Billionaires Dollar Series

“What a convenient arrangement,” I comment. Mentally, I pat myself on the shoulder. No iciness in my voice, nothing at all to hint at the unwelcome roil of emotion in my stomach. Emotions I had no business feeling in the first place. “I suppose you don’t really work twenty-four-seven.”

Liam’s lips quirk, and I hate that he’s amused at this, that he can read my emotions. So I turn around, reaching for another pot to scrub, cleaning service be damned.

“I know we agreed we wouldn’t see other people while we do this,” I say, “but I guess I understand it if it’s in your own building. Perhaps it’s a lot to ask, that… a man like you be celibate for a few weeks.”

Liam’s snort is soft, and then his hands appear again, taking away the pot I’m scrubbing. “I have cleaners,” he repeats. “And what exactly does ‘a man like me’ mean?”

I wave my hand at him, and suds fly from my fingers. He doesn’t seem to notice. He probably has a dry-cleaning service too. The difference between our stations in life seems so clear to me, then. Gone are the days when we sat together, heads bent over our homework.

“A-woman-in-every-port-kind-of-guy,” I say. “A man with the kind of reputation that he has to make up a fake fiancée for a business associate to believe he’s not a playboy.”

Liam’s eyes darken, but his face remains calm. “I won’t be with anyone while we’re fake engaged,” he says. “Regardless of the location. Same as you, Maddie.”

I give a little snort, but the sound is half-crazed. “No risk,” I say. “I don’t have time for romance.”

Liam’s eyes make it clear that he wants to say me neither, but evidence of the contrary had just come knocking on his apartment door. The casualness of it makes me shiver.

“When did you get good at girls, anyway? You always had your head in a fantasy book or your hands on a calculator.”

“We all grow up,” Liam says. “After all, the Maddie I remember wouldn’t kiss a man the way you did the other night.”

The air feels thin, like I’ve climbed to the top of a too-high mountain.

I’m afraid to see the view.

So I clear my throat, nodding to the plate on the kitchen island. “I still need your opinions on the duck.”

Liam retreats, sinking down on the stool with quirked lips. He takes a bite of the duck as I watch.

Then he raises his glass of wine in a toast, and I follow suit. “Delicious,” he says. “To culinary fellowships and fruitful partnerships.”

“To weekends away,” I say, “and to prestigious investment opportunities.”

His eyes stay on mine as we drink our wine, and something moves in the pit of my stomach, lurches and flips over. We’re about to embark on another adventure together, but I know, instinctively and deliciously, that it won’t be anything like the ones we undertook as children.

Maddie is quiet in the passenger seat. I glance over to see her hands clasped tight in her lap. My hand twitches with the odd impulse to reach out and take hers.

But it’s not something she’d welcome.

The words from the other night echo in my head, the recrimination of my actions and my so-called playboy status. The worst part is that she’s not wrong, either.

I do know how to talk to girls now, as she so quaintly put it. Women like me, I like them. The implications have never bothered me before.

But coming out of Maddie’s mouth, the word playboy sounded twisted, uncomfortable. Like hearing a song backwards.

“You all right?” I ask.

She stretches her legs out in front of her, the flashes of green outside the car windows whirling past. “I’m excited.”

“Excited?” There’s no hiding the incredulity in my voice.

“I’m going to spend the weekend at a giant hunting cabin in the woods with complete strangers and a fake fiancé. What’s not to love? It sounds like the premise of a horror movie.”

I can’t help but laugh at that. Maddie’s always had a way of cutting right through the bullshit.

“I’ll try to not leave you alone,” I say. “And let’s just promise here and now that neither of us will go into any basements or attics.”

“I agree. And it doesn’t matter if we hear any loud sounds at night-no investigating.”Property © of NôvelDrama.Org.

“Wouldn’t even dream of it,” I promise.

She shifts her seat further back, as if her short legs need the space. “What did your bosses say about this weekend? Did you tell them you were going to flatter Albert Walker?”

My grin is crooked. “I didn’t give them all the gory details. I just told them I would get them Walker Steel if it’s the last thing I do.”

“You really don’t like to lose, do you?”

“I wouldn’t know,” I say. “I never have.”

Maddie’s delighted laugh fills the car. My foot presses down on the gas in response until it feels like we’re flying down the road.

“Modest as always,” she says.

We arrive at the cabin by noon, pulling onto the gravel road indicated by my GPS.

“Yes,” Maddie says, looking out at the green thickets surrounding us. “I’m definitely feeling serial killer vibes.”

“I have to go out in the woods with him,” I say.

“Yeah, but you’ll have a rifle.”

I pull to a stop outside the giant timber house, too big to bear the diminutive term of a cabin. “So will he,” I say.

Maddie reaches over and puts a hand on my shoulder, her fingers squeezing. “Don’t worry. I’ll write a lovely obituary,” she tells me.

I meet her eyes, nearly gray in the dappled sunlight. No one has eyes like hers. “Just make sure it’s flattering.”

“Oh, I’ll exaggerate, don’t worry.”

As we smile at each other, I’m about to tell her that my accomplishments don’t need embellishing when the front door opens. Rita Walker emerges, dressed head to toe in khaki, her hair tied back with a headband.

“Showtime,” Maddie murmurs, sliding her hand off my shoulder.

The cabin is as much timber on the inside as it is on the outside. Trophies hang on the wall in the giant sitting room, twelve-point antlers. Seeing them makes me grin. Funny, how fat cats always have certain things in common.

In New York, they’d invite you to upscale restaurants or strip clubs. The Hamptons, perhaps, if they were older and farther up the ladder. In London it was men’s lounges, Chesterfield sofas and cigars.

The ones I’d met in Tokyo had preferred schmoozing over copious amounts of sake in a restaurant, everyone still in their suits.