Billionaire On Fire: The Complete Series (A Bad Boy Alpha Billionaire Romance) (79 page)

He took an additional step toward me, and
he brought his finger to my face. He traced my cheekbone, my eyebrow with his
first finger. I felt such menace from him: like he would hurt me if we weren’t
stuck at the White House, the two of us. Together and so alone in that middle
room—the very belly of the great political home.

“I can’t be certain how long I’ll need
you, can I?” he finally whispered. I thought he was going to kiss me, and I
braced myself. “I suppose I’ll keep the pictures until I get what I want,
ultimately.”

“And what is it that you want?” I asked
him. I swallowed, feeling such anger and hysteria beneath him.

He shrugged once more. “What I’ve always
wanted, of course. What I’ve always wanted.”

I shook my head. I sputtered another
question, feeling the quivering deep in my stomach. “Are there any more cameras
in my apartment?” I finally asked. I swallowed, closing my eyes.

I felt him step even closer to me. I could
feel his breath on my mouth. I could nearly feel his lips upon mine. His words
echoed over me, then: “I will answer this question, of course. For it is the
most interesting of all. How many did you find?”

“Three,” I said, still keeping my eyes
closed. I wanted to run away. I wanted to get out of there. But I felt so
trapped, like an animal in a cage.

He started laughing, then. I could feel
him tip his head back to laugh stronger, harder than I’d heard him laugh since that
first day, when he’d brought the photos to me—when he’d ruined my life. “Three
cameras. Of course. Those were the ones I wanted you to see. The one in the
armoire? What nice china, by the way. Antique, no?”

I bit my lip, feeling waves of nausea pass
through me. Three cameras. Three. “How many are there total, Jason?” I asked
him. My voice was on the hint of begging. I felt that this was the only way I
could translate my sheer anxiety.

“There are five cameras, my lovely. Five.”

My eyes snapped open, and I viewed his
hand before me—the five fingers out like rockets from his palm. I swallowed.

“Two others.”

“And you’ll never find them,” he said,
shaking his head back and forth. “Never.”

He jutted past me, then. He grabbed the
doorknob and jolted into the hallway, through the crowded room with all the
rushing campaign employees. I began to run after them, but I was immediately
bombarded with questions, with papers. I felt the anxiety close around my
throat. There was nothing I could do, in that moment.

Chapter
7

I sat at my desk for a long time, thoughts
of quitting and leaving the White House forever coursing through my brain. I
actually saw no way out of this dilemma. This terrifying man was watching my
apartment. I was losing control of my position. I was desired by the
president—by this wonderful, stunning man—and yet this was the very root of my
dilemma.

The phone started to ring once more.
Always, it was ringing off the hook. Sometimes, I considered snipping the wire
and falling away from this reality. I looked across the room at Jason once
more, catching his eyes. They were brimming with dispassion, with anger. He
mouthed the words. “Meeting with the president,” in such a way that made me
feel like he still had me pressed against the wall, forming his mouth over
mine.

I answered the phone in a hushed whisper.
“Hello?”

“Amanda. This is Xavier. I need to see you
immediately.”

I leaned back in the chair, then. I felt
my heart beating fast in my chest. “Is your wife all right?” I asked him. I
blinked wildly, knowing I was touching a nerve. I wanted to remind him who he
was and what he was meant to take care of. If he left me alone—maybe I could
get out of this alive and unscathed. Maybe.

But Xavier didn’t put up with it. “I need
you in my office immediately.” And then he hung up the phone.

I felt like both the good guys and the bad
guys were hounding me. I hated it. I brought my hands to my eyes and then
tugged at my hair, allowing myself this sensation of real pain. It rooted me back
in reality.

I darted down the hallway, toward the Oval
Office. Again, Dimitri was nowhere to be found outside the office. The secret
service agent pulled open the door for me and allowed me entrance, bowing his
head soundly for me. I felt like a queen, if only for a moment.

I closed the door behind me and turned,
finding the president in the center of the room instead of his usual position,
behind his desk. He looked so serious. His eyebrows dipped over his eyes, and
his mouth was pressed firmly together.

“Mr. President,” I whispered. I both hoped
and didn’t that he’d brought me in there just to ask me out again, to save me
from this terrifying world. I swallowed. “If this is about the campaign, I
think I’d better retrieve Jason.”

But the president held up his hand at
once, shaking his head. “Please. This is a meeting between you and I, only.” He
gestured forward, toward the center couch. I proceeded to sit down, bringing my
long brown hair behind my ear. I felt myself quivering and I hoped he didn’t notice.

“Amanda,” he began. He sat down hesitantly
next to me, leaning toward me a bit. He brought his hand toward my face and
played with a small curl that wandered around my ear. “I’m worried about you.”

I swallowed. I peered at a painting of
George Washington on the wall. What a terrifying presidency that had been; what
a terrifying life Martha had had to live all those years before.

But Xavier was still staring at me. “I
think about you all the time, Amanda. You have to know that. Before, they
were—blissful thoughts. Thoughts of such happiness we could have together. But
now. Those thoughts have changed.” He sighed, then. He placed his hand on my
knee, and I curled my toe in my shoe, wanting him. His touch felt so good. I
still held my eyes toward the wall. I could hardly look at him. I knew it would
draw tears.

“My thoughts are now—affecting the
presidency,” he murmured. “I can hardly focus on anything anymore. The other
day, I was in a meeting with the Secretary of State and I just stared out the
window, thinking of you.”

I blinked, feeling a small tear formulate
in the corner of my eye. Why was he telling me all of this?

“I feel like you’re pulling away from me,”
he finally said. His voice broke. “I feel like we had something really special;
I feel like we could have really done something, together.”

“You mean as a couple?” I whispered, then.
My voice was breaking, as well. I couldn’t believe he had had these thoughts; I
couldn’t believe that he’d thought about me in any manner that wasn’t sexual;
that he actually admired my talents, my drive, my very being. He wasn’t typical
in this way, of course. Most men just wanted to fuck me and leave me at the
curb.

His grip tightened on my leg, then. He
cleared his throat. “I know it’s insane to talk about. I know I’m a married
man. And I’m devoted to my marriage, of course. But I can’t stop thinking of
you. Please. Assure me that this—this—“

“This?” I whispered once more. The tear
had made a trail down my cheek by then, leaving me seemingly naked beside him.

“This beautiful thing that we have. I
don’t want to lose it. Assure me that it isn’t over, okay?”

My mind was spinning. I knew I needed to
tell him that I couldn’t see him anymore; I knew I couldn’t tell him that Jason
had me in his grasp, that I literally hadn’t a single sliver of free will
anymore. I swallowed and turned my head almost imperceptibly toward him. “I
just—I just have so much on my plate, Xavier. I need. I need some space. Some
space would be really good right now, for me. So that I can focus on the
campaign. So that I can focus on making you the best president you can be.” I
heard the quivering in my voice. I remembered the confident girl I had been
just a few weeks before. I no longer recognized that person anymore.

The president leaned back and removed his
hand from my leg. He clucked his tongue. “You need space?” he asked. His voice
was nearly incredulous. “Space from me? From the White House? From the United
States? Space from what?”

But I just shook my head, knowing that he
could never truly understand. “Just space, Xavier,” I whispered. “I have to
work through this, now. You have to leave this to me.”

Xavier stood. He grabbed a small,
decorative bowl from the table before us and flung it at the wall, allowing it
to crash to the ground. The glass shards crashed everywhere, reminding me of
the wine glass I had broken the week before when I’d been searching for the
hidden camera in my apartment. He stomped his foot, almost like a child but
with a man’s passion, with a man’s anger. In a way, it aroused me, making me
want to leap toward him and take him in my arms, kiss his lips with mine.

He sat at his presidential desk, then. He
left me on the couch by myself, my hands folded before me like a peasant. I bit
my lip.

He waved his hand. “That’s it, then,” he
muttered. It sounded like he was ending a business meeting—something incredibly
formal, instead of the final rousing after an evening of titillating pleasure.

I stood. I bowed my head, feeling such
sadness in my belly. I agreed with everything he said, of course. I agreed that
we could create a beautiful life together. If things had been different. If
people weren’t eternally watching our every step. If slimy creeps like Jason
didn’t exist, always around the corner with a camera, ready to ruin your life.

I walked toward the door and brought my
hand forth. I wrapped it around the handle, hearing him move in his chair. I
paused. His voice rooted me back into reality, humming through my ears.
“Amanda,” he whispered. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—I didn’t mean to make a
scene.”

I spun my head back around toward him and
bowed, allowing my eyelashes to drip down to my cheeks. I felt so unsure in his
presence, so jittery. “I’m sorry, too, Xavier,” I whispered.

“There’s more,” he said then. “I need you
to know something. Even if we’re never in the same room again, alone. Even if
this beautiful thing falls away forever. I need you to know that I am
completely devoted to you, in this here and now. And I have been for quite some
time. It took me a moment to make a move, and for that I am sorry. I wasted
precious time I could have had with you. That kills me.”

He tapped his chest with his long, thin
fingers. I held the doorknob loosely in my hand, listening to his words as they
fell through my ears, making me feel so open to him. I wanted to wrap my arms
around him and kiss him, feel him, love him. But instead, I saw Jason’s
laughing face in my head.

“Thank you, Xavier. I—“ I started shaking
my head. I wanted to words to come churning from my mouth once more, but I
couldn’t find them. I wanted to tell him that I felt the same way—that I’d
always felt that we were right for each other, from the first moment we’d
spoken.

Instead, I spun around and left the Oval
Office. I tapped down the hallway, feeling like the world was spinning around
me. This tumultuous White House offered so much: so much drama, so much lust,
and so much potential for love. But I had to put my head down. Continue to
answer phones. Do Jason’s bidding. I had to continue doing what I’d always done
before.

I couldn’t fall in love with anyone.
Especially not Xavier. Especially not the most powerful man in the world.

No. Especially not him.

Chapter
8

I went home a bit later, feeling beat from
the day. The mental and emotional fatigue from Jason’s continuous game was
making me feel off my game. I slumped in the back of the taxi on the way back,
not even bothering to laugh at the taxi driver’s jokes as we flew across the
city.

“You White House people never laugh,” he
murmured in his Mexican accent, driving swiftly.

I knew, in that moment, that I had turned
into everyone else—even when all this time I had thought I was different. I
knew that everyone worked for someone else; I knew that everyone was a pawn in
someone else’s game. I just used to consider myself higher up on the food
chain.

I arrived at my home and sat at the
kitchen table, not wanting to get undressed after what I’d learned about
Jason’s two extra cameras. I peered around the room as I poured a glass of
wine. I began talking:

“Hello, Jason. How are you tonight? You’re
doing well? Would you like a glass of wine? No?” I felt my quivering voice as
it emanated through my throat. I felt like I was going insane.

I sat deeper in the chair and began to
drink deeper, longer. I hadn’t bothered to turn on the television, and I could
only hear the traffic as it coursed by my apartment building. “I have to move,”
I said again. “I have to get out of here.” For a moment, I considered this with
greater certainty. If I moved away, I would rid myself of these cameras that
lurked like beasts throughout my apartment. I swallowed. The wine was so
bitter, and I loved it; it made my blood flow looser through my body.

I stood, peering into the armoire once
more. Perhaps there was another camera? I began to search for it, opening old
teapots and peering into the old china, smelling old age and years and years of
dust. I needed to clean, I knew. But I’d been too bogged down with work for the
past—oh—seven years; I had completely forgotten how to be alive.