Epilogue
in the middle of work, the entire scene washed over me. Like a tsunami, it knocked everything else out of the way. The wide window of my downtown Oakland office disappeared and I found myself standing on Stan's portico again.
Rainer was on one knee, his words so soft and stressed that I had to lean forward and down to hear him. Then I reeled back, not believing I had heard him right. Rainer had to shuffle forward across the bricks to catch my hand and try to convince me he was serious.
What really caught me was his sincere offer to always be there when I came home.
No other expectations, no other old-fashioned notions of marriage, just me pursuing my career and coming home each night to find him there for me.
After I said yes, Rainer had launched from the bricks and caught me up in his arms. Instead of the molten kiss I expected, he lifted me high in the air and spun me around until the twinkling lanterns and lights of Stan's mansion flowed into bright circles.
And then we kissed.
I leaned back in my office chair, ready to draw the warmth of that memory around me like a blanket.
"Ms. Nichols?"
Topher stood in the doorway, and when I spotted him, I jumped out of my chair. "What? I mean, I'm here. What do you need?"
My assistant gave me funny little smile. "I tried buzzing twice, but you didn't answer, so I knocked."
I smoothed down my suit. "I was just deep in thought. Business, of course."
"Of course," Topher said. "Though it would be very helpful if you set aside some time to think about a wedding date."
"Yes, yes, of course." I shuffled papers needlessly on my desk. "Rainer and I have been meaning to discuss it. We just keeping getting, ah, distracted."
Topher held up his hand. "No need to explain. I have a few suggestions if it would be helpful."
"Helpful for you?" I asked my eager assistant.
He nodded emphatically. "How am I supposed to plan the perfect wedding if I don't even know what season it will be?"
"Fine, yes. As soon as these projects are a little further along, I will sit down with Rainer and we will choose a wedding date," I said. "It's just a little bit more complicated than I expected."
"How so?" Topher asked. He pursed his lips, unable to hide the irritation he felt at not being able to plan ahead.
I couldn't very well tell my assistant that every time Rainer and I sat down to talk about our wedding we ended up in a passionate tangle. It was hard to think about giving that up in exchange for a mound of details such as what kind of fish we should serve at some overblown reception.
"Well, you of all people should know that I can't compromise work at this point in my career. Things are still just getting off the ground here, and I can't lose focus." I sat down again, faced my computer, and couldn't remember what I had been working on before falling into a daydream.
"I can put in the extra hours, Tasha. Or you can hire a wedding planner. It doesn't have to be a bother," Topher reminded me.
"I know, it's just that I'm not sure Rainer is ready for such structure. Can you imagine him going to taste cakes and pick out chair covers?" I asked. The thought made me shudder.
It was enough that Rainer had agreed to come live with me in the white house overlooking the three bridges. I didn't want to push for more when we were still trying to figure out how to be happy together.
"Now, I've wasted enough time as it is. I need to get these reports finished before I present everything to the board. Please hold my calls," I told Topher.
He opened the door to return to his desk and was bowled back by Rainer.
"Surprise!" Rainer said with a smile. "My volunteer shift at the community center ended sooner than I thought. So, I thought I'd swing by and take my lovely fiancée out to lunch."
I felt like a big, wet, wool blanket dropped over me. I hadn't been joking about the reports and the presentation to the board. If my own daydreaming hadn't distracted me, I could have been done. But, now, I had to tell Rainer that I didn't have time for him. Would he regret choosing someone who always picked their career over him?
I kissed him and felt like crying. "I'd love to, I'd really love to have lunch with you, but I can't," I said. "Please don't be mad. I'm just figuring out how to manage my time, and things will get better. I promise."
Rainer nodded for Topher to step out of my office and then he took both my hands. "Tasha, I don't know why you keep hesitating about getting married. I told you that I have no problem supporting your career, but I guess I have to prove it to you."
"No." I caught Rainer's face in both hands. "I need to prove to you how much I love you, and how much I appreciate you. I'll have Topher reschedule my presentation."
Rainer shook his head. "I'm not going to let you do that, but I am going to help you with those reports. Remember, I wasn't totally useless when we worked together."
"But what about lunch?" I asked.
"Taken care of." Rainer called for Topher and my assistant reappeared with a loaded picnic basket. "It may not be our little hill above the community garden, but it's good enough for me."
I watched through blurred eyes as Rainer spread out a blanket on the floor of my office. Topher raced out the door and returned with a large blooming tree in an enormous planter.
"What's this?" I asked Rainer.
"I brought the garden to you," Rainer said. "Happy?"
I threw my arms around him. "More than you know."
"Well, you can tell me," Rainer said, "after we finish those reports."
BILLIONAIRE’S VACATION
By Claire Adams
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2017 Claire Adams
Chapter One
Christian
I tapped my fingers against the edge of the couch as I waited for them to finish the final sound check and whatever other miscellaneous things that they were doing. I thought that they would get all that done while I was still in hair and wardrobe, but apparently, they weren't aware of how valuable my time was. I should have charged them extra.
“All right, I think we're ready,” Kelly, the interviewer, said, dropping into a seat to my left and giving me a winning smile. As though she needed a smile like that with legs like those. I watched as she carefully crossed her long, tanned, muscular limbs in front of her and carefully arranged her navy skirt. When she leaned toward me, clearly trying to appear friendly for the cameras, I caught a glimpse of a lacy, black bra beneath her gray shirt. Maybe she wasn't quite as straight-laced and prim as she appeared to be.
I smiled back at her, albeit more predatorily than anything else. I was so going to bag her by the end of the night no doubt. No woman could resist me for too long, though the small portion of the chase was most of the fun.
“All right, everyone, we're live in three, two, one!”
“Rolling!”
Kelly turned toward the cameras, giving her viewers her classic grin. She was a pretty girl, no doubt. Half the reason the viewers watched her was because she reminded them of who they wanted to be. Young. Successful. Sexy.
“All right, everyone, we're here on The Latest, bringing you the best in entertainment interviews and gossip. And tonight, we have a very special guest for you: Christian Wall!” There was clapping from the studio audience, and even though I hated interviews like this, I forced a charming smile on my face. Time to put on my best façade and give them what they wanted. Sounded like the cadence of my life story.
The thing was, even though I wasn't the sole owner of Sunrise Real Estate, I was the face of the company. I loved working press conferences, and I loved going out and talking to people who were looking to buy houses and helping them find their dream homes. I'd had the chance to be on a number of reality TV shows where I helped sell homes to couples looking in various cities that we operated in, and that was always worth all the fuss.
But the entertainment ones were always a bit trickier. I'd have to be careful not to let Kelly trip me up. I knew the kinds of things that had been in the news about me lately, things that were making everyone, even Paul, a bit frustrated.
“So, Christian, as you probably know, the main reason that I've asked you here today is that you have recently been named the hottest bachelor in the United States. Can we just start with a talk about that title?” She smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. I couldn’t help but wonder how many other people in the world were walking around, faking happiness.
I laughed a little, shaking my head. “Well, it's of course very flattering,” I said. “I've heard about guys getting named the hottest bachelor in their city or things like that, but I thought Mr. USA had to be a model!”
Kelly gave me a smirking once-over and looked out toward the audience. “I don't know about the rest of you, but if Christian here isn't fit to be a model, then I don't know who is! In fact, I'd say it's only a matter of time before they have you up on underwear ads around the city.”
“You wish, maybe!” I said, even though I was inwardly rolling my eyes. Sure, I was hot enough to be up on those sorts of ads, and what I did with my personal life had always been, I held, no one's business except for my own. However, she did have to realize that for all the other things that had made it into the news, I did have some professional reputation that I needed to uphold. Not many young husbands would feel comfortable buying a house from someone they knew their wives were wanking to. It was disturbing, and yet a little hot.
“From what I hear in the news lately, there are other ways to get the great Christian Wall down to his underwear,” Kelly said, a gleam in her eyes, and of course that was where she had been heading with that remark. I might have seen that one coming.
I cut her off with my canned response before she could mention the whole underwear incident. It had been a stupid bet with one of my friends, fueled by way too much alcohol. We'd been out at this bar, and girls had been stripping their shirts off so that guys would do body shots off them. Originally, I'd ended up on the table with just my shirt off, but then one thing had led to another, and there had been these two sexy Swedish girls practically fucking me right there on the floor, their hands trailing everywhere.
Someone had gotten a shot of me stripped down to my black boxer briefs and laid out on a table for them to do body shots off of me. That photo had proceeded to be picked up by seemingly every entertainment source in the world. It wasn’t my finest moment by far, but one that everyone seemed to cling to as if they had nothing better to do. It was one of the incidences that had made Paul a bit exasperated. Or maybe more than a bit.
But, obviously, I couldn't just tell Kelly to fuck off.
Instead, I smiled at her. “If you're suggesting that we go out to dinner on Friday night, I'm afraid I'm already taken,” I told her. “I've recently started seeing someone. It's nothing too serious now, but I'm not sure how much longer I'll be the hottest bachelor in the U.S., unfortunately!”
“Oh, really?” Kelly asked, arching an eyebrow at me.
It was total bullshit unless you counted this thing that I had going on with this girl Megan, but that was more of a 2 a.m. drunken thing than anything else. I wasn't about to quit being a bachelor anytime soon.
“But the parties aren't going to stop, are they?” Kelly pressed. “It seems like you've been at all the red-carpet events lately; it seems like you and Jamie Michaels are getting pretty chummy, hmm?”
“Jamie's a great guy,” I told her. “I was lucky enough to meet him on a ski trip last winter in the Alps; we started out at Meribel, but at the end of the week, neither of us were ready to go back to the grind.” I laughed a little. “Fortunately, I could get some work done remotely, and off we headed to Italy for a second week in Cortina. He's an amazing skier and a great guy.”
“Some people might say that you have a little too much fun sometimes,” Kelly said. “Tell us what you think about that? Is life just supposed to be fun and games for some and toil and work for others?”
I shrugged and smiled disarmingly at her. “I’m not too sure about what life is supposed to be about, or if you could put it into one or two words.” I shrugged. “But as far as my crazy life, you know what they say. Boys will be boys. And especially for Jamie and I, who have access to some of the best toys in the world, from snowmobiles to dirt bikes and more, yeah, we're going to have a ton of fun. Of course, we're always safe with them, and we haven't dropped off the globe like we did during the ski tour. For me, things have been busy around the office as people book their last-minute summer vacation homes and start looking ahead to next winter. And Jamie's working on shooting his latest movie.”
“Any details you can share about that?” She wagged her eyebrows.
I laughed. “Jamie's totally close-mouthed about it,” I told her, and that one wasn't a lie. “You probably know more about it than I do!”
“We wish!” She glanced toward the cameras as if including the audience in her ‘we.' “Christian, one more question before we let you go: any details you can give us about this mystery woman who has captured your interest?”
I mimed zipping my lips and throwing away the key, laughing at the noises of protest from many of the female audience members. “A gentleman never kisses and tells,” I said, holding up my hands. “Anyway, I believe in true love and all of that. I'd hate to think that I jinxed things by getting too far ahead of myself.”
“Aw, that's sweet,” Kelly said. She looked back out at the audience and began to introduce the next segment of the show; I gave a little sigh of relief, keeping the smile plastered on my face, and tuning her out.
Despite all the talk about this woman who I was supposedly seeing, I didn't even have to try to take her home that night, really. She would entertain me for the night, or a bit of it, for sure. The way she subtly eye-fucked me before the interview gave me full assurance. I was fucking her within an inch of her life later.
I walked off stage with various members of her crew patting me on the back and shouting words of encouragement. I needed a shower, and then I was headed to find her again.
Funny enough, I ran into her as I was finally coming out of my long shower. I'd done my best to scrub off the excessive makeup they'd covered me with prior to the interview, highlights and eyeliner and all sorts of silly things that combined to make me look better under the harsh lighting of the studio. Finally, I felt human again. Like a man.
“Oh! I didn't realize you were still here,” Kelly said as her eyes went a little wide. The soft smile playing at the side of her lips let me know that even though she might be a little surprised, she was happy about it.
I smiled at her, running a hand back through my still-damp hair. “Yeah, I chatted with a couple of the other guests for a bit and then got someone to let me into your dressing room so I could take a shower. I hope that's okay.”
I watched her expression carefully and, yeah, she was probably already wet in her panties. I could only hope her panties matched that flash of a bra that I'd seen. I could only imagine the way the black lace would look across her tight, sexy skin. My cock twitched in my pants at the thought of gripping it and running in along her soft curves.
“It’s perfectly fine.” She licked her lips and eye-fucked me again. “Did you like it?”
I chuckled. “The shower? Yeah. There was this hot guy in there, and he let me run my hands over his wet, muscular body.” I winked. “Wait. That was me…”
She laughed. “You’re so full of it. I swear the world waits in wonder for your next stunt or to see who you really are under that handsome mask.”
“I’m just me.” I lifted my hands to the side and gave her the cutest little boy look I could. “And me wants to know if you'd let me buy you a drink. It’s a ‘thanks’ for not totally destroying my reputation like so many entertainment anchors seem to want to do lately,” I told her, cocking my head to the side and smiling down at her.
There was a moment of indecision on her face, but then, she smiled. “Sure thing,” she said. “Can you give me ten minutes to get changed out of my suit, though?”
I spread my arms generously, nearly snorting as I saw her eyes dart down toward my abs. “Take as much time as you need,” I told her. “I've got some work emails that I need to answer, so I'll just lurk around the break room doing that.”
“Great,” she said and disappeared for a bit.
My mind became a playground of possibilities. I loved women. Especially when they were naked and moaning. Chill bumps pinpricked my skin as lusty images rolled through my mind, one after the next. I was heated and panting a little by the time Kelly showed back up.
“You ready?” she asked, looking like heaven.
“Yeah. Let’s get out of here.” I stood and lifted my hand. “Lead the way, beautiful.”
“Oh no, don’t you start that.” She laughed as she turned and walked in front of me. I let my eyes run down the long line of her back to the thick curve of her ass. Wonder if she likes anal?
“Start what?” I asked innocently.”
“You know what.” She laughed and moved through a large crowd of people.
From there, it was easy enough to lead her out to the street with a hand at her lower back. “You know,” I said slyly. “My place isn't that far from here, and rather than going out to a bar, I've got a really good wine that you might like. I picked it up the last time I was in Italy.”
Kelly moved onto the street and glanced over at me as she bit her lower lip, no doubt thinking about that imaginary girlfriend. Sure enough. “I thought you were interested in someone?” she asked.
“We're still pretty casual,” I said. “She's not going to protest if I have you over for a glass of wine. I think people are putting a little too much weight on the relationship anyway. She’s not wearing a ring, and I’m not buying one. And here’s this… what with you interviewing me and all, we're basically coworkers, right? It’s like a coworker happy hour. At my place.” I lifted an eyebrow, hoping like hell my antics would work.
Kelly laughed. “Maybe just for the day we are,” she agreed. “All right. I'd love to. Anyway, I can only imagine what kind of pad the world's hottest young real estate bachelor lives in.”
I shook my head, still smiling. “I hardly think I count as the world's hottest young anything,” I told her. “Maybe the city's hottest young real estate bachelor.” I winked at her, and could practically see the way she melted.
Of course, she didn't see much of the penthouse apartment that I lived in. I cornered her as she was taking off her shoes, crowding her up against the door as much as I thought she'd let me. “You’re a very attractive woman; do you realize that?” I told her.
“Oh no,” Kelly said, laughing and shaking her head, but making no move to leave, even though she must know what was about to happen. “I'm not going to be just another of your flings, Christian Wall. You can forget all about that.”
I sighed. “That's a pity,” I told her. “I'm pretty sure you're the world's hottest young journalist. We would have made quite the pair.”
Kelly bit her lower lip. “Do you think so?” she asked breathily.
Playing on a woman's weakness to want affection was all too easy. And it was a pretty easy guess that anyone who had chosen the entertainment field definitely had an underlying need to be wanted, namely by the masses. For some reason, it seemed like the hotter a girl was, the more worried she was that she was a no one.
“Fuck yes,” I whispered seductively. “I’ve been hard since I got to the studio.” My eyes moved down her body. “I’ve imagined making love to you twenty times since the interview started.”
Suddenly, Kelly surged up and kissed me, as I might have predicted that she would.
I slowed the nervous motion of her lips, stroking a hand down her back to calm her down. Even though I wanted to make this quick and dirty, to make her scream my name. I could tell I would have to go a bit slowly with her. She clearly didn't have that many one-night stands, and she had to know that this was a one-night stand; she was in entertainment, and she had done her research before interviewing me.
I lengthened the kiss, allowing it to deepen into something slow and lewd, our tongues twining around one another's. I slid my hands up under her shirt, stroking them tantalizingly across her skin before lifting the garment up over her head, revealing that lacy black bra that she'd unknowingly been teasing me with. It was thin, flimsy, and I could see her nipples were already pert little nubs beneath the fabric. I bent down and raked my teeth over those two points of pleasure while my hands worked at her jeans.
Then, once I'd stripped her down to nothing more than lace, I led her into the bedroom. She looked gorgeous sprawled out across my sheets like that. I kept a burning gaze on her as I stripped off my clothes, and then I crawled across the bed toward her, nudging her knees apart so that I could crawl between them.
I licked and sucked my way up those luscious legs of hers and then pulled her panties down away from her pink pussy, bending in to kiss that as well. Even with something that simple, she was arching against the sheets, and I knew this was going to be over fast.
It was a pity. I always hoped to find a sexy girl with a bit more stamina. But then again, if her stamina was that good, it probably meant that she slept around a lot, and I wasn't exactly looking to sleep with a slut.
Sure enough, though, it wasn't long before Kelly was gasping out my name and coming, her pussy pressing hard around me and her hands clawing desperately at the sheets. I kept going, managing to bring her to come again and again.
“Stop,” Kelly whimpered, pushing back against my shoulders. “It's–It's too much, Christian.”
I rolled my eyes and pulled out, jacking myself hard for a few moments before coming across her tits. That was never my preferred way to finish, but that seemed to be the way it always happened with women at this point. They just couldn't handle me.
I slipped out of bed and began collecting her things for her, ignoring the disappointed look she gave me. What, had she thought I was going to let her stay over in my bed? The thought was almost laughable. I escorted her back downstairs and got her into a cab. That was the most I had to offer.