Billionaire On Fire: The Complete Series (A Bad Boy Alpha Billionaire Romance) (39 page)

“Okay, mother, Gina can move back into the
house. But she’ll have to stay out of my bedroom.”

She flashed a smirk of victory. “For now
that sounds like a good idea. She’ll have to eventually move into your room,
you know. But we will wait until you guys have better results from couple’s
therapy. That’s fair enough.”

What part of this was fair? I didn’t love
Gina, I never would. She was wasting my time and her time and quite frankly
setting the woman up for quite a bit of disappointment and hurt feelings. But
until I figured out a better way to stop the suicide threats, I’d just have to
go along with it.

---

The next day, Gina was all moved in. My
mom had already told her to pack and get ready for it before even having that
conversation with me. She was a conniving fox.

There was a knock on my door. “I’m busy,”
I lied. I didn’t want to see either of them.

“I have something for you, it’ll only take
a second,” Gina’s voice said from outside the door. Better her than more
threats from my mom.

“Fine, come in.”

She did, wearing nothing but a robe. “Hi,”
she said in what I imagined to be an attempt at a seductive voice. Then her
robe came off. It wasn’t an utter shock. It wasn’t an unpleasant sight
entirely: Gina had a tall, slender and toned figure, with the right amount of
curves. Her bright blonde hair flowed under her big round breasts. Objectively,
it was quite aesthetically pleasing.

“Put your robe back on,” I said, turning
away from her and looking back at my computer.

“But, but I thought-“

“You thought wrong,” I said, ignoring the
reaction of my penis, which was quite different from my own. “I am not going to
fuck you. Not now, not ever. So quit embarrassing yourself.”

First I heard some sniffles and then I
heard her cry as she ran out of the room. Holy shit, women. Did she really
think that that would work? Just walking in here and stripping? That it would
make me forgive her for all she had done and we would go back to being okay
again? It was sickening, and also showed exactly what she thought of me:
someone who couldn’t keep his dick in place. Little did she know that the only
person I wanted to fuck was a twenty-year-old redhead, whose defiance and
stubbornness was enough to give me a hard on. I closed my eyes and lay in bed,
thinking of Aria’s smooth skin and soft pussy, stroking myself thinking I was
inside it, making her cum. I lasted less than a minute. The mere fantasy of
Aria was enough to make me lose all control.

I would lose it completely if I didn’t
have her back in my bed soon.

---

That evening, my mother somehow convinced
me to take Gina out to dinner. “I’m feeling particularly under the weather,
might need an extra dosage of my pills,” she had casually stated, right after
suggesting that Gina and I needed to have some romantic time outside of the
house if we were ever going to work. If only I could explain to her that I had
no interest in making it work whatsoever.

She could fit in with all the crazy rich
celebrities. We could be great a fucking reality show.

I knocked on Gina’s door and said, “I’ll
be in the car, come whenever you’re ready.”

I walked over to where Ned was parked
right outside my house and made myself a drink of whiskey.

“You don’t seem to be having a
particularly good day, Zay. Want to talk about it?” Ned asked upon seeing me
chug my whiskey.

I sighed. “I don’t know where to start,
Ned. Everything is a fucking mess. You know my mother. She’s decided to extend
her stay indefinitely and invited Gina too. She keeps threatening to off
herself. It’s frustrating. And then there is Aria…”

“So that’s the real issue. You can usually
handle your mother without seeming to collapse with the stress. But your lady
friend seems to have done a number on you.”

“She’s frustrating, yet I can’t stop
thinking about her. I am supposed to be taking my ex-wife out for dinner and
pretending to attempt reconciliation, yet I can’t stop thinking about Aria. How
was she? When you picked her up the other day?” I asked, suddenly remembering
Ned had seen her more recently than I had.

“Very intoxicated,” he said cheerfully.
“She seemed to be having a good time, but definitely a lot of trouble speaking.
She was shocked to see me and kept muttering words of what sounded like
gratitude, but I can’t be sure.”

“Did she—” I cleared my throat. “Did she
say anything about me?”

He looked back and gave me a doleful look.
“Do you really want to know?”

“Is it that bad?” I actually felt fear at
the possibilities of his answer. What if she had said she hated me?

“No, it wasn’t. I couldn’t make out most
of what she was saying but she kept repeating that she wasn’t an object and you
didn’t own her.”

“But I do,” I said, confused. “For now,
anyway.”

“Well, if you want an old man’s advice:
don’t let her feel that way. The best way to win her over is probably to let
her feel her independence. If she feels like she is losing that, it will be
much harder to keep her around.”

“But she doesn’t have a choice. She signed
a contract. She has to be around.”

“Would you rather her just be around or
would you rather she be around and enjoy being with you?”

Before I could answer, Gina showed up,
wearing a long green dress with the neck so low cut, her breasts were almost
popping out.

“Hi Ned,” she said pleasantly.

Ned just nodded curtly. He hated her for
what she had done to me, perhaps more than I hated her for it. So the drive to
the restaurant was particularly quiet. I asked her if she wanted a drink, to
which she politely declined. Probably thought her scheme to win me – and money
– over would fail if she didn’t have her wits about her. I resumed to quietly
sipping my whiskey and only looked at her when she finally spoke again.

“You look very nice,” she said, still
trying to sound annoyingly pleasant.

“Thanks,” I said and looked back out the
window. Gina had interrupted my conversation with Ned about Aria, and that
alone was enough to make me irritated by her.

“I hope you will be a little chattier at
the restaurant. It will make for a lot less uncomfortable of a meal.” She
smiled serenely at me, as though she wasn’t just complaining.

“I just don’t have anything to say.” I
shrugged.

“I’m sure we can find something to talk
about,” she said, putting her hand over mine. “There is a lot of history.”

“Oh, you would like to discuss history,
huh? How did it feel fucking someone else behind my back?”

She went red, all attempts at pleasantness
in her face vanished. “I meant the rest of our history. The good parts. Don’t
you remember any of the good parts, Zay?”

“No,” I spat as Ned parked outside the
restaurant. “Now let’s get this date that my mother forced upon us over with,
so that she can stop threatening to kill herself.”

She raised her eyes wider. “What are you
talking about?”

We hopped out of the car and Ned went off
to park. “Don’t play innocent. I’m sure you put her up to it.”

“I honestly don’t know what you are
talking about. I know your mamma really wants us to get back together, but I
didn’t know she had been pressuring you like that…I thought you wanted to give
us another shot. I thought—”

“Whatever you thought, you thought wrong.
But we are here now and we might as well enjoy the evening, yeah?”

“Zay, I really want us to work,” she said,
reaching out for my hand again but I yanked it away this time. “You’re the love
of my life.”

That made me snort. “I have no idea what
people mean when they use that word, but based on mother’s ‘love’ for my dad
and your ‘love’ for me, I am pretty sure I am not interested in that shallow
fucking emotion.”

She looked away holding back tears as we
stepped into the restaurant. It was a high-end Japanese establishment, with
authentic Japanese decorations, and the chef was famous for winning Japan’s
version of Top Chef last year. He had since moved to the States to open his own
highly exclusive restaurant. It would take a normal person months to find a
reservation here, but I just had to make a phone call. I figured if I was going
to suffer through dinner with Gina, I might as well at the very least enjoy the
meal.

“Sinclair,” I told the Filipino-looking
hostess.

“Come with me, Mr. and Mrs. Sinclair,” she
said brightly, escorting us to a private table at the end of the room. I
started to correct her but Gina held my hand again, obviously pleased to be
referred to as Mrs. Sinclair. “Thank you so much for joining us today, your
server will be here any moment.”

As soon as she was off, I told Gina, “We
are not Mr. and Mrs. Sinclair.”

“We technically are, Zay,” she sighed. “Like
it or not, we are still married, as the divorce papers were never fully
processed. You were too busy to make it to any of the court dates, remember? I
am Mrs. Sinclair, for now at least. And I would like to try my best to keep it
that way. You hate me right now and you can’t see past my mistakes, which I
totally understand, but I want this to work. I want you to trust me again.”

I snorted loudly. “You’re delusional,
aren’t you? You and my mom both. You think your actions bear no consequences,
and that you can just sweep in here with a slutty dress or take your clothes
off in my room and everything will just go back to normal?”

Her face went a deep shade of pink. “I
didn’t say…I didn’t mean to imply…or dress slutty—“

“Hah!” I cut her off. “So you’re just letting
your breasts hang out of your dress with no intention of seducing me right?
Just like how you came into my room with just a bath robe on and it
conveniently slipped off your body?”

“Yes, that was me trying to seduce you.
But you made it clear that you weren’t interested. Honestly, I never knew you
were capable of turning down a naked woman.”

“Now you do,” I snapped. “So don’t try to
pull that shit with me again.”

She put her hand over mine again. That was
getting annoying.

“Zayden,” she said with her frustratingly
pleasant tone back. “Be honest with me, and it’s okay, whatever the answer is.
Is there someone else?”

“What do you mean?” I asked, my mind
automatically drifting to Aria. I wondered what she was doing right this
second. Arguing with somebody about something, probably. She was feisty as
hell.

“Another woman?”

“There are many. You didn’t think I have
been celibate this whole time since you left, do you? If so, you’re far more
idiotic than I had thought.”

“I don’t mean one of the many young women
that you entertain yourself with on a regular basis – yes, word travels – I
mean someone you actually care about.”

“I don’t do that whole caring thing
anymore,” I said, but a part of me felt like I wasn’t being entirely truthful.
After all, I had been worried sick over Aria’s sudden disappearance. I could
lie to myself all I wanted – that I was mad that she was disobeying the
contract, or that I simply enjoyed looking at her ass in the office – but I had
spent every day of her absence wondering if she had been okay. And when she had
made those drunken phone calls, I had immediately sent Ned to take her and her
roommates home because I was concerned for her safety. Admitting that to myself
was surprisingly scary. The last thing I needed right now was to be blinded by
my emotions. I needed to grow out of caring again, as soon as possible.

“Then I’ll make you a deal, Zay,” Gina
said, her tone suddenly very businesslike and professional. Before she could
convey her “deal,” though, our server came over.

“Are we ready to order, sir?” A young
Asian girl asked.

We both looked at her, slightly annoyed
for being interrupted. “I’ll have a glass of whiskey and two spicy tuna rolls
for appetizers.”

While Gina made her order, I thought of
how that was one of Aria’s favorite foods and felt a familiar pang of longing.
That first night we had a date in our office was so incredible. She had matched
every one of my clever comments with her own, and had been delighted by the
exquisite menu that was custom-made in her honor. Her reaction to the champagne
in particular had been delightful. I would have to bring her here some day;
this would be some of the best sushi she had ever had and I could reserve the
whole restaurant just for her if she wanted. If she wanted. She had to, because
I had bought her for the next few months.

With a sinking feeling, I realized that I
didn’t want her to be around because of some contractual obligation, but rather
because she craved my company, and my body, just as much as I craved hers.
Angry with myself for feeling this way, I forced myself to believe it didn’t
matter what she thought or felt. She owed me her time, willingly or otherwise.
I couldn’t let the fact that she was unhappy to be around me get in the way of
what I wanted. That wasn't how I functioned. At least, I really didn’t want it
to be. What had that feisty redhead done to me?

“Zayden!” Gina had been repeating my name,
making me snap out of it.

“Oh yeah, sorry, I spaced out,” I said,
slightly frustrated to be taken away from thoughts of Aria. “You were talking
about some proposition.”

“Yes, and hear me out before declining my
offer,” she said, still sounding businesslike. “We cancel the divorce
proceedings-“

“No way. That’s not a deal. It’s just not
happening.”

“Hear me out!” She was clearly getting
frustrated. All attempts at being sickeningly sweet vanished. No more
pretenses. Gina was getting to the point. She wasn’t here because she thought
she loved me or something ridiculous like that.

“I know you don’t have any feelings for
me, and I am okay with that. But you gain something by having me around: you
can shut your mother up and she will stop with the threats if she thinks we are
back together and happy.”