The Wrong Billionaire, page 2
“Are you okay?”
“Fine.”
Now she was entranced by how their heads were tilted close, their lips so close.
Acting purely on instinct, she slid her hand up his shoulder and pressed lightly in invitation. His hand splayed on her waist, drawing her in.
She held her breath as the press of their bodies clicked like magnets connecting. A sensation of rightness, of completion, encompassed her as their lips met and slid, parted and sealed.
Joy blossomed within her. He was The One. She knew it from the way his arms closed around her in a way that was both gentle and powerful, crushing her into him in the most tender way. Claiming, but telling her she was precious and important.
With the colored lights glinting behind her closed eyelids and the thumping music amplifying her heartbeat, she transcended her human self. For a few seconds, they occupied one common dimension of time and space. There was nothing between them but sparking electricity and acute pleasure. It was perfect. Utterly perfect.
And so hot. She leaned into him a little more. His hand splayed over her bottom and his tongue tagged hers. She twined her arms around his neck and—
He jerked back a step, releasing her so abruptly she staggered to regain her balance. In the same second, he swung around to confront someone.
No. He’d been pulled, she realized. Dragged into a confrontation that quickly turned into a shoving match, one that might have turned to blows, but she suddenly recognized who had attacked him.
“Micah!” she cried in horror. “Stop!”
CHAPTER TWO
Last October...
TONIGHT WAS THEIR coming-out as a couple.
Hunter’s sister, Vienna, had introduced Eden to Hunter Waverly last month. They’d begun dating very casually. He was preoccupied by a court case that had threatened his national telecom business, Wave-Com, but the final judgment had come down a few days ago. Hunter was throwing a splashy soiree to celebrate his win and he wanted Eden by his side.
“I want people to know we’re serious. You’ve stuck beside me through a rough time. That bodes well for our future.”
Did he think she had so many prospects that dating him had been an act of loyalty? Given the jeopardy at her own family company, she was actually a liability. She had to come clean before things went any further.
“I don’t want to misrepresent myself,” she told him haltingly. “I need you to understand what you’re getting into before you we talk about whether we have a future.”
Eden had studied hard to prepare herself to take the reins at Bellamy Home and Garden. She had worked in the storefront at fourteen and moved to an entry-level position at head office when she turned sixteen. Through university, she had taken on greater responsibilities, running marketing campaigns and negotiating buyer agreements and working on inclusion policies with HR.
She had believed she had earned the respect of the board along the way. When her father had passed, she had thought she had everyone’s support as the next president of BH&G.
Knives had promptly come out, however. She discovered that movements toward a coup had begun when her father’s health had declined. As economic storms had battered the company, a handful of acquisitive shareholders had injected capital with a ticking-time-bomb sort of clause. If they didn’t earn a guaranteed return by the end of next year, they would assume controlling interest.
They were already trying to oust Eden. If she didn’t fight with every cell of her being, her family’s legacy would be a pitiful headline bemoaning the demise of “another” Canadian institution. All options were on the table, including an arranged marriage.
“That’s why I let Vienna introduce us. I didn’t want to bring it up when you were battling your own dragons, but I can’t keep quiet about it any longer.”
Hunter listened with equanimity. “I do have experience with dragons,” he said dryly, having just triumphed over one. “I’m sure we can work out a win-win.”
For the first time in a long time, Eden allowed herself a shred of optimism. Her smile was natural as she stood next to Hunter, greeting his guests. Maybe she wasn’t in love with him, but she had every reason to believe she could love him. Eventually.
Not a frothy, heart-twisting infatuation, either. She didn’t want that awful thing that continued to strike a pang of yearning through her soul. Whatever she had thought she had felt that long-ago night in Paris had been a deliberate play by a scoundrel on her youthful pheromones. It hadn’t been real so it shouldn’t haunt her.
It did, though. He did. Every man was measured against that illusion, even Hunter. He was the first to come close, but even he was found wanting for the crime of not being him. Worse, even the times she did feel a smidge of curiosity about a man, she felt so humiliated by her gullibility, she didn’t trust her own judgment.
If Vienna hadn’t set them up, she wouldn’t have trusted Hunter. Even then, she had made it clear she wanted to take things slow. They hadn’t had sex and probably wouldn’t until they were married. Hunter said he was fine with that.
Maybe if he had lit her fire the way Remy had, she might have lost her virginity by now, but the only man who had ever made her crave sex was her brother’s mortal enemy.
It was confusing and made her wonder if she possessed some hidden kink that yearned for the forbidden.
“There he is,” Hunter said with warm affection, excusing them from their conversation with a couple from New York and drawing her toward a man that made her entire body feel as though it iced over, became heavy and unwieldy.
“Eden, this is Remy Sylvain. Eden Bellamy,” Hunter introduced, then added to Remy, “You’ll remember I said Vi was setting me up? Turns out she has a talent for matchmaking.”
Somehow, Remy had become even more freaking handsome. More mesmerizing. His beard was a narrow strip on his chin, his hair shorter, his face now more mature in the nearly five years since she’d met him so briefly in Paris. He still had obscenely great fashion sense, wearing a closely tailored suit in dark merlot over a black shirt and tie.
The flash of his dark gold gaze cut across her like a scythe, practically taking her knees out from beneath her. “It’s nice to meet you.” His voice was cool. He offered his hand.
As it penetrated that he was pretending they had never met, she placed her limp hand in his, clammy skin burning on contact with his hot palm.
A lifetime of cultivated manners had the words “It’s nice to meet you, too” slipping from her lips. It wasn’t nice. It was a deadly shock. How was no one noticing that her jaw had fallen onto the floor?
He shook her hand in a perfunctory way. Not hurtful, but she felt his hardness toward her before he released her, as though she had burned him.
She felt hurt, which was so stupid! She didn’t want to feel anything for him or about him, least of all rejected. He hadn’t truly wanted her in the first place.
Her mind raced, trying to work out whether he would blurt something out in front of Hunter. Should she say something? She had only just gotten her life back on track!
She couldn’t speak, anyway. Her heart was in her throat, cutting off her voice. Her breasts tightened and her cheeks were on fire.
The memory of Paris was detonating in her mind, but so was Micah’s insistence afterward that she should forget it happened.
Also, Hunter hated scenes. His stepmother was notorious for them. He would dump her if he knew what a drama had unfolded back then. Eden would be back to square one, looking for a husband who possessed enough scratch—and enough courage—to save her company.
Her stomach knotted in anticipation of Remy saying something, but he kept his expression neutral and polite.
“Congratulations on the win,” he said to Hunter, exchanging a more heartfelt handshake and shoulder squeeze with him. “You deserve it.”
“Thanks. How’s your family? Is Yasmine still in New York?”
Eden stood there in a fog, waiting for Remy to look her in the eye again while he and Hunter briefly caught up. Remy turned his head her way a couple of times, appearing to include her in the conversation, but he looked through her every time.
He was really pretending they were strangers! Even though his lips had been on hers. His hands had fondled her backside. She had felt his erection against her stomach.
The backs of her eyes stung and her heart pounded so hard she nearly swayed under the impact. It was Hunter’s night, though. This wasn’t the time or place to confront Remy about old wounds.
Why did those wounds feel so fresh?
“I hate to be the guy who fails to stick around for the toasts, but I have commitments elsewhere. I’ll say hello to Vienna before I go, though.” Remy scanned the room. “I’m happy you’re finally able to put this behind you.”
“Thank you. Us, too. Let’s get a beer soon. I’ll put Vienna on the hunt. We can double-date.” It was pure facetiousness on Hunter’s part and spoke to how close the men were that he would make a joke like that.
“Sure.” Remy made a tight noise that held no actual humor.
Was she the only one who’d noticed? That cynical scrape of sound made her heart shrink in her chest.
“I’ll text you,” Remy said to Hunter, sending another streak of apprehension through Eden. He added an absent nod in Eden’s direction before he slipped through the crowd to the other side of the room.
They were quickly approached by someone else, but Eden was distracted. She couldn’t imagine a more hurtful way for Remy to behave toward her. At least if he’d been angry or hurled accusations, she would have known he felt something toward her, even if it was hatred. His cool disinterest only confirmed what Micah had told her—that Remy had been using her as a tool of spite.
“Okay?” Hunter asked, perhaps noticing her silence.
“Tiny headache. I’ll be fine,” she assured him with a wan smile.
She felt sick, though. Her inner radar tracked Remy for the next half hour before he waved at Hunter on his way to the exit.
Hunter nodded and Remy melted away.
As much as his presence here had turned this party into a pressure cooker of anticipating disaster, now she felt bereft. Why? Why did she have to feel this way about someone she had only met three times? Someone who had cared absolutely nothing about her?
She lurched her way through the rest of the evening, mind churning with trying to work out whether she should tell Hunter that she had once kissed Remy in Paris.
At face value, it sounded laughably innocent. A kiss stopped by a protective older brother. The night had been more embarrassing than anything. It wasn’t as if she’d given him her virginity or shared her deepest held secrets.
Micah had acted as though Remy had attacked her, though. He had shoved him and Remy had shoved back. Micah had made threats. Not the kind that communicated, “Ha-ha, I’ll kill you if you touch my sister.” No. Micah had been dead serious and things might have become truly violent if Eden hadn’t thrown herself between them. Quinn had rushed up to grab Micah’s arm. It had been awful.
Micah had never fully explained what had happened, only insisting that Remy had targeted her to strike at him. We have history. It’s not your fault. Forget this ever happened. When Eden got home to Toronto and brought it up with her mother, Lucille had been distraught, but also very cryptic. Just leave it, pet.
Eden had spent years trying to forget. She had concentrated on finishing school, worked alongside her father, cared for him and buried him, taking over at Bellamy Home and Garden after he was gone.
Now BH&G was hanging by a thread. As Hunter drove her home after the party, she tentatively asked, “How do you know Remy?”
“University. We shared some classes and a similar life experience, I guess. We were both taking over our respective empires. We don’t have time to see much of each other these days, but it’s one of those friendships where we pick up where we left off. I expect he’ll be the best man at our wedding.”
Her stomach tensed as if receiving a blow. His words sent her mind tilting off-kilter while the streetlamps flickered in her eyes.
Say something, she urged herself. Say something now. But she didn’t want to malign his best friend. Was that why Remy had pretended he didn’t know her? To protect Hunter finding out how low he could sink?
What if Remy turned it around and made it about her and Micah? Would he see this relationship as another chance to take a swipe at her brother?
“Am I rushing you?” Hunter asked with quiet caution. “I thought that’s what we meant when we said we were serious.”
“No. Um, I mean, a little. You caught me by surprise.” She tried to brush away her misgivings and not ruin the opportunity before her. With a tremulous smile that was equal parts hope and trepidation, she said, “I would love to hear what you’re proposing.”
His mouth quirked at her pun. A few days later, he presented a detailed business proposal that included a prenuptial agreement.
That brought Micah flying into town, which worked for Eden. She cornered him before they left to meet Hunter for dinner.
“I should tell you something before we go. Hunter knows Remy Sylvain.”
“I know.” Micah slipped his phone into his pocket, giving her his full attention. His expression had hardened to granite.
“Did you have Hunter investigated?” she hissed with outrage.
“The Waverlys have skeletons falling out of every second closet. Of course, I peeked in the open ones.” He shrugged, not the least bit remorseful. “Waverly and Sylvain are school friends. Aside from a weekend golfing last summer, they rarely see one another. They don’t have financial ties. I don’t think Sylvain is conspiring with Waverly to use you to get at me, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
It had crossed her mind and she hated that she had become so mistrustful.
“There’s nothing for Waverly to gain by that,” Micah continued in his detached tone. “He needs the appearance of stability and wholesomeness that you bring to this union as much as you need his cash. A fresh scandal is the very last thing he wants. I’m confident he’s acting in good faith, but I’ll say again, you don’t have to marry him.”
She held up her hand, forestalling that heavily belabored argument.
“Just tell me one thing. Does Mama’s refusal to let me accept your money have anything to do with the feud between you and Remy?”
“Not really.”
“A little?”
“Look.” His eyebrows settled into a line of frustrated concern. “I knew your father was having money troubles a few years ago. I offered to help. Mama asked me to stay out of it. I understand her aversion to taking my father’s money. His parents always believed she got pregnant on purpose and married him for his wealth. She refuses to fuel that misconception. I respect that, but you’re in charge of BH and G now. You can make a different decision.”
She sighed, wishing she could, but their mother had already told her she would rather lose the company than save it with Micah’s father’s money. Eden thought Lucille was taking pride a little too far, but she also wanted to respect their mother’s wishes.
“And Remy? Why does he hate you?”
Micah hissed out a sigh. “Remy’s father worked for mine. He stole proprietary information for our competitor.”
“Industrial espionage?” Eden thought that was something that only happened in films.
“There was gossip that he was retaliating for an affair between my father and Remy’s mother. All sides denied that and Remy’s father has always claimed he was robbed. My father was never able to prove that he was paid to steal the schematics, but he moved his family to Canada and started an airline. You do the math.”
“Okay.” She took in that information and saw the bad blood it would create. “But that’s history between your father and his. Why do you hate him?”
“He went after you.”
Her heart lurched in remembered anguish.
“Don’t you think...?” She felt self-conscious even saying it. “Isn’t it possible we met by accident and he actually liked me?”
“No, Eden, I don’t.” Micah’s voice was gentle, but heavy with reluctant truth, which made it all the more awful to hear. With another sigh, he hung his hands on his hips. “You remember when I was supposed to come live here? I started school and all the rest?”
“Yes.”
“There was an incident with Remy back then. I don’t want to get into it. It was kid stuff, but my father overreacted. As he was wont to do.” His expression darkened. “The bottom line is, I knew it was between the two of them and let it go. Remy hasn’t. Years have gone by and we have both taken over our respective companies, but do you think his will entertain a bid from us for any of their projects? Never.” He sliced his hand through the air. “And that’s fine. I don’t care if he wants to be petty. I don’t need work that badly, but a few weeks before that night in Paris, I bought a vineyard his family had been trying to purchase. I didn’t know that. I was in the right place at the right time with the right price. He was obviously annoyed and that’s why he went after you.”
She hugged herself, stung afresh by the thought of being used.
“Should I tell Hunter all of that?”
“I’ll tell him what he needs to know, which is that if he wants to marry you, he needs to find a different best man.”
“Oh, don’t.” Panic stung her veins. She wasn’t sure why. She told herself it was anxiety that the feud would only escalate, but it was more insidious than that. She didn’t want to push Remy away. Deep down where she barely wanted to acknowledge her desires, she wanted to see him again.
“Let’s be adults,” she urged. “If Remy is prepared to act as if he doesn’t know me—”
