Irresistible Billionaires by Summer Brooks
Bella
“I’ve got another one for you,” Yevgeny announced, plopping the rather thick folder on my desk. “Apparently, this one’s a grad of FIDM.”
The blonde Russian waved his hands in that sparkly sort of manner only a very sarcastic person ever would and shook his head.
“Great,” I sighed. “Add it to the stack, please. That’s a thick one.”
“She thinks she’s important,” he chuckled, tossing the large purple folder on my already humongous stack of applications to look over.
Applications for my potential replacement. No one had explicitly said that, of course, since my promotion wasn’t yet a guarantee and, similarly, it was no guarantee that Evan's next assistant would take my position when I left, as I had done a year and a half ago.
But it had been a silent understanding among the who’s who of the San Francisco branch of the Jane Sloan office for interior design that Evan’s newest assistant would, hopefully, take over for me when I inevitably left.
Even as I thought that through, I crossed my fingers underneath my large glass desk, despite the fact that it was totally see-through, and prayed that my hopes and dreams came true.
“No one could possibly be as important as you,” I joked with Yevgeny. He was my favorite of all of our interns but, unfortunately, had plans to travel back to Europe once he finished his internship with us. His father was some big shot who already had a job lined up for the kid in Italy.
What I wouldn’t give to have a rich dad like that.
“That is a straight-up lie,” Yevgeny chuckled. “Still, I’m curious to know who you choose. They’re going to do your job soon enough.”
“We don’t even know that’s true,” I reminded him, hiding a blush.
Yevgeny raised one of his perfectly plucked blonde eyebrows and glanced down at my desk, underneath which my crossed fingers were still very clearly visible.
“Go do your job!” I hollered jokingly at him, while simultaneously uncrossing my fingers and sitting on my hands.
“The rumor is that Jacinda will be retiring soon,” he called as he nearly skipped out of my office. “And we all know who’s first in line for her jo-ob.”
With that, Yevgeny disappeared, leaving only his lilting words behind him.
Jacinda.
I’d hardly allowed myself to think about it until recently, but Yevgeny was right. Every single day Jacinda grew richer and closer to retirement. According to the tabloids, she’d struck up a rather hot and heavy romance with one Harold Neimer, a wealthy Hollywood producer who would gladly pay for her to move across the country and be a stay at home wife.
As potentially anti-feminist as it might have made me sound, a tiny little piece of me was really hoping that Jacinda would take Harold up on his offer.
And soon.
And, okay, it was not a tiny piece of me. It was more like… ninety-eight percent of me.
I glanced over at the stack of applications and plucked the one Yevgeny had just delivered. It was three p.m. on a Friday afternoon and I was done with client appointments for the day. I might as well get started on this stack of applications that I’d been putting off ever since they’d appeared on my desk.
Paperwork was not my thing. It never had been, and it never would be. Normally, that was what my assistant, Ramona, was for. But Evan had specifically asked me to look over and sort through the applications for the assistant position since I knew her so well. After all, I had worked for the woman for three years right after I’d graduated from college.
I opened up the file, and the first thing I was greeted by was a massive piece of pink paper. I’m not talking soft, rose pink, either. I'm talking bright, hot pink, paper.
Half of me was impressed at the balls on this girl. The other half of me was annoyed at visual assault I’d just experienced.
“Jennifer Clarke,” I read aloud. But those were the only two words on that page. The girl had tased half a tree just to make sure her name was in size twenty-four font.
Putting aside my immediate need to judge anyone and anything, I slipped the first page out and got to her portfolio, which was plastered across similarly brightly colored paper. She’d chosen to put photos of her handiwork on blue and green paper, a not so subtle bow to the trademark colors of Jane Sloan design.
As I read further, I was glad I hadn’t marked the girl off based on my first impression. It became apparent to me that she hadn’t just filled out her application- she’d made the entire thing her portfolio. Everything from the paper to the typeface had been meticulously chosen to present a carefully crafted image of Jennifer and her ability, from interior design all the way down to writing.
I didn’t even need to see any more applications. I would glance through them all, of course, but my gut knew who I would choose to hire.
Jennifer Clarke, the girl who’d nearly given me a heart attack with her fantastically bright paper choice.
Even though I still had to interview her and a few more applicants to be absolutely sure, my heart rose in my chest, plumping up with excitement.
It was getting more and more real by the minute. Nothing was absolutely concrete, but I knew by now that Jane Sloan Designs worked a very specific way. I’d watched it happen time and time again. Hell, I’d been the recipient of a promotion myself, filling someone else’s slot when they retired.
“New York City, here I come,” I grinned, turning to the photo of the Empire State Building that hung above my desk. You could see it from the offices in New York, so I’d put the photo up the moment I’d moved into my office as a manifestation technique.
Now, it was finally happening. Or was about to happen, but I didn’t need to mince the details.
In times like these- the exciting, thrilling ones- there was only one person I called.
Logan.
It was time for a sushi date. Ever since we’d become friends two years ago when my friend Clara married Logan’s brother, Zach- for real that time- Logan and I had started a celebratory tradition.
Any time either one of us had good news to share, we went out to sushi. Over the last two years, it had devolved into a tradition for pretty much anything. If one of us had to share something, we went out to sushi. If it was good, we had sake to celebrate. And if it was bad, well, we also had sake to drink until we couldn’t even think anymore.
Beaming, I pulled out my iPhone and shot off a text.
“Got news! Mura at eight?”
I left my phone on my desk, face-up, anticipating Logan’s usually speedy response as I opened the next application dutifully.
But his response didn’t come.
I finished with the application and tossed it straight into my discard pile, then hit the home button on my phone just in case I’d somehow managed to miss his text. But I hadn’t. The screen was as blank as ever, showing me nothing but the time, date, and pastel pink inspirational wallpaper.
“No Excuses,” it read, in curly cursive script.
It was my version of inspirational, at least.
Just as I was about to fall firmly into the dark abyss of anger at my best friend- anger I logically knew was completely unfounded- my phone rang. To my slight disappointment, the name on the caller I.D. was not Logan’s.
Instead, it was my friend Clara, the one who was married to Logan’s brother, Zach.
“Hello sunshine,” I hollered as I answered the phone. “What’s up?”
“You seem awfully chipper,” Clara chuckled. “Did something exciting happen? Did you meet a man, perhaps?”
I could tell from Clara’s tone that she was not at all convinced I’d met anyone. Even so, I winced. Outwardly. For some reason, now that I was thirty-four, all of my conversations seemed to center around whether or not I had met a man. Even my friends had an annoying habit of asking if I’d met anyone pretty much every time they spoke to me.
And every time, I had to tell them, no, citing my extremely busy career.
“Please,” I guffawed, using my over the top laugh to make Clara think that was the last thing on my mind. “I didn’t meet anyone. I’m just having a good day! Isn’t a lady allowed to have a good day without having a penis involved?”
“Sorry, I was just asking.” I could hear the instantaneous hurt in Clara’s voice and quickly backtracked.
“I was just making a general statement, Clara,” I said apologetically. “I didn’t mean to make you feel bad. I’m sorry.”
Sometimes, I forgot how sensitive Clara could be. We were total opposites in that way. I liked to joke and poke fun at almost all hours of the day, whereas Clara’s penchant for jokes was a bit lacking. On a good day.
“It’s alright,” Clara replied, already over it. “I was calling to see if you had any plans tonight.”
“Plans, hmmm,” I replied, rifling through a couple of papers on my desk to make it seem like I needed to look at my calendar. Even among my friends, I didn’t want a reputation for being plan-less on a Friday night in San Francisco.
And I was also stalling to give myself a bit of time to check my text messages one more time, just in case I’d missed something. Which I hadn’t. It seemed Logan was ignoring me.
“I’ve got a few things, but I can move them around,” I lied. “Let’s do it!”
“Good,” Clara sighed. “We haven’t had a proper girl’s night in ages.”
“I’ll bring tequila?”
“And I’ll get the ice cream,” she laughed. “Your place after work?”
“You betcha,” I nodded, even though she couldn’t see me.
It was already nearing six, so I decided to sign off from work for the weekend.
“Bye, Yevgeny,” I called out as I left my office. The kid was so into whatever he was doing, with his head bowed down and an invisible bubble of laser focus around him, that he didn’t say a word, and just raised a hand in response.
“Hey,” I said, sticking my head in Evan’s office.
I’d always loved her office. Secretly, I’d attempted to copy it a bit when I was designing my own, but I didn’t have nearly the same sizable bank account that Evan possessed.
She had a huge glass desk, bare of everything save her massive Mac monitor and a photo of her and her daughter, Gracie. The wood was polished concrete, but the middle was covered in a plush white carpet, on which sat a low, silver coffee table and two chairs from Serena and Lily that were a lot less comfortable than they appeared. But, if Evan had taught me anything, it was that style outweighed comfort every time.
Evan looked up from her computer, allowing a graceful smile to swim across her plump lips as she did so. Today, her hair was enviously beautiful. She swept her tight black curls away from her warm brown skin and twisted them up into a French twist, but then added a few barrettes to give it the appearance of being studded with diamonds.
Knowing Evan, they probably were diamonds.
“Hey,” she beamed at me. “How goes the hiring?”
“Is it bad that I feel a little pang of remorse every time I reject someone?” I asked.
“Not at all,” Evan laughed. “I hate to break it to you, though. That little pang never really goes away.”
“That’s a real confidence booster,” I snorted. “I meant to ask you if there was any news from the New York office today?”
“Not yet,” Evan shook her head with a knowing smile. “I promise you’ll be the first to know when I have anything to share.”
“Okay,” I sighed. “Thanks, Evan.”
“Get out of here,” she replied. “I’m sure a pretty young thing like you has plenty of wild plans for a Friday night.”
“Of course,” I lied, and then got the hell out of there as fast as I possibly could.
I had plans. They just weren’t wild to anyone that wasn’t a seventy-year-old agoraphobe.
Sarah was already waiting when I walked out of the parking garage below my building.
“Finally!” The blonde gasped, balancing two bags of takeout and a stack of movies in her hands. “I thought I was going to have to call for help!”
“Let me take those.” I grabbed the movies from her to lighten the load, throwing a casual and unnecessary glance toward their titles. I already knew what she’d bring. We always chose from a rotation of the same ten rom-coms.
“How To Lose a Guy in Ten Days and Something Borrowed,” I murmured appreciatively. “Perfect choices.”
“I was in a mood,” Sarah shrugged. “Now, can we please get inside so I can dig into this chicken fried rice?”
“Yes, Boss,” I nodded, giving her an Army salute before I swiped my key fob so the door would open. We took the elevator up to the fifth floor, where I lived, and dumped everything on the table the moment we got inside.
“I haven’t had Szechwan Garden in ages,” I groaned as the aroma of sweet and sour chicken wafted through the cracks of one of the containers. “How is it you always know exactly what to get me?”
“One could gander that I know you fairly well,” Sarah shrugged.
“Ooooh, gander, what an SAT word!” I shoved her shoulder, playfully. Sarah always had been the smartest of the three of us. I was pretty sure she’d even gotten a perfect score on her SATs and lied to Clara and me so we wouldn’t feel quite so bad.
Mostly me, though. Clara had gotten a decent enough score as well. I, on the other hand, had only scored well enough to finally convince people that my talents lay outside academia. Far, far outside.
Just then, the buzzer squeaked, sending it’s loud, low call throughout my apartment.
“Yes,” I said as I pressed the button.
“It’s me,” Clara’s voice came through, crackling with the bad connection.
“Pay the entrance fee,” I replied, turning to share a giggle with Sarah. This was a callback to our elementary school days, when Sarah had a big house out in the suburbs, complete with a pool and a treehouse. Whenever someone wanted to enter, there was an entrance fee.
“Let’s see, I’ve got mint chocolate chip, strawberry, and cookie dough,” Clara called back. “That enough of a fee for you?”
“The council has determined to accept your proffered ice cream,” I responded, keeping my voice low and deep. I hit the unlock button so Clara could get in the front door, and it wasn’t too much longer before my friend showed up, three tubs of ice cream in hand.
“Yes!” Sarah cried out, eyeing the strawberry. “You truly do love me, Clara.”
“Only on the good days,” I interjected, grabbing the ice cream to put it in my freezer. “So, what movie are we watching?”
“What do we got?” Clara murmured, eyeing the two choices for a moment. Suddenly, her jaw popped open in a move that would have been comical if I weren’t confused and slightly terrified, and she very slowly spun around to face Sarah.
Silence fell between them for a second as Sarah desperately tried to figure out what the heck Clara was doing.
“Uh, hi?” She questioned.
“Your movie choices!” Clara gasped, pointing at the two films.
“What, do you hate them, or something?” I demanded with a laugh.
“No,” Clara shook her head vigorously, splaying her hair all about. “I don’t hate them at all.”
Sarah glanced over to me, searching for backup, but I was equally as lost as she was.
“Speak, Clara,” Sarah ordered. “Before I smack you just to make sure your brain hasn’t come loose.”
“Ok, fine,” she sighed. “What do these movies have in common?”
“Blonde leads,” Sarah said.
“Absolutely, ridiculously hot love interests,” I grinned, thinking of Matthew McConaughey shirtless. He was the stuff dreams were made of.
“Yeah, sure, but what else?”
Now, I was out of answers. Sarah seemed to catch on, though, because her eyes widened, and she started to back away, slowly, like a wounded animal.
“Clara, just choose,” Sarah rolled her eyes.
“Okay, enough with the strange secretiveness,” I requested. “Spill it, Clara. What’s going on?”
“Sarah likes someone.” The grin that spread across Clara’s face was so wide, it could have built a bridge right across the Sacramento River.
“What? How do you know that?” I choked, trying to figure out how she’d gone from chick flick titles to our friend’s romantic life in about two seconds flat.
“Both of those movies are about a girl, who likes a guy, but pretends she doesn’t,” Clara shrugged. “Sarah never chooses two movies in the same category. Therefore, I deduced that Sarah has a crush.”
“You got all of that from movie titles?” I raised an eyebrow and rounded on Sarah. “Come clean, missy.”
A red hot blush spread like wildfire across Sarah’s ivory cheeks, and even if she’d attempted to deny it, Clara and I would have known the truth.
“Okay, fine,” Sarah relented. “I do like someone. But it’s early, and I don’t want to jinx it.”
“Oh, please!” Clara rolled her eyes. “You can’t jinx it. We deserve to know!”
“This from the woman who hid the fake status of her wedding from us until, oh, I don’t know, right that day?” I asked with a laugh. “Sarah can be as private as she wants to be about this.”
Clara rolled her eyes, but Sarah gave me an appreciative nod. “Thank you, Bella.”
“You’re welcome.” I gave her a light smile, but I could tell it didn’t meet my eyes. The truth was that I’d only dissuaded Clara with talk of the fake wedding to Zach- the one she’d nearly gone through without even telling us it wasn’t real- was because I couldn’t bear to hear about my friend’s perfect romance life while I had none.
Which, okay, was a choice on my part. Mostly. I probably could have made more of an effort to date people, or even meet people, but I told myself my job kept me far too busy. And that I’d be moving to New York soon, anyway, so it was no use meeting someone I’d have to be long-distance within a few years.
But there was a part of me that was starting to doubt the lies I’d been feeding myself. It was all twisted and crumpled right under my heart, where I’d stuffed it when I decided that this was the way I could keep myself safe.
Maybe it wasn’t, though.
“Tell us more!” Clara demanded, rousing me from my thoughts.
“No,” Sarah protested. “I told you, it’s early. I promise the moment it becomes serious, you guys will be the first to know.”
“We better,” Clara warned.
“Who wants tequila?” I called suddenly, using the liquor as a diversion so I didn’t have to think about the way I was feeling. I wasn’t big on emotions. They were far too overwhelming.
“Please!” Sarah groaned. “I need it after the week I’ve had. But the same could be said for every week.”
“None for me.”
I had just grabbed a bottle of Casa Noble down from the cabinet when Clara spoke, and I was so sure I’d misheard that I went ahead and grabbed three glasses anyways. We always drank tequila on Friday nights. And sometimes on other nights when it was warranted.
“Bella, honey, you don’t need to fill up a glass for me,” Clara called again, making it difficult for me to imagine I’d misheard that time.
“You’re not drinking tequila?” I asked in disbelief. “What, are you pregnant or something?”
It was meant to be a complete and total joke, and I would have started laughing, too, if it weren’t for the tearfully happy expression of confirmation that littered Clara’s features.
“Actually, yeah,” she replied. That was all she could get out before the tears started flowing and turned her into a snotty mess of happiness. I hadn’t seen her like this since the day she and Zach had finally decided to get married for real.
“Oh, sweetie, sit down!” Sarah helped Clara over to my massive, overstuffed gray couch, where she took a couple of shaky, calming breaths.
“I wanted to tell you guys as soon as we found out,” she finally confessed. “Zach wanted to wait a little while, just to be sure. You’re not supposed to know for another three weeks, okay, so don’t mention it to him just yet.”
“So, you’re pregnant,” I repeated, my tone way too flat for the occasion. I’d always wished I was one of those normal humans who could actually regulate their tone despite what they may have been feeling inside, but alas, my vocal cords liked to conspire against me and give away my innermost musings at the most inopportune of times.
I was only aware of this because Sarah flashed me an angry glare, flaring her nostrils just slightly the way she did whenever she was really pissed and shook her head.
“I mean, congratulations!” I covered, flinging the bottle of tequila out and coating half my fridge in the amber liquid. “Crap.”
“Thanks, you guys,” Clara said tearfully, choosing to gracefully gloss over the part where I’d been extremely unsupportive.
Still, even as I plopped on the couch with Sarah and Clara and fussed over what kind of aunt I’d be to that little baby, I couldn’t help but feel that annoying flare of jealousy that had been trying to attack me all night.
I was happy for my friends, truly. I wanted them to have everything in life- the men, the money, the kids, the purses, whatever they wanted- but I was starting to think I may have been overlooking some of those things just a little too much.
What if I never got the promotion? What if I was stuck in San Francisco for the rest of my life?
Would I regret not playing the field and then finding someone to settle down with before my ovaries started drying up like a grape in the hot summer sun?