Top Love: An Alpha Billionaire Romance (Young Adult Stepbrother and Billionaire Romance Stories) (37 page)

“Easy now.  Don’t you dare threaten me.  Not in the position you’re in, mommy to be.”

“Why the fuck did I trust you in the first place?”

“Because Barb.  You just needed someone to use.  Just like you always do.  People like you are always so lonely.  Pretty easy to fool.  Your fake compassion is what drives you.  So you make friends with people just so they can buy you stuff, get favors and the like.  Now you’ve got a billion dollar boyfriend and you do the same old trick.”

“You know I’m pregnant, right?” I said, fuming.  Wanting to beat the hell out of my so called friend, but too afraid to hurt myself in the process.  “If I lose this baby…”

“Oh I know, Barb,” she said with a smile.  “You know how much we’re going to make off of Alfred Banes with this score?  Twenty five million.  You know if you were in my shoes, you’d do the same thing.  Not now of course.  But back then, before you ever met Banes.  You were just like me and you would have done the same fucking thing and you know it!  …Hell, nobody really wants to work in a fucking grocery store all their life.  Ain’t that right?”

Paranoia…it’s all paranoia.  That’s what I told myself.

Yeah right.  Sometimes it’s not.  Sometimes your paranoia is your good instinct telling you to beware of what’s coming.  Sometimes it’s just living a life that other people hate that puts an innocent person at risk.  The only illusion is that anyone is really happy.  Life sucks for everybody…rich or poor.

***

A long time has passed since I’ve written a letter to you, Mister Banes.  As you well know.  I know that I haven’t been completely honest with you, about all that happened during “the incident.”  But I’m ready to confess everything. 

I don’t know where you are at the moment, but maybe it’s good to just talk this out myself, and write down my most honest thoughts, unfiltered and uncensored.  We have had quite the up and down relationship, haven’t we? 

What started as a traffic collision proved to be a “billion dollar” affair.  I always wondered in the back of my mind if you thought I was just after your money.  Ironically, I did keep a tab and according to my math, I only owe you less than $1,000, which I have never avoided paying you.  You simply told me not to worry about it.  Well, I should say that doesn’t count the cost of the wreck.

But it was never your money or your fame that attracted me.  Just so you know, it was your good heart.  I’d be lying if I said it was only your good heart.  I think deep down, most girls like me want a challenge.  You were always complicated.  Not so much rude or insulting – just communicatively challenged.  And I struggled for a while to understand why you did the things you did.  Now that I understand you, I am in a better position to explain myself. 

And now, Alfie, I’m ready to tell you the whole story from beginning to end.

***

“You don’t have to do this,” I said to Chrissy, my new captor and conspirator and apparently a whore when it came to taking bribe money.  She put the pedal to the metal and sped off, letting me know that trying to escape from a speeding car was not an option.  She was driving me down a long road, Old Grandbury, and presumably to the middle of nowhere, where my captor was waiting. 

“I know I don’t have to,” she said bitterly. 

“You don’t care that I have a baby?  That my life and my baby’s life is in danger?”

“No, I don’t,” she said firmly.  “And besides, if your boyfriend pays the price, everybody goes home happy.

“Until someone else pulls the same trick.”

“But that’s not my problem, is it?”

“What do you think he’s going to do?”

“What?  Your boyfriend?”

“Yeah.  When he finds out you’ve been threatening me.”

“He’ll freak the fuck out and pay us, that’s what.  He doesn’t scare anybody, you know.  He’s just a rich douchebag.  That’s all he is.  Money is all he has.”

“He’ll make you pay,” I said.  “He loves me too much to let you get away with this.”

She laughed the thought off.  I was the only one who seemed to fear Alfred Banes, his potential at least, if not his good heart.  He was a joke to everyone else, but a monster among men to me.  I always adored the monster.  I wanted him to win this one.  To show these people he meant business.

But maybe all of this was out of Alfie’s league.  All I knew was I just wanted to go home. 

***

We arrived at the destination and the turncoat took me to a warehouse type structure on a dirt road, far from any civilized part of the city.  I trembled and objected but Chrissy wasted no time in dragging me out of the car.

I could have resisted, or fought her I suppose, but I was too afraid of hurting my baby.  Besides, I naively thought maybe I could negotiate or talk some sense into the kidnapper.  Maybe I was curious about who I was dealing with and if they wanted money…or something else.

Much to my chagrin, I did get to meet the mastermind behind the great steal and it was the worst possible scenario.

“Hello, Barbara.  So…Is it just me or do you look a little chubby lately?”

Victoria stood before me, looking downright mad.  The ex-wife of Alfie had returned and this time was seeing green, red and every shade of grey, and also despising me on a whole new level, besides just jealous rage.

“Oh, hi,” I said with a nervous flinch.

“I’m surprised you came willingly,” she said. 

I sighed.  “Well, I didn’t have much of a choice.  I trusted Chrissy.  She brought me out here.  I didn’t bring my phone.  So what are you going to do to keep me here, Victoria?  Aim a gun at me?  Beat me up?  I wanted to talk this out rationally.”

“Oh I very much agree.”

“So what?  You want a price?  How much?  I’ll deliver the message to Alfie…Alfred.  And then you promise to leave us alone?”

“Money?  Darling, I got plenty in the divorce settlement.  I have no need of money.”

My newfound confidence melted away.  How was I supposed to negotiate with a woman who didn’t care about money—the only thing I thought Alfie had for any of these envious women.

“What…what do you want?” I said with a gulp.

“Darling, I brought you here to help you, not kidnap you.  I don’t care about money.  I don’t even want to hurt Alfie anymore than you do.  I simply want to reach out to you, woman to woman.”

“Why?”

“Because I fear that you may be in over your head.  I want to warn you of what’s going to happen.”

“Whoah, wait a minute,” said Chrissy, speaking up.  “I thought we were doing this for the money.”

“I’ll pay you what I said I would,” Victoria said adamantly.

“No, you said we were splitting in three ways.  Twenty-million—”

“How much do you want right now?” she screeched back, grabbing her purse and rummaging through the contents.  “What?  Ten million?  Twenty million?”

Victoria swiftly chucked the purse and pounded it into Chrissy’s face, knocking her unconscious and probably a mortal wound. 

“Fuck!” I screamed, watching in terror as Victoria pulled a brick out of the purse and sat it down on a nearby table.  No doubt a warning, I figured, as she watched me curiously for a reaction, feasting her devilish diamond eyes on me.

I took a deep gulp but tried to hide the panic on my face.  The woman was batshit crazy…and yet she had an oddly platonic tone when talking to me.

“So…as I was saying…”

But she certainly demonstrated who was in charge.  And just how worthless I really was to her.  What in the world could she possibly want from me…from us?

As if reading my mind, the woman looked straight into my weak soul and spoke an uncomfortable truth.  “I want you to know who the real Alfred Banes is.  You’re naïve.  You think you’re in love.  Just as I once did.”

“Well…not in love.  Just dating.”

“And is that child he accidentally gave you, what, an engagement ring?”

I sighed quietly.  She was already poking me in my most vulnerable spot.  I had no idea what I meant to Alfred, let alone what our future held.

“What are you saying?  Just tell me.”

“I’m saying that you are me, about ten years ago.  I used to be head over heels in love with him too, you know.  Before realizing the kind of man he was.  He was the kind of man to make you feel confused, more than loved.  He wanted you curiosity, he would do anything for your attention.  But when it came time to love, he was emotionally vacant.”

I frowned and couldn’t help but listen in respect.  She was telling me everything I already felt.

“He doesn’t know how to love.  Only how to control women and make them suffer.  It’s what he did to me.  Sure, if I’m being honest, I am jealous of you.  But I am also older and wiser, darling.  And I know now that I don’t hate you, but him.”

“What did he do to you that was so terrible?”

“He didn’t just dump me like an old sack of potatoes.  He cheated on me.  He was unfaithful during our marriage.”

I tried to flinch away the suspicion, remembering that the woman was freaking insane and just knocked my former friend unconscious.  But…she did kind of have it coming for selling me out.

“I don’t believe you.”

“He cheated on me after I became pregnant.  Does that sound familiar?”

“What?  But…he doesn’t have any children.”

“Not that you know,” she said confidently.  “And besides…I had a miscarriage.  I sure hope he has learned a better bedside manner now that he’s all grown up.”

“I choose not to believe you,” I said strongly.  “I don’t care what you say.  I trust him over you.  And if I didn’t hate Chrissy for selling me out, I would call the police on you.  Now take me back home.  And I won’t press charges.”

“Mmmm…it’s not that easy, darling,” she said, a wicked little gaze coming back to her face.  She knew what this was.  She was just playing coy, toying with me just as much as Alfred—if not worse.  “Although I consider myself a hospitable stalker, I DO actually have requirements that I need from you.”

“Like what?”

“You’re not going back to him.  I want you to stay here and see what I see.  I don’t want you to trust me.  I want you to see it for yourself.  See him cheating on you, in the flesh.  It’s the closure I need, to let someone know, to show someone who he really is.  I am so tired of the world loving this odious man and not seeing through his lies.”

“How?” I said uncertainly.

“I’m going to let you see him.  I’m going to recreate the perfect scenario of infidelity and let you watch via satellite as he fucks someone else’s brains out.  All the while you and that delightful baby are waiting like fools.”

“You’re wasting your time.  He wouldn’t cheat on me.”

“Of course not.  How could a man ever stoop so low?  No, maybe he would force you to make love to another man instead.  Forcing you to keep your eyes closed while a strange new pair of lips kiss you in the night?”

I stared in heartbreak.  Everything she said sounded true.  It had to be a lie.  I had to be missing something.  How could she be describing the man I love?

“I know all about his games.  He always wins.  I’ll bet you’re figuring that part out too.  Go ahead and laugh in my face.  But I’m going to make damn sure that you watch it happen.  Not tonight…but this weekend.  Saturday night.  We’re going to watch it together.  I want to be there the second that your heart breaks.  It’ll feel like old times.”

***

Victoria was a fairly kind and hospitable kidnapping hostess and made sure that I at least had a warm and moderately soft bed inside my “apartment”, a one bedroom studio that was locked from the outside.  Victoria kept me in waiting for days, giving me two meals a day and a change of prison-like clothes.

It didn’t matter if I pleaded with her to let me go.  She wasn’t interested in negotiation or money.  I could see plainly that her only interest was in breaking my heart, making me feel what she feels—to have loved and lost a great man.  It didn’t take much to see that Victoria’s quest was revenge.  I could have fought with her, for those first few hours, I suppose.  But since Victoria already cold-clocked Chrissy and then sent her away, I really wasn’t in the adventurer frame of mind.

I suppose, truth be told, I just wanted to see what she insisted I see.  She challenged me.  She told me that I would see firsthand what a creep Alfred was.  It was a taunt, as much as a challenge, and not really a threat.  It would be cowardly to try and run away and deny myself the chance to learn—to see what she sees.

I don’t know.  Maybe she got to me.  Or maybe I was psyching myself out.  Either way, I was stuck there until my baby’s father came to rescue me or until the crazy woman let me go.

Two nights passed and nothing.  We were waiting until Saturday when the big revelation would happen.  I was curious as to why Alfred hadn’t come bursting through the walls, eager to protect me.  I figured logically that he was probably frantic, investigating my disappearance.  Maybe not too eager to call the police, especially if he knew Victoria was behind it.  Maybe she sent a ransom note.