Sinfully Rich: A Steamy Billionaire Box Set

by Vivian Wood

  Shaking my head, I am at a loss. “I’m sorry, but no one told me.”

  “It’s your responsibility to reach out to her. And now it’s a bit of a moot point anyway, because this was the last straw.” His lips curve up into a smile. “You’re fired, Cate De Rose.”

  I don’t believe it. “But… but I’ve never even had a negative review! On the customer comment cards, they all love me! And the other managers love working with me…”

  Javier shrugs. “Too bad. There a million eager young baristas waiting to fill your shoes.” He clears his throat. “I’ll need you to return your work shirt and keys before I can release your last paycheck.”

  I scowl, still a little taken aback. “For the record, you are the worst manager I’ve ever had. Like ever. And before this I worked at McDonald’s.”

  He rolls his eyes. “Yeah, all the employees I’ve fired say that. Listen, I’m gonna need your shirt and keys this week—”

  I press the end button and his face vanishes. What a jerk! I mean, who fires someone over the phone in the first place? My eyes well up, although I know that Javier really did me a favor. It’s just hard to look at it any way but as a personal slight at the moment.

  I take a few deep breaths, trying to remind myself that I kind of hated the job anyway. I just relied on it for a steady income, but other jobs can offer that.

  Grinding my teeth and wiping my eyes, I toss my phone at my bed. A second later, Carmine pops his head in the room, looking like nothing so much as a grape that has withered with age. When he speaks, his voice is hoarser than it usually is. It sounds like someone grating a particularly hard cheese.

  “Eh, Cate. You got a friend looking for you downstairs.” His accent is Italian, so thick you could spread it on toast.

  My eyebrows fly up. “Yeah?”

  “Eh.” Carmine turns and hobbles back down the hallway, his cane clicking faintly on the hardwood floors.

  I take a deep breath, willing myself to calm down. It’s probably Luna, all excited about the Billie Eilish show. One part of my mind is whirling, trying to think of all I have to do: update my resume, compile a list of coffee shops, and start plastering every single place on that list with a picture of me attached to my resume.

  I head downstairs in the meantime. It’s still early in the day. Plenty of time to head to the library and use their computer and printer.

  Gosh, it really grinds my gears that Javier was so rude. I trudge down the stairs, angry at the whole world just now.

  7

  Cate

  Clenching my jaw, I hit the bottom floor and round the corner, expecting to see Luna waiting there.

  I pull up short, startled. Luca is there, looking every bit the part of the bad boy in his dark jeans and leather motorcycle jacket. He glances up, catching my eye. His gaze automatically narrows, but his expression is blank.

  “Hey, Cate,” he says. For just a second, the throatiness of his voice makes my heart speed up. His expression turns hesitant, which I don’t think I have ever witnessed before.

  “Hi?” I ask, folding my arms across my chest. “I didn’t even know you knew where I lived.” My brows draw down. “Did you bring a form for me to sign or something?”

  Luca glances behind me, pulling a face at the sound of the vacuum firing up in the next room. “Want to take a walk?”

  Now I’m growing suspicious. “Uhhhh….” I glance behind me, biting my lip. Grandma’s friend Cynthia pokes her head in, looking gently surprised. I turn back to Luca with a shrug. “Sure, okay.”

  Slipping on a pair of Grandma’s clogs and one of her heavy woolen coats, I follow him out of the house. It’s cold out here, Seattle in the winter cold. So I can see my breath and there is a thin layer of snow on the ground.

  It’s definitely no Las Vegas, that’s for sure.

  I can feel Luca’s gaze on me, judgmental as ever. In the cold light of midmorning, he seems cool and impenetrable, as if nothing in the world bothers him. I take in his oversized features and his dark, brooding look. The thought of being on the wrong end of one of his glares sits heavy in the pit of my stomach.

  Shivering, I shake my head at myself. So he’s handsome. So he’s moody. So he’s attractive. That’s no reason to get bent out of shape, is it?

  I wrinkle my nose. “So?”

  He glances away for a moment, seeming to steel himself. “I need a favor,” he admits.

  Tilting my head to the side, I frown. “From me?”

  “Yes.” He folds his arms across his chest. “It’s to do with the annulment.”

  Shoving my hands deep into the pockets of my coat, I try to imagine just what he’s getting at. Another chill slides down my spine. “Well, anytime you want to get around to naming it, that would be great.”

  He shoots me an annoyed glance. “Alright. I need you to agree not to annul for a little while. I need a month before we can start the paperwork.”

  I pull a face. “Okay… that’s not really a favor, though. That’s just being patient.”

  He closes his eyes briefly. “Well… that’s not all. I also need you to attend a wedding with me.” He clears his throat, his dark eyes flashing with intensity. “My ex’s wedding.”

  Now I am officially surprised. “The one who dumped you recently?”

  His cheeks color but he just grows more gruff. “Yeah. Madisyn. She’s getting married in a month and a half and I…” He pauses. His throat works as he swallows. “I told her that I was married. Which is true…”

  That gives me pause. On one hand, my heart immediately goes out to Luca. He’s admitting to being upset by Madisyn’s treatment of him, which I think was poor. But on the other hand, he’s proposing lying to her.

  To what end exactly, I can’t say.

  “I mean… technically we are married,” I say, looking at him skeptically. “I’m guessing you didn’t fill her in on the fact that you got drunk and wed someone you don’t even like, huh?”

  Luca looks at me as if I was actually torturing him. “No, I didn’t. But you have to know that I wouldn’t ask you if there was any other way.” He hesitates. “I could make it worth your while, though. I could give you a job at my bar. And… I don’t know… a cash bonus when you finally sign the annulment paperwork, maybe?”

  My eyebrows go up. “A bonus?”

  He rolls his eyes at my response. “Yeah. If that’s what needs to happen, sure.”

  I bite my lower lip, thinking for a second. “Let me just be sure that I’ve got this right. You’re offering me a job and a cash bonus for just… not pursuing the annulment for a month?”

  His head bobs. “You would probably be legally bound up for two months total. But yeah, that’s about the breadth of it. I’d be willing to pay you five thousand dollars.”

  Puffing out my cheeks, I exhale slowly. That’s a lot of money to me. And I can’t think of any downsides offhand, honestly. I’ve already made the mistake of marrying Luca. I might as well get something out of it in the meantime.

  “Two months. Five grand. Sounds like a good deal.” Thrusting out my hand, I give him an uncertain look.

  His lips curl up at the corners as he takes my hand. He steps closer, his expression intense, making me feel small next to him. His palm feels warm and a little rough where it presses against mine. “All right. We’re agreed, then.”

  He grips my hand for a second too long, looking down into my eyes. And me being me, I blush. Then he releases my hand, turning and pacing away from me. I stand still, unsure how to proceed.

  Luca is on the ball, though. “Do you need to make arrangements with your current job?”

  My cheeks turn pink and I look down. “Nope.”

  A hint of a smirk appears on his face. “Right. Well… can you come into the bar tomorrow, then?”

  I nod, drowning in my embarrassment. “Yep.”

  “Great.” He looks like he means the opposite. “See you then, Cate.”

  He turns and heads to a sleek black motorcycle parked
in front of the next yard. I roll my eyes; of course that would be his bike. The fact that Luca drives a two-wheeled death trap should surprise exactly no one.

  As I watch, he mounts it, puts on his helmet, and revs the engine. I’ll admit it to myself: right this second he is tall, dark, and oh so very handsome. Enough to make some girls swoon, I should think.

  Then he pulls off, quickly disappearing. I stare after him for half a minute, then shake my head.

  Staying married to Luca won’t be that bad.

  It will only be two months at the most.

  And at the end, I’ll get a little more cash to bundle into my nest egg. I’ll be that much closer to buying my house.

  I would consider that a win-win.

  Shivering against the cold, I turn and head back inside.

  8

  Luca

  At one forty five the next day, I glance at my watch. For some reason I’ve been keyed up all morning. Drumming my fingers, tapping my foot, staring at the front door of The Attic.

  I guess I’m searching for a sign of whether hiring Cate was a terrible idea or not.

  Will she flout the rules? Will she drop every bottle of liquor handed to her?

  Will her big brown eyes and elfin features distract me from my work?

  More importantly, will she even show up in the first place?

  “Hey!” Bradford says, snapping his fingers. “Earth to Luca. We’re having an ownership meeting here, buddy.”

  “Sorry,” I mumble. “I’m just distracted,”

  I look at Bradford and Owen, both of them sitting with their papers spread out on the little table before us. Owen looks up from his calendar notebook, his brow creasing.

  “I was asking whether the twelfth of February will be too early for a staff appreciation party,” he sighs. “I want to close the whole place down and have the bar open late the next day.”

  “Uhhh…” I look down at my calendar, which is basically covered with post its and scrawled notes. Checking beneath several piles of post its, I shrug. “I don’t think I have anything booked for that day…”

  Bradford narrows his eyes and looks down his nose at me. “I don’t trust you, Luca. Your management style as a whole is wonderful, but you are absolutely the worst when it comes to keeping a calendar.”

  Owen nods in agreement. “He’s right. I don’t want to announce a staff appreciation day and then cancel it at the last minute because you realize that you’ve double booked us. Again.”

  Rolling my eyes, I stretch. “That was one time, guys.”

  Bradford is ready. “No, it was two times. I think you secretly have it in for the staff.”

  He crosses his arms and gives me a dirty look. I wave him off. “Send me the date in an email. I’ll block the day off, okay?”

  “And the next day,” Owen reminds me.

  “Yes, mother.” I glance around, my gaze ending up on the empty doorway once more. I grind my teeth; I have a dozen things to worry about that are more important than when precisely Cate walks through that door. “Are we by any chance done here?”

  Owen rolls his eyes, closing his notebook. Bradford just frowns. “Yeah, all right.”

  “Hello?” I turn around to find Cate waiting at the bar, biting her lip. She spots the three of us and looks a little relieved. “Oh, there you are.”

  “Where did you come from?” I ask, irritated with her already. Cate comes around the bar, dressed in an ankle-length gray skirt and a long sleeve gray cotton top. “Jesus, what did you do, rob a nunnery?”

  She immediately turns bright red, tucking her wavy dark hair behind her ear. “You didn’t specify that I needed to dress any particular way. And I came from the employees’ entrance out back.”

  I stand up, shaking my head. This was a bad idea, I can already tell. Cate nods to Owen and Bradford. “Hey guys.”

  “Hey, honey…” Bradford says to her, arching a brow at me.

  Oh. Yeah, it would probably have been a good idea to tell my business partners that I brought someone new onto our staff. By the angry look I’m receiving from Owen, I can see that I should’ve brought Cate up before right now.

  “Cate’s going to be working here,” I say, pretending that her hiring is totally normal.

  Yeah, it’s absolutely the norm to hire someone I got drunk with and married to the weekend before. No, I’m not going to regret this at all.

  There is a look shared between Owen, Bradford, and I that says we will definitely get into this later. For her part, Cate looks like she’s drowning over by the bar. I sigh.

  “Come on,” I say to her, stalking back behind the bar. “Let’s get you in the computer system, I guess.”

  Heading back to my mess of an office, I try to figure out where the fuck I’m going to stash Cate. Casting an eye over her choice of wardrobe, I shake my head a little bit. She can’t dress like that, first of all. I should’ve thought of her clothes yesterday, but I was too busy plotting against Madisyn.

  So for today, I can’t have her waiting tables or anything. Which kind of sucks, because I was just going to dump the responsibility for training her in Bradford’s lap. He likes new people. At least he would get along with her, probably.

  “Sit down,” I rumble, pointing to a chair that is almost entirely covered with a big pile of white buffet bunting from something we did at Easter this year. “Just move that to the ground.”

  Cate eyes the pile with some suspicion, but eventually moves it to the ground by tilting the chair. The bunting slides off into a graceless pile. She gives me a cool smile as she sits down.

  Rooting around in one of my desk drawers, I produce a new employee packet. Flinging it across my desk, I favor her with a dry smile. “Bring this back tomorrow filled out. And make sure you bring your identification, too.”

  She leafs though it with a frown. I unearth an iPad from under some stacks of paper on my desk and start keying her basics in to the system.

  “What am I going to be doing here, exactly?”

  Looking at her frankly, I shrug. “I don’t know. We don’t exactly have any positions for baristas. I figure that we’ll find you something that fits for the next few months. The absolute worst case is that I pay you for nothing and you just stay at home. You would have to be pretty bad at everything for that to happen, though.”

  She shoots me a glare. “I plan on pulling my own weight thank you very much. I don’t want your charity.”

  That earns a raised eyebrow from me. “I thought you only agreed to do this for the money.”

  The apples of her cheeks flush. “I want to be useful.”

  She ducks her head. I stare at her for half a minute. “Is this a Christian thing or something?”

  Cate gives me a dirty look. “No.”

  I shift in my chair. “Because this is a bar, princess. We are not interested in judging our patrons. Or musical acts. We book whoever we want, whenever we want. And we don’t dress…” I wave my hand over her. “…like this when we do it, either.”

  Her look shifts to a glare. “I said it wasn’t a Catholic thing, okay? Everyone likes to be useful and productive.”

  I raise my brows. “I think you’re giving people way more credit than they are due for.”

  She just rolls her eyes. Shaking my head, I finish plugging her into the computer system. Then when I’m done, I frog march her out to the bar. “Come on. Let’s see if you are a decent bar back.”

  “Bradford!” I call out. He turns around, his pen poised over his inventory list.

  “What?” he asks, eyeing both of us skeptically.

  “Try Cate out as a bar back tonight. She can prep fruit, stack beer cans, wash glasses, clean the bar…” I stop, giving him a desperate look. “Please take her.”

  Bradford gives me a look, holding his arm out to Cate. “Come on, darling. Let’s get you set up juicing oranges and lemons. Citrus fruit is the best way to start any shift.”

  Cate looks at me, her brown eyes wide. She goes along with
Bradford, who keeps making stern eye contact with me until I turn and leave.

  Heading back into my office, I start sifting through a whole pile of artist-venue contracts. I put the ones that need contacting to the side and then start to plug all the finished ones into a spreadsheet on the iPad. It’s boring as fuck, but it’ll make Owen happy. As the money manager of our threesome, he is always moaning that none of us put anything in Excel.

  And if I’m not paying enough attention, I know it’s something I can’t screw up too badly. I keep my eye on the door at first, relaxing after a few minutes. Still, I feel like I’ve barely started when Bradford and Cate are in my office again.

  Cate is nursing her right hand and looking paler than usual. Bradford looks like he wants to sigh about people testing his patience but thankfully doesn’t.

  “We just got Miss Cate here all bandaged up, didn’t we? You’re gonna need to find somewhere else to work today, hon,” he says, pursing his lips. “Cate just gored her own hand when I was trying to teach her how to zest a lime.”

  “I’m sorry,” Cate tells Bradford. “I know I already said it, but I’m so sorry bled on your pants.”

  “It’s okay, honey.” Bradford pats her on the back. “I’ll tell people I was tussling with a wild bear. No one will know the difference.”

  “Fuck. Are you okay?” I ask.

  “Yes,” Cate mumbles. “Just clumsy, I guess.”

  “Hm.” I scrub my hand through my short hair.

  Bradford shoots me a questioning look as he leaves. I’m going to have so many questions to answer when Cate isn’t around. Pushing myself to my feet, I consider what to do with her next.

  “Ummm… I need the stock room organized… or I guess there is the filing room…”

  She perks up a little. “Filing? I can file in my sleep.”

  Blowing out a breath, I shrug. “Yeah, all right. Come on. Just… prepare yourself. It’s a little bit of a zoo.”

  I walk right next door, opening the door and flipping on the light. The filing room, more of a closet really, is an absolute disaster. So is the stock room. So is my office.