The Billionaire's Desire (A Billionaire BWWM Steamy Romance) (2 page)

Chapter Three

Carter

I'm on
hold, but not for long. By the sound of his huffing, Dennis Fallon must have
sprinted to the phone the minute he heard I was calling.

"Carter!
Good to hear from you! How's the weather?" he wheezes into the receiver. I
wonder mildly what I'd do if my congressperson had a heart attack and dropped
dead right now.

"The
weather is pretty much the same as yours, Dennis. I'm only fifteen miles
away."

"Of
course, of course." He sounds embarrassed, and I'm getting annoyed. I was
expecting news from him today and it's already 11:45 in the morning. "So
how can I help you?"

"You
know damn well why I'm calling, Dennis, cut the shit."

Dennis
exhales heavily and I can picture him collapsing into his leather swivel chair.
I used to spend a lot of time in his office...back before the accident. I had
the layout memorized and I doubt he had changed anything in two years.
Congressman Dennis Fallon was not a man who moved quickly...on anything. It was
a quality I admired in him back in the day, but now I was impatient to see
results.

"Dennis?"

He
hears the warning in my tone and sighs again. "It's stuck in committee for
the time being. I'm having a real hard time with these First Amendment
nuts." His voice rises. "The rights of journalism and speech and all
that."

"It's
not fucking journalism," I explode. "It's harassment and it should be
fucking illegal. My parents...."

"I
know, Carter, believe me, I know. We're going to get justice, you just gotta
hold tight on this. Laws like this are never easy."

I sigh
and sit back, looking out the great, expansive window and over the bay. Dennis
is somewhere over the horizon, a quick helicopter ride away. I could fly there
right now, grease his palm again,
speak
the only
language he seems to understand.

But I
can't do that.

I'm
already breaking out in a cold sweat at the very thought. My hands are shaking
as I reach for the pills I always keep close by. I don't need Dennis to know
that I have worked myself into a damn panic attack over his ineptitude.

And the
wedding too, I remind myself. I promised my baby sister that I was well enough
to host her big day and I'd be damned if I wasn't going to make good on my
promise.

"Carter?"
Dennis is shuffling the phone around. "You still there? Damn phone
connection, cutting out...."

"Fine.
Keep me informed," I interrupt him crisply, and hang up before he can say
goodbye.

I sit
back in my chair and look back out over the water. The gulls are wheeling over
the bay, and I can tell by the angle of the sun that I need to head out there
if I want to get my daily swim in before my conference call. But I can't stop
staring at the gulls as they swoop and dive en masse.
How can they stand to be so near each other? Jockeying for food,
resources...air itself?

Fuck. I
turn my head away from the windows. It's a sorry fucking state of affairs if
fucking seagulls are enough to trigger an attack of the crippling agoraphobia
that has confined me to Annika Island for two long, lonely years. Time heals
all wounds, they say, but the hurt is still right
there
,
red and rubbed raw by guilt.

I should have died. Not them. It was me
they were after. It was me they wanted. Not my parents.
 

Chapter Four

Sanniyah

I open
up another browser tab and then angrily close it down,. Then I smack myself on
the hand for good measure.

"Focus,
Yahya," I admonish myself. "Time for working."

But my
fingers seem to have a mind of their own, and before I can stop myself, I have
a new tab open and I am typing Carter Easton's name into the browser window.

The
results are instant...and lengthy. I scan down the page, feeling my mouth start
to gape.

His
smiling face, startlingly good looking in a way that makes my breath catch, is
everywhere.

I know
who Carter Easton is. Everyone does. But I never realized just how much the man
had been in the public eye a few years ago. I had been struggling to put myself
through business school back then, with no extra time to pay attention to the
lives of the rich and famous, so I had missed out on what a craze he was. Now,
as I scroll through the years of coverage, I feel myself reacting with a
mixture of fascination and revulsion. Fascination with the man himself.
Revulsion at the sheer depth of detail splashed all over the
internet
.

 
There were reams of interviews,
snapshots,
paparazzi
photos. Telephoto shots of him on
the beach, his chiseled torso on proud display, though it is clear he has no
idea he is being watched. Clearly private moments and conversations,
a cheek kiss
with a woman that caused wild speculation, only
to turn out to be his mother. Details of his dating life, his hobbies, his
childhood home, all out there for me to read at my leisure.

I feel
like a peeping Tom....

Quickly,
I close all of the tabloid articles, hot shame consuming me out of nowhere. I
pause for a moment, thinking that I should really stop right here. I've learned
too much already, stuff I have no business prying into. He is a client now, and
he deserves my professional detachment. I really should stop researching him. I
make as if to shut my laptop.

Instead,
I open up his Wikipedia entry and keep on reading, compelled to know more about
the man.

The
picture that accompanies his article is the same headshot I keep seeing
everywhere, and once again I feel that strange fluttering in my belly as I
stare at the screen. He is handsome in a way that can only be described as
"rugged," as if Bradley Cooper and Chris Hemsworth somehow had a baby
who grew up to be a CEO.

And he wasn't
just your average CEO, not by a long shot. Carter Easton
was
Easton Ventures.
His
annual shareholder meetings brought movie premier levels of excitement, and the
accompanying press was always breathless in its coverage. He seemed to enjoy
stunt appearances too, whether it was the summer he tested out the new line of
mountaineering equipment by climbing all of Colorado's fourteeners himself, or
building a submersible to test the depth resistance of the Easton brand of
diving watches. He started Easton Ventures as a touring company and quickly
moved it into a brand. His brand. He was an adventurer, a maverick and people
wanted to be just like him. And the press loved him.

And
then he just
disappeared
.

I close
Wikipedia and go back to my search. I scroll back up, wondering if I had missed
something. I knew about the disappearance, but what I didn't know, was why.

And
then I find it. The very first article, oddly enough in the business section of
the local paper, titled rather ominously. "Easton Ventures Founders as
Rumors Swirl Around CEO."

The
first paragraph was terse enough to make my lip curl.

"Easton
Ventures, the outdoors behemoth, took a nosedive in the markets today amidst
rumors of charismatic CEO Carter Easton's nervous breakdown. Easton, 28, has
not been seen or heard from since the night of the fiery wreck that took the
lives of his parents, Annika and Dale Easton. Carter Easton blames the
paparazzi for chasing his parents' car under the mistaken impression that he
was in it. Easton's PR team is scrambling to repair the damage done by a
garbled and disturbing press release sent out by Easton himself in which he
vows to seek justice in the courts by any means necessary."

I sit
back in my office chair and nervously chew on my fingers. Is that all? There
has to be more. I search again, this time for Carter Easton latest news, and the
very same headline I saw in the checkout aisle pops up again.

"The
Broken Billionaire: Why is Carter Easton Hiding?"

The
language in this article is much more florid, going into wild, speculative
detail about his reasons for disappearing. But one paragraph in particular
stands out.

"Cocky,
swaggering Easton was once the darling of the glitterati, part of the clique of
rarified jet-set explorers who aren't content with the idleness of the rich.
Carter Easton was a man of action. Impulsive to the point of recklessness, he
still had the magic touch necessary to smooth any ruffled feathers.

But now
the ruffled feathers are his own. Sources close to the Eastons say that he
spends all of his time in seclusion on his own private island, unwilling, or
rather, it seems, unable to set foot on the mainland. Those same sources say he
visits the company that bears his name only under the cover of darkness and that
he has all but given up control of the company he founded to crusade against
the paparazzi."

When I
am done reading, I swallow back the sick feeling fluttering in my stomach. A
reclusive, paranoid weirdo, and
I'm
supposed to meet
with him tomorrow. On his private island…where I will be completely at his
mercy. No one has seen, or heard from him in two years, and yet I'm supposed to
just fly off in his private helicopter like a lamb to the slaughter.

I grab
my phone and fire off a text to my best friend Tricia. "I'm going to meet
with a client tomorrow. I want you to check and make sure I make it home okay."

She
beeps back. "You afraid of axe murderers?"

I
shiver a little. "Something
like
that."

Chapter
Five

Sanniyah

A private airport!

So that's what this is!

I have
my epiphany as I make the turn into off the highway. I must have passed this strip
of land a million times in my usual back and forth commute from downtown but I
had never considered what it was. It was hidden in plain view, only
recognizable to those who could use it.

This is
a familiar feeling and once again I have to wonder if I will ever stop feeling like
a pretender. No matter the expensive shoes, the prestige makeup, the polish and
the poise, I can never truly blend in with my wealthy clients. And try as I
might to keep it at bay, the resentment still rears its ugly head. That feeling
of being on the outside, looking in will never leave me, no matter how many
years separate me from my childhood.

When my mother woke me in the middle of the
night and told me to grab my things. When we left the house of the man we had
been living with as quietly as we could. The months spent in and out of
shelters, my mother's exhausted sobs in the cot next to mine.
..

That is
the part of my story that I gloss over when I speak of it now. When I give my
PR statements and press releases, I always emphasize the positive outcomes. The
literal rags to not-quite riches part of my life.
How we finally scraped enough together for a studio apartment with paper-thin
walls. How I hustled to get back to grade level when I was finally able to
attend school again.
 
How I
succeeded even with the odds stacked against me.

I leave
out the difficult bits. Like how I learned to blend in and
adapt
by planning out every word. How every thing I said and did became scripted and rehearsed.
How I would practice in the cracked mirror that sat on my rickety bedside
table, miming laughs and smiles; practicing a poise I didn't possess until it
was a mask I could slip into and wear comfortably.
 
My mother worked long hours and I was
left alone a lot, and I used that time alone to plan. Very soon I was able to
fit in anywhere I went. Adults praised my maturity, my poise,
my
professional demeanor. They didn't know it was the only
way I had survived.

I spun
those skills into a business. After working at a bridal salon, I set those
planning instincts into motion for a client, who hired me to finish everything
for her when she suddenly found herself pregnant. That was the first time and
the last time in my business that I was caught unprepared. By the time my bride
waddled up the aisle, hugely pregnant, Sanniyah Jones Events was born and I was
off and running.

Now I
can blend in effortlessly.

But
Carter Easton's wealth is on another level entirely.
 

I swing
my car into the space where I'm directed, my mind whirling. A private island,
how could someone possibly need all that space, all that privacy?
Reclusive be damned,
he has to have an ego the size of the island
itself,
I decide. A billionaire recluse, it is almost too clichéd to be
real. Deep down, he has to want to show off his fortune. That was probably why
he wanted to host the wedding. That had to be it.

I accept
the pilot's helping hand and step in to the helicopter like it is nothing at
all to me. As he runs his checks, I'm sitting in the seat, trying to harden my
heart.
This is no big thing to me at all,
I try to say with my body language.
I
ride on private helicopters every damn day.

But it
is impossible not to feel my breath catch in my throat as we lift off and zoom out
over the white-capped ocean. It shimmers below us in the summer sunlight,
showing the colors of turquoise in the shallows giving over to the deep indigo
of the depths.

Annika
Island is directly ahead, sitting like an emerald jewel in the sapphire sea,
curved like a crescent moon, the two points aimed towards the mainland. A huge mansion
sits above the bay, white and gleaming like a pearl necklace along the throat
of the island, clinging to the cliff through some marvel of architecture. As we
fly closer, I can see the white, sandy beaches in detail; little hidden coves
dotting the shoreline. My heart gives a little unwelcome lurch both from
jealousy and a twinge of fear. My hand wanders down to clasp my cellphone. I
still have full strength; I can call Tricia if I need to.

The
landing is so smooth I barely realize we are on the ground until the pilot
turns to help me exit. The helipad is attached to an air-conditioned garage,
filled with cars, at least fifteen that I can see although three or four
hulking shapes underneath tarps tell me he has even more. Where the heck does
he even drive this many cars? He lives on an island and commutes via
helicopter! The ridiculousness of Carter Easton is firmly entrenched in my
brain by now.

 
I am scoffing at him, even as the planning
wheels are turning. This is indeed an incredible location for a wedding. I step
out of the elevator into the first floor and stand stock still, taking it all
in.

The
walls are all glass, doors flung open to the sea breeze, the scents of the sea
wafting in on the light breeze. I turn my head and inhale the whisper of
jasmine and wonder if it grows wild in the tress in the wooded interior.

"Hello?"
I call into the wide-open space. There is no one there to greet me, which I
find odd. The helicopter pilot flew off immediately after dropping me off,
explaining that Mr. Easton allowed him to eat dinner with his family most
nights, and that he'd be back just as soon as I called. I try to ignore the
feeling of being trapped and tap out another message to Tricia. "Here on
the island. Will check in soon."

"Hello?"
I repeat, stepping forward. The whole first level is wrapped in an immense,
deep deck as large as the interior space. I am already moving towards it before
I realize I should probably wait to be invited. But dammit, if no one is going
to be here to greet me, how can I be invited?

Once I
step out onto the deck, it hits me. This is sheer perfection. There was never a
more perfect place to hold an intimate wedding. I can already imagine the
set-up. A sunset wedding out on the beach, cocktails on the deck, the colors of
pink reflecting off of the gentle peaks of the waves, while the sky above
flames in oranges and violets. A white pergola at the shoreline, the groom
dressed in white linen, the bride's hair loose and flowing. I will suggest
maids dresses that compliment the colors of the sky above, perhaps several
different shades of the same dress.

Already
the picture is forming in my head.

I stand
on the deck, the gentle breeze lifting my hair and brushing against my skin
like a lover's caress. I am sunk so deeply in my own, solitary vision that I
startle badly when I realize I am not alone.