Shopping for a Billionaire 3 (16 page)

Fortunately, I have a taste in shoes that veers pretty close to that of a skateboarder, so I’m safe.

He sniffs the air, narrows his eyes, and looks at the phone in my hand.
Go
ahead,
he seems to say.
Make my day.
 

Now my cat is giving me Dirty Harry lines. This is worse than I thought.

“But before you read your messages, you need to read Jessica Coffin’s Twitter feed,” Amanda explains as she comes out of the bathroom shoeless. “It’s…well, honey,” she says with a compassion that makes my heart race. “Honey, you need to have that coffee in you.”

‘Honey’ is what Declan calls me
, I almost cry out. It sounds pathetic and ominous when Amanda does it.
 

“How bad can some frozen woman’s Twitter feed be? What does it have to do with my life?” They’re scaring me. She’s just some woman Steve dated. Some woman who wanted Declan.

“
R
emember yesterday at the credit union?”

“How could I forget?”

“How we ran into Steve’s mom?”

“Get to the point.” Amy brings me a coffee and I take a sip, burning my tongue. The coffee could peel paint, it’s so strong, but that appears to be intentional.

Oh, boy.

“Monica must have said something to Steve who said something to Jessica.”
Amanda
and Amy share a look that makes my blood run cold. Chuckles smiles.
I should rent him out as an interrogator for the Russian mob.
 

Oh, this is bad. Really bad.

“And Jessica—what? Mentioned me on her Twitter feed?” I make a huffy laughing sound. Ludicrous.
What’s a Tweet going to do to me? Hurt my Klout score? Ouch. You hurt my fake internet feelings.
 

They look at me with alarm. “Yes,” they say in unison.

I glare at Amanda. “I knew that tentacle porn comment would bring us nothing but trouble.”

I reach for my phone in slow motion, like something out of
T
he Matrix
, except instead of feeling like I’m part of some kickass save-the-world moment, I feel like an insect that is two seconds away from being crushed by the windshield of a Mini Cooper.

Amanda holds her phone out to me
as Amy stares at her and whispers, “Tentacle porn? Do I even want to ask?”
 

@jesscoff
N
says:
Lesbians who date billionaires to make big business deals. Sounds like a reality TV show or a trashy romance novel
 

“
T
hat’s it?” I laugh. “No one cares.”

“Look at the stream that follows,” Amy says in a voice you’d use to tell someone they’ve walked around in front of the CEO of their corporation with their skirt shoved in the waistband of their pantyhose.

@bigdealmkr:
Let me guess. SJ? Unbelievable
 

“SJ? Shannon Jacoby? What? People talking about me online using my initials? C’mon, guys, this is…” My voice disappears as I read the rest. Bigdealmkr is Steve. I remember the day he picked his username.

@jesscoff
N
:
@bigdealmkr I guess some people are so desperate they’ll stoop to anything, even cheating on their wife to make a business deal
 

“What? What?” I scream with laughter. “This is fucking hilarious!”

“Keep reading,” Amanda urges, nudging my elbow so I’ll drink more coffee. I suck down half the now-cooler cup and my eyes scan the page as I scroll through.

About twenty people asking Jessica to “dish” or “spill.” Obviously scheduled tweets from Jessica for places to eat or shop.

“
T
his is nothing!” I insist. And while a creepy, cold electric feeling is growing in my gut, I stand by that. I mean it. This is just stupid online social media crap that doesn’t affect me in real life. Right?

“Look at the one that Tweets Declan.”

“Declan?” That cold electric feeling sparks like someone’s flipped a breaker.

@jesscoff
N
@
anterdec2
How’s business?
 

“That’s no big deal.” But my voice is shaking. I’m
quivering, the vibrations deep inside, like a flock of birds has been scared by a distant gunshot and needs to flee, flying straight up without a plan or a pattern. Just panicking and needing to move.
 

Thousands of birds inside me begin their sudden migration, but there’s no way out. They bang into my bones, my skin, my muscles.

“
H
e never responds,” Amy says quickly, eyes wide and so blue
I want to swim in them
.

“
Why would he? He knows it’s bullshit.” But that’s the problem, I fear: does he? When you don’t know what people are saying about you to others behind your back, all you’re left with is your own crazy imagination. And I have a penchant for self-torture that is so strong I should headline at a masochists’ convention.
 

“Check your messages. Maybe he texted or called.”

My fingers feel like icicles as I fu
m
ble with my phone. No voice mail. A quick scan of my email shows a few communications with mystery shoppers who encountered problems, a couple who lost receipts, and a ton of junk mail.

1
57 text messages.

I open the app with a finger that feels like I’m pushing the nuclear war button.

I’m getting tweets from people in high school who didn’t bother to acknowledge I existed back then. People who openly mocked me. And is that my former orthodontist? Christ. Who’s next? My gynecolo—

Y
ep. @openwide
123
—
t
hat’s the gyn
ecologist
, not the ortho.

Most of the messages,
though,
are gibberish from people I don’t know, all from Twitter. I opened an account a few years ago but barely use it. Did someone loop me into the @jesscoff
N
conversation?

Amy explains. “Steve did it. He referenced you. You can see it in his feed.”

“We can explain this to Declan,” Amanda whispers as I groan.

I ignore her, searching my messages. Nothing from Declan. Nothing. Not a word. Silence is worse than outrage.

Much worse.

“
We have a meeting today with him,” Amanda adds.
 

“Who?” My voice sounds like it’s coming fro
m
the end of a very long tunnel.

“Declan. We’re meeting with Anterdec today.”

“Oh, God.” I pull the covers over my head like it will accomplish something. Inside my white, billowy pretend cloud of escape, I wish I could go back to being five years old, when the worst thing that could happen to me was to have to wear the wrong colored ribbon.

A
my comes back in. “Shannon? Come out from under there,” she insists. I pop my head out like a turtle checking it out after an atom bomb’s been dropped.

In my panic I hadn’t noticed she took my empty coffee cup and
now
she’s returning with a full one. When did she become so servile? Ever since I met Declan she’s been waiting on me. Not that I mind—coffee in bed is best served by a naked man who s
m
ells like sex, but a close second is, well…
anyone
delivering hot coffee in bed.

I reach for the cup, grateful. “Thanks.”

“No text from Declan?” she asks, pointing to my phone.

“Nope.”

“You’re sure? With a bazillion messages you might have missed one.”

“Go
a
head.” I point my chin at my own smartphone. “See for yourself. Or,” I add, t
a
king a long sip of coffee, “
don’
t
see. There’s nothing to see. He’s dumped me, hasn’t he?”

A big, tight wave of pain and lust billows through me. It’s the feeling of tidal waves pulling back from shore, exposing all the starfis
h
and hermit crabs to the sun and air, helpless and at the mercy of a force of nature so much stronger.

Jessica Twitterhead Coffin.

“That Tweet wasn’t so bad.”

“It’s pretty incriminating,” I mumble. I can’t believe my life has imploded because of comments made in 140 characters or less.
If brevity is the soul of wit, then Twitter is the steaming pile of manure at the end of the horse. Yeah, I know that comparison made no sense, but I’m sitting here in bed with 157 text messages, most of them from people with Twitter handles like @lebronsux4ever and @mygunmyheart and I’m supposed to have a cogent reaction?
 

A
nd not one damn message from Declan or @
anterdec2
or…

“Wait.” I snap my neck up at Amanda, who, I realize, is now a redhead. Her hair is the exact same color as Amy’s. I narrow my eyes. “You said we have a meeting with Declan today?”

“And James and…Andrew.” I can see long strands of drool coming out of her bright-red-painted mouth when she says that last word. Great. Now my best friend wants to hump
m
y boyfriend’s brother. This could be a sitcom.

Except a good sitcom needs a crazy mother to invade at just the right moment. I pause, because if ever there were a time for Mom to appear, it would be now. I close my eyes, cross my legs, and just…wait.

Chuckles climbs on my bed and settles into my lap. This must be worse than I thought if he’s offering me comfort. You know how those nature shows on cable TV talk about how animals have a preternatural insti
n
ct to sniff out natural disasters like tornadoes and earthquakes before they happen?

Uh oh.

“
Why did you just go blank?” Amy asks. She keeps wandering in and out of the room and I see why. Her hair is pulled up now in a perfect up-do, one long, springy curl cascading down around each ear. Her work suit is cut to fit her curves and she’s inserting a simple pearl earring
into one creamy lobe.
 

“Why do you look like a young Chelsea Clinton?”

She beams. “Do I? Because she worked for venture capital firms, too,
and now she makes $600,000 a year
!” My inadvertent compliment makes me forget, for a split second, the mess in cyberspace I apparently need to deal with in real life. At Anterdec.

Today.

“
I think that $600,000 has something to do with her last name, Amy.”
 

“Whatever.” Amy fluffs her hair. “If I can make half that I don’t need to chase billionaires.”

O
uch. Chuckles leaps off my lap and gives her ankles a rub.
Too bad she’s not wearing laces. His head twitches around and our eyes lock, as if my damn cat read my mind.
 

“What time is the meeting?” I ask Amanda.

“One o’clock. But Greg wants to have a strategy session before we go.”

“Strategy session?”

“James McCormick wants us to start evaluating his high-end properties immediately.
T
hey’ve experienced a significant financial loss over the past two quarters at their major hotels, specifically.” She claps her hands with joy, like Pee Wee Herman. “We’re gonna shop The Fort! We’re gonna shop The Fort.”

All I can manage is a scowl. “One o’clock.” Can I wait that long?

My damn mind-reading friend says, “Text him. Call him.”

“He didn’t text or call me!”

“Maybe he’s just busy.”

“Amanda, he was sexting nonstop after our
last
date, and then he goes cold.”
I hold up a finger to get her to pause. She’s sliding her shoes back on, and I want to warn her, but...
 

I
type
Please call me
and click send, hoping he replies.

She watches me, and when I’m done Amanda says,
“
Maybe he l
ost his phone in a toilet?”

I throw a pillow at her. Chuckles chases after it, then stops at her foot. I open my mouth to
say something
but it’s too late.

“Jesus Christ!” she screams as a thin stream of yellow pee hits her foot.
She limps back into the bathroom, whimpering something that sounds close to a Scottish curse you’d hear Geillis Duncan mutter in one of the
Outlander
books.
 

Chuckles looks back and me and I
s
wear he winks.

“Bad kitty,” I mutter through a smile.

“
Did you train him to do that? Why does he pee on laces and gladiator shoes, of all things?”
 

“Your kink is not my kink,” Amy says as she s
l
ings her leather bag over her shoulder. She really does look like a commanding businesswoman, ready to take on a boardroom full of investors, cat-pee-free and blissfully unencumbered by Twitter rumors about her sociopathic use of a bad-boy billionaire to clinch a business deal while cheating on her lesbian wife.

Say that five times fast.

“
What does that even mean?” Amanda shouts from the other room. “I don’t have a kink. I’m vanilla.”
 

“Nobody’s truly vanilla,” Amy scoffs. She gives me a mischievous look, playing Amanda. “You have to have a kink. Getting golden showers from Grumpy Cat, for instance.”

“Golden
what
?”
 

Amy frowns at me. “And
she’s
the one who gets to do sexy toy store evaluations?” She shakes her head sadly but, thankfully, does not elaborate.

“No, but Mom offered to go with her on those.”

Amy’s face twists with agony. “Poor Amanda.”

“Right. Mom has a kink or two she can lend.”

“I don’t need a kink!” Amanda insists, walking into my bedroom smelling like the orange air freshener spray we keep in there.

“Everyone needs a kink,” Amy and I say in unison.

And it was like say
i
ng
Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice
,
because my front door opens and in walks my mom.

“
You summoned her!” Amanda hisses. She’s holding her sandals again, and turns to my closet just as Mom walks into the scene. “You better have some nice shoes I can borrow.”