Billionaire On Fire: The Complete Series (A Bad Boy Alpha Billionaire Romance) (96 page)

I
tapped toward the window and peered out, still naked. Washington D.C.’s Friday
night was still in full swing, all these hours after midnight. I knew that
every single one of the people, rushing to and fro in one of the many taxis
that pulsed over the great expanse of the city, had worries akin with mine. We
were all working toward greater understanding. We were all reaching toward
final decisions.

As I
lay back down, still naked in the bed, I knew that I was growing closer and
closer to the decision that worked best for me. And that, beyond anything else,
was beautiful.

The
following morning was Saturday. I lifted my body from the bed, feeling the
hangover rally against my brain. I sighed, feeling the aches and pains emanate
throughout my torso. “Not so young anymore,” I murmured to myself. I brought a
borrowed robe around my slim frame and wafted toward the kitchen, where I found
Rachel sitting at the table, her own head in her hands.

“What
happened last night,” she whispered to the table.

I felt
the laughter bubbling in my stomach. But soon, those bubbles turned sour. I
felt sick and collapsed in the chair beside her. I sighed into the words. “God.
I don’t even know! I woke up naked!”

Rachel
brought her hands over her mouth. “I would laugh,” she murmured. “But I don’t
think it would result in anything good.”

“We
need hangover food,” I muttered. I reached toward my cell phone, thinking of
the greasy spoon down the road. “Do you think they deliver grilled cheese
sandwiches?”

“Ugh,”
Rachel said, flopping to her side on the table. Her legs cranked out from her
on the wooden floor. She looked minutes from death.

Moments
later, we’d both sprawled out on the floor before her living room television,
ready to soak in whatever terrible Saturday mid-morning programs were running,
full-color and full-scale. We had very low expectations for our day.

As a
talk show host blared on about celebrity gossip, Rachel suddenly rolled toward
me. She closed her eyes, working through her headache. “I’m sorry if anything I
said last night touched any sort of nerve,” she murmured. “Oi.”

I
shook my head into the carpet, closing my eyes as well. “Everything you said
was honestly warranted. It made me realize another perspective of my situation.
That, beyond anything else, is what I needed the most.”

“Do
you think you’ll talk to him again? Do you think you’ll tell him? Or is it all
lost?” Rachel asked me.

I
shrugged my shoulders half-heartedly. “I honestly don’t know what to expect,” I
murmured. “I think that—perhaps—the ship has sailed. But if I do decide to talk
to him, I know that you have my back.” I reached out and grabbed her hand,
holding it tightly for just a moment. “Thank you for everything.”

Suddenly,
there was a great rapping on the door. My eyes widened, and Rachel’s snapped
opened quickly. No one had ever come over, not in the many weeks since I’d
moved in. “Did you order food?” she whispered to me.

I
shook my head, my heart thudding quickly in my chest. “No. Is someone coming
over? Could it be the mail?”

But
Rachel was lolling up quickly, bringing her hands to her head once more. “God
dammit,” she murmured. “Coming!” she called, as a hand rapped once more.
“Better not be that neighbor again, complaining about the loud television. I’ll
kill him!” She winked at me.

Finally,
she reached the door. I sat up, leaning against the chair while on the floor. I
brought the blanket up around my neck, covering myself into near invisibility.

Rachel
caught the door open and didn’t say anything. I peered around the chair, trying
to make out who it was. But Rachel’s head was blocking the figure.

There
was a great, hanging pause. My eyes searched wildly around the room as I
panicked about what was going on—who had come over? Did anyone know I was here?
Why wasn’t Rachel saying anything? Rachel—who always had something to say?

Finally,
the silence broke. “Hello,” the voice said on the other side of the door.

My
heart dropped into the acidic sea of my stomach. I crunched myself into a ball
beneath the blanket. The voice was so familiar, spoken in a near-bedroom voice.
Xavier.

Xavier
Callaway, the President of the United States.

Rachel
tipped her head to the right. “Hello, Mr. President,” she crooned, a bit of
sauce on her lips. I was glad that she was standing up for me, even if she
thought this man was right. “Do you remember me?” she asked.

Xavier
paused. “I believe I do, yes. On the first campaign trail. You were good
friends with Amanda. I believe she’s our mutual friend, these days.”

“I
suppose that’s true,” Rachel said, her voice haughty. Suddenly, she spun her
head to the side, placing her hand over her mouth. I brought my chin to my
chest, worried Rachel was about to hack all over the president’s shoes. This
hangover was nothing to mess around with. “But what can I do for you?” she
finally asked him, finding the words after her brief scrape with embarrassment.

“Are
you sure you’re all right?” he asked her then. “You don’t look so good. A
little green, maybe.”

“A
friend and I had a good deal of wine last night,” Rachel said off-handedly.
“She needed a pick-me-up after a hard few weeks.” Her voice, again, was a
challenge.

I
peeked further around the chair to see him.

Xavier
paused for a moment, still standing in the doorway. He turned to his right and
spoke to who I assumed was a Secret Service agent. “Could you wait out here?”
he asked this before he spun back toward Rachel. “Rachel. I’m sorry if this is
too forward. But could I come in, please?”

Rachel
took a step back, uncertain of what to do. My heart was beating wildly in my
chest. I wanted to grab Rachel, to tell her I wasn’t ready yet! My mind had
been a whir of emotion all throughout the morning. I didn’t see how I was ever,
ever going to be able to pick myself up from this hangover and deal with the
president. God, this was a disaster.

But
Rachel didn’t have a choice, really. She bowed her head and told him:
“Certainly. But only for a moment.” She closed the door behind him. I jumped
back behind the chair. I could hear his fine shoes tapping on the wooden floor.
I told myself not to feel sick, but my stomach kept flipping over. I brought my
fingers over it, shaking my head. I knew I was concealed from view by the chair
in front of the living room floor.

“Quite
a place you have here,” Xavier said politely.

Rachel
shrugged her shoulders. “It’s okay. All I can afford right now.”

“You
left the political scene, I know,” Xavier offered.

Rachel
seemed embarrassed. She searched for the right words. “I’m not altogether too
upset about it,” she stated. “The stress was far too much for me.”

“I
might join you very shortly, should I lose my campaign manager forever,” Xavier
said. “Do you have coffee, by chance?”

Rachel
paused before answering. The mere mention of me seemed to echo throughout the
room. I heard her parse through her coffee filters and plopped one into the
maker before filling it with water. I heard her hit the button and let the
crackling begin.

“Thank
you,” Xavier said again, bringing his voice into the mighty absence of noise.

Rachel
grunted. “So. What is that you have there?” I peered around the chair once
more, noting that Xavier had seated himself away from the living room, rather
than toward it. In his left hand, I saw beautiful, brightly-colored tulips. My
heart flip-flopped.

“Oh,
it’s nothing. They’re just—they’re for someone, if I found her here.” He
smacked the back of his neck with his free hand, looking a bit sheepish.
“Doesn’t seem that I’m that lucky, though.”

Rachel
didn’t say anything. She eyed me, and I skirted back, suddenly realizing that
I’d been hidden for far too long to make anything happen. I would remain there,
hidden, or be deemed a creepy spy for the rest of my days. My heartbeat
quickened, and I began to shiver on the floor. There was no escape.

I
couldn’t stop myself though and looked around the chair again.

Rachel
reached toward the cabinet filled with coffee cups and retrieved two. “You
know. I think I know what’s going on,” she offered. “And if it’s any
consolation. I don’t think it’s over.”

I
frowned at these words, feeling anxious that she should deliver these words,
not me. But she knew how strained and angry I was, all the time. She knew that
sometimes, I didn’t have the words—that usually I just switched to a quick
vessel of madness, rather than speaking out my emotions appropriately.

Xavier
placed the flowers on the table and kneaded at the back of his neck. In so many
ways, I longed to kiss that place between the two bones—that hollow. I wanted
to wrap my arms around him and feel his hands over my arms, around my butt. I
wanted him so near me.

She
passed the coffee to him, and I could hear him lightly slurp it. I knew it
would get in his beard, that he would have to wipe it away. This was so much a
part of him, it nearly hurt me to think about it. “So. You’ve spoken with her?
She hasn’t been at her house in weeks, I’m told. Actually, my agents have
mentioned that she often stays here.” These words were a bit obtuse, a bit
overreaching.

Rachel
lurched her head back, a frown drowning over her normally chipper eyes. She
shook her head. “You’ve been spying on me?”

Xavier
shook his head slowly, knowing he’d fucked up. He placed his coffee cup on the
table and sighed. “It’s just. I have agents watch out for her, sometimes. Just
so I know she’s safe.”

Rachel
sighed. “And they directed you here, this morning?”

Xavier
brought the tulips into the air once more. “The reason I knew to bring this
gesture,” he murmured. He spun the bouquet, gazing at the pinks, the purples,
the yellows, the oranges. “A beautiful flower. Perhaps one of the strangest, as
well. Like her, in many ways. So confident, so self-assured. And yet so starkly
beautiful and unique—something you can’t keep your mind off of. You know?”

Graciously,
Rachel didn’t say anything. She bit her lip across from him at the table and
then took a long drag from the coffee cup before her.

“Anyway.
She’s not here. So my search must commence.”

“What
is it you’re planning to say to her? Just that—she’s unique? That you can’t
stop thinking about her?” Rachel began. Her voice was soft.

“I
wouldn’t pretend to know precisely what I would say, faced with the likes of
her,” Xavier admitted. He messed with the flowers once more. “It seems I’ve
never met anyone who made me both instantly so happy and so very, very angry.
She fills me with emotion, you know?”

Rachel
nodded. “It’s lucky, really. To find that sense of emotion. It’s like blood
flow. It’s like oxygen.”

Xavier
didn’t say anything. He sipped at his coffee and sat there with my best friend
in peace, gazing at the walls around her apartment. Still, I sat strong, silent
in the living room. Still, I waited for everything to fall apart.

Finally,
after several more minutes, he stood up. He stretched his taut legs, and he
brought the flowers back into his arms.

“You’re
leaving?” Rachel asked, her voice a bit chipper. I was sure she felt awkward,
knowing all she did about our situation.

Xavier
sighed. “I am. I couldn’t take up any more of your time. I must get back to the
White House, to figure out the wreckage that is my current campaign. Without
Amanda, I’m lost. Jason has no idea what he’s doing. It’s a power struggle for
him, pure and simple. He’s not trying to better the society of this country.
He’s just trying to better himself.”

Rachel
walked toward the door in front of Xavier. She turned the handle and allowed
Xavier to exit, even as he chortled.

He
paused for a moment, biting at his lip. I was sure that Rachel was about to
break. “Please tell her I stopped by,” he said. With a flourish, he was gone
from the doorway, bursting down the hallway. Rachel closed the door behind him
and stood that way, her hand on the doorknob, for what seemed like forever.

As
soon as she heard him scurry down the first few steps, she flung herself to my
side of the room. Her eyes were so large in her head. “Can you believe that
just happened?” she whispered, her voice harsh.

I
shook my head, bringing my hand over my cheeks. “I should have done something,”
I whispered. “I should have told him I was here; I should have allowed him to
understand that I still care about him. Life is too short, Rachel.” My voice
staggered. I jolted up from my position on the ground and tore the sweatshirt
from my body. I reached toward a dress that still hung, haphazardly, off the
chair beside me. I wrapped it over me and then, without thinking, opened the
balcony door.

“No!”
Rachel called, her voice hissing. “You haven’t prepared yourself! You don’t
know what you want to say!”

But
before I could think about it, I was standing on the balcony in just a dress.
Beneath me, standing at his stretch, black limousine, was the President of the
United States. An agent had opened the back door for him, and Xavier was
halfway into it, still holding the flowers in his left hand.