into the fanciest hotel and get the most beautiful penthouse available.”

“It doesn’t have to be fancy,” I murmured. “Or a penthouse.”

“Quiet, just listen,” he said in a commanding tone of voice. “This is as much my fantasy as yours.”

I smiled. “Okay.”

“And it’s going to have the biggest, most beautiful bed you’ve ever seen.”

“…uh-huh…”

“And we’re going to go up there, and I’m going to slowly undress you.”

Oh.

“…uh-huh?” I whispered, a little more awake now.

“I’m going to slip off your dress, then your bra, then your panties, very slowly, until you’re standing naked in front of me.”

Heat fluttered in my belly.

“Uh-huh…?”

“And then I’m going to take off my jacket and shirt, then my shoes and pants, then my underwear, until I’m standing there naked in front of you.”

In my mind’s eye, I could see his sculpted muscles… his bronze, perfect skin… and his limp shaft, dangling thick and huge between his perfect thighs…

…and then I imagined it growing, lengthening, hardening.