Billionaires, Bad Boys, and Alpha Males (147 page)

***

On her way back from the bakery, Nicole
tried to call Red.
 
She really
wanted to tell him everything that had happened, she wanted to hear his
voice.
 
Nicole knew that more than
anything she needed things to be right between them again.

The first time she tried his phone, it
went straight to voice mail.
 
So she
tried again.
 
This time, Gia picked
up.
 
“Hello?”

Nicole grimaced, but tried to play
nice.
 
“Hi, Gia, it’s Nicole.
 
Is Red around?”

Gia’s voice became even more sing songy
in return.
 
“I’m so sorry.
 
He’s tied up in a meeting.
 
Should I give him a message?”

“Actually, I think you should go tell him
I’m on the phone and that it’s important.”

Gia sighed.
 
“I wish I could, but he gave me pretty
firm instructions not to disturb him while he’s in this pitch meeting.
 
It’s a big, big client.”

“Okay, then.
 
Just give him the message.”

“Okay, byeeee!”

Nicole hung up and decided it was time to
pay Red a visit at work.

About twenty minutes later, she arrived
at the building and made her way up to The Red Agency.
 

There was no receptionist at the front
desk, so Nicole just walked past it.
 
But she bumped into Gia in the hallway.
 
Gia looked surprised and a little
outraged.
 
“You really shouldn’t
just come into the office unannounced.”

“I work here, too,” Nicole told her.
 
“I’m on temporary leave but I’m a
partner in this company and I can absolutely come into the office, Gia.”

Gia sighed and made a face of
distaste.
 
“I’m really sorry, but
Red’s been so specific. He’s busy and he’s not to be disturbed by
anyone—and I mean, anyone.”

Nicole saw movement behind Gia and with a
leaping heart, realized that Red was coming out of the conference room and was
within earshot.

“Red told you to answer his cell phone
and to prevent me from talking to him, no matter how urgent the call?” Nicole
asked pointedly.

Gia nodded.
 
“He was very specific that nobody get
through—and I assume that includes you.
 
Now I really think you should leave,
because he’s in an extremely important pitch meeting.”

Red shook his head and walked past Gia
and gave Nicole a big hug.

She’d never felt so warm and loved in all
her life as she did right then.
 

Gia became suddenly awkward, standing
there, making confused faces as Red kissed Nicole and whispered an apology.

“Sorry, Mr. Jameson,” Gia said.
 
“I think there was some confusion about
schedules and I was trying to explain to your wife—“

Red spun and looked at the younger woman,
and she shut up as if he’d stolen the vocal chords right out of her neck.
 
“I heard what you said to my wife,
Gia.
 
That was blatantly
untrue.
 
I told you specifically
that you should come and get me if my wife was on the line, no matter what.
 
And the idea that you would try and
convince her to leave the very office that she co-owns?
 
Did I really give you that impression?”

Gia shook her head.
 
“No.
 
No, sir.
 
I just thought that you were so
busy—“

“You’re fired, Gia.
 
I want you to grab your things and
go.
 
Immediately.”

“Yes, sir.”

Several of the other employees were
coming out of their offices to see what the ruckus was about.

“I’m so sorry I stirred up problems for
you,” Nicole whispered.
 

Red laughed.
 
“Are you kidding me?
 
I love you.
 
I don’t give a shit about any of this
stuff, I care about you.”

They hugged again, and a moment later,
Gia rushed past them and down the stairs, her tight little butt wiggling one
last time as she scurried out of sight.

“I love you, Nicole.
 
I don’t want anything to ever get in the
way of us.
 
And if anyone or
anything does, I’ll make it go away.”

“I know,” she said, smiling and burying
her face in his chest as they hugged.

“Red?” someone called from behind him.

Nicole broke away as one of his employees
came out of the conference room.
 
“We were wondering if we should take ten or if you’re coming back in
now?” the younger man with his hipster glasses asked.

Nicole started to walk away.
 
“I’ll go now.
 
Call me when you get out of your
meeting.”

But Red grabbed her hand and wouldn’t let
her leave.
 
“Jonathan, take over the
lead on the pitch for me.
 
Tell everyone
I’m sorry but I have something really important to attend to.
 
My wife.”
 
And then laughing, Red kissed her hand
and pulled her toward the exit with him.

“You can’t just leave your pitch
meeting,” she cried as they ran down the stairs, giggling like two kids cutting
class.

“Fuck the pitch meeting,” he said.
 

“You’re crazy!” she laughed.
 
“What’s gotten into you?”

When they got outside the building, he
pressed her up against the wall and kissed her deeply and passionately.
 
For a moment, neither of them said
anything.
 
Then, Red looked into
Nicole’s eyes, as he caressed her hair.
 
“I’ll tell you what got into me.
 
You did.
 
Your heart, your
laugh, your smile, your caring soul.
 
That’s what got into me.
 
I
don’t want to give you up for anything.”

“You don’t have to give me up,” she
said.
 
“I want you to have
both.
 
I want you to do your
business—“

“Our business,” he corrected her.

“Don’t give anything up for me.”

“I’m not giving it up.
 
I’m just making my priorities crystal
clear, Nicole.”

She laughed and kissed him again and he
kissed her back.
 
When they’d broken
off, she told him about the call from Danielle and firing Marcie.
 

“You took a stand,” Red said, shaking his
head with admiration.
 
“That’s my
girl.”

“The wedding got blown so out of proportion,”
Nicole said.
 
“I don’t even know how
it happened.
 
I just let my head get
filled with so many ideas and I stopped even making choices.
 
This whole thing was supposed to be
about us—you and me.
 
I don’t
care who else is there or what kind of cake we have.”

“What do you say we just skip town?” Red
asked her, his eyes lighting up with familiar devilish mischief.
 

“Skip town?
 
I don’t think I’ve ever heard that
phrase used before, except maybe in an old black and white movie.”
 

“Yeah, let’s get out of here.
 
Tonight.
 
Right now, actually.”
 
He grabbed her hand again and started to
pull her as he picked up his pace.

“Where?
 
Where will we go?”

“Anywhere!” he yelled.

***

As it turned out, “anywhere” meant
Belize, a Caribbean island only a few hours away from New York by plane.
 
It was one of the few places in Central
America where English was spoken as the official language.
 
Red told Nicole that he’d been there
once before on business and had wished to go back someday with a special
person.

Red handled everything.

He had flights arranged and resort
accommodations booked by the time they’d packed their bags.
 
Nicole hadn’t even realized how much
she’d missed being taken care of by him, until she felt his warm, protective energy
surrounding her once more.

After so many days of stress and tension,
she was finally able to relax on the flight and went instantly to sleep with
Red’s arm around her.

And then they were landing in Belize and
being whisked away to Almond Beach Resort, a quaint, scenic beachfront lodge
situated right near a small town.
 
The town of Hopkins was full of little shops and cute, colorful houses
and buildings.
 

When they arrived at their own bungalow
at Almond Beach, Nicole could tell she was going to love it there.

She took a deep breath as Red dropped his
bags and smiled at her.
 
“Welcome to
the first day of the rest of your life, Mrs. Jameson.”

“Are we going to really do it—elope
here?”

“Do you want to?”

She nodded.
 
“Yes.”
 
Just saying it made her nervous, because
that meant the ceremony was suddenly much closer than it had been just a day
ago.
 
Now instead of being two
months away, it might be just a couple of days away.

“I need to apply for the wedding
license,” he said, “and it will be a few days before we can get approved.
 
But that’s good because I want to make
sure everything’s just right for our day.”

“What does that mean?” she laughed.
 
“Make sure what’s just right?”

“You’ll see,” he told her.

***

The next few days were gorgeous in every
way.
 
They would wake up late and
lie in bed, laughing and talking and holding each other.
 
They would literally run out the front
door of their island bungalow and jump straight into the Caribbean, where
Nicole would swim for a few minutes, and then come out and relax on the beach,
slowly warming as the sun came up.

Red loved the water, and he would
sometimes swim for an hour or more, going so far from shore that it made Nicole
a little nervous—except that she knew he was an excellent swimmer.

Next, they would eat a light breakfast of
fruit and coffee, after which it might be time to walk into town and browse the
shops and eventually get a bite to eat.

The one rule both of them followed was to
keep their cell phones off.
 
They’d
set their outgoing messages to explain to people that they were on their
honeymoon and would only rarely check messages or email.

At night they would have a nice dinner
and there was often music and dancing on the beach.
 
The last two evenings Red and Nicole got
slightly drunk, and after dancing and drinking like teenagers, went back to
their bungalow and stripped naked, jumping into bed together and making slow,
intense love.

Finally, on the fourth day in Belize, Red
was up earlier than usual, and he woke her to tell her he was leaving for a few
hours.

“I’ve got to go check on the license,” he
told her, kissing her forehead as she blearily opened her eyes and looked up at
him.

“Let me come with you,” she whispered.

He stroked her hair.
 
“No, no.
 
It’s going to be interminable, sitting
in some stuffy office and waiting to fill out forms.
 
I’ll be back in a few hours and I’ll
call you if I get held up.”

Nicole sighed.
 
“I love you so much.
 
I can’t wait to be Misses Jameson.”

“I love you too.”
 

And then he left.

Nicole sat up in bed and yawned,
wondering what she would do for the next few hours while Red was off trying to
get the wedding license.
 

She went to the bathroom and looked at
herself in the mirror.
 
Nicole was
surprised to see just how tan she’d gotten over the last couple of days.
 
Her skin was brown and she was never
brown.
 
She was used to being
pale.
 

But Nicole found that she liked how her
skin looked right now, even though she knew that it wasn’t the healthiest
long-term option.
 

She jumped in the shower and just did a
quick wash and rinse, didn’t linger too long.
 
And then she came out and changed into a
pink two-piece bathing suit that she’d bought while walking through town with
Red the day before yesterday.