Beauty and her Billionaire Beast Page 7

  I carefully place the framed photo back into the drawer and force my eyes closed. Who knows. Maybe we crossed paths last week and tonight for a reason. As my mind slowly drifts off, an outlandish idea forms.

  Isabelle and me. Maybe she showed up at exactly the right time.

  9

  Isabelle

  I lie awake in bed, my eyes staring blankly up at the ceiling. For the life of me, I can’t shake the memory of Knox’s last kiss. I hear a whimper leave my throat and run the pad of my index finger across my lips. They’re still a little swollen. Raw, like the ache that continues to grow in my chest.

  He wanted me and I turned him down. I should feel bad but saying no to Knox tonight gave me back a bit of my power. But God, how I wanted to say yes.

  Just the thought of giving in to temptation causes my core to clench, and I have to drag my thighs closed to ease the throbbing at my clit. Then our time in that cramped closet comes flooding back again. His strong wandering hands, his heated mouth at my puckered nipples, his cock filling me to completion, almost stretching my walls beyond their limits. And that soreness between my legs that lasted for days after that night.

  No wonder I bolted.

  If I had stayed, we never would’ve gotten back to dinner with our family, and my parents would not let me live it down. They’re already rooting for us to get together. No matter what, we can’t have anyone find out what we did, or what I fear we might do again if we’re anywhere in the vicinity of each other again. For that reason, I need to stay the hell away from the Hamptons and the Steele family for the Independence Day long weekend.

  I roll onto my side and glance at the bedroom window. My curtains are usually drawn at night, but I was so distracted when I got home tonight that they’re wide open, letting in the faint haze of a flickering streetlight. I catch sight of my alarm clock and notice the time. It’s two in the morning. I need to shut off my mind and get some sleep, but that won’t happen until I get a few things off my chest. There’s only one person in the world who can relate to what I’m going through.

  Unplugging my phone from the bedside charger, I scroll through my contact list until I make it down to my ‘P’ contacts, and hit the call button for my sister, Bethany. It’s barely midnight out west. She’s sure to still be up.

  I pace the apartment while I wait for her to answer, wishing desperately that she’ll pick up. I need some of her unfiltered down-to-earth energy to mellow me out. Nothing ever fazes Bethany. She’ll probably laugh when I lay it all out for her, and she’s sure to tell me to live a little.

  “Isa?” she answers in her lazy drawl. “How are you up so late, little sis?”

  “Beth, oh my God, remind me why you’re several states away again? I need you here so bad, sis.”

  “What’s going on? Are Mom and Dad giving you hell?”

  “Not exactly, but it’s a nightmare all the same. Gosh, where to I start? Okay…I bumped into someone a week ago, and I—”

  “Stop right there,” she says firmly. “Do not tell me you saw him. Is this about that lowlife bastard, Knox?” I open my mouth to answer but I hear her swear through the phone. “Please say that you saw him and told him to fuck off and go to hell. Isa?”

  “Well, I…I was angry at first, but we were at an engagement party. I think it was all that champagne, and all those cocktails, and the whiskey later on.”

  “Oh no, no, no, no. You drank with him?”

  “That, and a whole lot more,” I confess.

  “What the hell? You forgave him, didn’t you? I can’t believe you let that sorry excuse for a friend off the hook.”

  “We had sex.”

  The other end of the phone goes dead silent for a long stretch of time.

  “Beth?” I call. “Are you still there?”

  “Girl, you’ve gotta be shitting me,” she practically screeches through the phone. “You let him fuck you after he ditched your ass for ten goddamned years?”

  “Okay, take a breath,” I tell her. “It’s not what it sounds like.”

  “Like hell it ain’t. You’re calling me in the middle of the night, wanting my advice on this arrogant, cocky, spoiled son of a bitch, because you spread your legs for him after what, one chance meeting?”

  “Well Mom, Dad and I had dinner with him and his grandfather earlier tonight too.”

  “Hold on. Wait a minute. Mom and Dad are in on this too?”

  “No no, it wasn’t planned. Although, she did text me his number. We bumped into them at dinner, and you know how Dad is with his big campaign donors.”

  “Oh my gawdddddd,” she says, dragging out the last word. “You see why I got the hell outta Dodge when the time came? There’s only two modes in New York City. Fast, and crazy. And you, little sis, are on the crazy train.”

  “Are you going to continue to criticize me, or will you be my big sister for five seconds and just lend an ear?”

  She takes a loud, long breath that makes me feel she’s a lot closer than two thousand miles away. “All right, all right. I’ll hear you out. But don’t expect me to like the guy. You keep insisting that the two of you were just best friends, but I could tell there was a heck of a lot more between you, even if you never acted on it until now. He might’ve seen you as a friend, but you? Girl, you fell so hard for that guy that there was nothing left for you to land on.”

  My heart freezes in my chest and I have to swallow a few times just to open up the tightness in my throat.

  “I was never in love with him,” I shoot back and hear the defensiveness in my voice. “We were just friends. We were always just friends…until now.”

  “Oh yeah, sure. That’s why you cried yourself to sleep for ages after he left and forgot all about you… Look, sis. I’m sorry. I was never very good at being a nice, supportive sister. I’m gonna shut up now, and just listen to whatever you have to say.”

  Of course, now I don’t know what to say anymore. She’s already judged me, Knox, and our actions. I can’t ask her for advice on what to do. She won’t understand.

  “So, you saw him?” she asks after silence from my side.

  “I did.”

  “Are you together now?”

  “No, of course not. I’m just…I don’t know what to do. I see him everywhere I go now. And the attraction between us, it’s nothing like when we were friends, yet that bond is still so strong.”

  “Oh.”

  “And I have all these feelings that were never there before.”

  “I see.”

  “He kissed me tonight. There’s something going on with him. He’ll open up to me eventually, and I want to be there for him like before… but…”

  “But what?”

  “He’s so going to hurt me again. I can feel it already. Like my heart is breaking now because it knows what’s coming.”

  “Hmmm.”

  I know my sister isn’t being authentic. She’s holding her tongue. But even in her act, letting out my fears, hearing them out loud, it’s helping me.

  “You know what?” she asks, breaking the silence.

  “What?”

  “Take it a day at a time. For all you know, this is exactly what the two of you needed.”

  “What?”

  “You’re my sister and I love you. Go ahead. Get laid. Fall for him. Hear his hopes and dreams. Maybe this time, with sex in the equation, maybe this can work.”

  “Wait, what? How can you go from he’s a sorry ass son of a bitch to wishing me luck with him?”

  “Easy peasy, my darling. All I’m saying is try to live a little. If he breaks your heart, so what? Broken hearts heal…eventually. And I promise I won’t say I told you so if it doesn’t work out. I swear to God. I might fly back to kick his ass if that happens, but I won’t say I told you so. How’s that?”

  I flop down onto the bed. Bethany is no help. Not one bit. I need to work this out on my own. Not even Knox can give me all the answers. In a way, Bethany is right. I’m going to take a chance and live fo
r a change.

  “Thanks, Beth. You’ve been a big help.”

  She lets out a laugh. “Liar.”

  “No, really. I’ll take it day by day. Bottom line is I’m glad he’s back. So, I may make a few more mistakes, but I’m sure to enjoy at least some of it. It’s better than what I had going on before.”

  “True.”

  “Tell me about Colorado,” I say, moving on to her life.

  “Get your butt out here for a visit and you’ll see for yourself.”

  “I will, one day.”

  “Sure, all right then,” she groans. Mom has been out to see her once. Dad and I are yet to pay her a visit.

  “I will. I promise. You’ll see.”

  “Okay Isa. Thanks for calling. Love you.”

  “Love you too, big sis. Thanks for listening.”

  Once I hang up the phone, I pull the covers over me and close my eyes.

  If I see Knox again, there’ll be more yes responses than no’s. The sky’s the limit.

  10

  Knox

  For the last two weeks, all I’ve done is work the business. I spend time in every department and at all major meetings, shadowing Pops and every senior VP throughout the firm. It’s been intense. I’ve learned more than my entire business degree, although much of it comes more naturally than I thought. Probably from all those years Pop dragged my ass with him to work as a kid. There were countless times he had made me sit in his office sofa after school and sometimes on weekends. He had to keep a close eye on me back then, on account of all the trouble that followed me.

  So far, he hasn’t been all over my ass about my personal life, so that’s something.

  Except that today, he summoned me to his house—my parents’ home—for a check-in meeting. I have nothing to worry about if our conversation is limited to Steele Industries. But if he plans to give me more bad news about his health, or to delve into setting me up with some random female socialite he approves of, I can’t see either scenario going well for me.

  At this point, I can’t bring myself to object too strongly or give him any hassle. The man is not well. The more I see him, the clearer it is. He just thinks he’s doing a damn good job of masking his failing health. Sure, most of his executives, colleagues and acquaintances are unaware of his situation, but he can’t fool me. No fucking way. I see the way he strains to sit upright in his corner office, and how he struggles with getting through the day when all along, he was a workaholic, spending ten to fifteen hours a day on the job.

  I don’t want to face his mortality, but all this time around the office isn’t giving me much choice. And every evening when I walk through the door of my condo apartment, I’m gutted all over again.

  He may not be here next year. Or this Christmas. He won’t see me turn thirty, or walk down the aisle, or gaze into the eyes of his great grandchildren, if there are any in the cards. I start to regret taking him for granted for every fucking milestone I hit before now. He was there for all of them. My first shave, high school graduation, going away to college, coming back with a degree.

  And he’s been there for the fuckups too. That time I had to call him collect to bail me out of jail for breaking a guy’s nose at a bar, and the other times I got those drunk and disorderly charges after binging with Foster in my early twenties. The few lawsuits that came my way as a result of bad behavior, once the offending party realized my family’s net worth. He handled them all. He had our lawyers throw whatever money at those problems so that they’d go away. I can’t think of even once when he left me to handle my shit alone. I just kept on believing he’d always be there for me, which in hindsight, was awfully naïve of me, given the way I lost my parents.

  I feel dampness in my eyes and force down the somber thoughts. When I walk in the door today, there’ll be none of this. As he can hold his own and be strong, then fuck, I can too.

  After the long drive through rush hour traffic, I park at the end of the driveway and head inside.

  “Pops,” I shout from the front door, and he hollers back from his smoking room. As I spot him sitting in his chair next to the fireplace, I smile. This man is a creature of habit, that’s for sure. He’s in that chair with a Cuban cigar in his fingers and a fire going whether it’s the middle of winter or as hot as an August lunch hour.

  “Good to see you, son,” he answers, and puffs a few times on his Cohiba cigar. “How were the roads?”

  “The usual,” I reply and take a seat in the leather sofa opposite him.

  “You should stay for a while, if you’re free. It’ll save you from sitting in another hour’s worth of gridlock for the drive home.”

  “Sure, why not.”

  He nods over at his wet bar. “Whiskey?”

  I shake my head. “Maybe later,” I answer. My remaining sober is essential, as I have no idea why he asked me here. “So, where were you? I missed you at that financial risk meeting this afternoon.”

  “You’ve been so good at showing up that I figured you could handle it on your own.” He walked over to the bar and pours himself a drink. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but you’ve surprised me, stepping up the way you have this past couple of weeks. Keep it up and you’ll be well on your way to impressing the board of directors.”

  “Do I detect a hint of pride somewhere in there?” I tease.

  “I wouldn’t get too carried away. You’ve got a ways to go. But sure, you’ve restored my faith that there’s still hope for you, young man.”

  Even though I turned down his offer for a drink, Pops walks over to the sofa with two glasses filled with amber liquid. He takes a seat beside me and hands me a glass.

  I shift my body toward him and set the glass down on the coffee table in front of us. “Should I be bracing for more bad news, or are you gonna drop another ultimatum?”

  He flashes a one-sides smile. “Are those the only two options you can come up with? Is it so hard for you to believe that I might want you here to spend time with my grandson?”

  I’d feel bad if the creases at the sides of his eyes didn’t reveal so much levity. “You’re yanking my chain, Pops.”

  He laughs and that deep rumble fills the room. “That’s how I know we’ve spent way too much time together. You have no business reading me so well, kid.”

  “That’s how it goes.” I shrug. “So, give it to me straight. What did you want to talk about?”

  He swirls the drink around in his glass, seeming to search for the right words. Then he looks me in the eye. “You’re joining me in the Hamptons this weekend,” he says, but it’s not a question. It’s a statement.

  I nod, because well, I know how limited our time is. “I’ll be there.”

  “Good. The Harrisons and my old friend, Earl and his wife, Jean are all coming. And the McCutcheons will be next door as usual, with their whole clan.”

  “I’m used to it being a full weekend,” I say.

  “Did I mention that Isabelle will be there too?” he asks, and seems to pause, waiting for a reaction or objection from me that I don’t provide.

  “Nice.”

  “Yes, it is. She’s a lovely girl.”

  I can see where he’s going with this, but I’m not taking the bait. What’s ironic is I’ll enjoy having Isabelle around for an entire weekend. Although we haven’t seen each other since dinner that night, we’ve exchanged a couple of text messages. But I’m not about to hand over any hints to Pops about Isabelle’s and my friendship. That’s poking the bear. No doubt, if he ever finds out that we had a drunken sex session and messed around a little during that dinner, he’s bound to put the whole marriage plan back on the table. And I’m not ready to fight him on it, but if I have to, I will.

  “You’ll take the time to get to know her…better.” His statement is laced with so much suggestiveness that I wonder if he’s listening to himself.

  “Careful, Pops. You’re starting to sound like a pimp.”

  “I’m just saying—”

  “I he
ard you loud and clear. You want me to make a move on that girl…while we’re in the Hamptons.”

  “Would that be so bad?”

  “That’s not creepy at all…Jesus H. Christ.”

  “Well, would it?”

  “Do you want to chaperone while we’re at it?” I ask with sarcasm. “Look, I get it, all right? You don’t want me to be alone. But at the rate you’re going, if you keep laying it on so strong…All I’m saying is if you push this hard with Isabelle or any woman at all, they’ll run. Far.”

  “All right, I’ll tone it down with the whole pimping you out.” Pops laughs at his own statement. “Just give it a chance. Give her a chance.”

  “Are you saying that if I spend the weekend getting to know Isabelle Harrison, you’ll drop the whole marriage idea?”

  “Yes.”

  “Just like that?” I ask, skeptical. “One minute you want me to settle down and find some woman to spend the rest of my life with, the next minute one weekend with some girl from my childhood is enough? That seems like a big change of heart.”

  “Well, like I said.” He shrugs, not bothered by my questions at all. “You’re doing well at the company, and that was one of my biggest concerns. But I also don’t want you to be lonely. My choice is for you to have something more than friendship with Isabelle, but if you at least have that, I’ll be all right.”

  “I do have friends, you know. I’ve got Foster and the guys.

  Pops scoffs. “That kid has done you no favors through the years. He’s from good stock, but he couldn’t survive one day in the real world.” I can’t disagree with that. “Are you hungry?”

  I empty my whiskey glass and get to my feet. “Sure. I’ll eat.”

  As I follow him into the dining room I have to admit to myself that we’re on much better footing than we were a few weeks or months ago. He’s gotten it out of his mind that he needs to see me drag some unsuspecting socialite down the aisle just so he can feel more at ease about my future.