Billionaires, Bad Boys, and Alpha Males (31 page)

When an hour had gone by, she’d moved to the
dining room.
 
It was the most
uncomfortable room in the house – her mother had insisted on buying a
heavy oak dining set with chairs that forced you to sit ramrod straight -- but
its windows looked out onto the street.
 

She’d been wearing a new summer dress, one
she’d bought especially for that night.
 
It had cost her a week’s worth of pay from her summer job bagging
groceries at the Shop ‘n Save, and she knew she wouldn’t be wearing it again
anytime soon, since the warm weather would be over in another couple of weeks.

But she had wanted to look pretty for her last
night with Jaxon, wanted to make sure he went off to college with a picture of
her looking amazing burned into his mind, ensuring that those pretty blonde
California girls wouldn’t tempt him away.
 
She’d pulled at the skirt, a soft blue gauzy material, and reapplied her
lipstick.
 

It was eleven o’clock before she’d finally
given up.
 
And even then it was only
because she wanted to be in bed before her parents got home from the fireworks,
wanted them to believe she was still out with Jaxon so she wouldn’t have to
deal with any of their prying questions.

She’d brushed her teeth but kept her makeup and
her new dress on, slid under the covers and left her window open, sure he would
come for her that night, sure there was some kind of explanation.
 
She could still remember how it had felt
to lie there, the warm summer breeze tickling her skin, the soft cotton blanket
pulled up over her fully-clothed body.
 
The tears had started at around two in the morning, so quiet that she
didn’t even realize she was crying until she felt the wetness on her pillow and
the saltiness in her mouth.

“Do you like it?” Jaxon was asking now.
 

Anna shook herself out of the memory.
 
“Do I like living in London?
 
Yes, I love it.”
 
It was a half-truth.
 
She loved the city, loved her job, loved
her cute little flat that was in the middle of everything.
 

But the dreary weather sometimes got her down,
and she worked such long hours that she’d never built up the kind of social
circle she would have liked.
 
Yes,
she had friends, but they weren’t the kind of friends you could call up on the
spur of the moment, asking them to come over for a cup of tea or meet you on
the high street for some spontaneous shopping.

“That’s good.”
 
Jaxon leaned back in his chair and
polished off the rest of his sandwich.
 
He’d always been a fast eater.
 
Anna hated that she remembered that about him, hated that she remembered
anything
about him.

“And you?” she asked.
 
“Are you happy living in L.A.?”

He nodded.
 
“I love it,” he said.
 
“I
love the fast pace, and I love my job.”

“Good.”
  
She nodded. “And what is it that
you do, exactly?”
 
She didn’t want
to admit that she’d been Google stalking him for years.
 
It was too embarrassing, especially
since he obviously hadn’t done the same.

“I’m a real estate developer.”

“What kind?”

“I buy properties that have been abandoned in
bad areas and then fix them up.”

“Then sell them for a profit?”

He nodded.
 
“We sell them in an effort to bring up home values in the neighborhood.”

“Really?” She hoped she sounded
believable.
 
“That’s very cool.”

“I’m not a total jerk, you know.”
 
His eyes were on hers, and her stomach
did a somersault.

“I didn’t say you were,” she said.

The two of them lapsed into silence.
 
Anna didn’t know what else to say.
 
His very presence was unnerving.
 
He was looking at her across the table,
his posture relaxed, his eyes half-closed, his mouth turned into a half-slip of
a grin.

Anna twisted the cellophane wrapper that her
cookie had come in.

“Well,” she said.
 
“Should we go back up and see if Katie’s
ready for visitors?”

Jaxon licked his lips and thought about
it.
 
For a half second of torturous
anticipation, Anna thought maybe he was going to suggest they find somewhere
quiet where he could have his way with her.

But instead, he just shrugged his
shoulders.
 
“Sure.”

***

When Jaxon and Anna got back to Katie’s room,
Katie tried to give them permission to leave the hospital.

“You guys don’t have to stay,” she said,
sounding sleepy.
 
“I have Adam.”

She gazed up at her husband adoringly, and Adam
grinned and then readjusted the blanket on Katie’s shoulders.
 
She was shivering from the epidural
they’d given her.

Jaxon kept his mouth shut.
 
He wanted to be there for his sister,
but if he was being honest, he didn’t relish the thought of hanging around the
hospital for the next few hours.
 
That was, of course, unless Anna was going to be there.

“Of course I’m going to stay,” Anna said.
 
She pulled out the deck of cards she’d
picked up at the gift shop on their way back up to Katie’s room.

“Why did you get cards?” Katie asked, sounding
slightly panicked.
 
She stared at
the cards like they were a poisonous snake.
 
“Please don’t tell me you think we’re
settling in for a long night.”

“Definitely not,” Jaxon said.
 
He reached over and took the cards from
Anna, slid them out of their package, and started to shuffle.
 
“That baby’s going to be here before you
know it.
 
Now who wants to play
poker?”
 
If he was going to be stuck
here, he might as well win some money while he was at it.
 
Not that he relished taking money from
his pregnant sister, her husband, or his high school sweetheart.
 
But you had to raise the stakes at least
a little bit.
 
Otherwise it wasn’t
any fun.
 
“Dollar ante?” he
suggested hopefully.

“We can’t play poker,” Katie said, shocked.

“We can’t?” Adam frowned and looked at his
wife.
 
“Why not?”

“Because we can’t bring a child into this world
while we’re
gambling,”
Katie said,
her tone suggesting that Adam should know better.

“Katie’s right,” Anna said.
 
She reached over and took the cards out
of Jaxon’s hands, giving him an admonishing look.
 
“We’ll play rummy or something.”

God, she was being so damn bossy.
 
Jaxon wanted to grab the cards back,
throw her over his shoulder, and cart her out of the room so he could give her
a good spanking.
 

His cock got hard again, and he shook his
head.
 
How the hell was Anna Webb
having this kind of affect on him?
Anna started dealing, and Jaxon made a big show of pulling up his cards one by
one, fanning them out in his hand.
 
Who’d ever heard of not being able to gamble in a delivery room?
 
What did Katie think was going to
happen?
 
That her child was going to
grow up to be a gambling addict just because they were having a friendly game
of dollar ante poker?
 
He’d never
heard something so ridiculous in his life.

An hour later, the four of them had grown tired
of rummy, and Anna had pulled out a pack of Uno cards.
 
Katie won the game pretty quickly,
having been dealt a somewhat suspicious number of wild cards.
 
Jaxon suspected perhaps Anna had been
stacking the deck, making sure Katie got all the good cards, but he couldn’t
prove it.

Adam had been out next.

And now Jaxon and Anna were the only two left
in the game.

And Jaxon wanted to beat her.

He narrowed his eyes, looking down at the
discard pile that was sitting in between them.
 
There was a red three on top, which
meant he could put down either a red card or a three of any color.
 
He only had two cards left -- a red
five, and a yellow three.
 
He
hesitated, wondering what card Anna held in her hand.
 
Was it red?
 
Yellow?
 
A three?
 
The wrong choice could cost him the
game.

Finally, he settled on the red five.
 
“Uno,” he said quickly as he placed it
on top of the discard pile.
 

Anna bit her lip, frowning.
 
After an excruciating second, her hand
reached for the draw pile, and Jaxon breathed a sigh of relief.
 
He’d chosen wisely.

But then, Anna smiled and put the card in her
hand, a red six, on top of the discard pile, leaving her hands empty. “I win,”
she said.
 

Jaxon’s mouth dropped open in shock.
 
He’d been duped.

Katie and Adam were deep in conversation,
having long since lost interest in the game. So Jaxon leaned over and whispered
in Anna’s ear, “You’re going to pay for that, Princess.”

Before he could elaborate, the same nurse who
had come to check on Katie earlier walked into the room.

“Seems like there’s a party going on in here,”
she said, her tone cheery.
 

“We were just playing Uno,” Katie said.
 
She was sucking on some more ice
chips.
 

“How are we feeling?” the nurse asked.
 
She was over by the monitors now,
checking the printouts that were coming out of the machines, surveying the
numbers that signified the baby’s heartbeat and all sorts of other things Jaxon
didn’t understand.

“I’m doing great,” Katie said.
 
“Hungry, but not feeling much pain.
 
That epidural was a godsend.”

“I’m more nervous than she is,” Adam said, then
reached out and grabbed his wife’s hand.

Jaxon looked at them and smiled.
 
Katie had always wanted to be a mom, and
it had taken her and Adam almost three years to get pregnant.
 
They’d just begun to talk about starting
IVF, which he knew Katie had been upset about.
 
It was nice that their son was almost
here, that their wishes and hopes were about to be fulfilled.

As the nurse studied the printouts that were
filled with indecipherable squiggles and numbers, her normally happy face
arranged itself into a mask of concern.

“What’s wrong?” Katie asked immediately.
 
She tightened her grip on Adam’s hand.

“Nothing,” the nurse said, her tone sunny.
 
But where she’d been completely relaxed
before, now there was a certain brusqueness about her, as if she’d encountered
a problem she knew had to be dealt with.
 
“The baby’s heart rate is decelerating, which means he’s not getting
enough oxygen.” She smiled.
 
“I’m
going to call the doctor in to talk a look.”
 
She turned to Jaxon and Anna.
 
“Would you mind stepping into the
waiting room?
 
It shouldn’t take
long.”

Jaxon looked over at Anna.
 
She stood frozen, worry on her pretty
face.

“Of course we don’t mind stepping out,” he
said, taking control of the situation.
 
He turned to Katie.
 
“We’ll
be right back, okay, sis?”

Katie nodded, then turned to Adam, who grabbed
her hand.

“It’s going to be okay, honey,” Adam said.
 
“Everything’s going to be fine.”

The last thing Jaxon saw as he led Anna out of
the room was the nurse slipping an oxygen mask over Katie’s face so that the
baby would have an easier time breathing.

***

Jaxon’s cell phone rang again as they walked
into the waiting room, and he pulled it out to check the caller ID.
 
It was Donovan Cuban.
 
Why the hell was he calling
again?
 
Jaxon shoved the phone back into his
pocket.
 
He would worry about that
later.
 
Right now he had to
concentrate on getting Anna to the waiting room and making sure she didn’t
freak out.

Her face was white as he sat her down in a
chair.
 
“You want some tea or
something?” he asked.