Billionaire On Fire: The Complete Series (A Bad Boy Alpha Billionaire Romance) (40 page)

“Your point being?”

“We can stay married, but we don’t have to
actually be married. You are free to do whoever you want, and I will do the
same. Just on the down low. I will have my own room in your house – except when
your mother is around so we can sell it – and not bother you with your life
whatsoever. We have no physical obligations to each other, or emotional, but to
your mother we will appear as a functioning happy couple. It’s enough to get
her off your back. Tons of rich people do this kind of thing.”

“What do you want in return? You obviously
wouldn’t be making this deal if there wasn’t something in it for you.”

“Money and security,” she said and
shrugged, as though it were only natural.

Even though I always knew these things,
the fact that Gina was sitting in front of me like this and boldly stating her
screwed-up intentions made me surprisingly angry. She would definitely fit in
The Real Housewives cast.

“You are appalling!”

“Some would say I am clever in looking out
for myself. Always have been. You are a very difficult person to love. There
isn’t a woman out there in the world capable of it, I guarantee you.”

Her words hit harder than they should
have. Was she right? Was I just completely unlovable? Not that it mattered –
regardless of whether a woman loved me or not, I was still the most powerful
man in a two-hundred mile radius of this town. What did it matter if I could
never get some dumb girl to devote her life to me? Love was bullshit, anyway. I
always knew this: nobody was capable of loving anybody else…

My mind drifted to Aria again. Until the
running out of my office incident the other day, she had always spoken
surprisingly highly of me. She had called me a friend and even said that people
underrated my character. Surely, Aria would disagree with what this woman was
saying?

Starting to get angry with myself again, I
scoffed. What the hell did it matter? Why did I care so much what Aria thought?
Why was Gina’s comment about me being impossible to love making me think of
Aria? I did not want her to fall in love with me.? That’s the last thing I
would want: it would just complicate things and make it difficult to get rid of
her after the contract was over. The whole idea behind our deal was to not have
any messy endings. The problem was, as I was just realizing, that I wasn’t sure
if I wanted there to be an ending at all. The idea of “getting rid of her”
sounded wrong in my head, as though I was planning to get rid of an organ from
my own body.

What the fuck was happening to me?

“Are you going to keep spacing out, or are
you capable of having a mature discussion about this?”

“Mature?” I sniggered. “What part of any
of this is mature? A marriage of convenience? Mostly of convenience to you, I
might add, you shameless gold-digger.”

“Oh, stop it, Zay. It’s not my fault you
were so blind the whole time. I was with other men since before our wedding and
you were just in denial. You never asked any questions! I figured it was
because you knew what I was after and didn’t really care. Because it was and
always has been a marriage of convenience. You just wanted a wife to take to
charity events and shut your mother up, I just wanted your money. We can still
continue to have that. Why even pretend to care?”

She was right. I never really loved her or
cared for her. Gina was simply a woman my mother approved of and she kept out
of my business as long as I was with her. I enjoyed fucking her from time to
time but other than that there never really had been any connection. I should
not have been surprised when I found out she had been cheating – I am not sure
why I ever was. But she was right, this had always been a marriage of
convenience. And could continue to be…but…

I couldn’t stop thinking of Aria, and how
she would react to finding out about Gina. She would never be okay with having
any kind of relationship with a married man, she was far too self-righteous for
that. No matter how hard I explained to her that it was just a marriage in name
without any of the values, she would see me as a lying, cheating adulterer. If
I were to accept Gina’s offer, I would have to make sure Aria never ever found
out about it. It meant I could never take her home with me, never take her to
any more public events and she would be diminished to the role of my mistress.
She was far too strong-willed and independent to accept any situation where
that’s the tag she ended up with. Even the suggestion of it would hurt her
pride far too much for her to ever recover from it and forgive me.

“I will have to think about it, Gina,” I
said eventually, exasperated.

“Take as long as you need,” she said, her
sweet demeanor back. “I hope we can make this work, Zay.”

“Cut it out with that sugary sweet tone,”
I snapped. “I haven’t accepted yet.”

Chapter
9

Aria

I got a call from my mom right after
completing my make-up exam for Statistics. Another ten-thousand dollars had
been added to her medical account.

“I don’t know what I would do without you,
sweetheart. I promise I will get myself together and help you repay the loan
cent by cent,” she said on the phone.

“More money was paid?” I asked, sounding
more surprised than I should have. It was the end of month two after all.

“Of course, thank you Aria. I am lucky to
have a daughter like you.”

If only she knew what I was doing in order
to get her medical bills paid. I doubt she’d think I was the best daughter
ever. But what she didn’t know didn’t hurt her.

“How is everything else, mom?” I asked,
deliberately changing the subject.

“Good, good. You should come visit this
weekend. I really could use some company and I haven’t seen you in so long.”

“I will try, but can’t promise anything
okay?” I crossed my fingers behind my back. I wasn’t going to try and visit her
just yet; I had way too many things to sort through first. On the other hand, I
could probably use some time away from all of this.

“Okay, sweetheart. No pressure. I know you
have enough going on between your job and school, and this loan must only add
stress.”

If only she knew.

“It’s okay, mom. I will try my best, okay?
I love you, I have to go now!”

I had made up my mind about what was to
happen and it was time to follow through. This wasn’t going to be easy. If I
knew Zayden at all, then he wasn’t going to make it easy. But if I didn’t break
the contract now, I would never be able to look at myself again. I hadn’t
signed up to be in a controlling relationship where I was somebody’s puppet. I
had signed up to spend time with him in return for a favor that I was going to
return. He had taken it too far and convinced himself somehow that he hadn’t
bought my time, but me. I was not going to let him get away with that. I had
gotten this far in life by living it on my own terms, and I wasn’t going to
allow some man to dictate how I lived it all of a sudden because of a piece of
paper. I would have to find another way to help mom, and I sure as hell was
willing to do anything to this end. I didn’t need Zayden or his money. I was
going to be okay.

---

When I reached the bank – after almost two
weeks – my heart was fluttering, and not in a good way. It was a little past
five so everyone else should have scurried off by now. It made me glad because
the thought of having this conversation with Zayden and with people staring
through his window was chilling. Actually, the thought of having this
conversation with him at all was chilling.

I had to get ahold of myself.

What was he going to do? Take me to court?
It was just a silly contract, and maybe not even legally binding. I would pay
the twenty thousand dollars he had already given to the hospital back as soon
as possible, and then take care of the rest of my mom’s debt.

I walked in with wobbly feet, my chest
shuddering with fear, only to find out he wasn’t in. Of course, the one day he
decides to leave work early had to be now. If I didn’t do this now, I would
never be able to get out of the contract. It had to be taken care of before I
could have a second to change my mind. I headed to the teller’s booth and
dialed Zayden’s cellphone. No answer. I called once more and then decided it
was best to text him.

With trembling fingers I typed: I’m out of
the contract. I can’t do this anymore.

My phone started ringing immediately
after. It was him.

“Hi,” I said, clutching my shirt tightly.

“What was that text about?” Zayden’s voice
was trembling and for a moment I wondered if he was as scared as I was. He was
probably just pissed. Then I remembered I was nothing but a commodity to him.

“You read it. I want out.” It took
everything I had to keep my voice straight. “I really cannot do this anymore,
Zayden. You are too controlling and it’s not something I can handle. I think
you are a decent person, and I always will. Thank you for helping me out and
everything, really. I have nothing against you whatsoever, but I cannot live my
life as somebody’s possession. I am just the wrong person for this deal. You
need someone who will do your bidding and let you control her life. You should
have probably figured that out by now. I really enjoyed spending time with you
before things got out of control. You don’t get nearly enough credit for just
how fun you can be. I am going to miss that, whatever we had, but this is not
worth my dignity and never will be.”

To my surprise and utter horror, he
started laughing hysterically, and after about a full minute of that insanity,
he said, “You are joking right? I mean you’ve read our contract. You signed
it.”

The truth was, I hadn’t fully read it as I
should have. I skimmed through it and got the basic gist of it – I was to spend
time with him, go on dates with him and owed him no sexual obligations. In
return, he would pay for my mom’s hospital bills, which I was to pay him back
as soon as I got a job out of college – and the rest seemed to just be legal
jibber jabber. I marveled at how stupid it was of me to not give it a more
thorough perusal, and feared that I had got myself in a situation I didn’t want
to be in.

“What are you talking about?” I asked very
carefully.

“Aria, you’re a really smart girl, don’t
play dumb now. Unless you have found a way to give me the twenty-thousand I
already paid back in—”

“Yes, I will pay it to you in installments
as soon as I can,” I cut him off.

“You can’t do that. Did you read the
contract?” He asked again, now sounding genuinely concerned. “You should never
sign things without reading them properly. Just advice for the future.”

“I skimmed it,” I snapped. “And have no
idea which part you are referring to!”

“The part where, if you break the
contract, you owe me the sum I have already paid on your mother’s behalf.
Within 10 days. Oh, and you lose your job, but I guess that’s the part you had
already figured out on your own.”

I felt the ground escape from my feet. How
could I have been stupid and gotten into something I couldn’t get out of,
without even reading the contract?

“You can’t do this to me,” I said, tears
running down my face.

“I don’t want to,” he said gently. “I want
us to enjoy each other and if you don’t it won’t be nearly as fun for me
either, believe me when I say that. I never wished to coerce you into anything,
but you are leaving me no choice. We were having a great time until you went
and fucked it up.”

“I fucked it up?” I yelled in anger. “I
did? Really? I don’t recall telling you who you could or could not speak to and
trying to control every aspect of your life!”

“I was looking out for you, god damn it!
Don’t you see that? That jerk hurt you and yet you were standing there being
nice and friendly, willing to go on coffee dates with him, as though he hadn’t
wronged you in any way.”

“It wasn’t a date and never was going to
be. You’re the one who doesn’t see it! Spending all that time with you was what
really helped me move on from Rick. This whole year I had been moping about how
hurt I was, never fully able to accept what he had done.” I was crying. “Then
you came along – and – and – I saw how much fun I could have and what I was
missing out on while nursing a heartache. You helped me get over him, and that
coffee was going to be a symbol of my new-found strength. To show I didn’t
care. But you just saw me smiling at another man and decided all on your own
that I was wronging you in some way. It was not okay for you to tell me to stop
talking to him, Zayden. Do you understand that?”

“We’ve already been over this. It doesn’t
matter anyway, Aria. You’re stuck in this contract, whether you like it or not.
It would be immensely helpful to the both of us if you just accepted it and
tried to enjoy yourself.”

I felt like I was trapped in a windowless
room with nowhere to go. How could he be okay doing this to me? There was no
way I could produce twenty-thousand dollars in such a short time, and he knew
it.

“I won’t enjoy any of it. I promise you
that. And I’ll try and make it so you don’t either,” I said with all the spite
I could muster, then hung up before he could reply.