The Billionaire's Wife (A Steamy BWWM Marriage of Convenience Romance Novel) (17 page)

“It’s a forgery!
You put him up to it! Maybe you’re the one who tied the fucking noose.”

I saw
Coppersmith for the first time then and there, who he really was. I knew he was
still in pain, and he always would be; it was clear as day that he clung to the
memory of his son. But I never dreamed that he would fall so low as to blame me
for any of this.

Whatever
petty little cloud he had cast over the staff, it was born out of this
irrational hatred. I should have seen it sooner. I should have known that he
was a poisonous firecracker, desperate to set off a chain reaction to undermine
me somehow. I still needed answers, and I didn’t have nearly enough information
to understand what he was doing, but he was right…

I’m on my last days.

And what
little I had left needed to be dedicated to the buyout. Alphonse Megami was
coming soon, and I needed my attention
there
,
focused entirely on preparing for his arrival, not sitting here with this
broken man.

Everything
hinged on Megami…

If
Coppersmith ever knew…

But I was
coughing now, pushing down against the desk again to steady my shaking
shoulders. The handkerchief was held against my lips, and the metallic taste
revisiting my tongue silenced any desperate hope that I wouldn’t see fresh
blood on the stained fabric.

“But all of
it, everything that you’ve done…it doesn’t particularly matter anymore, does
it, Mr. Andrews? Karma is, after all, a bitch.”

Coppersmith
stood up straight in front of me, straightening his tie as well. A cool
smugness descended upon his stony features as he glanced down upon me with the
sort of power that comes only with complete self-righteousness.

“As it turns
out, I don’t even need to lift a finger to remove you from the picture…you’re
just going to collapse all on your own. And after I’m done burying you, as I
did with my son…I will not rest until your legacy is wiped clean, and the true
inheritor takes his place…”

I glared him
down with renewed understanding as he walked back across my office towards the
door. As he placed his hand on the doorknob, he turned one last time to face me,
his face a disgusting mockery of sincerity.

“By the way,
Cole...conserve your strength. Take it from an old man – it wouldn’t
exactly do wonders for morale if you dropped dead while roaming the halls.”

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Chapter 27

Kiona

Three Days
Later

The tension was palatable in the air,
constricting around our throats with every passing day. As the days ticked by,
Cole conserved his strength, revising the preparations over and over. We
ultimately settled on entertaining our guest in the penthouse for an intimate
meeting – just the three of us.

Cole still
hadn’t told me much about the mysterious businessman. It was only through prying
that I learned his name at all – Alphonse Megami, the head of the large
and powerful Megami Corporation.

Suddenly,
things made sense. Of course I knew the Megami Corporation. They weren’t a
major player stateside, but their name was stamped on a lot of consumer grade
electronics, appliances, and other various things like that. They didn’t have
much of a presence here, but they could benefit from setting up shop here in
New York…but why an e-commerce agency?

Clearly they
weren’t after the marketing department... Megami wanted Cole’s secret weapon,
the one Hunter had left him when he died.

“I need to
know more about him,” I told my billionaire husband over sautéed cod during
dinner one night. “If I’m going to help you convince this guy, you’re going to
have to educate me. I can’t improvise properly with little to no information.”

Cole took a
bite of his seasoned fish, chewing a few times while he thought. He swallowed,
and then chased the bite with a sip of wine.

“Our guest is
a very powerful man,” he started to explain. “He was born
Alphonse Robinson
and raised in Harlem many years ago; he was but a
young boy during the Second World War. This was, of course, prior to the Civil
Rights Movement, and his schooling was somewhat complicated…but the boy had a
keen eye for business. Unfortunately, opportunities were not very open to him
here, but he found a place that would accept him – Tokyo.”

“Wait, Megami
isn’t Japanese? He’s
black?
”

“That’s
right,” Cole answered. “You see, Japan in the world after World War II was seen
as a bastion that stood against the dominance of white culture in the world.
While African Americans faced social injustice here, Japan offered something
else. Acceptance. Opportunity. It offered a place in society – a proper
place.

“When
Alphonse Robinson was old enough, he found a way across the world. Arriving in
Japan, he lived on the streets briefly before securing a foothold in Japanese
society, gradually overcoming the language barrier and integrating. He was a
bit of a novelty at the time – the runaway black student who had come to
Japan to learn.”

“Sounds a
little like a certain
Runaway Tycoon
I
know,” I teased Cole.

“I had it
lucky. I obtained my power with a set plan. Alphonse, on the other hand, had to
work his way up from the bottom. As post-occupied Japan underwent an economic
and educational revolution, he found a place in the business world, pulling
himself up the ranks as viciously and quickly as possible. At the same time, he
fully invested himself into Japanese culture, even choosing the Japanese
surname
Megami
for himself.

“Throughout
this time, he was known for two things, most of all: a reputation for getting
results and revolutionizing departments, and for being merciless and absolutely
cutthroat. To do business with Alphonse Robinson was to deal with the Devil…

“He was a
brilliant chessmaster…and he learned very quickly. When he inevitably set out
on his own, he put in the blood, sweat, and tears to forge a place for his own
empire, one significantly larger than mine could have ever been…and he made
sound business purchases. Through his hard work and dedication, the Megami
Corporation succeeded, growing into the multi-conglomerate that it is today.”

“And this is
the man you want me to impress.”

“
That
Alphonse is not the man you will
meet,” Cole reassured me. “After decades of success and destroying everything
in his path to achieve his goals, he reinvented himself into the image of a
gentile old man. Taking up philosophy in his spare time, he rules with an iron
fist through several appointed Presidents to his smaller companies, and simply
helms it all from atop his tower, where he can afford to be publicly kind and
charitable…”

“So he’s some
kind of wise-man?” I asked.

“No, the man
you
will meet is a stocky, sanctimonious
windbag who feels that his opinion in the room is the only one that matters…and
a complete hypocrite who insists on business with
traditional
men, although he is absolutely nothing of the sort.”

“You despise
him?” I asked thoughtfully, sipping my glass of water. He was lost deep in
thought at my question. “No,” I corrected myself. “You respect him.”

“I respect
all that he has accomplished,” Cole replied, taking a bite of steamed
asparagus, “but as for
him
in particular…he
has been a thorn in my side. He’s kept a simple negotiation from going
smoothly, and insists on this charade. I don’t know why. Maybe it’s how he
amuses himself now.”

I bit into my
salmon again, nodding. “It sounds like maybe that’s just what he is.”

“What’s
that?” Cole snapped his attention my way.

“Someone who
is always looking for a shake-up, something out of the ordinary…I mean, what do
you
want
when you have that much
power? I’d like to think that, from what you’ve told me, he’s an intelligent
and resourceful man…maybe he just likes to screw around with powerful people
when he knows he can.”

Cole grew
stern. “That’s probably it.”

“Unless,” I
thought aloud, taking another delicious bite, “that’s not what he’s really
after all along. He knows that he’s untouchable. Nobody would dare cross or
question him…maybe our esteemed friend just wants a challenge.”

*
      
*
      
*

The rest of
the week was a whirlwind of activity. It seemed like the time just rocketed
past while we made our preparations for the arrival. He placed his personal
driver, Gregory, on standby for the evening – the two would arrive to
pick Alphonse up from his private jet, then bring him straight here to the
penthouse. Cole trusted me to put together an itinerary for the following day
– giving Alphonse some sights to see before heading back towards his home
in Tokyo. I settled on breakfast in a fine dining restaurant not far from here,
as well as a private museum visit, an early afternoon play, and thanks to
touching base with Patrick, our private helicopter pilot, an aerial tour of the
city.

Cole hid how
poorly he was feeling – while I lay down with him at night, my head
against his chest, I could hear a distant rattle in his chest. His stamina in
bed was slipping; we would have to take breaks during our mind-blowing sex, and
I would keep a glass of water nearby for him, or do most of the work myself. It
almost felt wrong, reveling in pleasures of the flesh even as his body failed
him, but he insisted that he’d never felt more alive.

And I’d never
felt so
satisfied
.

To hell with
dying. I might get hit by a bus tomorrow. Cole’s lungs might fail tonight. It
didn’t matter. For now, we were together. We were going to live.

While I did my
best to console and comfort him, Cole rested in his bed. He needed all of his
strength for the visit, although it sounded like Alphonse Megami was already
well aware of his condition.

The disease
was clearly taking its toll on him, and he could no longer hide his affliction.
We didn’t dare go into public for fear of the tabloids. If they snapped a
picture of Cole pale as a ghost or sputtering up blood, it would start a media
firestorm around the sick billionaire – the very last thing that he
needed before this climactic meeting.

And before we
knew it, the night in question was upon us.

But we could
have never prepared ourselves for what that night was destined to bring…

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Chapter 28

Kylie

While I
strolled across the departments, clipboard held to my chest, everyone was
getting ready to head home for the evening. With a perky smile on my face, my
thoughts drifted back months in time, before any of this had happened.

I knew that Cole
Andrews didn’t remember that night. It had been commonplace for me to come over
to his penthouse and brainstorm his schedule with him, and he was just so
handsome and so powerful. Oh god, it was so fucking sexy.

Of course, he
didn’t hire me to be
that
kind of
executive assistant. I wasn’t there to suck him off beneath his desk, although
I fantasized about it all the time. I imagined what it would be like to
unsheathe his thick, heavy cock from his slacks, drop down between his knees,
and feel his strong fingers grasp my ginger curls, forcing my mouth to accept more
of him inside…

And one
night, while celebrating a particularly victorious business deal of his, I got
my wish…although he was
way
too
drunk. I could smell the liquor on his breath as I pulled close, seeing the
lack of coherency in his eyes when he looked at me.

His tongue
was sloppy, soaked with alcohol. I knew I was taking advantage of him. I knew
that I was crossing a line. But it wasn’t my fault – it was
his.
Cole had seen my advances and shut
them all down. He’d even threatened to fire me over them. But it was clear to
me that if I could just make him experience me the once, he’d see the truth.

We were meant
to be together.

I had pushed
him, encouraged him that night. I poured a few of his drinks, adding in a
little too much alcohol. I’d even poured a little something extra in it, just
to make him see things my way. It had worked, and I was in his lap and tugging
at his clothes within an hour.

The feeling
of his hot breath on my slickened sex was everything I’d hoped for and more. I
grabbed at his tufts and pulled him close, riding his mouth until he pulled
back, flipped me onto all fours, and fucked me like an animal.

I was his to
do with as he pleased. Even with too much alcohol in his system, he’d been able
to pummel my wet, slickened chasm into submission. With my hands pressed
against the glass of his penthouse, the whole city sprawled beneath us, he
fucked me like a monster uncontained.

That had been
the most incredible fuck of my entire life.

But he’d been
furious the following morning. He knew himself too well – knew that he
would never succumb to that without pressure. I didn’t expect him to go so far
as to have his blood tested that day – and when the evidence of my little
help
came up, there was no going
back.

He didn’t
fire me. Instead of being absolutely livid, as I had expected, he was
incredibly disappointed.

For some
reason, he just blamed himself.

That stung
even more.

Keeping my
job and working for the love of my life, a man whom I’d drugged and raped, and
he didn’t destroy me. I couldn’t understand it. Why? Why keep me close after
that? What did he see? Surely there were other assistants…other girls he could
hire.

But he
didn’t. He kept me.

And he never
trusted me again. Not completely.

The trips to
his penthouse stopped. He began to give me rougher assignments, slowly and
gradually cutting me out of the finer points of his life. It was
all
professional now. But I still held
on, hoping that he’d come back around. After all, I’d tasted his come on my
tongue. I’d been filled with his seed. Despite my greatest hopes, I didn’t turn
up pregnant.

I felt
betrayed, and I wanted to strike out at him.

Breaking me
from my thoughts, Larry Higgins passed in the hall, passing by on his way out
with his motorcycle helmet under his arm. He flashed me a smile, wishing me a
good night, and I did the same for him.

I always
liked Larry. Not the brightest, but friendly enough.

My thoughts
returned. Coppersmith was the perfect companion. It was clear that he resented
Cole for some reason, and I scheduled a private meeting with him under the guise
of a one-on-one board review. As soon as I started pushing him the right way,
it all started coming out. He hated Cole. He blamed him for so much.

He’d make an
interesting partner. Sure, he was old for my tastes, but the man was easily
manipulated. Show a little affection, press him in the right direction… He
probably thought he was the one running the show.

I snuck him
access to Cole’s secret files. Proof that he was sick with some sort of disease,
although I hadn’t looked into them too deeply. I didn’t realize how severe it
was – that it was fatal. That news rocked me completely. I thought he was
going to bounce back, but he was
dying?

By then it
didn’t matter. Our little alliance was set. Coppersmith had this plan to
overthrow Cole. It was a little much for my tastes, but then he promised to
make me a board member. At my age? I’d be one of the youngest in the city. It
was enough to separate me from my grief that the object of my love was a dead man.

The lure of
power was intoxicating, and I agreed. With Cole’s disease slowly ravaging him,
I’d play the part of the dedicated, atoning executive assistant, and he’d never
suspect me. Sure, he’d never trust me again, not really, but the distracted
billionaire would have never guessed that I had turned to cut him deeper than
before.

And then when
Kiona showed up, it seemed so perfect. Coppersmith had brought in his little
spy and she was busily weaving her web. I had some trouble keeping up with what
Kiona was tasked with accomplishing, but Coppersmith assured me she was
critical for my own rise to power. When Cole revealed her deception and
destroyed Larry’s attempts at ascension, it looked like things were really
going to turn in our favor.

And then he fucking proposed.

It had
destroyed me. That wasn’t supposed to happen. I knew they were having some
lunches together – I thought that was just about infiltration on
Coppersmith’s behalf. I didn’t realize that they were going to
marry
each other. All I could think
about was Cole fucking her in that office of his, and it made me furious.

I didn’t care
that he was dying. If I couldn’t have him, nobody could. I’d go to any length
and give Coppersmith any weapon I could provide if it meant breaking up their happy
little union in Cole’s final hours.