The Boss's New Plaything

by Layla Valentine

  “The apartment is going to be taken care of,” Ari said with a nod. “I would have taken care of it anyway, because I wanted that apartment bad.” He grinned and Eva rolled her eyes, overjoyed with the success of their scheme. “But I want you to know that I appreciate what you’ve done. I wouldn’t leave you hanging on something like that. You’ve done such a good job, little wife.”

  Eva snorted. “That is a really terrible pet name for me,” she told him. “It’s a good thing we aren’t actually married—I’d have to waste so many hours schooling you on how to address me.”

  “Now that you mention that—I was wondering: would you be willing to do this again?”

  Eva raised an eyebrow.

  “Just how many businesses have you been trying to work with who don’t want to have anything to do with you unless you have a wife?”

  “It would be for events of a few different kinds,” he told her, ignoring her sarcastic question. “But there are lots of occasions I can think of where having a wife at my side would make a good impression. I’d be willing to pay you a retainer fee, since my hand is played out on the current thing.”

  Eva smiled at him, but her heart sank at his words. She hadn’t quite come to terms with the fact that she had feelings for the man—but she had recognized that it was true. The thought of pretending to be his lover when it was convenient for him to have a spouse at his side almost turned her stomach. Eva shook her head.

  “I can’t do that,” she said, sighing. “I can’t—I don’t want to pretend to be your wife at your convenience.”

  “I told you: I’ll pay you well. You won’t want for anything in the world.”

  Eva shook her head again.

  “I could win the lottery tomorrow and never want for anything in the world,” she pointed out. “I’m not exactly interested in becoming an escort.”

  Ari scowled down at her. “You wouldn’t be an escort—you’d be my companion. Paid discreetly, of course. And you’d be making connections, getting to know people, becoming someone who doesn’t have to choose between customer service jobs and a life of crime.”

  Eva stared at him in shock, wondering if she was even understanding him correctly.

  “Is it the fact that this went off without a hitch that’s made you so anxious to have a fake wife?” Eva crossed her arms over her chest, feeling vulnerable under Ari’s gaze. “Or am I that good a lay on top of it?”

  “Both of those things,” Ari said with a shrug. “And then some. But mostly it really is that I need a woman to present as my partner. I need to know that the woman I choose is able to hold up to the ideas that I have.”

  “You took my ideas,” Eva countered.

  “We took each other’s,” Ari corrected.

  Eva had to concede that that was right about that. Her throat felt dry. She was still reeling from Ari’s matter-of-fact assessment of why he wanted her to continue to play the part of his wife.

  “What do you say?” Ari raised a dark, well-groomed eyebrow. “From a practical standpoint, it makes sense for you—you don’t have to worry about making ends meet, and you get all the nice dresses you could want.”

  Eva’s stomach turned over inside of her and she shook her head.

  “No,” she said finally. “I can’t do it.” Her heart pounded in her chest and she felt her eyes tingling, stinging with tears that she tried to swallow down. “I need to tell you something, Ari.”

  “What’s that? If it’s a legal issue, I can make sure it’s taken care of,” he told her, looking concerned.

  Eva shook her head. “It’s not a legal issue, it’s a personal one,” she said. She took a deep breath, trying to keep her composure. “I have feelings for you, Ari.”

  She shook her head, laughing bitterly. “I never in a million years expected to, but I have feelings for you, and I can’t—I won’t—pretend that we’re a happy married couple whenever people are looking at us, and like we’re just business partners whenever we’re not. I can’t…” She swallowed, closing her eyes for a moment. “I can’t have sex with you and pretend to be in love with you, and then just…act like there’s nothing between us but business.” Eva met Ari’s gaze for a moment. “I either want to be with you for real, or not at all,” she said.

  Ari opened his mouth to reply, but in the next instant, Eva heard the sound of footsteps moving away from the corridor where they stood. Her eyes widened and she turned to look in the direction that she’d heard the steps; Ari looked at the same time.

  “Oh—oh God. You don’t think they overheard us?”

  Ari’s lips pressed into a thin line.

  “Only one way to find out,” he said quietly.

  Eva followed in Ari’s wake as he hurried back into the dining room. In a matter of seconds, Eva knew that whomever it was who had eavesdropped on them, they’d definitely spread the word about what they’d heard. The members of the board were talking angrily among themselves, rising from the table with faces that proclaimed their disgust with what they had just been told.

  “Lies! Falsehoods!” The man Ari had spent the most time addressing throughout dinner—the leader of the delegation and the eldest son, Mahmood Al Akanish—shook his head and glared at Ari. “You want to form a business arrangement with us based on false premises,” he said. “We will not be taking part in any deal founded on lies.”

  Eva’s heart pounded in her chest; she felt the same way she had when the FBI had arrived on the scene during the con job that went bad, the one that had put Jared in prison for years to come.

  Ari maintained a stoic exterior, and Eva struggled to come up with something to say to the representatives.

  “I believe there has been a misunderstanding,” Ari said calmly.

  “There is no misunderstanding,” one of the other board members said. “We are leaving tomorrow, and we will not be part of this deal.”

  All at once, all of the royal family members turned their backs on the two of them and left the room.

  Ari watched them walk out of the dining room and Eva watched him, forgetting her own sadness at the businesslike way in which he had acted when proposing that they continue their sham marriage. His face was impassive, but in Ari’s dark eyes, Eva could see that he was heartbroken; it was one of the few moments when she had been able to truly see the way that the billionaire felt, and it shook her.

  He turned to face her, and Eva took a deep breath, trying to think of something to say.

  “I should go,” Eva said. “I—the trains are going to be a mess so late at night, and I don’t have money for a cab.” She met Ari’s gaze, and once more saw the deep, haunting pain in his eyes. “I need to go,” she said again, feeling unreal and not quite capable of moving. Another quick, deep breath allowed her feet to move and Eva turned away from Ari, walking as quickly as she could before he could think to say anything.

  She knew that they had built something between them—something that she wasn’t willing to trade in for a sham marriage that would conveniently allow Ari Christodoulou to rehabilitate his reputation. But whatever it was that they had managed to do together, whatever feelings Ari might have actually begun to entertain for her, Eva knew that the moment of his crushing defeat had killed it all. She would never hear from him again; that much she was certain of.

  Eva nearly got lost in the path to the building’s exit, and in spite of telling Ari that she didn’t have the money for a cab, she let the doorman put her in one of the clean, yellow cars. What does it matter, anyway? It’s not like I’m going to be any broker than I would have been otherwise.

  She spent the entire ride home in a state of shock, too numb to cry, too appalled to laugh at the terrible twist that her scheme with Ari had taken. It had all fallen apart in a matter of moments, and after they had pulled it off. Eva shook her head, thinking to herself that she was never—ever—going to try conning anyone again. She had gotten her two warnings; the next time, it wouldn’t be someone else who tragically lost out—it would be her.r />
  Chapter Eleven

  By the time Eva walked through the front door of her apartment, some of her shock had worn off, even if she still had no clue about what to do. She closed and locked the door behind her and began stripping off the finery that Ari had bought her, gathering it up carefully as she walked to her bedroom. She stood under the shower for what felt like a long time, washing off the makeup, the hair products, everything that had formed her costume as Ari Christodoulou’s privileged wife, and crawled into bed.

  She knew that at the end of the day, there were only two choices: she could stay at home, miserable, blaming herself and hating the circumstance that had led someone to uncover Ari’s scheme; or she could do something about it. But what? What can you actually do?

  Eva turned onto her back and stared up at her ceiling, exhausted but unable to fall asleep. Her stomach twisted and churned inside of her, in spite of the fact that there was nothing at all wrong with anything she’d eaten that night. Was it really her fault that her conversation with Ari had been overheard? Eva sighed, scrubbing at her face and wishing that she could go to sleep and forget the whole ugly mess.

  It wasn’t exactly her fault that they’d been found; she had no idea when their eavesdropper had begun listening, but clearly he had gotten the message that she and Ari were not truly married. For a little while, as she tossed and turned, Eva thought that Ari was as much to blame for their discovery as she was; after all, he had been just as indiscreet. But Eva couldn’t help feeling as though there was something she could—should—do for him.

  Eva twisted around between the sheets, unable to get comfortable. Her body was exhausted, but her brain worked in overdrive, turning over the moment when they’d been discovered. She thought about the dinner; she was certain that the Al Akanish family members had believed that she was Ari’s wife. She had felt the kind of rush that only came with successfully putting one over on a mark—and the family had seemed absolutely charmed by herself and Ari.

  At some point, Eva fell asleep. She faded in and out of consciousness, occasionally waking up with something that wasn’t quite a thought, only to slip back into darkness with the idea unresolved. Images flitted through her mind: Ari during their intense sessions, watching her attentively, seeming genuinely interested in what her life had been like, the polite but probing questions from the guests at the table, the look on the representatives’ faces when they’d entered the room after everything had unraveled.

  Hours later, Eva woke up for good, the half-formed ideas swirling around her head coalescing into something like a plan as she came out of yet another vivid, anxiety-spurring dream. She crawled out of bed and padded into the living room where her laptop sat. “This is either going to fix everything, or it’s not going to work at all,” Eva said to herself as she waited for her computer to boot up. She considered making coffee, but knew it wouldn’t do her much good; she was already jittery and nervous, even without the caffeine.

  Eva opened a browser and started searching. There had to be some way to get to the Al Akanish family before they left. She looked up all of the information she could find on the royals, trying to piece together some method of getting to them.

  There was surprisingly little; Eva nearly gave up on trying to figure out where they might be—there were no tabloid details, no news articles about the international shipping magnates coming to the city for any reason. Of course, they’re probably very private. But there were ways to find even the most private businessmen and women, Eva reminded herself.

  She finally found what she was looking for: the Al Akanish royals owned a hotel a few blocks away from Grand Central station; surely that was where they would be.

  “If I owned a hotel, I’d stay there when I was in town,” she said to herself, rising from her desk and hurrying into her room. She had no idea if the representatives of the shipping company would still be there, or if they would listen to her. She only knew she had to at least attempt to find them, and that if they were there, she would find a way to convince them to listen to her—the same way that she had with Ari.

  Eva quickly put on the most professional-looking outfit she had from her previous life, slipping her blazer over a nice blouse and the tailored pants she had invested in to give herself the best possible air of status. She had no idea if there would be any impact on the members of the royal family, but it would make her feel more confident—and Eva was certain that she would need all the confidence that she could get.

  As soon as she was dressed, Eva threw her makeup bag and a brush into her purse and hurried downstairs, opening up the Lyft app on her phone and checking to make sure that there was someone close enough to pick her up as quickly as possible. Don’t think about it too much. Jump into it and make it happen. If you think too hard, you’ll psych yourself out.

  Her driver arrived, and Eva confirmed that he knew where he was going. She hadn’t even stopped to consider whether she might be able to get to the hotel by subway; the Lyft would at least be cheaper than a cab, though it would be a near thing, and it would be the fastest possible way to get across town. Her heart beat faster and faster in her chest as the traffic ebbed and flowed, making her driver slow down or speed up.

  Eva tried to rehearse what she would say to the royals if she could actually get to them—assuming they were in the hotel at all. Assuming that they hadn’t already left. She felt nauseated, uncertain of herself in a way that she hadn’t in years.

  By the time she arrived outside of the hotel, shortly before noon, Eva’s whole body was tingling with anxiety, her mouth and throat dry. She darted out of the car and up the stairs, not even certain of how she would go about finding the royals or discovering their whereabouts inside the hotel.

  Think, Eva. Think! She looked around as she stepped into the lobby, slowing her forward momentum to avoid drawing attention to herself.

  Eva’s searching gaze landed on a group of people standing off to the side in the lobby. She spotted Mahmood Al Akanish arguing with one of the other men in the group and her heart stuttered in her chest, a mixture of excitement and nervousness flooding through her. Her knees felt weak, but she strode forward anyway; this was the best chance she could possibly have hoped for: the entire group seemed to be waiting for their departure, not isolated in rooms.

  “Excuse me? Excuse me!” Eva threw back her shoulders and advanced towards Mahmood, keeping her gaze on him even as the security detail moved to intercept her, silent and stoic. “If I could please just have a moment of your time, Mr. Al Akanish,” Eva called out. “Five minutes—that’s all I ask.”

  After a tense moment, Mahmood Al Akanish stepped forward, saying something to the guards that had moved between himself and Eva. The guards stepped to the side, and Mahmood peered at Eva closely. “You must be very brave or very stupid,” he said coolly.

  “I am probably both, though right now I’m thinking slightly more on the stupid side,” Eva said, smiling nervously. She took a deep breath. “I couldn’t live with myself if you left without me at least attempting to explain the situation that ended so poorly last night.”

  “I’m not sure that it needs explanation,” Mahmood said. He glanced at some of the other members of the royal family and shrugged. “But I will hear what you have to say. Our driver is delayed.”

  “Thank you,” Eva said. She licked her lips; everything that she had thought to say, every word she had rehearsed on the drive into the city fled from her mind. “I know that you were expecting to see a reformed, serious man,” Eva began. “I know because Ari himself told me. And I understand that lying to you—creating this fake marriage—was deeply insulting.”

  Mahmood began to speak, but Eva plowed forward, the words tumbling out of her with little discretion or thought. “I met Ari at an open house,” she explained. “There was a misunderstanding between us—it was partly pride, and partly ignorance on both of our parts, but there was a…difficulty with the realtor involved. I ended up accidentally putting myself in a pos
ition to owe a realtor one hundred million dollars.”

  One of the women snickered, but when Eva glanced quickly in her direction, she saw sympathy in the woman’s eyes.

  “When I contacted Ari for help, he informed me that the businessmen and women…” she nodded to the rest of the Al Akanish delegation, “that he was attempting to make a deal with took family and business very seriously, and he asked me to pretend to be his wife, so as to demonstrate to you that he values your opinion.” Eva paused, uncertain of how to proceed.

  “One hundred million dollars?” Mahmood asked.

  Eva nodded. “Which he promised to pay, to make sure that the realtor wouldn’t have grounds to sue me,” she said, shaking her head ruefully. “As I’m sure you’ve likely figured out, I do not have a hundred million dollars.”

  “How long have you known him?” one of the women asked.

  Eva smiled wryly. “A little over a week,” she admitted. “But please believe me when I tell you that in that week, with both of us working as hard as possible, I have come to know the man that Ari Christodoulou really is.”

  She blinked a few times, feeling the tears starting to form in her eyes and struggling to keep them at bay. “I know that it was never his intention to insult you; he wanted to honor you, to abide by the idea you held of him, and the expectations you have of someone that you would do business with.”

  Eva took another quick breath, glancing at the various members of the board. “I came here to speak to you because I hope that you are all understanding enough to realize that Ari desperately wanted your approval. He has wanted to form a partnership with your company for years. He made an error in judgment in lying to you—but I’m sure that there have been things that you’ve wanted desperately enough to lie, even to such a degree as he did.” Eva caught a glimpse of one of the other men in the group smiling—just for an instant. “Please, reconsider the deal. I know that you won’t regret working with him.”