Priceless: Contemporary Billionaire Romance Novel (4 page)

As
she turned away, he suddenly seized her hand.

“Thank
you. I’ll take it.” 

Maribel
glanced down at his grasp.  He was smothering her hand with force, and noted
the absence of a wedding band.  After a moment, she petitioned him with her
eyes to release her so she could move away to the register, prepare the gift
box, and ring up the sale. 

Miles
felt the intimacy of their interaction slipping away.  He slid his black credit
card across the glass countertop.  Everything was back to business—a state of
being that normally was natural for him—certainly more natural than a surge of yearning
emotions.  Maribel charged his credit card and he signed the receipt without
looking at the final charge.  He accepted the sleek shopping bag without a
formal goodbye.  Instead, he felt the need to escape as soon as possible
through the revolving doors of the Grand Lobby and endure the bitter cold of
the winter night.

Just
outside the department store, a homeless man, donning a cardboard heart on the
front of his worn jacket, greeted Miles at the street corner.  Miles stopped,
pulled out his wallet, and deposited three individual hundred dollar bills into
the man’s cap, lying on the icy sidewalk and lined with quarters and dollar
bills.  Miles glanced up at the tall anonymous skyscraper across the street. 
It was Harvey Zale’s building, his competition.  Miles looked back at the
iconic Fields Building—his building—and thought about calling Gillian to
finalize the thirty-five million dollar lease deal that he had stonewalled the
whole day.  But he looked down at the gift bag and reconsidered. 
No, this was
a better plan
, he thought.  And certainly one that promised to facilitate
“less conventional” consequences.

Chapter Four

The next morning, Maribel awoke early, consumed by a
mixture of anticipation and dread.  She had worn her ruby necklace to sleep and
it was the first thing the moment the sun twinkled in through her blinds.  She
pulled herself from her bed and considered all the possibilities the day
offered to her.  Then, she considered what to wear.  She settled on something
simple, casual, but fashionable.  If working at a department store for ten
years had taught her nothing else, it was how to be both comfortable and
stylish.  Knit tights, black skirt, and mohair shell pink sweater with a scoop
neckline.  It would accentuate her new necklace while hiding her perspiration
marks—a major plus. No matter how nervous Maribel knew she would be, she didn’t
want to sweat in front of a billionaire.

Abruptly, her buzzer rang.  She glanced over at her
oven clock.  It was 10AM sharp.  Like her, he was punctual.

She called into the intercom.

“Hello?”

“Driver picking up Miss Martinez.”

A driver
…? Maribel felt a
sudden wave of exasperation.  
Of course, his driver
. 
He’s a
billionaire.  He probably has ten drivers
.  Maribel didn’t even own a car,
so she certainly hadn’t expected to be picked up by a private driver.

“Yes, be right down.” Maribel tried to sound
assertive, but she was shaking, and she slunk down on the edge of her bed to
calm her nerves. She had been prepared to spend the whole day by herself—lounging
in the comfort of her bed and pajamas—reading, watching TV, and indulging in the
discounted box of Valentine’s Day chocolates she had bought from Roxanne in the
candy department.  Instead, she forced herself to her feet, put on her winter
coat, scarf, earmuffs, and gathered up her purse.  She exhaled and exited her
apartment, fully aware she was trading the security and certainty of her cozy
studio for the insecurity and uncertainty of a date with a wealthy man she
barely knew and who barely knew her.

She must be crazy,
she
thought as she pushed open the foyer door and into the courtyard, where she spotted
the black Mercedes and its driver, parked along the curb, waiting for her.

“Good morning, Miss Martinez,” the driver said,
crisp and attentive.  He whisked open the rear door, allowing her to slide
across the smooth beige leather seats.  Then, he briskly closed it and slipped
into the driver’s seat to start up the engine.

“Here you are, ” he said, passing off a sleek powder
blue bag. “A gift from Mr. Braxton-Worth.”  The driver didn’t wait for her
response.  Instead, a panel of tinted glass rose up between them, and before Maribel
knew it, she was sealed up in the back seat of the black Mercedes like precious
cargo.

Maribel gazed down at the mint blue bag.  She
recognized it immediately.  Its familiar black block logo stared back at her: TIFFANY
& CO.

Her heart raced. She started to sweat. 
Stop
sweating, stop sweating, stop sweating,
she warned herself.  But it was
useless. Whatever was in that bag was a symbol of his expectations, which suddenly
overwhelmed her. 
Maribel considered how long it had been
since she had been on a date—much less a date with a man with whom she actually
was interested. 
It had been a very, very, very long time
, she
concluded.  There had been suitors. Miles Braxton-Worth wasn’t the only customer
who had offered to see her again after she had helped him with a special
purchase. But unlike Braxton-Worth, those suitors had been significantly older
and already married,
and
they assumed that Maribel was the type of girl
who would understand that, and still accept their invitations for drinks and
dinner.  They were wrong. 

As for dating men her own age, she had invented
every excuse in the book for why she was destined never to find the right man. 
Crystal had tried to convince her that online dating was the only way to meet a
good guy, but in a world of smartphones and tablets and ebooks, Maribel felt impossibly
old-fashioned.  She didn’t have a Facebook or Twitter account.  She still
preferred to read paper books over ebooks.  And she needed to
see
a man in-person—hear
his voice, look into his eyes, assess his manners, feel his sensitivity towards
her—in order to judge whether or not spending her one free afternoon a week
with him was better than spending that afternoon in her studio apartment,
sipping hot chocolate and reading a romance novel from the library.  

Maribel looked down at the gift bag.  She was already
wearing the ruby pendant necklace. 
What else could he possibly have bought
for her?
  She shifted through the ruffles of white tissue paper like she
was peeking inside a gift intended for someone else.  There, under billows of
white, was the corner of a powered blue box with white ribbon. 
Yes, it was the
real thing
—
an authentic piece of jewelry from Tiffany & Co
.  Maribel
sat back in her seat and peered out onto Lake Shore Drive. They were
approaching the Magnificent Mile, where she had often strolled along Michigan
Avenue during her lunch hour, and window shopped all of the finest retail
jewelers—Cartier, Harry Winston, Georg Jensen, Bulgari—but none of them
captivated her more than Tiffany & Co in the Peninsula building.  And yet,
she never entered the store.  She knew how store attendants were trained to
immediately assess the net worth of a potential customers; Maribel would be
dismissed by them as a having a net worth of a gnat.  As merely a high school
graduate, she had worked her way up into the fine jewelry section of the
department store and she was proud of it, but she also knew her place in the
world.  Stores like Tiffany & Co. were sophisticated sanctuaries reserved
for the wealthy elite. They were havens that Maribel admired from the outside
without daring to dream that one day she would be invited in.  Now, Miles Braxton-Worth
was sending her an invitation—a crisp white gift card attached to the bag’s
white silk rope handles.  It read:

Thanks for the tip about the earrings.  I checked.  Miles
.

The suspense was unbearable. 
What could he mean?
 
She quickly dug into the bag and found the signature mint blue jewelry case. 
She flipped it open and gazed inside—two dazzling tear-drop ruby and diamond
earrings twinkled back at her. Their checkerboard cut face and platinum setting
matched her ruby pendant necklace. Maribel touched her ears. 
Thanks for the
tip about the earrings, I checked…
Maribel never even noticed him checking
to see if her ears were pierced.  In fact, she often had forgotten her ears
were pierced because she wore the same cubic zirconia studs every day.  They
had been an early graduation gift from her mother, and she had never considered
wearing anything else.

Jewelry—
any jewelry
—from Tiffany’s easily
cost five-figures, much less pieces with decent-sized diamond and rubies.
Maribel,
what are you doing....
she fretted, suddenly reconsidering everything. 
This
is not you, this is not your world, this is a total and complete mistake.
 
But it was too late.  The car dropped below street level and into an
underground parking garage.  Their destination was near.

 Maribel unfastened one of the ruby earrings from
its case and held it in her hand.  It caught the flare of the garage’s
fluorescent lights and throbbed in her palm like a glowing ember.  Maribel made
an effort to swap out her mother’s earrings for her new gift.  She felt like
royalty as the tear-drops earrings grazed her skin, just below her ear lobe,
and watched as the Mercedes rolled up in front of a ramp and stopped in front
of a private garage door. 

The driver lowered the tinted window and called back
to her, “Almost here,” he confirmed, then leaned out his window to enter a
keycard into the security pad.  The garage door rumbled open, and the driver
navigated the Mercedes up the ramp and into the private parking garage.  There
was a white Bentley, two sports cars—a red Ferrari and a vintage black corvette—two
motorcycles, and one silver Tesla.  The driver parked next to the Bentley and
quickly opened the door, offering his hand for assistance. “Please…”

Maribel stuffed the Tiffany’s bag into her purse and
reluctantly slid out of the car.  She followed the driver’s lead up a flight of
concrete stairs and through a heavy door that suddenly opened into an opulent
lobby with marble flooring and a crystal chandelier.  She glimpsed out through
the brass revolving doors and recognized Michigan Avenue—its familiar boulevard
and crowds of tourists were a relief. 
They must be in a skyscraper along
Michigan Avenue
, she thought as she followed the driver through the main
corridor and past the doorman’s podium.  The driver nodded to him, and the
doorman greeted Maribel with a curt tip of his cap.

“Miss,” he nodded with formality.  Maribel smiled in
return.

The driver led her towards the elevators and into
the center cab, its doors opened wide, awaiting her entrance. 

“Mr. Braxton-Worth is waiting for you,” he confirmed,
then pressed the button marked “78”, allowing the doors to slide shut between
them.  Suddenly, the elevator cab accelerated upwards with a whirl.  Maribel glanced
at all seventy-eight elevator buttons.  Seventy-eight was the final floor.  Her
stomach butterflied, feeling the sensation of speed as the cab jetted upwards
without restraint. 
Forty-five, forty-six, forty-seven, forty-eight
… Maribel
watched and heard every floor chime in succession. 
Dear God, it was endless
. 
Fifty-nine, sixty, sixty-one, sixty-two
… Maribel had never been in an
elevator with this many floors, not even as a tourist to the top of the Hancock
Building or Willis Tower.  Finally, the elevator cab ebbed to a stop and the
seventy-eighth floor bell chimed.  The doors shimmered open.  Maribel stepped
out into the receiving area of an elegant, but empty restaurant.  She was
greeted by a pleasant man in a tailored waiter’s uniform.

“Miss
Martinez?” he smiled.

“Yes…”

“Right
this way.”

The
waiter led her through rows and rows of tables, dressed with crisp white table
cloths and decorated with crystal bud vases of fresh pink roses.  Immediately, Maribel
spotted Miles, seated in a secluded corner of the restaurant.   
My God, he
was so impossibly handsome
, Maribel thought with an exhale.  All her
uncertainty about whether or not she should come were dispelled when she saw
him sitting there, flanked in sunlight.  He was peering out the panoramic wall
of windows that offered a sweeping view of the Gold Coast beachfront and the
crystal waters of Lake Michigan.  He looked young and relaxed, his dark hair
and Mediterranean complexion glowed with warmth.  He wore a charcoal suit and
stark turquoise tie that flattered his piercing blue eyes, which seized upon
her. 

She
strode through the empty white tabletops in her black coat and black earmuffs
like a bounding rabbit cutting through snowdrifts. 

Earmuffs
,
he suddenly thought.

Miles
Braxton-Worth had been gazing out at the immense skyline and considering his
life and all the responsibilities he needed to address with every one of his
buildings.  His eyes were surveying all his properties along the Northshore
that he could see—
one, two, three, four
… he had started to count them
before losing interest, as if none of it mattered because finally she had
arrived.  And he absolutely loved that about her.

No
one in the business world wore earmuffs
, he pondered, and
tried hard to not smile as she approached him.  Her brown eyes caught his gaze
immediately, and refused to drop it until he acknowledged her.  He rose from
his seat and circled around to meet her.

Earmuffs
,
Miles thought again, hiding another smile.
Curious and endearing, like her
. 

 “Allow
me,” he said, offering to remove her coat.  Maribel consented with ease.  As he
guided her into the leather high-back chair across from him, he caught the
faint scent of her perfume and noticed her shell pink sweater that scooped
along her graceful shoulders.  And there, twinkling down along her attractive
neckline, was the ruby necklace. 

“Javier,”
Miles said, passing off her coat to the waiter, “wine for Miss Martinez, and then
the starters…please.” He added at the end, like punctuation.

“Very
good, sir.” Javier jetted away to fulfill the request.

Maribel
flushed, suddenly realizing she was still wearing her earmuffs.  She used the
distraction to pull off her earmuffs and stuff them into her purse. 

She
didn’t notice the way Miles shifted his eyes back onto her.  The sunlight
streamed through the floor-to-ceiling windows and highlighted her long black
hair, full lips and olive complexion. 
She was so naturally gorgeous
. 
He took up his wine glass and released a warm smile, waiting for her to settle
into the environment before attempting to make conversation.

 “I
wasn’t sure you would come,” he finally said.

 “I wasn’t sure either,” she suddenly confessed with
a small laugh—it was laughter of relief—an exhaling sigh, signaling the release
of hours and hours of anxiety and anticipation.  And it made them both grin a
little wider than either of them expected.