The Billionaire's Seduction (Billionaire Bodyguards Book 5)

by Avalon,Kristi

  The last place he could check for signs of a guy was the least protected room of the house. People’s personal habits—and who they shared them with—showed up there more honestly there than rooms that offered initial impressions.

  “Hey, Sophia. Can I use your bathroom?”

  “Sure,” she called from one of two back bedrooms, separated by the length of a narrow hallway. “Center of the hall, next to the closet.”

  He found the correct room, switched on the light and closed himself inside a wealth of information. Toilet seat down, check.

  Quietly, he drew back the shower curtain. He found no men’s razor or guy-smelling soap or masculine shaving cream in the shower caddy. No second towel hanging from a hook, check.

  The curtain settled back into place. He went for the medicine cabinet behind the mirror. A hairbrush, containers of makeup, ponytail bands, deodorant—girl-specific—two perfume bottles, dental floss. Only one toothbrush, check.

  Satisfied, more than he should be, Liam used the facilities for their intended purpose. When finished, he washed his hands and returned to the living room.

  While he waited for her, he stuck his hands in his suit pockets and strolled up to the painting above the fireplace mantel. Unframed, with a two-inch-thick canvas, it revealed sweeping brush strokes of a greenish-blue landscape, the canvas varnished in a heavy gloss finish.

  Nice, but nothing memorable.

  Then he found his gaze drawn to the only other artwork in her condo, hanging on the wall aligned with her dining room table. A triad of print illustrations spanning three framed pieces, the next one picked up where the previous left off. Unusual and modern. He liked the precision of the lines, randomly interrupted with unexpected rough, scribbled flourishes. Yet, the randomness made sense to him. The unique patchwork filled with bold colors of gold, maroon and cobalt blue contrasted with gray, white and black, spoke to him. He couldn’t believe it had escaped his attention the first time.

  Now this was memorable.

  The black frames were basic and cheap, just there to showcase the prints. The inner matting around the far right one showed signs of slippage, tilted slightly. Something that might happen with age and inattention. Dust had collected on the frames’ inner ridges, as if they didn’t deserve the same spotlessness as everything else in her place.

  The closer he inspected them, approximately three feet high by one foot across, he realized these weren’t computer-generated prints—damn, because he wanted copies. He could see indentations of pen strokes in the paper. They were originals.

  Originals…by Sophia?

  Too curious for his own good, he took the left one closest to him off the wall, inspecting it in detail. Sure enough, he found a tiny inscription revealed by the drooping matte. Reading the tops of the letters, he saw they unmistakably spelled out Sophia Melano, in all caps.

  The corners of his lips kicked up. Ha, I knew it. She was an artist, an extremely talented one. That was her true gift, the passion she hid instead of pursuing. So different from the buttoned-up accountant.

  When he heard her bedroom door open, he hastily returned the illustration to its hook on the wall.

  “What are you doing?” she asked.

  She stood in the middle of her living room, staring at him.

  Why was he touching her pictures?

  He slid a finger along the edge of a frame. “These illustrations are dynamite.”

  “Those?” Her tone held genuine surprise.

  She suddenly felt extremely uncomfortable. Not violated, exactly, but definitely exposed. He’d uncovered a secret, and she didn’t know how to react. “They’re okay, I guess.”

  “They’re one of a kind. Sharp and fluid at the same time. At first, I assumed they were prints made by a computer.”

  She snorted. “Not even close.” Although she had dabbled in computer-generated art over the past few years, she still preferred the real thing. Used to, anyway.

  “How much?” he blurted.

  “Pardon?”

  “These showcase serious talent. They’re worth a lot. I want them. How much would you sell them for?”

  Stunned, she blinked. “I have no idea.”

  “Two-thousand dollars? Three thousand?”

  “Huh?” she whispered. Why would anyone buy old artwork? If she could even call it art.

  “Too low?” He rubbed his chin, absorbed in the pictures she’d drawn her senior year of high school. They’d won the top award at her school, but they weren’t worth anything near the figures he’d stated. “Okay, seven thousand.”

  Her jaw dropped.

  He sighed. “I’m not sure I can go over seven grand.”

  “Liam—”

  “Fine. Ten-thousand dollars. That’s my final offer.”

  She gulped. “They…they’re not for sale.”

  “Ah. Priceless, then.” His eyes glittered with respect. “I understand. Somethings in life, money just can’t buy.” He tilted his head. “It’s a shame, though. They’d look spectacular on the landing of my staircase.”

  She didn’t know what to say.

  No one had acknowledged her skill in art for the past decade. Sure, she’d dabbled here and there. She still had her best friend from college art class’s painting above her mantel. He’d been the visionary. He’d chosen art as his entire life. She had never been that invested, like him.

  When Todd moved in for a month, while in between places, he hadn’t been impressed with the illustration. She’d enjoyed painting and illustration as a hobby, a side thing to enrich her life beyond her tedious desk job. But Todd knew art, his family had donated millions of dollars to artists and museums. He’d know, of anyone, if her hobby was meant to be that—just a hobby. He’d affirmed it was.

  Last month, determined to start her own business, she’d put away her easel and paints and illustration kit. Todd had been right, she needed to devote herself to starting a business. She appreciated his insistence, his support of her as an entrepreneur. Mom would be proud.

  Liam’s sudden interest in her artwork ran against The Plan.

  So what. He’d shown interest?

  Interest in one print, done years ago, didn’t equal a solid paying job, or starting her own business in her chosen profession.

  “Are you ready to go?” she asked.

  Liam stepped away from the paintings with something like sadness, bordering on disappointment. “I’m ready. You?”

  “I’m as ready as I’ll ever be.”

  As they approached the door, she thought of Todd. “Wait.”

  She reached into a kitchen drawer, took out a notepad, and scribbled a brief script, describing what she was doing, and where she was heading. How she hoped he’d get her written message, if not her digital ones, and asking for one phone call. To touch base. To be there for her.

  As she wrote the hopeful letter, her heart sank.

  “What are you writing?”

  “A note.”

  Liam nodded. “Slide it under your neighbor’s door, so they know you’ll be gone for twenty-four hours?”

  “What?” She glanced at him. “No. It’s for my boyfriend, Todd.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Shock slammed into Liam’s chest.

  He rocked back on the heels of his cowboy boots, like he’d been hit with a physical blow.

  Bullshit.

  There was no boyfriend. He’d seen the proof.

  If he existed, the guy wasn’t the stick-around type. Even Jules had left small things scattered around Liam’s place. They’d only lived together four months.

  Before he exploded in disbelief, he gaged Sophia’s expression. He saw she still held a trace of hope for the idiot.

  Fucking fool.

  A coward, too, since he obviously hadn’t let Sophia in on the fact that he wasn’t coming back.

  Liam couldn’t meet her eyes. “Come on, let’s go.”

  As he guided her back to the car, he held her arm tightly. The landscapers were long g
one. Didn’t matter.

  Something far more sinister had a grip on her.

  Liam wanted to break it. More than anything he wanted to do in his life.

  He tossed her luggage into the back.

  Waiting until she buckled her seat belt, he drove with tires squealing toward the private jet awaiting them in the hangar. Every minute the plane and pilot waited cost a small fortune, even if his family had bought the jet outright for use in these kinds of emergencies.

  Screw it, he’d toss the rental car, the pilot’s cost, and gas on Atlas’s tab, too. But that wasn’t the real source of his anger.

  Once they arrived on the tarmac, he arranged for an attendant to take the rental back to the dealer.

  Looking alarmed, Sophia glanced between him and the private jet. “This is taking us to Denver?”

  “Yep.” The word came out terse. “Climb the steps and buckle up. We’ll be there in an hour.”

  Stunned, she paused. She peered at him—curious would be an understatement—before she followed his directions.

  Okay, she had given signs the was a guy, Liam admitted to himself. He’d ignored them, for a purely selfish purpose. He didn’t want to think about her with some other dude. Didn’t want her to be with anyone else. So that when this was over, her innocence proven, he could ask her out.

  No chance of that now.

  Knowing the good, honest, decent person she was, he figured she’d consider herself attached and stay faithful. That sucked, too.

  Frustrated beyond the scope of reason, he thrust her luggage—and the mysterious laptop of the theft’s origin—into an onboard compartment. He shoved the latch hard.

  Feeling a heaviness in his chest, he dropped into the seat across from the one she’d taken, and cracked open a mini bottle of whiskey. He poured it over ice he’d scooped from a silver bucket into a cut-crystal glass.

  Within minutes, the jet hit the runway. The wheels lifted. The moment they went airborne jerked him in his seat. Jerked him back into reality.

  That guy she wanted to count on was never coming back. But she didn’t know it.

  Because someone else had wrecked his selfish plans didn’t mean he should be a jerk to her. The truth would reveal itself soon enough.

  When it did, Liam would be there to help her pick up the pieces.

  He could—and should—take the high road. Not necessarily his first inclination, but she was different. She meant…

  Hell, he wasn’t sure what she meant to him. But he wouldn’t leave her stranded, alone, like her asshole boyfriend.

  “Liam.” Her voice echoed in the enclosed space. “You’re not an interrogator, are you?”

  When he turned his face to her, he found her attention pinned on him. He wanted to keep it there. “What makes you say that?”

  She spread her hands to encompass the confines of the plane. “You have a private jet. It waits for you.”

  “That’s not normal?” He hid a quick smile behind his glass as he took a long sip.

  “Uh, no.”

  Her thorough inspection of him sent ripples of awareness radiating through him. He could get lost in her exotic eyes. He wanted to, but that wasn’t an option. He gripped his glass tightly. “Interrogation is part of what I do.”

  “What is the rest? Please. Tell me who you are.”

  Setting her elbow on the ivory leather of her armrest, she placed her chin in her palm. He soaked up the intrigue she wrapped around him. As if he were some mysterious puzzle she intended to solve.

  No one had ever looked at him like that.

  He wanted to be the center of her world. Even just for an hour.

  To do that, he needed to maintain his air of mystery. “A person can’t be summed up in a sentence. Or defined by his occupation.”

  “True.” She smiled. Her eyes glowed like twin flames in the low lighting. “I get that. You’re different.”

  “I’m glad you think so.”

  “There’s much more to who you are, though.”

  He glanced at her slyly. “Why do you think that?”

  “Fascinating.” She blinked, like she hadn’t meant to say the word aloud. “I mean.” She dropped her arm and cleared her throat. “You have many facets. For instance, you were hired by Mr. Atlas for a job, to interrogate me, to decide if I’m innocent or guilty. You must work outside of law enforcement, but you’re familiar with the process of investigation.”

  “I am,” he replied, deliberately vague.

  “You also have access to a private jet and dress in expensive, tailored suits, while wearing beat-up old cowboy boots.”

  He nodded. “Why does it matter…to you?”

  “It interests me. I can’t figure you out.” She slid her palms along her thighs. Again, he fought the urge to stare at her stunning legs, which she crossed right then, as if to torment him. “What’s your ‘official’ job title?”

  “CEO of a bodyguard company,” he stated.

  For a second her mouth gaped, before she closed it. “You—you own your own security company?”

  “Along with my brother and two cousins. Soren Security Bodyguards. We’ve gained international traction, with a personal security device we created.”

  Impressive was the first word to cross Sophia’s mind. No wonder he possessed all the trappings of a man with high status. Perhaps not exactly on par with Alex Atlas’s vast fortune, but still, impressive. He had to run a multi-million-dollar venture—or even a billion-dollar one. Then there were those boots. “You didn’t start out at the top.”

  A sound of amusement resonated from his chest. His low, sexy laugh pooled at the base of her spine. She gripped the armrests.

  “No, I started from the very bottom. I grew up in a trailer park just outside the city center of Las Vegas. It’s long since been raised to the ground, to make room for some swanky pre-planned suburb.” His mouth twisted. “Good riddance.”

  The cowboy boots. They offered a link to his past, like she’d suspected. A constant reminder of where he came from. She respected that. Tremendously.

  “How?” She wanted to know everything. “How does a kid from a trailer park become the CEO of an international security company?”

  The corners of his mouth slid upward, revealing a trace of irony. “I ask myself that on a daily basis.”

  Captivated, she hung on every word.

  He stared at the ice in his glass. “Luck. Timing. Who you know. Busting your ass. The usual things, I guess, that launch a white trash nobody to the top of the corporate heap.”

  She tilted her head. He could’ve said the top of the corporate ladder, but he used the word heap. That said a lot about how he viewed his impressive station in life. Not what she expected from a newly minted millionaire—or billionaire—because he didn’t appear to buy into the hype. He almost seemed disillusioned by it.

  That prompted her to blurt out, “Would you go back, to how it was before your family made its fortune?”

  He sent her an arrested stare. He was silent for a full minute. “No, I wouldn’t,” he finally said. “That was a special kind of hell I never want to relive.”

  “Then, you’re happy where you are?”

  “Mostly.” He rolled his broad shoulders. “It ain’t perfect, believe me. But it’s a leagues better than where we came from, so that’s where I put my focus.”

  Warmth spread through her chest. Liam proved unexpected and refreshing. She really, really liked him. Was admire too strong a word for someone she barely knew?

  Another question arose. Her forehead crinkled. “I don’t understand. Why did Alex Atlas hire you?”

  That drew a wide smile from him. The sight dazzled her, all chiseled lips and straight white teeth and charisma.

  For a second she couldn’t breathe. The backs of her knees and insides of her elbows tingled.

  The man was beyond gorgeous.

  If she wasn’t dating Todd…

  Don’t go there, she scolded herself.

  Besides, what
would a man like Liam see in her, anyway?

  “One of the men who works for our company is Isaac Atlas, our Director of Sales. He was a big part of taking us international. Great guy.” Liam nodded.

  The four dimmed sconces along the walls of the jet reflected the sheen in his suit. She wanted to touch his sleeve, to see if it felt as luxurious as it looked. And then touch his hand, to see if it felt as warm as she suspected.

  “Isaac told his cousin, your boss, Alex, about my…abilities.”

  That was a loaded response. Or maybe she’d just thought of a ton of loaded questions to go along with it. She needed to pull her mind out of the gutter and remember she had a boyfriend. “Your abilities?”

  The irony returned to his smile. “Apparently, I’m known around the company as our resident ‘mentalist.’”

  She blinked. “What is that?”

  Casually he waved his hand, like batting a moth away from a potentially dangerous flame. “Someone who can read people.”

  “You read people? I don’t get it.”

  “It’s not something you get. You either have it, or you don’t.”

  Enthralled, she perched her chin in her palm again. “Explain.”

  Starting at the crown of her head, he swept a thorough gaze to the point of her high-heeled shoes, looking her over. An unassuming appraisal, versus blatantly “checking her out.” Still, the top of her head and the tips of her toes tingled.

  “I know things about people, the moment I meet them. Intrinsically.”

  Unable to resist, she asked, “Do you know I’m innocent?”

  His gaze held hers, nearly hypnotizing in its intensity. He blinked slowly.

  She gave an almost imperceptible nod, recognizing he was technically still employed by her boss. Regardless, his response comforted her. Immeasurably. Proof he was on her side. She needed a little reassurance right now.

  “How do you…know?”

  He swiveled his chair toward hers—wait, these chairs moved? How cool was that?

  Amused by the quirk, since this was the first and likely last time she’d travel in a private jet, she rocked back and forth and then swiveled toward him, as well.