This wasn’t happening.

I wasn’t covered in white chocolate mocha, with extra whipped cream. Drenched, sticky, and red faced with all eyes in the cafe locked on me—including a set of gray ones I hoped I’d never see again.

When I’d left home this morning, I considered it a stroke of luck that Hope didn’t give me a bit of her breakfast to carry with me on my scarlet blouse. Well, it used to be scarlet. Now it was scarlet with espresso polka dots. Turns out Hope’s addiction to giving you her little signature to carry around all day doesn’t compare to Mommy’s klutziness.

I squeezed my eyes shut and took a deep, bone rattling breath. The flow of oxygen to my brain should have been like a shot of adrenaline. Something similar to four shots of turbo charged espresso, hitting me all at once. The world should have trembled and whirred like some demented carousel, dangerously close to spinning off of its axis. Instead, I felt like I was trapped in a slow motion sequence in a movie. Time slowed down; the fluttering of my eyelashes, the thunder of my heart, the gaping of my mouth, the bulging of my eyes, all of it grinding to a crawl that magnified one devastating truth: this wasn’t a movie at all. Not a nightmare that I could wake up from. Reality was a bitter pill I had to swallow, and there was no escaping what was right in front of me.

My ex, who I thought I wouldn’t ever be seeing again if I had anything to say about it, was here. And this wasn’t the concert, where a barrier and juiced up security guards stood between us.

He was close enough to touch.

Close enough to strangle.

The room was so quiet you could hear a pin drop. Every conversation was silenced. Whatever people were chewing had either been abruptly swallowed or choked on. No one was on their phone because whatever was unfolding before their very eyes was infinitely more interesting.

This was more than somebody klutzing out, giving everyone something to pretend they hadn’t noticed. Grateful they weren’t the ones that had spilled a latte all over themselves.

But I wasn’t just anybody.

I was the boss’ wife, who was frozen in shock and horror as she blinked down at the man who was trying to clean up my mess.

A man that was all up in my personal space—and he wasn’t Jacob Whitmore.

I tried to swallow the wrecking ball in my throat. Tried to clear the haze that had turned me into some pillar of salt because I dared to look back. Because I was looking into the past, jerked back to the gamut of feelings that Corbin Wolfe evoked with a single look.

Excitement.

Anger.

I decided to focus on the last one as I still tried to wrap my head around the fact that this was happening. I was still dripping, wearing 80% of my drink while Corbin sponged up the liquid with napkins. My heart was no longer thundering in my ears and I could tune into the only sound in the room.

Corbin’s voice, low and sincere.

Apologizing profusely.

Once upon a time, an ‘I’m sorry’ from Corbin Wolfe would have meant something. Now? It was just a hollow, unnecessary, and-

“What are you doing here?” I asked shrilly, finally snapping out of it. Finding my voice and taking a step out of the growing pile of napkins. I set my phasers to kill as I glared at the last person I ever expected to run into at the office.

He was even more hipster than he’d been at the show, like he was hoping the paparazzi would snap a picture that would send the ladies to the store to buy their men everything Corbin wore, from head to toe. The ripped jeans were intentionally so, the indigo wash intensifying his olive colored skin. The combat boots were speckled with my latte. He’d traded his concert get up of flannel and a band t-shirt for a plain black sweatshirt that would have made anyone else look dumpy and dressed down. Apparently he’d left the glasses at home, and to be honest, I doubted he wore them out of necessity. The ball cap on his head was the color of his eyes, a cozy, dark heather gray. Combined with the wavy, blond wisps peeking out, he reminded me of California. He reminded me of broken promises and hollow disappointment.

I took another step back, turning to the barista with an apologetic wince. “I’m so sorry about the mess-“

“It’s no problem at all,” she cut me off, all her attention on the scene of the spill. I frowned when I realized that she wasn’t eyeballing the mess, making a mental note that she should be on alert whenever Leila Whitmore was in the general vicinity. She was watching every move Corbin made, with hearts in her eyes.

And she wasn’t the only one.

When you do something embarrassing, you always assume that everyone is looking at you. That me dropping my drink was like a gunshot heard round the world. But it didn’t take having access to people’s private thought bubbles to know that I was the last thing on their mind. The woman were all swooning over Corbin, swooping in to save the day. And the men? They were all giving him pointed looks, like he’d invaded their territory.

It was all ridiculous and not nearly as important as the question that he still hasn’t answered, Lay.

“Corbin-”

“Leila!”

Because clearly I’d pissed someone off and was getting my karmic due, Missy decided to remind me that it could always be worse.

I leveled my gaze in her direction, fighting the overwhelming urge to shake like a wet dog and make it rain white chocolate drops that would speckle her get-up like a Jackson Pollock painting. It wasn’t enough that her slacks weren’t covered in whipped cream. She had to circle us so we could get a good luck at how she meticulously matched every aspect of her outfit. Ivory blouse, ebony pants, suspenders and a bowler hat that stayed in place by some magic, with onyx ringlets framing her smug face.

She paused directly in front of me, turning the break room into some dusty town in the Wild West. She parked both hands on her hips and smiled deviously as a tumbleweed gusted past.

“I’d do introductions, but I believe you two are already acquainted.”

With Missy in my sights, I almost forgot there was anybody else in the room. With time, being around her wasn’t entirely contentious, but we were far from being the making chit chat/sitting together in the cafe/making introductions kind of work friends. In fact, from her smile (which was looking more like a snarl by the second) and considering every hackle I had at my disposal was raised, I would strike the whole ‘friend’ part altogether. We were two people who worked together. Tolerated each other. And from the lightning bolts that flashed in her dark eyes and the balling of my fists at my side, we barely did that.

Missy’s gaze was locked on me, but she was talking to someone else. Talking to him. “You’re such a sweetheart, Corbin, but I think Leila’s a big girl.” Her emphasis on ‘big’ made me want to wipe that Mean Girls flavored grin right off her face. Missy Diaz was the personification of every bully I’d encountered growing up. The girls who looked like they walked off the pages of a Delia’s catalogue. Who would smile sweetly if an adult was near and send you a silent message that later, when you were alone, they’d make you wish you stayed home sick. Pretty girls with a black hole where their hearts should have been, who grew up to be the bossy, gossipy, cool chicks that everyone worshipped because you’d rather be a kiss ass than the one she labeled ‘Not One of Us’.

Once upon a time, I would have stayed out of her way. Tried desperately to not butt heads with her. Made myself next to invisible.

Not anymore.

“Can I help you?” I squared my jaw, flicking my eyes over her from head to toe in the most dismissive way I could muster. “I was just-”

“Talking to my new client,” she finished with a smile so cold that I almost shivered. The chill was a fleeting thing because it was quickly replaced by an inferno as I realized that my eyes and ears weren’t playing tricks on me. That was Missy, holding out a hand to help Corbin to his feet. Corbin, who was looking back and forth like he was watching a tennis match, ready to duck so the ball wouldn’t smack him upside the head. Me, jaw dropping to the floor as I replayed Misty’s sentence in my head.

Talking to my new client.

Corbin was a client?

At Whitmore and Creighton?

As in, running into him just may become a common occurrence?

I took a step backward, not even caring that Missy’s smile stretched from ear to ear. She was all but doing a victory dance.

I wanted to go down swinging, but Corbin took a step toward me and everything in me cried out. I held out a hand, trying to keep my voice low and level. For his ears only, even though I felt like everyone in the room, on this freaking floor, could hear every word. “Don’t.”

He was never good at listening, reason #145 why we were an awful match. He came forward, all contrite and puppy dog eyes. “I couldn’t believe it was you at the concert! And when I realized that my agent hooked me up here at Whitmore and Creighton, at your company no less, I just knew that this was my chance to make things right. I have so much to tell-”

I shook my head again. Harder this time. I felt my cheeks shudder like I’d stepped into a wind tunnel.

Missy came forward to, licking her lips like a dog licked its chop when a big juicy something was waiting to be devoured. She had the juiciest scoop yet, and she knew it.

“So, how do you two know each other?” she asked, still smiling. Smiling because she knew the answer.

“We used to-”

“-live in the same town!” I finished for him, not ready to have the lines drawn to connect the obvious dots. I had to get out of here. We had to get out of here. The man who hardly ever talked about his feelings had apparently turned over some new leaf and was ready to share our history with the one person who was intent on making my life hell. “Speaking of, we should really catch up!” I made a wide arc around both of them, not wanting to get too close to Corbin or Missy. “I know of a great place if you’re free.” I didn’t look him in the eye. I made eye contact with his chest, trying to ride the wave of voices in my head that screamed this was a bad idea. To be honest, my co-workers whispering about our connection and concocting theories was preferable to having all their suspicions confirmed from Whitmore and Creighton’s new client.

I hoped that all the fame hadn’t erased his ability to pick up on nuances and I breathed a sigh of relief when he told Missy that he’d call her later. Without a word, he followed me out of the cafe and towards the elevator.

Once we were alone, he turned to me with a sly smirk that fed into my worries that I made a mistake.

“You’re even more beautiful than I remember, Leila Bear.”

I backed up as far as I could go, feet shoulder width apart. I hoped that despite the fact that Whitmore and Creighton was a busy hive with people coming and going from 6am until the cleaning crew shut the place down, no one would pop in and interrupt us before I made some things crystal clear.

“First off,” I began curtly. “I am not your Leila Bear. I’m Mrs. Jacob Whitmore and just in case you’re wondering, he’s more of a man than you ever were and could ever hope to be.” I didn’t wait to see if his fragile ego had been broken. I wanted to get us out of this building and out of sight as quickly as possible. There was a clear path to the control panel, so I hit the button for the lobby. “I know of a discreet but public place where we can have a conversation.” I gave him the address of the quaint coffee shop I frequented, with a parking lot in the back and a security guard who made sure the paparazzi were too afraid to try their luck at getting a snap of the clientele. “Meet me here.”

I wasted no time leaving the elevator when we hit the lobby, and I didn’t doubt that he’d show up.

I felt his gaze following me until I stepped out on the sidewalk.

*

“YOU DON’T LOOK LIKE you’re having a whole lot of fun.”

I took my eye off the target, a neon balloon that would earn me a goofy looking teddy bear. Corbin was already holding a stuffed animal in both arms. He’d conquered this game in record time, according to the game operator, a man who was missing most of his teeth. And from the way the man cleared his throat, eyeing the line that had grown behind me, he was also running out of patience.

I’d fired three shots, with one left. And Corbin was right—I wasn’t having fun. He’d already proved the game wasn’t rigged. Twice. And I’d walked away empty handed from three other carnival games, each a little easier than the last once Corbin noticed my annoyed meter was close to breaking altogether. I didn’t even consider myself all that competitive, but the County Fair MVP over here made it impossible to not take this thing way too seriously. There was a gaggle of teen girls who’d signed up for the weighty task of being his cheerleading section.

“You’re so good, Corbin!” A blonde with a tongue ring she kept playing with gushed. “You should show her how it’s done!”

I hurled a scowl over my shoulder. “I’m about to show her how it’s done,” I grumbled, before I noticed that Corbin was loving every minute of it. Winking. He even said yes when two of them asked if they could take a picture with him.

This time, I cleared my throat, my face a hot, red mess. I didn’t want to perseverate on the fact that I had to remind my boyfriend of my existence.

“Maybe later,” he said quickly, and they let out an ‘Awww’, like he’d just told them Santa wasn’t coming around this year. ‘Maybe later’ wasn’t good enough. I was looking for a no...because they’d wait as long as they had to.

“Sorry,” he offered, a guilty edge to his voice. He pecked me on the cheek, a move that used to make me melt. A move that used to lead to him dipping me like we were in some black and white movie. Like I was the only woman that mattered in the whole world. I wished I’d known that our honeymoon period would last for one amazing month, then I’d learn that dating the hottest guy I’d ever seen came at a price. That price was, other women had eyes too. Desires.

And he lived for the attention.

“Honey,” the toothless carnival worker began. “Are you gonna shoot? If not, I’ll let someone else have a turn.”

Corbin stepped up, like he was reporting for duty. “I can shoot for her.”

His groupies let out a whoop of support and I rolled my eyes so hard that I nearly rolled my entire head, too.

“No,” I snapped, trying to block everything out except what was in front of me. “I’ve got this.”

I think.

The games before had some sort of shooting element as well and Corbin gave me a quick tutorial. Too quick, since he came up behind me, body pressed against mine. Leaned in and whispered for me to exhale, then pull the trigger. That moment was so hot, so beautiful, so ours that I’d turned to jelly and handed the gun over. so he could show me how to do it in living color.

I didn’t realize that he was going to give the exact same tutorial to three other women.

Body pressed against theirs.

Whispering in their ear.

Before he had the chance to rub up on someone else, I got real interested. And I was determined to shoot this freaking balloon. All his other students had failed, I had to show him that I was the exception to the rule. That I was special.

I ignored the voice that whispered he’d probably miss it because he was too busy flirting and I breathed.

Inhaled.

Exhaled.

Pulled the trigger.

The whole stand lit up like the Fourth of July when I popped the balloon.

“You did it!” Corbin’s voice was the only thing I heard, rising up above the bells and whistles as he lifted me, spinning me around. When he put me down, I glanced back to give his admirers a special little smile, but they’d already conceded, sulking off in the other direction.

The operator handed over my prize, clearly trying to get this oddly lucky couple away from his game before he lost any more money.

I took the bear in my arms, not even caring that it was the ugliest thing I’d ever seen. It was cotton candy pink, with mismatched eyes and a discolored belly that read ‘Congratulatiens!’ with an E.

Corbin wrapped me in his arms again and I inhaled the smell of Irish Spring soap, kettle corn and love. “Good job, Leila Bear!”

*

I GRABBED MY COFFEE and made a beeline for the far wall. It was apart from the main floor, far enough from the window that we wouldn’t be seen from the sidewalk. The back room was reserved apparently, which would have been my preference otherwise.

I lowered myself in my chair, the irony of that not lost on me. Back when Corbin was in my life, I loved having him on my arm. Walking into a room and reaching for his hand to make it known that he was mine.

That’s because otherwise, no one would have had any idea, reality reminded me. Corbin was a shameless flirt. Monogamy wasn’t in his nature, something that I didn’t learn until it was too late.

I tapped my foot nervously, checking my phone. It had been half and hour since I gave him the address, he should have been here by n-

Almost on cue, the bell at the door chimed and I knew it was him before I even lifted my eyes from the screen. There was a hush that raced around the room, like the world was taking notice as he strode to place his order.

“Unbelievable,” I scoffed as I watched him lean on the counter. The barista, who barely made eye contact with me, was currently giggling like a schoolgirl. I glared at the scene as he popped his cap off and gave his golden locks a shake before he slipped it back on—backwards, of course, so she could get a good look. He took his cup and headed over to the cream and sugar station. He finally scanned the room for the whole reason he was here, cocking his head in acknowledgment when he saw me.

I just stared at him until his smile disappeared. He finished up and trudged over like a kid with a report card lined with C’s and D’s, filled with apologies and explanations.

“Sorry I’m a little late-”

“Don’t worry, I remember punctuality isn’t one of your strong suits,” I interrupted with a shrug. Among other things...

He winced. “I guess I deserved that.”

No way was I walking away from that. “Deserve? What you deserve would be something along the lines of a slap. Or a punch.” I gripped my mug with both hands. Or another cup of coffee being spilled, only this time, it would be thrown right at that picture perfect face.

I put the mug down, not because I was having second thoughts about assault via coffee, mind you. I was starting to shake uncontrollably, and I didn’t want him to see. His effect on me these days was far from positive; anyone with the gift of sight could see that being around him was a trying affair. But I didn’t want him to know he still had any effect on me at all.

I put down my mug and dropped my hands to my lap. I rubbed my hands together and tried to not imagine that I was wringing his neck.

My struggle must have been all over my face because he hung his head. “I know I’m the last person you want to see. Trust  me, I nearly had a heart attack when I saw you standing in the front row.” He lifted his chin from his chest, dusky eyes flickering with light. “Didn’t know you were a fan.”

“Oh, I’m not,” I said without missing a beat. “Me ending up at your concert was a complete fluke. We-” I paused, feeling the first spark of hope since I saw him at the office. “My husband and I were scouting the event.” I left out the fact that said husband wasn’t with me that night since we were arguing. He didn’t need to know the dirty details. I didn’t owe Corbin Wolfe a thing.

His nostrils flared and I almost laughed. I knew him well enough to know he wasn’t jealous. Not really. Everything was about him—if anything, he was just bothered that I was no longer drinking his flavor of Kool Aid. No longer pining over what could have been. Not asking for his autograph.

“You’re married now? Wow!”

“And we have a daughter,” I piled on. “But I didn’t come here to talk about my home life-”

“Uh huh,” he grunted sarcastically. He had the audacity to wink at me to boot.

I knew better, but I decided to bite anyway. “What do you mean, ‘uh huh’?”

“C’mon, Leila Bear-”

“Don’t call me that,” I growled, leaning in so he could see that I wasn’t joking. “I wasn’t fond of it back then, and it’s disrespectful and inappropriate now.”

“My bad,” he followed up with a shrug. Really drilling home how he wasn’t taking this (or me) seriously. “What should I call you then?”

I almost said ‘Mrs. Whitmore’, but that would have made me as petty as he was. “My name works just fine.”

“Fair enough, Leila,” he tried it out and managed to still maintain that playful spark in his eye. “And the ‘uh huh’? You could have just kept it professional. Not mentioned him or your kid if you didn’t want to brag about your amazing life now.” He brought his mug to his lips and blew the surface of the liquid, creating a ripple effect that made me wish I could drown him in it. “You think I don’t know that you’re married? Even if I avoided the newsstands at the store and little pieces of The Whitmores on the news, the minute I saw you, I used my Google fu and and got up to speed on all things Leila. Saw that you got hitched and popped out a baby . The cutest little baby, if babies are your thing.”

“And we know they’re not your thing, don’t we?” I snarled, so hot that I was surprised I wasn’t sweating buckets. “Nothing that would make you grow up or settle down.”

His expression changed. Softening around the edges. Eyes abandoning mine, like he couldn’t take staring me dead on. Couldn’t take the truth. “I guess you have me all figured out.”

I lifted and dropped my shoulders. “I know enough.”

That made him try again, gray sweeping from the table to my chest.

He’s not gonna-

But he did. He slowly worked his way up, taking me in like he wanted to reacquaint himself with every part of me.

Suddenly, I wasn’t sure if the heat was anger...or something else.

I jerked back from the table, my chair toppling to the floor as I snapped to my feet. The whole room heard it, because of course they did. I was getting really good at making a scene.

“I’ve gotta go to the bathroom,” I lied, turning on my heels and making my way to the back like an emergency was underway. I threw a hopeful look at the private room, wishing I had a do-over, a way that I could talk to Corbin freely without worrying someone would overhear or I’d knock over a chair or spill another drink. Minimize the chances that I’d read on some blog tomorrow that Leila Whitmore had first date jitters during her illicit rendezvous with the lead singer from About Us.

I almost walked right past the room because the door was still pulled almost shut, but a volley of devastatingly familiar laughter stopped me in my tracks.

I leaned in, listening to the ebb and flow of it as my heart balled into a fist in my chest.

Was this The Twilight Zone?

Had I lost my mind?

It sounded an awful lot like-

I peered into the sliver left by the pocket door and saw a flash of blue. But not just any blue. Navy, purple, and gray. A perfect kind of blue. The kind of blue that made my heart skip a beat when I saw it. I’d dropped everything and bought it immediately, because it reminded me of Jacob’s eyes.

I pulled open the door, seeing Jacob’s profile and smiling, until I kept going and saw another profile.

A female’s profile.

A petite female, with ivory skin and flawless chestnut hair. The kind of hair from the commercials.

She was laughing too.

With my husband.

I let the door slam and both of them whipped their head in my direction.

Jacob stopped laughing immediately, probably because the words that came out of my mouth weren’t words at all. It was the screech of a woman that was teetering on the edge. A gentle breeze away from going batshit crazy.

“Jacob, what the hell is going on here?!”

*

Thank you for taking the time to read The Billionaire’s Caress. Please consider leaving a a review. xoxo, AC