I’m so fucking bored I could shoot myself. If I have to go on one more date with a money-hungry, gold-digger, I swear, I’ll end it all. Women are fun. Sure. They have what I like. Pussy, tits, lips, I like all that as much as the next guy. More, in fact. I live for it.

But spending night after night with some girl from a bar who’s only there because she knows you’re a billionaire, that shit gets old, know what I mean?

I need to shake things up. I need to make a change. I’m not exactly sure what I want, but I’ll know it when I see it.

At least, I hope I will.

I sit down at my desk and open an escort site. Beautiful woman after beautiful woman. All with the same perfect legs, same perfect hair, same fake smile.

What’s a guy got to do to get something new? Something fresh? Something real?

There’s a knock on my door and I close the browser window.

“Mr. Anderson?”

It’s my assistant, Jeb. He’s gay, and I’ve seen the way he looks at me, but I’ve never been bored enough to go that far, if you know what I mean. I want something new but not that new.

“What is it, Jeb?”

“It’s this Dairy Technics deal. Looks like the team’s come up with a few bidding strategies.”

He struts over and hands me the strategy document. I scan through it. It’s the same old shit. Bid high, force his hand. Bid low, get him to let his guard down. I know none of it will work.

Wes Eastwood is no fool. He didn’t get to be the youngest billionaire on the street by falling for shit like this. I crumple up the document and take aim for the basketball hoop hanging over my trash can. Swish! The document hits the trash can and Jeb gets the message loud and clear.

“We need something different for this one, Jeb. Did I fail to make that clear in the meeting?”

“Eh, no sir, you made it perfectly clear.”

“Then why are the sending me this shit? You know we won’t beat Wes with crap like this. He wants this deal. I can smell it.”

Jeb scurries off back to the team and I pour myself a neat bourbon and take a sip.

Wes has been my biggest rival since forever. I fucking hate that people refer to him as the youngest billionaire on Wall Street, because technically, it’s misleading. The truth is, Wes and I are exactly the same age. Yup. One more thing we have in fucking common. We have the same birthday, the same year. We’re both thirty-nine. We’re the same age to the exact day. And we’re both billionaires. So how can he be the youngest billionaire? Because he hit the magic number first, that’s how.

He was a billionaire before me. I thought I had him beat, but he pulled a fast one on me. He’s always pulling shit like that. Which is why I’m determined to beat him this time. He comes from dairy farmers. He cares about dairy farmers. And I’m going to own the company that outsources dairy farming to Asia, or Mexico, or wherever’s fucking cheapest.

I can’t wait to look him in the eye and say, “Too fucking bad, Wes. That’s business.”

Not that I hate him. I’m his kid’s godfather. I’m just a competitive prick. Hey, at least I’m honest.

I sip my bourbon and there’s another knock on the door.

“What now?” I growl.

It’s Jeb again, this time with my head of legal and head of strategy. All three enter the room timidly.

“I hope you’ve come up with something more than just, ‘try to win,’ this time.”

“I think we have, sir,” Jeb says.

I look at him and then at the two advisers standing slightly behind him. Between the three of them they probably earn more than ten million dollars a year. Let’s see if all that brain power has paid off.

“Well,” I say, impatiently, “what is it?”

The head of legal takes over. He’s a slick, heartless lawyer who made a name for himself tearing down factories and putting the workers out of the job. Just the kind of ruthless prick I like to have on my side.

“We’ve come up with a strategy, sir.”

“No kidding,” I say, throwing my hands up. “Are you going to tell me what it fucking is?”

“Well, sir, it’s a little unusual.”

“Are you going to make me fucking guess, or are you going to say it?”

“Yes, sir. It’s … well. It’s just …”.

“Just what?”

“I’m not sure you’ll like it.”

I look at the lawyer. I know he’s done some pretty heartless things in his career, so if this one’s giving him pause it really must be bad. I take a long sip of my bourbon and slam down the glass.

“Will it make us win this Dairy Technics deal?”

“We, I mean, I, I think so, sir.”

“Then I like it.”

He steps forward and hands me a legal brief.

“What’s this?”

“It’s the strategy, sir.”

“This is a child custody document.”

“It’s a child protection complaint, sir.”

“A what?”

“A child protection complaint. Sir, Wes Eastwood is a single father.”

“I know he’s a single father. I’m his kid’s godfather.”

“That makes him vulnerable, sir.”

“Vulnerable, how?”

“We can say he’s failing as a parent.”

I let out a hollow laugh. “Wes is the best father I’ve ever seen in my life. Even without a mother that kid knows one hundred percent he’s loved.”

“Yes, sir. You know that, but a judge won’t.”

“What judge?”

“A family court judge.”

“And why would a family court judge be looking into Wes Eastwood’s parenting.”

The lawyer clears his throat. Here it comes.

“Because we have a child welfare officer on our payroll, sir. We tell her to issue the court order saying Wes is a bad father. He’ll be forced to show up in court or risk losing his kid.”

I look at the lawyer and have to resist flinging my glass at him. I’ve seen some pretty underhanded bidding strategies in my day, but this is fucking low.

“And how would that help us with the bidding war?”

“Well, sir, we can fix it so the hearing is on the day Dairy Technics closes. Wes will be distracted by the court hearing. He’ll be worried about losing his kid. He won’t care about a business deal.”

“So that’s how we win? By cheating?”

The three men in front of me nod their heads.

I think about all the times I’ve been with Wes and Brady. Wes really is the best father I ever knew. He’d die for that kid, and there’s a very deep part of me that respects the fuck out of Wes for being that way. It’s more than my father ever did for me. I know it’s more than Wes’s father ever did too.

“It’s low,” I say. “Attacking his family like that. It’s below the belt.”

“Well, sir. He wouldn’t actually lose the case. Any judge would immediately see that Wes Eastwood is a good father. He’d be in and out of that courtroom without ever being at risk of actually losing.”

“How could we be sure he wouldn’t lose?”

“Unless he suddenly becomes a really shitty father, he wouldn’t lose.”

“So he’ll get to leave with his kid?”

“Yes, sir. Of course. We just want to distract him while the auction is closing. We don’t actually want to harm his family.”

“I don’t know,” I say. “Do you have any idea what Wes would do if he ever found out about this?”

“He won’t find out, sir. The child protection officer, she’s under our thumb. We have photos of her cheating on her husband.”

“Oh, we do? And how did we get those?”

The lawyer looks at me, then at Jeb and the head of strategy.

“Because I’m the one who fucked her. I knew we’d be going up against Wes, and I knew he’s a single dad.”

“So you took it on yourself to fuck a married child welfare officer so that you’d have this on her?”

He clears his throat.

“Yes, sir.”

I pick up the bottle of bourbon and pour another glass. I hand it to the lawyer.

“Fucking genius,” I say.