Not Another Billionaire (Not Another Romance)

by R. L. Kenderson

  But even the promise of reading sexy scenes couldn’t stop sleep from trying to take over. I set my open book down on my chest and told myself, Just ten minutes.

  I didn’t know how long I had actually been out because I woke up to Seth pushing my door open. He scratched his head, and his eyes were barely open.

  “There you are,” he said with a smile and flung something on my lap before getting into bed with me. He stuck out his chin in a fake pout. “Why’d you leave me?”

  I laughed, having never seen this side of him before. He was adorably cute, which only made him sexier to me.

  But I couldn’t tell him I’d panicked this morning, so I lifted my book for him to see. “I couldn’t sleep, so I came in here to read.”

  He snatched the book out of my hand and tossed it over his shoulder. “You don’t need that anymore. I’m here now.”

  I was already getting wet for him, but I needed to make something clear first. “Listen, that is not how we treat books. If there is so much as a corner bent, I’m coming after you.”

  Seth looked at me with heat in his eyes and picked up the item he’d thrown on my lap. “Why don’t you put this on me? That way, I can make it up to you.”

  I slid my hand under the covers and wrapped it around his cock. He was already hard, and I loved it.

  “You think giving me some D is going to make up for my book?” I teased.

  He cocked an eyebrow. “How about a lot of D? Because after last night, I want to give you so much more.”

  I stroked him but also looked away, as if to consider his offer.

  But before I could form a good response, he said, “How about a lot of D and ten new books?”

  I chuckled, looking back at him. “Wow, you must really want the P.”

  “If it’s your P, the answer is always yes.”

  I knew it was all pillow talk, and we’d only slept with each other one night, but his words made me feel special and sexy.

  I snatched the condom from him. “You’ve got yourself a deal.”

  I awoke sometime later to my phone beeping multiple times. I was alone, and the sun was shining through my windows.

  I picked up my cell to see that Alexis had messaged me back.

  Alexis: Oh my fucking God.

  Alexis: Was it good? Please tell me it was good.

  Alexis: And let me know when you’re alone, so I know it’s safe to call.

  Rather than text her back, I just called her.

  “Tessa Archer, you naughty, naughty minx.”

  I laughed. “Guilty.”

  “So, was it good?”

  “What do you think?”

  “I think it rocked your world.”

  I laughed at the old phrase we used to say in high school. “Yes. Yes, it was.”

  “Where is he now?”

  “I don’t know. Probably getting ready for the day or something like that.”

  “I want to hear all the details.”

  “Hold on.” I got out of bed, opened my door, and peeked around it to see if Seth was out there. I didn’t hear anything, so I figured I’d guessed right about him being in his room. “Okay, here’s what happened…”

  When I was done with my story, Alexis said, “Wow. That’s so hot. I need to get some dick. I have only had sex with one guy since my divorce, and it was barely worth the time it had taken to put on the condom.”

  “I’m sorry, babe. Maybe we should go out when I get back. Find you a man…for a night,” I quickly added.

  “Sigh. That means I have to wait until you get back,” Alexis said, and I laughed. “Until then, I’m going to live vicariously through you.”

  “I’ll keep you updated. We do have three more nights here.”

  Alexis clicked her tongue. “I knew I should have sent lemon frosting with you.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Seth

  I closed my computer. “Let’s go somewhere for lunch.”

  Tessa looked up from her own computer. “Okay. Where are you thinking?”

  Anywhere that’s not this hotel room.

  I was finding it hard to resist her and not take her to bed again. She was hotter than I had imagined she would be. So responsive. It made me hard, just thinking about it.

  But Paragon had called that morning, and we had set up a dinner meeting. It was more of a meet and greet, but I wanted to be as prepared as possible in case they suddenly said something like, Let’s go back to the office, and you can show us your proposal. As much as I wanted to pull Tessa into my bedroom, I knew we had to wait.

  “I’m not sure. Let’s go out and take another walk. We passed a lot of restaurants last night. Maybe they’ll be less crowded today.”

  Tessa shut the lid on her laptop. “Sounds good to me.”

  We didn’t have to go far when we found a cute little bistro.

  Once we ordered our food, I asked a question that had been on my mind, “How did you end up taking this assistant job?”

  Tessa sucked on the straw in her drink. “What do you mean?”

  “You and your friend have this business plan, but here you are, working for me.”

  She sighed. “It’s kind of a long story.”

  I gestured to our table. “We have time.”

  She smiled. “It seems we do.”

  “I’m all ears.”

  “Alexis used to be married, and her husband was an asshole. He bullied her into quitting her job because he wanted her to be a stay-at-home wife and mother. Those are my words, not hers. At the time, she claimed she was perfectly happy to stay home, but I think part of that was because she thought they’d have kids right away. For the record, they were married four years and didn’t have any children.”

  “Ah.” I could already see where this would cause a problem.

  “Her ex refused to get tested for anything and blamed not getting pregnant on Alexis even though her doctor said they couldn’t find anything medically that would prevent her from having children. Except maybe stress, but who knows for sure when her ex wouldn’t get checked? Anyway, to pass the time, Alexis started baking. She’d always been good at it, but she began coming up with her own recipes, and they were really delicious.”

  “I can confirm that. I still have dreams about that lemon cupcake.”

  Tessa gave me a you’re not funny look. “I guess I can’t blame you for loving the cupcake that was supposed to be for me.

  “Anyway, after Alexis’s divorce, she went back to work. Actually, she went back to work after they separated, but that’s not important. The thing was, with a full-time job, she realized how much she missed baking. Of course, I—and the rest of our friends—missed getting to eat her desserts.” Tessa smiled. “One day, I said she should open her own bakery. I was half-joking. You know, one of those things. And she said, ‘Let’s do it.’ I never went to college, and I had a good job, but I didn’t love it, so I figured, why the hell not?”

  I smiled. I loved hearing her tell this story.

  “Fast-forward about a year. Alexis got her divorce. We hadn’t wanted to do anything with our idea until that was finalized.”

  I nodded. “Smart.”

  “We started planning. We found a strip mall being built. We both knew it would be a perfect location, so we kicked our plans into high gear. I put in my six-month notice at my job. They had been good to me, so I wanted to make sure I could train the person who came after me. Plus, I knew I had time with the mall still being under construction.”

  As a boss, I appreciated how good Tessa had been to her previous employer.

  “The strip mall is almost completed now, and Alexis and I were planning to put a down payment on the location, but we ran into a money issue. Alexis’s ex-husband comes from some money—they’re not as rich as you—and when they were married, he had enough to buy a large house for him and Alexis. Now that they’re divorced, he’s supposed to sell the house and give Alexis half the proceeds, but so far, he has refused to sell it. He claims that sh
e never made any payments, but he already agreed to it when they got divorced. Also, she would have contributed money if he hadn’t forced her to quit her job.”

  “What a dick.”

  She snorted. “Tell me about it.”

  “So, this money was intended to go toward the building?” I asked.

  “Yes. And since we don’t have all the funds yet to get the mortgage and I already left my job, I went to a temp agency.” She held out her hands. “And now, here I am.”

  “That sucks.”

  “It does, but I have hope. I know you started out with a business partner. How did you two get your business off the ground?”

  I cleared my throat. I didn’t like talking about John, but she wasn’t really asking about him specifically. “We worked for another agency, and our boss was a real prick. When we started our company, some of the clientele followed us. And we were able to work from home for a while.”

  “Yeah, working from home isn’t really an option with a bakery and café.”

  I chuckled. “Not really.”

  “So, was it hard to start on your own?”

  I shrugged. “Sure, but it’s worth it. Now, show me the location of the strip mall.”

  I felt bad for cutting Tessa off from further discussion about how I’d started my own business, but I didn’t want to talk or think about those days anymore. They were bittersweet, and I couldn’t go back there.

  Thankfully, she didn’t seem to mind. She picked up her phone. “I have pictures.”

  After lunch, we walked back to the hotel a different way and happened to come upon a bakery.

  I stopped and pointed to it. “Look at that.”

  “Let’s go in and look around. Maybe I’ll get some ideas.”

  “Also, a little dessert never hurt anyone. Maybe they’ll have lemon cupcakes.”

  Tessa smiled and shook her head at me before going in.

  We just got in the door when she stopped suddenly and gasped.

  “What?” I asked.

  “It’s a cat café.”

  “Is that a good thing or a bad thing?” I honestly couldn’t tell.

  “It’s a good thing. But I’m super jealous.”

  “You haven’t opened your business yet. You can still decide to do a cat café.”

  Her mouth dropped open just as an employee came over to greet us.

  “Hello. Is there anything I can help you with?”

  “We came in for dessert, and someone has cat-café envy.”

  The woman smiled. “Do you like cats?”

  “Love them. I have two.”

  “You do?” I asked.

  “I do.”

  “What are their names?” the woman asked.

  “Persephone and Hades.”

  “I like it,” the woman said. She held out her hand. “Why don’t you have a look around? Please, let me know if you need anything.”

  “Will do,” I told her.

  The woman walked away.

  “Let’s go check out the desserts.”

  “Okay.” Tessa chewed on her lip as we made our way over to the bakery case. “Do you really think I could do a cat café?”

  “I don’t see why not. You should okay it with Alexis first though. And you’d probably have to check with zoning laws, but I’m sure you could figure it out.”

  I could practically see the wheels turning in her head, and I grinned.

  We stopped at the counter, and I took a look at the bakery case while Tessa was perusing the shelf next to it that displayed items for sale.

  She pulled something off. “Oh my God, I have to get this.”

  She turned and showed it to me. It was a mug that said My Bookshelf Is My Boyfriend.

  “Cute,” I said.

  “It’s more than cute. It’s funny. Not only do I like to read, but this also reminds me of my friends.”

  “How so?”

  She smiled to herself. “Oh, just a little club we have.”

  “A club?” I asked.

  But she didn’t seem to get that I was fishing for more information because she said, “Yep,” and then she pointed to the bakery case. “Look, lemon cupcakes.”

  “How many should we get?” I asked.

  “That depends on how many you want to eat. But I wouldn’t mind getting a dozen,” she said.

  “A dozen should last us until we go home.”

  “I wonder if we can buy some extra frosting on the side.”

  “Huh?”

  Tessa laughed. “Never mind. It’s kind of a joke.”

  I furrowed my brow. “I need to hear this joke about frosting. Is it dirty?”

  “Seriously, it’s nothing,” Tessa said as she turned to pay.

  “Come on. I have a good sense of humor.”

  “Nope. It’s an inside joke. You wouldn’t understand,” Tessa insisted.

  “Maybe you can explain it to me later.” I could only hope.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Seth

  Tessa and I had worked the rest of the afternoon and were now on the way to the restaurant to meet with Paragon.

  “Are you nervous?” she asked.

  “Some.”

  “Just some?”

  “I’ve been doing this awhile now. When I first started, I would break out in a sweat every time we met with a new client, but I’ve gotten somewhat used to it.”

  “But even though this is a huge company that could bring in thousands of dollars, you’re not nervous?”

  I grinned at her. “That’s where the some comes in.”

  “I wish I had your nerves of steel.”

  Our Uber pulled up to the restaurant, and Tessa and I got out.

  “What’s the plan again if they spring a meeting on us at the last minute?” I asked.

  “You’re going to go with them to their office while I run back to the hotel and grab your laptop and the presentation, and I’ll meet you there,” Tessa answered.

  Earlier, I’d had a Zoom meeting with the rest of our creative crew back in the office, working on the Paragon proposal, and we’d finalized the ad we wanted to present to them. Our design team had finished off the rest of it, and Tessa had gone to pick up a rush order of some big cardboard cutouts we could use to show the CEO how serious we were.

  “I think we’re ready. Let’s head inside.”

  The hostess greeted us.

  “We’re meeting the Ainsworth party,” I said.

  She pulled out two menus. “Right this way, please.”

  When we reached the table, a gentleman stood. Old enough to be my father and then some, he had a full head of hair, but it was completely white, except for a few strands of gray here and there.

  I held out my hand. “Seth Crawford.”

  He took it. “Gene Ainsworth,” he said. “And this is my daughter, Gwyneth.”

  Gwyneth held out her hand, so I shook it. She was fair and blonde and younger than me.

  I had done my research on the Ainsworths, and Gwyneth was the daughter from Gene’s third marriage. He also had two daughters from his first marriage and a son from his second. The other daughters didn’t have much to do with the company, and the son had been in and out of drug rehab since his teens.

  “This is my assistant, Tessa Archer.”

  “Please sit,” Mr. Ainsworth said.

  I sat across from him while Tessa sat across from the daughter.

  “Thank you for coming all this way,” Gwyneth said.

  “It’s our pleasure,” I told her. “San Francisco is a beautiful city, and I can always use an excuse to visit.”

  Gene turned to Tessa and looked her up and down. “What about you, dear?”

  Tessa looked uncomfortable, and to be fair, there was something about the way Gene had addressed her that rubbed me the wrong way.

  “This is my first time here,” she said.

  “Well, welcome to our city.” He smiled. Or at least, it was supposed to be a smile. It came off as more of a leer.

 
; “Thank you,” she said, but she seemed anything but thankful. Her body was stiff, and she almost looked pained.

  I hoped she was okay.

  Tessa

  I didn’t like Gene Ainsworth. He made me think of a dirty old man, and I didn’t trust him. Whenever Seth’s attention was elsewhere, Gene would look at me with creepy lust in his eyes. The worst part was, he might have hidden it from Seth, but he made no qualms about letting his daughter see it, and I could tell it made her uncomfortable.

  Dinner seemed to last forever. Before the night had started, I had been worried the man would want to see Seth’s proposal, and I would have to scramble to get everything from the hotel. But by the end, I was praying he’d ask for it, so I could have an excuse to leave.

  Unfortunately for me, he kept the evening all about dinner and small talk.

  I did get a break when Seth’s phone buzzed on the table between our plates. It was the same number that had called yesterday for Ryan Jackman. Since it was after working hours and Seth had a meeting with Mr. Jackman tomorrow morning, I figured it was important and I should answer it.

  “Excuse me,” I said, picking up the cell and exiting the table for a quieter spot. “Seth Crawford’s phone. How may I help you?” I answered.

  “Hello. I believe you are the person I spoke to yesterday to set a meeting,” the woman on the other line said.

  “Yes, this is his assistant.”

  “I am very sorry, but Mr. Jackman will not be able to make it tomorrow in person. Is there any way that Mr. Crawford can do the meeting over the phone at the same time? He’ll be driving, so he can’t do a Zoom meeting either.”

  I honestly didn’t know how Seth would feel about that, but I assumed that he would rather do a phone meeting than no meeting at all since I wasn’t being offered an alternative time.

  “Yes, a phone meeting will be fine.”

  “This number?”