DANCING BILLIONAIRES
ARE THE BEST
IF I ACT like a tween spotting a pop star, Liam will run.
I know this from firsthand experience—of the Liam variety rather than the rock-star variety.
When I was thirteen, Liam was the kind of hot that made me blurt out random thoughts and hang around my front yard for hours, hoping he’d drive up in his beat-to-pieces Jeep, big hands on the wheel with easy confidence. He’d been built along football player lines, rawer and less polished, and because he’d just started his conquest of the business world, sometimes he’d skip the suit. That his blond hair had been surfer-long, perpetually tousled from driving too fast with the doors off had factored in mightily in my adolescent fantasies. Sometimes he’d spot me and raise a hand in greeting, and I’d wave back furiously, alternating between smiling like a loon and blushing. My adoration had not been subtle.
Liam either figured out the cause behind the effect or Jax had clued him in because around my fifteenth birthday, he stopped casually dropping in at our house, and that absence lasted three years. Whenever he had stepped foot inside, he’d glued himself to Jax’s side. Flirting in front of your older brother is almost impossible, so I’d gotten over big, Boy Scout–worthy, take-charge Liam, or so I’d thought. Last Friday I’d learned an important lesson.
Liam is still my sexual kryptonite.
I also thought I’d learned that I was his, but Saturday morning he’d been right back to treating me like little-sister material. Or trying to. He won’t admit that I have boobs and a perfectly lovely vagina. The handful of hours I spent riding him like a sexy cowgirl and then tucked up against him as we slept were an aberration as far as he was concerned, something to beat himself up over and fix. Sure, he’d been amazing in bed. Not only was Liam generous in the giving department, but his Boy Scout tendencies made him insist on doing things “right.” I came first, I came often, and he was all about my pleasure. That part got an A-plus.
In the long-term aftercare department, however, he sucked. He’d booted me out of his bed with mortifying speed.
He hadn’t apologized.
And yet the man has definitely made his case today.
On the Richter scale of orgasms, I’d rate his most recent effort an earthshaking 8.9. He’d destroyed my defenses and left me sprawled on his lap trying to find some vestige of the good sense I used to possess. It’s hard to kick a man to the curb when you’re still feeling the aftershocks between your legs. Despite our very public situation, I’m seconds away from unzipping his dress pants and refreshing my memory about his awesome penis.
This is mortifying because there are obvious reasons the two of us would never work, starting with his plan for our marriage to be a temporary, sexless sham where I play the good girl to prop up his business image. I add to the list in my head because I need a distraction. Liam is also too rich, too domineering and too big. He sucks the air out of a room when he saunters in and most people rush to give him what he wants without waiting for him to actually take charge and start issuing commands. I’m sure part of it is the money. Jax hates the way people look at him and see an opportunity to cash in.
I believe in gratitude, though, and being happy for the good things the universe sends my way. Happy, but realistic. Mentally, I add today’s orgasm and my memories of Liam’s full frontal nudity to my gratitude list, and then I promise myself I’ll hide that list away because some things are a onetime thing and shouldn’t happen again. I’ll just have to jill off to my Masterson memories and never see him again.
Shifting off his lap is trickier than I expected, thanks both to the monster erection that wants to come out to play and to the twisted rope my underwear has become. The man got my panties down effortlessly, but getting them back up myself proves to be a challenge. When I tug, my skirt gets caught in the cotton twisted around my thighs. I get up on my knees, trying to measure the distance between the top of the truck bed and my waist so I can hike things up and get on with my day, but then I spot ancient Mrs. Abernathy peering at me from behind a mountain of crab-apple jelly jars. I can’t traumatize an old person with my panties, so I sink back down onto Liam’s legs, trying to pretend I was just doing some kind of really athletic yoga pose.
The third time I try to wiggle everything discreetly back into place, Liam makes a rough sound and takes over with his usual efficiency. “On or off?”
I consider protesting but I can’t go back to work panty-less and if I try to hop out of the truck in my current state, there will be an accident. “On. Tell me you can fix this.”
He nods. “Hold still.”
His fingers stroke over my thighs, straightening out the twisted fabric with a minimum of tugging. Liam Masterson, panty whisperer. At least they’re on and not off. I’ll add that to my gratitude journal.
As soon as he’s put me back together, I get out of the truck bed. Clearly I can’t be trusted on horizontal surfaces around Liam, plus I need to get back to work. There’s still a few minutes before the farmers’ market officially closes, and I have a million things to do, some of which involve honey sales and other responsible, nonorgasmic adult tasks.
Now that I’m standing on solid ground again, embarrassment sets in. Okay, not really. But I feel like I should at least pretend that I’m semi-mortified he fingered me while we were in the back of my truck. And since the man’s wearing my bite mark on his shoulder and has a baseball bat in his pants, I’m probably supposed to apologize or offer him a BJ. I try to figure out where that fits in our good guy/bad girl lesson plans and give up. I’ll have to stick to the social niceties.
“Thanks for lunch.”
“You’re welcome.” Liam does some discreet adjusting of his own that makes a mockery of my gymnastics. He’s clearly going to be the coordinated half of our couple.
And... I guess that means I’m doing this?
“Sorry it wasn’t reciprocal.” I may stare at the giant trouser anaconda he’s packing.
I also announce this far too loud.
Mrs. Abernathy starts fanning herself with extreme vigor. I think she may be craning her neck for a better view. I don’t blame her.
Liam does that thing where he smiles with his eyes while the rest of his face impersonates a sexy, frozen glacier. “Hana. It’s okay.”
It’s only been seconds since I came, I’ve apparently already made a life decision, and he’s acting all normal. I grin at him and wrap my arms around him. “Ten out of ten, Mr. Masterson. That was most definitely memorable.”
The corner of his mouth quirks up. “So then we have a deal.”
There’s a moment of silence while I try to decide if negotiating post-orgasm is even possible. Probably not. The man literally has me in the palm of his hand.
“Right now what I really want is a margarita and a nap.”
He leans in, resting his forehead against mine. “Say yes and I’ll throw those in.”
“Tempting.” Both the man and the booze. “But I have a business to run here, so we have to say goodbye.”
He pauses, perhaps running through what’s probably an amazing, well-thought argument. “Say yes instead.”
I lean back in his arms until I can see the blue sky overhead. It’s a picture-perfect afternoon and this is the best position to watch it from. “That’s all you’ve got? At least describe a day in our new, couple-y life for me. Help me see how it would go.”
His arm dips me lower as if we’re tangoing. “We’re having sex?”
“That’s it? Is that a question or a statement? Do you see sex as a daily thing?”
He pulls me back up effortlessly, spinning me around in a lazy circle. “Let’s explore that. How often do you like to have sex?”
Honestly, I tend to prefer a side of commitment with my sex and it’s been a while since I’ve been in a relationship. Liam may not take that the right way, so I fudge. “A couple times a week?”
He stops the almost-dance-number and looks at me. “That’s it?”
Is there some kind of standard deviation normal number thingy here? “I can do less. Or more. When I asked for lessons, Professor Masterson, I wasn’t imagining a seven-period school day.”
“Pity.” His slow grin just about melts my panties right back off.
“Pervert. I have sex when I feel like it. It’s not like cardio where I’m trying to hit so many miles per week. How often do you like to do it?”
His grin grows. “As often as you’ll let me.”
“But when we’re not having crazy monkey sex, how do you see this happening between us?”
He thinks for a moment. “I’d like for us to live in the same house. Go places together. I have work events, and I’d appreciate it if you came with me.”
“I could do that, but we’ll have to stay at my place. Bees, you know. It’s hard to telecommute.”
He nods. “Counterproposal. We hire someone to take care of the farm—it’ll be like a vacation, okay?”
“Seriously?” I’m tempted to introduce him to my hive personally. “You think you can swap someone in for me, but you’ll keep going to the office because there’s only one Liam Masterson?”
He has the grace to flinch. “Right. That came out wrong. I would like to make this as easy as possible for you. For the record, I know you’re good at what you do. I’m sure your bees would miss you. Why don’t we spend weeknights at my place and weekends at yours?”
“That’s hardly even,” I protest. “But okay.”
He opens his mouth, but I don’t want to think any more about how he’s made all this money and practically runs the world. His being good at his job doesn’t mean I suck at mine or that I’m worth any less. I mean, financially, of course I’m worth less, but that’s just bank accounts and stock options.
I flash him a half-assed thumbs-up and turn toward my stand. While farmers’ markets are loads of fun and have the best free snack options ever, it’s also sadly true that they’re not raging business opportunities. I mentally count up the unsold jars, balancing them against their departed companions. It’s not a sophisticated form of accounting, but it works for me. I pretend I can’t feel Liam cringing behind me. I’m sure he runs his business with some kind of super sophisticated, double-column-whatever, Mensa-rated accounting system. He can adjust.
Jars first, I decide. My neighbor, the one who volunteered to fill in for me on my “lunch break,” shoots me a grin as I approach and I pretend that I’m sweaty and flustered from the California sunshine and not because of any truck-bed shenanigans or bad-girl lesson previews. I almost think he believes it, too, when I send him off with three jars of honey and my thanks.
I risk a backward glance and am just in time to see Liam vault lightly over the side of my truck like he’s some kind of world-class athlete. It never occurred to me that all the rock climbing he and my brother do on the weekends might come in handy in real life. Wow. I’m considering whether I should give the sport a shot when Liam strides up beside me.
He gives my poor stand a very Judgy-McJudgment-pants look. He’s probably thinking that by now he’d have moved all of his product and probably franchised sales to Europe, Africa and the outermost reaches of Siberia. I’m just thinking that I have to get all this stuff back into my truck—and out of it again when I get back to the farm.
I think I might groan—and not the good sex kind of sound—because Liam nods at the mountain of glass jars and honeycomb.
“Tell me how I can help.” He pulls his suit jacket off, hanging it on the back of my folding chair.
“You don’t have to ride off into the sunset and do whatever it is billionaires do with their Friday afternoons?”
“You’re my business.” He levels one of those indecipherable Liam looks at me, calm and steady. He feels like a really complicated sudoku puzzle, all empty squares waiting for me to figure out what goes where. Unfortunately, math and I are not on speaking terms. His hand tucks an errant strand of hair behind my ear.
“Just so we’re clear, you’re volunteering to be the orgasm fairy, my sexual guru and my farm boy?”
His face pokers up as he works through my list. “Farm boy?”
He can’t be serious. “Princess Bride? The helpful, do-anything guy Buttercup keeps around her farm for fetching and carrying?”
Liam blinks at me. “Do I need to know more or should I just assume that everything I see goes back in your truck?”
“Farm boy grows up and becomes a really successful pirate.” I pat his arm, taking a moment to appreciate the muscles beneath his sleeve. “You have lots in common. Jars, hive, tables, chair, tent all go back in the truck.”
I point to each item as I rattle them off. Boxing things up seems like a big step down for a man who runs a billion-dollar company, but he offered.
“How much for the shirts?” He motions toward the small stack of Hey Honey Farm T-shirts on the far end of the table. They’re bright yellow with a frisky cartoon bee getting it on with a flower on the front. As usual, they’ve been my bestseller today.
“On the house.” Frankly, I’d pay to see Liam in one of those. He’s always so put together and dignified.
He groans and pulls out his wallet. “You can’t give things away, Hana. That shirt cost you money to produce, plus you have intellectual capital sunk in it.”
We both eye the copulating bee on the front, clearly coming to the same conclusion. That’s not intellectual capital sunk in my design. He hands me a twenty and I dutifully make change from my cashbox while he sorts through the pile for something that will fit.
When he finds one—of course it’s the XL—he sets it on top of the table and then his fingers go to his tie. Loosen the knot slowly while he watches me with his bedroom eyes. Undo his shirt buttons, one neat, orderly flick of his fingers after another. It’s just a shirt, Hana. You’ve seen him naked before. Even before our drunken lovefest at Château Sin, Liam had occasionally gone shirtless around me. Not as often as I’d have liked, but his chest wasn’t terra incognita. I could be totally cool, right?
Naked Liam.
I stare while he strips off the tie, and the dress shirt follows with a loose shake of his shoulder. Rats. He’s wearing a perfectly respectable white T-shirt underneath. While I mourn his not-nudity, he sets the tie on top of his suit jacket and then folds his shirt with retail-store-precision into a neat rectangle.
His fingers curl around the edge of the T-shirt and slowly tug upward. My breath catches and Mrs. Abernathy lets out a wolf whistle.
I clap enthusiastically because oh my God, playful Liam is the sexiest thing ever. He hums something as he teases the shirt up over his perfect abs and then pulls it over his head. For a moment our eyes meet and then he winks at me, giving the shirt a saucy twirl in the air, before he treats it to the same meticulous folding job.
The sight makes parts of me melt, and not just the sex parts, although those are definitely paying attention, too. He just looks happy and a little goofy and nowhere near as remote as he usually does.
“You’re hired.” I slip my fingers underneath his belt and his pants to tuck the handful of dollar bills from his change into the waistband of his boxer briefs.
I’m not surprised that he spends the next hour methodically working through my usual closing tasks. He charms the last few customers into buying honey. He loads the unsold jars back into their crates and then shifts those crates to the back of my truck. He breaks down my tables and awning, fitting the equipment neatly into the bed around all the crates, although my lack of tie-down cables concerns him.
His Hey Honey Farm T-shirt hugs his perfect chest and I spend more time admiring the way his biceps bulge as he effortlessly moves my stuff around than I care to admit. He may have a big, bastardy brain that’s disgustingly good at making money, but it’s not all he does. Finally, though, we have everything in my truck and the beehive strapped in the spot of honor in the passenger-side seat. I fidget, not sure what to do next.
“Thanks. I appreciate the help.”
He tips his head, acknowledging my thanks, and snags a honey-and-cracker taster from the tray on the table.
“Help yourself,” I say.
He winks. “Your honey tastes amazing.” I’m pretty sure there’s a dirty joke in there, but before I can respond, he snaps into what I’ve decided is Pirate Liam mode, all take-charge and corsair-y. “Friday is a weekday. Come to my place.”
“Normal people consider Friday night part of the weekend,” I point out. “That’s when the fun starts. Your raunchy sex party could be considered an example.”
He gives me a dubious look. “Arguably, that was a business event.”
“Seriously?” God, billionaires are weird.
“Seriously.” Humor twinkles in his eyes. “You can make all sorts of connections there. People are relaxed, their guards down.”
“Naked,” I interject. “It’s naked business. Yuck.”
He rocks back on his heels. “It’s a business I’m out of, seeing as how I’m married.”
Should I go there? Absolutely not. Instead, I wave a hand at my truck. “I have to take that home. There’s honey to harvest, combs to straighten. Plus, the bees don’t just look after themselves. I have to check their water, and since these guys can be bullies, I have to make sure the stronger hives aren’t trying to rob the weaker ones or it’ll be outright bee war. And I have to look in on the queens and make sure they’re laying well.”
“You’re a bee Peeping Tom.” The laughter is back in his eyes.
Also? The man has a tiny dimple. How did I not know that?
He follows me over to my truck and opens the door for me, motioning for me to get in. I do, feeling a whole new fondness for my vehicle as I remember what we did in the bed of my truck. I’d like to drag him into the cab and ride him like a cowgirl.
While I contemplate mauling him, he pulls a sleek silver pen out of the suit jacket he’s draped over his arm. Then he picks up my hand and scrawls a scary-looking series of digits on the back.
“Are you giving me the nuclear missile launch code?”
“Gate code. I’ll text you my address.” He cups the back of my head and pulls me into him for a quick, hard kiss. “Go put the bees to bed for the night and then come to my house. Or I can follow you to yours.”
I look down at my hand. Somehow, while he’s been kissing me, he’s gotten my rings back on my hand. I hold them up so they catch the sunlight like the world’s most expensive prism. They cost way too much and I should be making plans to sell them and donate the money to a food bank. But I can’t even pretend to think about it. My weakness for all things Liam is shameful. I conned him into marrying me in a moment of drunken weakness and now I’m essentially taking his money, which makes me at best like all his other girlfriends and at worst some kind of weird gold digger. I don’t like this version of me. And I still don’t want to take off his rings.