WIFE WANTED (A Billionaire Bad Boy Romance) (3 page)

“I don’t think she’ll try anything here. Too many witnesses,” he said, nodding to others around the funeral parlor. It was packed with friends of his grandfather’s and those from the company. If she raised a hand to him, he was pretty sure she’d be dragged out kicking and screaming.

Slowly, he made his way through the crowd, shaking hands and accepting condolences as he made his way to Diane’s side. She held onto the man’s arm tightly, as if afraid she might fall over. There was a hankie in her hand, but Riley didn’t buy it. Who wore six-inch heels to a wake?

“Diane, I’m glad to see you made it. Again, I am so sorry for your loss,” he said as she turned to face him. He held out a hand and waited.

“Same to you,” she said, but he felt the steel behind her words. Her grip was cold as she took his hand. “I wasn’t sure if you’d be up to attending this evening.”

“Wouldn’t miss it for anything.”

She quickly pulled her hand back and wiped abruptly at her eyes where fresh tears started to form.
Fresh and fake
, he thought as she directed the gentleman at her side to Riley. “And I assume you two have met.”

“Ah, pleasure and all. Horrible circumstances, though,” Yancey said, a bit gruff.

“Yes, horrible. I didn’t think you and my grandfather got along?”

“Not in person, no, but we had our moments when we weren’t competing for the same clients.”

Riley, a little ruffled, stiffened and stood straighter. “As you do with me. Constantly.”

“Yes, of course. I’m sorry about that, but business is business.”

“So, are you a friend of Diane’s?”

“Yes, we met through a legal issue my company had.”

Riley smirked. He knew all about the troubles Yancey Securities had had in the past. They were always under investigation for one thing or another. “Of course, a legal issue. I’m sure Diane was your legal counsel, too.”

“Yes. Do you have a problem with whom I do business?” Diane snapped.

Riley’s anger flared as he shook the man’s hand and forced a smile onto his face. “No, of course not. Well again, Diane, I’m sorry for your loss. I will see you both tomorrow at the funeral, I assume?”

They said they’d be there, and Riley backed away and hurried from the parlor. He needed to get away and call Ben. Diane was definitely after his grandfather’s company. Yancey Security was Cyber Vault, Inc.’s biggest competition. They’d been after their trade secrets for years and even tried poaching some of their clients and best techs. Thankfully, Riley and his grandfather treated them too well for them to ever consider leaving.

He pulled out his cell and called Ben. “Is that Yancey?” Ben said the second he answered.

“One and the same,” Riley said. “I just shook hands with the guy.”

“What the hell is he doing hanging out with her?”

“I don’t know, but all those years she’s spent with my grandfather at his ranch? You think she was spying on him?”

“But he didn’t work at the office anymore,” Ben said. “What could she possibly hope to gain?”

Riley scratched his head, messing up his hair. “I don’t know, but she’s up to something. We’ll have to keep an eye on her. And I want protection put on that ranch. Darcie and Bethany will be moving in. If he left anything there, I don’t want them to be in danger.”

“What danger, Riley? You think Diane would do something that crazy?”

“I don’t know what to think right now. I’ll see you tomorrow morning?”

“Course. I won’t miss the funeral. Just get through tonight, then tomorrow, then we can get drunk.”

That sounded perfect to Riley. Get drunk, find a wife, get married, and hopefully, stop this Chandler woman from stealing everything he had left of his family’s legacy.

***

Riley awoke the following morning to thunderclouds rolling in over the city. For once, it looked like the prediction of rain was accurate. He dressed in his best suit, fixed his hair, and put in his silver stud. Mr. Benton might not approve, but he’d gotten that piercing the same day his grandfather did. On his eighteenth birthday. Bit of an impulse on both their parts.

It made him smile, and he felt his chest tighten when Ben knocked on his upper-floor penthouse door. The town car was there, ready to take him to say goodbye to the man who had become his second father. He wasn’t sure how he would make it through the day, but somehow, he’d manage. Ben shook his head and patted Riley on the back as he accompanied him to the elevator, down to the ground floor, and into the car. Riley had questions for him about Diane and the candidates to be his future wife, but he stopped himself from asking any of them. Now was not the time for that. There was a bottle of whiskey in the backseat, and Ben held up a black flask.

“Here, all ready to go,” he said as he tucked it in Riley’s hand.

“Thanks, man, really…for everything.”

“He was like family to me, too. Hell, he’s the one that let you hire me in the first place.” Ben laughed. “I was close to being a screw-up, and he let me have my second chance.”

Second chances. Maybe that was why his grandfather did what he did. Making Riley get married. Forcing him to step away from the lifestyle he’d fallen into. Giving him a second chance at finding that special someone.

The drive out of the city and to the cemetery wasn’t long, and Riley wasn’t prepared when they arrived to step out and see not only his grandfather’s freshly placed tombstone, but those of his parents…and the woman he loved. Ben got out first and let him have a moment. Riley opened the flask and drank deep, trying to steel his nerves. He didn’t visit as much as he should have. He seemed to be always making up some excuse or another, but today, he didn’t have an excuse. Didn’t have a choice. He had to face them all and pray that, wherever they were, they weren’t disappointed in him. Especially his Meredith. He couldn’t stand to think that she could see the past few years of his life and what he’d done with it.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered to the stale air in the car.

The anniversary was only a month away. The night that changed his life forever. The accident he couldn’t stop from happening…the sirens, the flashing lights…the sound of her flat-lining—

“Riley, are you ready?” Ben asked as he opened the car door again.

“Hmm? Yeah…yeah, I’m ready.”

He scooted out of the car and stood just as the first few drops of rain started to fall.
Figures it would rain
. His grandfather had loved the rain, loved when storms would roll in. Riley smiled up into the dark clouds and wondered if anyone else watched him, too. He headed towards the hearse to help the others carry the casket to the gravesite. His grandfather’s two closest friends and several of the other board members of the company were there to help. The second the weight was in his hands, Riley felt tears sting his eyes as they followed the priest to the site and set the casket in place.

“Good morning,” the priest began as everyone gathered close. “We are here today to say our final goodbye to Riley Marston the first. He was loved by many, family and friends alike…”

He went on and on. Riley stopped listening to his words. All he heard was the weeping of those around him and scattered, disjointed whispered words of comfort. It felt like it had dragged on forever before the priest said the final prayer and Riley was asked to toss the first handful of dirt onto the lowered casket. Slowly, he reached down and scooped soil up into his hands. Slightly dampened by the rain, it felt cool and strangely comforting. He sprinkled it gently, then stepped to the side, allowing others to do the same.

Hands were shaken as he said goodbye to everyone who had attended, saying they would see him back at the company where they were hosting a lunch for everyone. He saw Diane and her friend William head straight for their car afterwards, not even bothering to say hello. Not that Riley cared. The rain started to fall harder, and soon, he was soaked from head to foot. As everyone else ran to their vehicles, he spread his arms wide, turned his face towards the sky and laughed. It was the perfect way to end the funeral. Ben came over, and together, they stood there as the casket was lowered all the way into the grave.

“Come on, let’s go get a drink,” Ben said.

“Or five,” Riley muttered. They headed back to the car, but something caught his eye across the path. “Ben, is that a woman?”

“Yeah, she’s getting soaked, too.”

“Here,” he said shrugging out of his jacket. “Take this to her. I have to say hello to someone else really quick.”

“Of course,” Ben said, a bit confused, but he rushed over to the woman standing near another gravesite.

Riley turned back to the tombstones behind him and walked until he reached Meredith’s. Someone had placed fresh flowers at her grave, but there was no indication of who. He bent down and kissed the wet stone. “I love you, Meredith. Promise I’ll visit again soon.”

Chapter 4

It was late afternoon by the time Phoebe made it back to her small apartment in Brooklyn. She was soaked from head to toe, including the jacket that some strange man in the cemetery had loaned her. She’d tried to turn him down, but he’d insisted and then run off back into the storm. Once the door was bolted behind her, she took it off and shook it.

“Damn, this is ruined,” she muttered. “What is this, silk? Shit.”

Far better than anything she could hope to afford—ever. Not that clothes were her first concern right now. She traipsed through the apartment, dripping water everywhere as she undid her long, auburn hair that was already starting to kink and curl from the rain. No point in trying to fix it now.

“Mom? Are you awake? I’m back home,” she called out as she dropped the wet jacket in her bathtub and walked to what had been her bedroom. Now it was her mother’s room since she was unable to care for herself any more. “Mom?”

She knocked on the closed door, but there was no answer.

Her mom always answered.

“Mom, are you awake?”

She tried the door and found it locked. Phoebe’s stomach plummeted. If her mother had an episode while she was gone, who knew what she’d done.

“Mom, I need you to open the door. It’s Phoebe. Come on, Mom!”

Still no answer. She ran to the living room and grabbed the key out of the dish by the front door, sliding and slipping back down the hall in her hurry. The key seemed to stick in the lock a few times, probably from her fumbling hands, before she managed to get it unlocked and yank the door open.

“Mom! Oh, my God,” she cried. Her mom lay on the floor, her head bleeding. Phoebe scrambled for the phone on the bedside table and dialed 911 as she checked for a pulse. “Hello? Yes, my mom, she fell…her head’s bleeding. I don’t know how long she’s been like this.” She spat out her address then did as the operator said, grabbing a towel to try and staunch the oozing wound. She knew she shouldn’t have left her alone again, but the doctors had said the new medicine would help...

She’d rip them a new one when they got to the hospital.

“Hang on, Mom, help’s coming,” she whispered. “Just hang on.”

***

It took fifteen minutes for the ambulance to arrive. Phoebe watched as they loaded her mom on a stretcher and carried her down the two flights of stairs. The ambulance ride seemed to take forever, and when they got to the hospital, she was directed to the waiting room while her mother’s head was examined. She’d demanded to see her mother’s doctor and was told he was on his way and would be in shortly. Phoebe took the clipboard and sat down in a huff, filling out the paperwork for her mother.

Her clothes were still wet, and she started to shiver from the cold air blowing through the waiting room. The writing on the page was reduced to scribbles as her hand shook from the cold…from everything. This ER visit was going to cost her again. Money she didn’t have, and neither did her mother.

“Phoebe, what are you doing here?”

She glanced up, confused, then tried to smile when she saw her friend, Charlotte, standing there. “Hey, I didn’t know you were working today.”

Charlotte was a nurse in pink scrubs today. She hurried over and gave Phoebe a hug just as the tears started to fall. “Your mom in again? What happened this time?”

“I left her alone, went to visit Dad,” Phoebe whispered through the tears. “I was gone a few hours, but I thought she’d be fine. They said she’d be fine, but she locked herself in the bedroom and fell! She hit her head. She could have died! She almost did.”

“It’s all right, I’m sure she’ll be fine.”

But Phoebe shook her head. “Something else is wrong with her.”

“Is her doctor here yet?”

She shook her head as she glanced around. “Whatever medicine he put her on isn’t working. We have to do something else, and they haven’t told me anything.”

“Okay, just sit right here. I’ll go see what I can find out, all right?”

Phoebe nodded and watched her friend go to the nurse’s station to see what she could dig up. Charlotte had been helping her through so much lately, and Phoebe wasn’t even sure she deserved a friend like that. Things had been rough since her mom got sick and her father died of a heart attack that came out of nowhere. She’d been left to deal with everything. She had no other family, and no one close except Charlotte.