Of course, the asshole is still pimping out his daughter. I shove the phone in my pocket and snatch Willow’s cheap white coat off the floor. It feels paper thin between my fingers. “Was there a coat on that rack?”

“A what?” she asks, completely confused.

I whip open the door and bellow, “I need a long winter coat. White.”

“I don’t need a new coat,” Willow protests. “This is fine. Con, seriously.”

Callie appears immediately with a puffy, white coat in her hand. “It’s not a dressy coat, but I’m sure I can find one in a few days. This is one of our most popular items—”

“I’ll take it.” I fold Willow’s old coat over my arm in case she has some sentimental attachment and then drape the down-filled coat over Willow’s shoulders.

She runs a hand over the round patch on the arm with the map of the Arctic. “Con, this is too much. Do you know how much these Canada Goose jackets go for?”

I don’t, but neither do I care. I take her hand. “Let’s go.” As we pass by Callie, I shove my black credit card toward her. “Charge it and get the rest delivered.”

“But Mr. Romano—”

I cut her off with a wave of my hand. “You have my card. I don’t care what it costs.”

It pisses me off that our shopping excursion is being cut short before we got to the good stuff—the sparkly, glittery stuff—but Willow’s dad needs to be taken care of immediately. He’s a cancerous growth on her life, and if allowed to continue to cling to her, that disease would spread until it consumed her.

“I’m sorry,” Willow says when we reach the elevator bank. She sounds miserable.

I’m going to string up her dad with his own tie when we get to her house. “What for?”

“I know you saw the texts,” she says, her head so low that her chin’s nearly making contact with her chest. “I can’t imagine what you’re thinking right now. Actually, I can and that makes me feel awful.”

I stare at her in astonishment, speechless for the first time. Is she thinking that I’m mad at her?

“You must think that I planned for this.” She plucks at the shirt we just purchased. “That I’m playacting because I want your money and that I’m going to steal all your secrets and give them to my father. I swear to you that I didn’t come to you with any intention of getting money. I just wanted…you. Now you’ve bought all these things and I don’t have a gift for you.”

The elevator door slides open, momentarily halting my response. Three people wait impatiently for us to get on. With her eyes pinned to her shoes, Willow steps inside the car. I follow her, frustrated that we’re not alone.

While she stews in her misery, I chafe at the people around us. I throw an arm around her shoulder, but she stands stiffly at my side. I glare at the others. Can’t they get off and take a different elevator? When the first floor lights up, the car empties.

Immediately, I take Willow’s shoulders in my hands. “I know you aren’t a gold-digger, Willow. You’ve been chasing after me for three years. Gold-diggers don’t spend that much time waiting for a mark. A real hunter would’ve moved on to easier pickings.”

Her chin comes up and out. “Why would I move on? Aren’t you one of the richest men around? My father says you’re worth at least twenty billion.”

“That little?” I smirk, amused by her pugnacious response. I pinch her chin. “You don’t have it in you to be a gold-digger.”

That makes her frown even harder. “Have you met my father? He’s as avaricious as they come. And I only put up a token resistance to you buying a few pieces of clothing that probably cost more than the gross national product of a small country.”

The elevator stops on the basement and the doors slide open. I usher her out, directing her down the long hallway. All the while, she continues to argue that she’s a terrible human being out to take me for all I’m worth.

“I loved the nice car. I know you live in that amazing two-story penthouse overlooking Central Park. I’ve fantasized about waking up in that place and cooking breakfast for us.”

“Or asking the chef to prepare us breakfast,” I chime in.

“Or I’ll ask the chef to make me breakfast, lunch, and dinner,” she adds on miserably.

“Go ahead,” I tell her as we reach the sidewalk. I wave a hand to hail Ben. “I don’t give a shit. I’ve got plenty of cash and no one to spend it on. You could be the Bill Gates of gold-diggers and I wouldn’t even notice.”

“If you don’t care, then why are you so angry? Why are we running off to confront my father?”

I look down at her in surprise. “You thought I was angry at you?”

Her wide eyes blink in confusion. “You’re not?”

“No, baby girl. Like I said, spend my money. It’s there for you to use. I’m angry because you’re eighteen and in charge of your dad’s life. Part of the reason I’ve been trying to resist you is because you’re young. You should be living it up, going to college, getting drunk, skipping class—”

“Getting groped by guys doped up or bombed out of their head, having professors leer at my tits, going to classes I don’t care about, looking for jobs that are designed to kill my will to live. That’s what you want for me?” She jerks her coat tight around her body. “I thought you wanted to take care of me. How is pushing me out into that cesspool of reality taking care of me?”

The light at the crosswalk turns green and she starts to trot across 58th Street to the Plaza.

Ben climbs out of the driver’s side and arches his eyebrows in silent query. I shrug and gesture for him to go park the car.

“Where are we going?” I ask, catching up to her.

“You said you were taking me home. I’m ready to go home.” She points upward in the direction of my aforementioned swanky two-story penthouse at the top of the Plaza Hotel.

“I thought we were going to see your father.”

She stops at the entrance of the Plaza. “I know that taking care of me is your privilege as my Daddy and I want that, but my father isn’t a bad man. He’s got questionable instincts and shitty parenting skills, but underneath all of the mess, he does love me.”

My anger melts at her words. I don’t want to drive a wedge between her and her old man. I just want to protect her from all the bad shit that is out there. “I don’t want you to have burdens, baby girl. I want to shoulder those for you. You’re too precious to have to worry about anything.”

She places a small hand on my chest and pushes up on her tiptoes to plant a kiss on my mouth. “That’s not realistic and I don’t want to live a fairy tale. I want a real life with you. I bet we’ll argue at times—and not the fake kind that I press so I can get a punishment, but actual disagreements where we’re going to have to compromise, but I’m okay with that because it’ll mean that our bond is strong enough to last forever after.”

I cup a hand around her neck and kiss her harder, longer, and more fervently. I thought I was getting a plaything, but I’m really getting a partner. Willow might only be eighteen, but she’s perfect for me in every way. She’s strong enough to stand up to me and to know what she wants.

Releasing her lips, I smooth the hair off her forehead. “Before Tim left, he reminded me I had one last present to buy. It’s a task I haven’t been able to complete yet, because the gift was for you. And, at the time, I couldn’t buy you what I really wanted to.”

I kneel down on the snowy sidewalk, not caring that the slush is ruining my two-thousand dollar Tom Ford suit. Above me, Willow gasps. People stop in mid-stride and gawk at us.

I reach into my pocket and pull out a velvet case, one that I’ve carried around since the day Willow turned eighteen. I knew then that I wanted to bind her to me forever. I’d just been in denial.

I lift up her left hand and stare into her beautiful green eyes that are filled with moisture. I tug her closer to me so that there’s barely room between her body and mine. “For three years, I’ve told myself that you were off-limits,” I say softly so that the outsiders can’t hear. “For three years, I’ve lived a celibate life, only wanting you. When you turned eighteen, I tried to remind myself that you deserved a different life than one with me. But you came to my office, you spoke your own truth and deserve the same from me. I love you Willow Kaplan. I love you more than the zeros in my bank account, more than the next deal, more than my own life. I want to be your man from now until the seasons stop turning and the oceans empty out. If you say yes, I will devote my entire being to making you happy. Be my little girl forever.”

She grabs the velvet box and throws herself into my arms. “Yes. Yes. Forever, yes! I love you, too!”

The crowd around us cheers. Willow licks the top of my ear and whispers, “If you don’t take me upstairs to our new home right now and fuck me like the Daddy I know you are, the tourists are going to get an eyeful.”

I lower her to the ground, pluck the box out of her hand and open it. She doesn’t even look at the five-carat rock I slide on her left finger.

“The ring’s not even on your finger and you’re giving me instructions,” I mock.

She presses her lips together pertly to give me an impudent close-mouthed smile.

“I guess you’ll have to be punished for that.”

The crowd titters, not having the first clue how serious I am.

“I guess you’ll have to catch me first.” She whirls and starts running.

I give her a head start, calling the doorman to let him know that he should let her up. After that, I call her father to let him know that I’m marrying his girl. He’s flabbergasted. I reel off a litany of instructions: he’s not to bother her with anything but emergencies; all requests shall be directed to my office; and I’m hiring him a personal assistant.

Even though my baby can handle all of it, she shouldn’t have to. I’m her Daddy now, and there’s nothing I want more than to love, cherish and adore her forever. As I walk into the Plaza, fat snowflakes lazily land on my hair and shoulders.

I look up at the new snow. It’s Christmas and I’ve received the best Christmas present ever. And if this the last present I ever get, I won’t care because I got the only one that matters.