Billionaire With a Twist (13 page)

“You think I’ve had it
easy?” Hunter countered, his volume rising to match my own.
“You think I haven’t worked and sweated and goddamn bled
for this goddamn company? You don’t know me. You don’t
know one fucking thing about what I’ve had to do these past
years.”

Rage coursed like acid through my
veins. “And you don’t know one fucking thing about what I
have to do right now, every single day.”

Hunter shook his head, his expression
fierce. “I’m not letting you walk away from this, Ally.”

As if I had wanted to walk away. As if
this were anything other than my only choice.
Oh, Hunter. Oh,
proud, beautiful, angry Hunter.
My heart felt like it was going
to burst with regret and loss and rage and desire.

“There’s nothing to walk
away from. We only ever had a beginning. And it might seem like it
matters to you now, but one day, you won’t even remember it.”

“Ally—”

“It’s done, Hunter.”
I tried to walk away but he placed a gentle hand on my shoulder,
attempting to pull me back toward him. I resisted his touch, keeping
my body still and refusing to turn around.

“Is this…is this really
what you want?” he asked. “I’ll respect your choice
if it is, and we can end this for good, but—”

“Yes,” I said, my voice
cracking at the lie. “It’s what I really want.”

I turned and ran, Cinderella fleeing
the ball, before he could hear me cry.

Before he could realize just how much I
wanted him to persuade me to stay.

I muffled my tears through my hands,
head bent over my desk in my semi-private cubicle.

It didn’t make sense. I had won.
Hunter had once again gone for my ideas over those of the Douchebros.
Mr. Avery, my boss, had greenlit them too. I should have been
happier than I’d ever been in my life. I was finally on my way
to the top.

But all I could think about was what I
had left behind.

I had steeled myself for the
Douchebros’ heckling, and kept an un-amused smile on my face as
they harangued me, letting their own immature complaints about a lack
of sex and explosions in my concept speak for themselves.

But somehow I hadn’t steeled
myself against Hunter’s cool indifference.

He had approved my concept while barely
glancing up from his phone.

He hadn’t met my eyes once.

He had walked away in the middle of my
attempt to thank him for going with my idea.

His rejection hurt like nothing I had
ever experienced before. I felt as if my heart were ripping in two,
as if I were drowning, as I were falling forever, as if I had already
fallen and broken every bone in my body.

And now he was gone, back on a plane to
Virginia, and I was stuck here in D.C. alone with my heartbreak,
trying to cry discreetly so no one else would discover how upset I
was.

I was counting the hours till I could
escape work and go home to family dinner. That’s how bad it
was.

#

My dad passed me the mashed potatoes
with a silent look of commiseration as my mother chattered on. We
were both doing our best to get by with the minimum amount of nods
and ‘mm-hmms,’ and eventually she would notice and there
would be scolding. But for now there was food.

Roast beef and mashed potatoes and
braised greens and perfectly toasted rolls were arranged artfully on
the best china, on a little pink checkered tablecloth that would’ve
done Betty Crocker proud. And it was delicious. Almost enough to make
up for the conversation.

“And how often do you find a
straight man who’s into historical costuming, I mean really—”

Had I really thought this would be an
escape? It was a commuted sentence at best.

Mom hadn’t stopped congratulating
herself since she sat down. It was the same old song: I was a huge
disappointment, but Paige was perfect and so was her new man, whoever
this latest one was who was joining us for dinner soon, and he was
going to be the one to make an honest woman of her, and we would all
just pretend that Mom hadn’t said the same thing about every
other man she’d set Paige up with since junior prom.

I swear, you’d need an archive to
keep track of the polite fictions we keep current in my family.

“And so successful, why, Paige
will be set for life—”

I wasn’t in the mood for this;
not now when I was so heartbroken it was taking all the energy I had
to keep from sobbing. I was sure this guy was like all the rest:
blandly handsome, a mid-level job in a forgettable corporation, golf
on the weekends and a second girlfriend in the Keys. For Paige’s
sake, I would smile and pretend to believe that he could really be
the one. Inside, my heart would be breaking for her, as well as me.

“I think Paige should go for an
off-the-shoulder wedding gown, and daylilies will make excellent
center pieces—oh look, there they are!”

The bell rang, and my mother sprang up
to answer it.

In the silence that followed, my father
topped up my mashed potatoes. I topped up his greens. We gave each
other matching looks of resignation, prisoners with extreme cases of
Stockholm Syndrome.

Mom bustled back in, grinning fit to
burst. She gestured behind her.

“Darlings, let’s extend our
warmest welcome to Paige’s new beau!”

I looked up, expecting Bland
McForgettable—

And my heart turned to ice, and then
smashed into a million pieces.

My beaming sister had come in
arm-in-arm with Hunter Knox.

TO BE CONTINUED...

What happens next? Hunter and Ally’s story continues in
BILLIONAIRE WITH A TWIST: PART TWO
,
available September 16, 2015

On Facbook:
https://www.facebook.com/lilamonroebooks?fref=ts

Tweet Me:
https://twitter.com/lilawrites

@LilaWrites

Do you enjoy fun, romantic reads? Read on for a sneak chapter of
THE ART OF STEALING HEARTS
by Stella London,
available September 30, 2015
.

Meet Grace and St. Clair: she’s an aspiring gallery girl, he’s the sexy billionaire
art collector. Together, they’ll discover a world of romance in the hot new series by Stella London!

THE ART OF STEALING HEARTS
available September 30th
!

CHAPTER 1

My
mom taught me that art is everywhere; you just have to look. “Keep
your eyes open, Grace, and you can always find the beauty,” she
said, filling our small apartments with gorgeous paintings and bright
colors, pointing out shapes and compositions as we walked city
streets. Her love of art inspired mine, but right now my heart and
head are pounding under the stress of running late, so it’s
hard for me to notice anything pretty about the traffic literally
standing between me and the chance of a lifetime.

“Um,
excuse me?” I pipe up from the back seat of the immobile taxi
cab, anxiously looking at the driver slumped in his seat. He ignores
me.

I
check my watch again: 8:41 am.
Crap!
I bite my lip to
keep from yelling.
Crapcrapcrap.
I’m
supposed to be at Carringer’s Auction House in nineteen—make
that eighteen—minutes. First BART was late, and now I’m
spending the last of this week’s tips to be trapped in this
smelly cab, sweating under my best business outfit. My only business
outfit.

After
a year of dropping off resumes and talking up gallery owners and
museum directors, I’d nearly given up hope of finding a job in
the art world until last week when the best auction house in San
Francisco called me. Carringer’s deals in the most sought-after
and highly-valued art and antiquities in the world: French
Impressionist paintings, Chinese ceramics, Native American head
masks, Greek sculptures…I get chills just imagining the
masterpieces that flow in and out of those vaults. If I’m late
to this interview, the first opportunity I’ve had in months
might slip away and I’ll be serving spaghetti and meatballs at
my waitress gig until I permanently smell like marinara and am too
old to remember the specials.

“Sir?”
This time I rap insistently on the plexiglass separating me from the
driver. He eyes me in the rearview mirror. “I’m super
late. Is there a short cut or something you could use?”

The
minute hand on the watch my mother gave me jerks forward again and
we’ve gone less than a block.
Why
aren’t we moving?!
As if the obvious answer wasn’t right outside my window,
honking and spewing fumes and inching along like snails on their way
into the financial district’s high rise office buildings.

The
driver just laughs at me. “What do you think?”

I
think you smell like someone Febreezed over a cigar shop. But it’s
the number one rule of waitressing: rudeness never pays. “How
much further is Gold Street?”

The
cabbie shrugs. It’s 8:43.

“Is
it close enough to walk?” I press him.

“Sure,”
he says. “Everywhere is close enough to walk to eventually.”

Screw
this. There is no possible way for me to arrive looking cool and
collected as planned anyway since my makeup probably already looks
like a Jackson Pollock, and I’m not going to let some stupid
traffic keep me from my dream. “Here,” I say, tossing a
pile of ones onto the front seat and scooting out the door. “I’ll
take my chances.”

The
cab driver rolls his eyes. “Maybe ten blocks,” he says. I
inhale a deep breath of crisp ocean air, steady my purse on my
shoulder, and start jogging.

Immediately,
my sensible yet stylish heels feel like vice grips on my toes. My
feet are used to day-long shifts in sneakers, and it’s hard to
run in a skirt, but I can’t give up. My carefully blow-dried
hair is getting wind-whipped and frizzy, and my bangs are sticking to
the sweat beading on my forehead.

“Sorry!
‘Scuse me! Coming through, please!” It’s like
running an obstacle course in heels.

I
dodge through the crowd, trying not to think about the frazzled and
sloppy impression I’m going to make. In the meantime, I force
myself to focus on the beauty of this city: the long shadows of the
tallest buildings, the modern architecture, the sunlight reflected
and refracted off a thousand windows, the blue sky beyond. I love San
Francisco, even though right now it is not loving me back.

One.
More. Block. So. Close. I can almost see the brass carvings and
scrolled handles on the thick auction house doors as I cross Gold
Street and round the corner…and smash right into the muscular
chest of a man coming from the crosswalk.

I
shriek at the same time he says, “Whoa, there,” like he’s
a cowboy, except he’s as posh and polished as can be. He holds
his coffee cup out in front of him like a bomb and I see the brown
liquid dripping down his blue tie and white shirt.

“Oh my God!” I grab
some clean tissues out of my bag. “Here, let me help,” I
say, reaching for his tie, but he’s already shaking it out.
Luckily, most of the drink seems to be splattered on the concrete.

“It’s
fine,” he says, catching my hand. “There was too much
sugar in that latte anyway.” He looks at me as our fingers
touch, his eyes flecked with shifting shades of blue like Van Gogh’s
night sky and just as mesmerizing. I want to paint them, but then I
remember my priorities.

“I’m sorry about the
spill, but I really have to go.” I check my watch. “I’m
running late for an important meeting.” I start to turn away,
feeling guilty, but his voice stops me.

“So this is a run-by
coffee-ing, then?” He has an accent. British. Sexy.

I
turn back, unable to keep from checking him out again. He has a mouth
that looks like it was carved by Michelangelo, perfectly shaped lips
that smile at me and highlight the sharp cheekbones as sculpted as
the famous David’s. It’s like his face belongs in a
museum.
Whoa, there.
“Should I call the police?” he asks.

I
smile despite my hurry, sure that my face is turning strawberry red.
I’d love to stay and flirt with this gorgeous man, but there’s
no time. “Look,” I say, backing away. “If you give
me your card, I’ll happily pay for the cleaning bill, but I
really do have to run.”

He
falls in step beside me like we’re old friends. “Oh, no,”
he says, loosening his tie as he easily matches my sprint. “Don’t
you worry about this old thing. I’ve been meaning to donate
it.” He tosses it in a trash can as we speed down the sidewalk
and I can’t help but notice the triangle of smooth chest
showing now that he’s unbuttoned his collar.

“It
mostly missed my shirt, which is good because the public tends to
frown on shirtless businessmen.”

I
imagine him shirtless and almost walk into a mailbox.

“That
was a joke,” he says, smiling.

Over
the smell of salty sea air and car exhaust I catch the fresh, soapy
clean scent of him. “Oh,” I say, avoiding a pothole, and
thinking that no one would frown at that body. “Funny.”

“This meeting must be a big
deal,” he says. “If you’re too distracted to
converse with a handsome man.”

“It
really is,” I say, separating from him just long enough to
weave around a woman walking a poodle. “Life-changing actually.
It’s a job interview at Carringer’s.”

“Ouch,”
he says, putting a hand on his heart in mock anguish. “Not
going to bite on the handsome line?”

“Oh!”
Flushed, party of one, please. Thank God for the cool air. “That’s
not what I meant. It’s just—”

“So
you’re admitting you do think I’m handsome?”

“I
admit nothing,” I say, laughing.

He
grins. “My kind of girl.”

I
stop to catch my breath as we arrive at the gorgeous façade of
the Carringer’s Auction House building. Time to bid farewell to
Mr. Charming. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little
disappointed to see him go.