Priceless: Contemporary Billionaire Romance Novel

Priceless

A
Contemporary Billionaire Romance Novel

By
Aria Hawthorne

Copyright
© 2014 by Aria Hawthorne

Kindle
edition

ISBN:
978-0-9890858-6-1

Published
by French Kiss Press LLC

Website:
frenchkisspress.com

Twitter:
@frenchkisspress

All rights reserved, including
the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form, except for the use
of brief quotations in a book review. 

Chapter One

Maribel
Martinez stood behind the jewelry counter and wondered what it would be like to
be courted and wooed on Valentine’s Day.  She was watching a young couple her
own age in the perfume section.  They were flirting and snuggling each other while
testing the colorful pink fragrance bottles at the special Valentine’s Day
display.  The young man sprayed the mist behind the young woman’s ear, and then
pulled her close to nibble at her neck.  She laughed and shrugged playfully every
time he nestled his chin over her shoulder and whispered into her ear.  The
young woman was dressed in designer jeans and a fashionable winter coat.  Maribel
recognized the coat.  It was one of the most expensive items in the women’s
apparel department.  She had eyed it for herself, but knew she couldn’t afford
it.  Maribel had worked at the department store as a sales clerk for the past
ten years, and still she couldn’t afford most of the items in the store. 
Had
he bought it for her?
  Maribel noticed the young man’s navy blue uniform
jacket, white shirt, and tie. 
He was a trader on the floor of the Chicago
Board of Trade
, Maribel assumed.  She had helped many customers who worked
in the exchange pit.  They would come in during their breaks and purchase high-end
luxury jewelry like solitaire diamond pendants and natural pearl necklaces for
their girlfriends and wives.  Maribel watched as the young man glanced over at
the jewelry counter, attempting to tow the young woman towards it.  But the
girl shook her head and enveloped his hand with her own.  She simply enjoyed his
flirtatious attention and didn’t want it to stop.  Maribel understood the
sentiment.  Love—true love—was the most priceless gift he could give her.

“Oh,
gag me with a chain saw…”

Maribel
turned and saw Crystal, leaning over the counter and sneering at the couple.

“Oh,
Crystal…don’t be so cynical,” Maribel sighed and moved behind her register.  “They
look like they’re in love.”

“Exactly,
which is why I hate them.  Happy freaking Valentine’s Day,” Crystal smacked her
gum and swung around to meet Maribel on the other side of the register.  Both
women eyed the couple from afar.

“Oh,
please tell me you are
not
moving into my lingerie section,” Crystal
cried out. 

“Shhhh…”
Maribel hushed her.

Crystal
lowered her voice and tracked them with a glare. “It is quitting time, Jack and
Jill.  I’m in no mood to be working overtime tonight.” 

Maribel
glanced up at the wall clock.  It was fifteen minutes to nine o’clock.  Maribel
didn’t feel in a hurry to be anywhere.  It was Friday night and Valentine’s Day
weekend, but Maribel planned to spend it the same way she spent every weekend—in
bed with a book at home, alone.

“Nice
footwear,” Crystal suddenly said, noticing Maribel’s bedroom slippers, crowned
with a ladybug emblem and trimmed with red and black lace. 

“Thomas
had me help Sharon yesterday in the lingerie section.  You were off and it got
busy because of all the Valentine’s Day discounts.  But I’m not like you,”
Maribel glanced down at Crystal’s cherry red stilettos, “six hours in heels
make my poor cramped feet cry for mercy. That’s why I love hiding behind the
jewelry counter.”

“It’s
true,” Crystal peered down at her flashy red shoes, admiring them with
affection.  “My feet definitely
are
my best asset.”

Crystal’s
dark eyes fell back onto the young couple, who were circling the red velvet
gift table, decorated with hot pink, red, and black lace panties, tagged with
heart-shaped messages like BE MINE and FOREVER YOURS.

 “Even
if I could fit into one of those black lace thongs,” Crystal cracked her gum, “I
certainly wouldn’t want it stuck up my ass—much less stuck up there for anyone
else to pick it out.”

“Shhhhh—”
Maribel hushed her again, but they both giggled because it was true. “You never
know, Crystal… you might be persuaded to wear a black lace thong by the right
man,” she teased.

“There
is no man on earth who could possibly persuade me to wear XL thongs… Trust me,
Maribel… No – Man,” Crystal’s punctuated it with certainty.  Then, her confidence
waned as she gazed far across the Grand Lobby of the department store, “Correction…no
man, except maybe
him
.”

Maribel
followed Crystal’s eyes, and both women watched as Miles Braxton-Worth exited
the shimmering gold elevators.

 “Hubba
hubba alert…” Crystal said, nodding in his direction, “now there’s a man who
could pick at my ass any day.”

Both
women stared at Miles Braxton-Worth, dressed in a designer suit and black dress
shoes.  Tall, handsome, and ridiculously loaded.  The girls were used to seeing
the young, wealthy building owner exit the elevators into the Grand Lobby at
the end of the work day.  His offices were on the top floor.  But he never formally
came into the department store. 
We’re too trashy and cheap for someone rich
and beautiful like him
, Crystal loved to quip.  But suddenly, the women
watched as Miles Braxton-Worth stopped, turned, and head straight towards them—not
cutting through the cosmetics section or turning down the middle aisle into the
leather accessories, but coming directly towards the jewelry counter. 

“Bite
me, he’s coming this way,” Crystal warned and wheeled around to the opposite
side of Maribel’s counter.

Maribel
glanced over to the elevators.  Crystal was right.  He
was
coming right
towards them. 

Maribel
shooed Crystal back to the lingerie section.

“Maybe
he’s planning on making some last minute V-day gift purchases for his favorite
vajayjay,” Crystal lobbed back at Maribel. 

Maribel
quickly smoothed down her black pencil skirt and adjusted her long black hair. 
She had never had the pleasure of meeting him or assisting him with a
purchase.  Now, as he approached her counter, the only thing that filled
Maribel’s mind was the fact that he was the most elegant force of masculinity
she had ever seen. 

 “Hello,
Maribel.”

Maribel
felt herself flush.  She thought she had forgotten to put her nametag on this
morning.  She touched her sweater collar and confirmed its absence, then
wondered how he knew her name.   

Maribel
. 
She replayed the way that he said her name with smooth refinement.  He made it
sound like the name of a queen. 

 “I’m
looking to find the right gift for someone.  Would you be able to assist me?”

“Of
course,” Maribel nodded and forced a smile.  Maribel automatically moved
towards the mid-end jewelry case—a routine sales strategy to determine whether
or not a shopper was a serious buyer or merely a low-end casual browser.  But
Miles Braxton-Worth was no casual browser; he was a real estate tycoon.  She hesitated. 
His attractive face and confident blue eyes overwhelmed her.  “What kind of a gift
are you looking for Mr. Braxton-Worth?”

Maribel
flushed again.  There was really no reason for Maribel to know
his
name except
for the fact that
all
the sales girls knew who he was—from the perfume
counter to the cutlery and dishware department.  And there had been that one
interaction, so many years ago, when he had spoken to her briefly to give her
condolences for her mother’s death.  It was a moment she had never forgotten, an
unexpected gesture of kindness from a complete stranger who shouldn’t even know
about her mother’s illness.  Now, he peered at her the same way he had peered at
her then, his blue eyes searing a silent moment of connection between them, as
if nothing in the world mattered except for the way that he was looking at her.

“Miles,”
he corrected her, gently.

Maribel
nodded, but remained silent.  Under the weight of his authoritative stare,
Maribel felt the urge to curtsey, and she would have tried, if she wasn’t
wearing lady bug bedroom slippers.  There was no way she could bring herself to
call him ‘Miles’—not when he was dressed up in a Valentino merino wool suit and
sporting a gold and diamond Rolex Masterpiece watch.  Maribel had been
fortunate enough—once—to sell and receive commission on the female version of
that watch, so she knew it was at least a thirty-thousand dollar purchase. 

 “Is
it a personal gift or professional one?” Maribel suddenly asked.

“That’s
a good question,” Braxton-Worth answered, as if he hadn’t considered the
meaning he wanted to convey behind the gift.  “Unfortunately, I wish I knew…”
He eyed her carefully.  She wondered if he noticed the chipped paint on her
fingernails.  She hadn’t had time in days to manicure them herself.  “You see,
I don’t know what the right approach is for this gift, so it’s a bit of a
challenge. That’s why I’m hoping you can help me…”

 “I
see…” Maribel hesitated before turning towards the designer watches, still
distracted by the beauty of his cerulean blue eyes and the masculinity of his own
manicured hands. 

 “I
suppose it could be perceived as both,” he finally confirmed.  “But I suppose
that I want it to be a symbol of pursuing something… mutual.”

It
was an intimate confession—one that surprised Maribel, although she didn’t know
why.

“I
see, so perhaps something a bit more delicate.” Maribel turned to the
bracelets.  She was careful not to look up at him. She could smell the scent of
his cologne and envision his impossibly handsome profile, charming smile, and
penetrating aquamarine eyes, though she wasn’t sure she had the confidence to
face them, or allow them to settle upon her.

“Yes,
delicate,” he repeated, dropping his words downwards onto her wrist.  She was
wearing a diamond tennis bracelet with a sterling silver setting.  It was a
fake, clearly. Maribel had scooped it up on the clearance rack in the costume jewelry
section when it was seventy percent off.  

“But
also perhaps something that conveys a message,” he offered.

Maribel
wanted to ask what kind of message, but she didn’t dare pose the question.  She
glanced over at his ring finger.  It was bare.  She had never heard about a ‘Mrs.
Braxton-Worth’ from the other sales girls, but the absence of a wedding band
wasn’t a sure sign of anything.  She had served countless men who had chosen not
to wear their wedding bands simply because they found it to be restrictive—both
on their hands and in their extracurricular pursuits.

Maribel
needed another cue.  Braxton-Worth sensed her needs.

“Inviting,
but not too forward.”

“I
see…earrings?” she offered.

“I’m
not sure…” he suddenly laughed, as if the joke was on him. “Aren’t all women
born with the ability to wear earrings?” he grinned with self-deprecation. 
Maribel smiled in return, as if he was betraying a rare weakness—his inability to
ever know perfectly the opposite sex.

Someone
he doesn’t know well
… Maribel gathered. 
Not a current
girlfriend or a wife, but someone new
.

“Better
not to assume,” Maribel said in sympathy, turning away from the earrings. Her
smile made him smile wider, and they both relaxed.  Now, they understood each
other and were joined in their mutual conquest.

“Well,
I don’t think you can go wrong with a necklace,” Maribel finally confessed
after surveying all the cases and carefully considering all their options. 

“A
necklace,” he repeated as a confirmation.  “Which is your favorite?”

The
question caught her off-guard.  The necklaces were five-hundred dollars—minimum.
Maribel never dared to consider which one she might enjoy on herself.  Braxton-Worth
swiped his hand across the glass case and peered down into it, as if to coax
Maribel to follow him.

“They’re
all so lovely,” she betrayed, almost as a whisper. “You really can’t go wrong
with a solitaire diamond pendant…”  But there was hesitation in her voice.

“But…?”
he nudged.

“But
perhaps something less conventional.”

“Yes,
exactly,” he agreed. 

Maribel
finally found the courage to look up at him.  He was staring at her with his
radiant eyes, as if her answer was perfect.  Simply perfect. 

Maribel
exhaled with relief.  She had helped so many men who didn’t want to take risks;
they preferred to stick with elegant and traditional.  Maribel, on the other
hand, always preferred jewelry pieces that flashed with their own unique aura.

“That
one,” Braxton-Worth nodded with confidence, his eyes falling upon a one-carat siren
red ruby pendant with a checkerboard cut face.  It glimmered with brilliance the
moment Maribel lifted it out of the case and rested it atop the glass counter. 
It was crowned by three round cut diamonds and accented by a border of petite
white sapphires, all mounted in a contemporary platinum setting.

“Breathtaking,”
Maribel said, acknowledging the fact that it was indeed the most beautiful
pendant she had seen all season—and the most expensive piece in the case.  “In
some parts of the world, rubies are even rarer than diamonds.  This one is set
in white gold, which I always prefer over yellow gold settings…”