Nikki’s also a member of Romance Writers of America National chapter (http://www.rwa.org) and OCC/RWA local chapter (http://www.occrwa.org) and is a member of the board as Co-Programs Director. She is also a member of the online chapter Passionate Ink RWA, The Beaumonde RWA, and the Rainbow Romance Writers (RRW).
Website: Http://www.authornikkiprince.com
twitter: @authornprince
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/AuthorNikkiPrince
Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/AuthorNikkiPrince
Pinterest: http://www.pinterest.com/ebondreamz/
Tumblr: http://nikkiprince.tumblr.com/
Bookshelf: http://authornikkiprince.com/bookshelf/
RICH GIRL
By
Kate Baum
DEDICATION
To my support group
Thank you for your friendship and validation.
“There is a gigantic difference between earning a great deal of money and being rich.”
Marlene Dietrich
Chapter One
All of a sudden, my car’s dashboard lit up like a Christmas tree. Every warning light was flashing just as the steering wheel locked. Panic surged through me as I put all my strength into trying to turn the wheel towards the side of the road.
A rush of relief that the steering wheel was actually cooperating, quickly dissipated when my car began to tilt downhill. Dear god, please tell me I’m not going to tip over?
I rammed my foot into the brake while white knuckling the steering wheel. I got a feeling it wasn’t the strength I put on the brake pedal but more the fact that the car had begun to break down. At that point, I didn’t care that my car began to self-combust. I felt relieved the car had actually stopped. Although the car seemed lopsided, I no longer got the sense it was going to turn over. Still, I’d better get out now.
I reached for my purse. The passenger seat felt empty. Did it fall? I leaned over and felt on the floor and then under the seat. Where the fuck is my purse? I sat up quickly as a feeling of dread overtook me. I just remembered when I drove off from the bar, my passenger door wasn’t fully closed. I am such a dumbass!
It was my Marc Jacobs Delray handbag. I knew I shouldn’t have left it in my car when I went into the bar. Actually, I never should’ve taken the handbag with me to work this morning. I just couldn’t help myself. I wore a Pink embroidered Kurta Churidar dress and that handbag matched perfectly! Then, while sitting there in the Cook County courthouse, I became aware of how I stood out so glaringly. I glanced around the courtroom at shabbily dressed melancholy people. Some had anger written all over their faces when I made eye contact. I knew what they were seeing.
I always hated being a child of privilege. I didn’t grow up among the rich. I grew up among the insanely rich. My father is a billionaire. He founded a private investment organization that, at this point, has investments in 200 companies among 15 countries. Although, currently he lives in the Bahamas, I was raised in England. Well, I’m not sure if I can even claim that, as I lived in boarding school after boarding school all over Europe.
My mother died when I turned four. I don’t remember much about her. Consequently, my early life consisted of your classic stereotypical English governesses. Stuffy and strict. My father went through a slew of girlfriends. I have to hand it to him. He never let his dick run his life. No matter how beautiful these trophy wife wannabees were, my father didn’t cave. Oh, he would fuck them all right. There were plenty of times while I was home on school holiday, that I’d be eating breakfast when some tousled tramp would be trying to walk out with her head held up high. I found it all quite entertaining. I knew she opened her legs for nothing in return.
My father expected his only child would one day run his empire. I received a business degree from Cambridge. Groomed from my teenage years, the message became clear that one day, I would head up his investment firm. Every summer since that golden age of eighteen, I interned at his corporate headquarters in London. Not one of his employees even tried to hide my father’s plan. I’d been told point blank that what I learned would benefit me for the day I took over.
I guess to the average young adult, this all could’ve been frightening. I learned early on to mask my emotions. I’m not sure why I come across as cold and hardened. I actually have been called a bleeding heart liberal by my few friends. Yet, in the same breath, I’m teased for being distant and aloof. It all made me feel like a walking conundrum.
I often tried to diagnose why I withdrew from close relationships. I even took those psychology elective courses in college. Did I subconsciously keep myself detached because my mother died when I was so young? I know my father didn’t plan it intentionally, but none of the nannies I grew up with were loving or motherly towards me.
In turn, my father isn’t very affectionate either. I don’t remember ever being kissed or hugged while growing up. Even when I returned home on holiday from boarding school, the physical contact felt limited. When I was in my middle school years, it amounted to a pat on my head. As I grew into a young adult, it progressed to a squeeze on my shoulder or his hand on my cheek.
Ironically, I don’t ever remember being bothered by the fact that he wasn’t demonstrative towards me when I was younger. I guess it’s because I always knew that he loved me. No matter how important that board meeting was or the multi-million dollar closing, he’d drop everything if I needed him. He would call every Sunday night when I was away at boarding school. No matter what country he was in, he’d fly in the first of the month, like clockwork to take me out to dinner.
When I turned twenty one, he threw an enormous birthday party for me. I’m unsure why, as I didn’t have many friends. Basically, the party consisted of the social circle of billionaires, their families, and contacts who I despised. Still, I appreciated the sentiment.
It was at my party when my father’s most trusted long time secretary took me aside. I always admired Miss Bell. She’d been in my father’s employ for over forty years. A spinster by choice, although I have this inkling she hadn’t married because of her gender preferences. No one could serve my father like Miss Bell. She showed no weakness, amidst the billionaire bullies my father rubbed shoulders with. I think a part of me tried to live up to her fearlessness.
At my twenty first birthday party, Miss Bell had more than a few cocktails in her. I’d never seen her tipsy and enjoyed the refreshing inhibitions that came forth. From what I could understand through her slurring, came to be my father’s confession to her that I’d become the only good thing in his life. He’d told her he could be a billionaire fifty times over and it never would replace his pride in how I turned out. He would do anything for me, Miss Bell gushed and, believe me, I’ve never known Miss Bell to gush about anything.
I guess that’s why it came as no surprise that my father didn’t fight me on my declaration to go to law school in the United States. After I graduated, I knew the plan was for me to start working under him. At twenty-one years of age, the last thing I wanted to do was to spend my days entrenched in a culture I’d come to despise.
You see I hated the people he associated with. Fake, Spoiled. Arrogant, with no concept of the real world. All through college, I volunteered at soup kitchens, coat drives, dental clinics. I saw the plight of the poor first hand…and it broke my heart.
The idea that I would now be surrounding myself every day with the overindulged that ran wasteful lifestyles made me sick to my stomach. How could I tell my father this without offending him? He made his fortune rubbing shoulders with these very same people.
So, I painted a picture in his head that I wasn’t ready to grow up yet. I wanted to experience the United States. I wanted to go to law school to keep being in my student phase for just a little longer. What a perfect little trust fund girl.
He smiled, patted my hand and said anything for his little girl.
I bought myself some time. The problem now. I desperately wanted to become a public defender. After my first
year of law school, I found myself mesmerized by the study of law. How strange it felt to be electrified by the evolution of law and how it changed. I actually got a thrill out of legal history and the way it shaped civilizations. It had to be bizarre to get a buzz out of the legal system’s complex set of processes, systems, rules and players.
I felt alive when I argued my point among my classmates. It seemed so different from managing investment deals or advising billionaire brats. Defending my position felt real…An actual purpose.
Which brings me to my dilemma about wanting to be a public defender. Underpaid, long hours, ridiculous caseload, defending dangerous people. Who would want that job?
Then, there he was. An eighteen year old boy. He grew up poor, without a father. He had a mother who worked two minimum wage jobs just to keep a roof over their heads. Growing up in the inner city, surrounded by gangs and drugs, he maintained a high grade point average in all honors classes. He earned a college scholarship that would be waiting for him upon graduation. Then a terrible tragedy. The owner of a pizza shop was robbed and shot. The eighteen year old boy found himself arrested and picked out in a lineup. How was this possible all his friends and family said? The district attorney’s case seemed strong. There were three eye witnesses.
The public defender believed in her client. Testimony after testimony, she dismantled each witness’ story. I realized then that this boy had been wrongly accused. If he’d been unlucky enough to have acquired an incapable attorney, I had no doubt he’d be in prison. The rest of his life ruined. Instead, I watched this attorney save this boy’s life. It became the most honorable profession I’d ever been exposed to.
I had thought my biggest dilemma would be to keep my billionaire father at bay while I explored a career that I found an intense satisfaction in. What has surprised me instead, became the challenge of keeping my secret life out of law school.
I didn’t want anyone to know that my background consisted of being, well—insanely rich. I felt embarrassed about it now that I lived in the real world. These clients I saw in the courtrooms, their problems weren’t hidden by the protection of money. The security of social class. The defenses that are built in when one is always in control. No, these people have actual valid problems—with no support system built in to rescue them.
There were students in my class on scholarship. I watched one male student, at break, actually counting his change, so that he could put some gas in his car after class. This was rare. Most of the students in my classes came from solid middle class backgrounds. Like my friend, Dee. God, I loved Dee.
There are very few people I can relax around. Dee is one of those rare people. Damn, she’s gorgeous. Tall, blonde with an hourglass figure but with intelligence and wit to match. She’ll be an incredible lawyer. She relishes winning an argument and seems to take an inordinate amount of joy in putting men in their place. When I’m with her, all I do is laugh. I’ve noticed in myself how rarely I let my hair down and just—laugh.
Dee doesn’t know my father is a billionaire and how I will one day inherit a company that’s net worth is on the Forbes list. She’s sharp though. She picked up on those subtle signs of a person raised around the elite. She noticed my designer clothes, knowledge of exotic places, and my litany of boarding school experiences. I’ll give her credit. She’s never drawn attention to my vast experience in the many arenas of the upper class. It’s almost as if she picked up on how uncomfortable I am when I slip up and say something like my father is flying in from St. Maarten today.
One area where she doesn’t seem to hold her tongue is my cold and distant attitude. Dee finds it amusing how I come across to people. She says it must be because I’m British. She claims I live up to the stereotype of anyone from England as stiff. She nicknamed me ‘Queenie’ as in the formal and aloof, Queen Elizabeth, the second. For once in my life, it didn’t bother me to be teased for my standoffish persona. Dee actually made it sound so endearing.
My mind became lost in my thoughts as I remembered drinking with Dee in the bar. We had to drive to the suburbs to observe a special trial assigned by our professor. Dee drove separately, as she wanted to visit with family afterwards since she’s originally from the suburbs of Chicago. She knew of a quaint wine bar off the beaten path.
I drank two glasses of wine and split a plate of appetizers. I wasn’t even tipsy, so how did I manage to miss the turn to the expressway? The radio played a dedication to the eighties. I wasn’t alive during this time period but I felt a kinship towards Pat Benatar. Singing to Hit Me With Your Best Shot on the radio at full blast which considering how horrible my vocals were, it became obvious I was taking advantage of my solitude. It felt great to sit at a bar like a normal working woman. I guess my frame of mind still seemed lost in that feeling of merriment which I felt unaccustomed to and it caused my concentration to waver. As soon as I noticed how the road became more and more rural, I knew I missed the turn to get on the expressway.
“Where the fuck am I?” No longer singing, I screamed out the expletive. At that moment, it became like a bad horror movie. I noticed the darkness of the night. There were no streetlights on this road. The trees looked sinister. A sign that noted the county line was mangled in a seamlessly creepy way. In perfect timing, a deer darted out and missed my car by inches. My body trembled at the near accident. I could feel the goose bumps forming on my body at the idea of how I was lost in such a deserted place.
Then—my car breaks down. Could this night get any worse?
Chapter Two
As I reached for my purse that obviously had been stolen from my car when I’d been at the bar, I got my answer. Spray painted in a florescent silver under the county line sign were two words…Hard Lines. How is that possible? I needed to think for a moment. Was I in some sort of time warp? A dream maybe? Hard lines is British slang for bad luck. Where the hell am I?
I went into the bar with just my cell phone and wallet. Quickly, I dug through the passenger seat for my phone. The second my fingers hit it, my pulse began to calm. Although my hand was shaky, I found enough balance to scroll through the contacts to find Dee’s name. I hit the call button and held my breath as it rang. Please pick up. Please pick up.
Then Dee’s glorious voice came on, “Queenie? Is everything okay?”
“No!” I wailed and then my phone died. This is not happening. I sat back in the seat in total shock. Now what?
The summers I worked at my father’s company, I oversaw reports in excess of millions of dollars in all forms of revenues, expenses, endowment funds and investments. I spoke out at meetings of billionaire philanthropists, investors and lawyers. My father was duly impressed at my efforts to realign some of his business processes and organizational structures to ensure effectiveness of all major initiatives. Basically…I knew how to kick ass. Now, here I sit in this car, feeling helpless.
A strange sensation overtook me. I realize I’d never felt defenseless. I’ve always shown confidence under pressure. Self-reliance in the face of trepidation. I’ve never asked for anything. I’ve never needed to. With a bottomless bank account and my father’s name, I could accomplish whatever I wanted to.
Sitting on a deserted road with a broken down car, I came to quite the epiphany. My life was just as pathetic as those billionaire investors who I despised. This was the real world and I had no idea what to do. My eyes began to well up. Holy shit! I’m actually crying? I don’t remember the last time I cried. I’m always in control. How scary it all became when I realized I wasn’t.
Faintly in the distance, I saw a pair of lights. As they became brighter and bigger, I recognized car headlights. I felt conflicted. I needed help, yet the reality took a hold of me that I was a single woman, lost on a deserted back road. I took the pepper spray out of the glove compartment. My father would’ve been furious if he knew I exchanged the brand new Mercedes for a used Ford Focus. Now I was seriously berating myself for my need to blend in.
The car pulled up behind me a
nd the lights were blaring full force into my car. Briefly blinded, I wondered if it might be a truck that stopped. My body tensed as I heard the sound of footsteps on the gravel. I turned to the shadowy figure who must be male because his form appeared quite large.
“Ma’am? Do you need help?”
Yes, definitely a man’s voice. Deep and husky, although he did sound concerned. I shaded my eyes from the glare of his headlights. “My car broke down.” No duh! I hated hearing the tremble in my voice. I’m always strong in front of men. This damsel in distress feeling wasn’t sitting well with me.
“Well, I can take a look. I’m a mechanic.”
“Thank God!” I screamed it out so fast, I saw him jump. “Oh, uh, sorry. I just know nothing about cars.”
“Yep, that’s usually when people get excited to meet a mechanic.” He smiled and then stuck out his hand. “Name’s Trent. Trent Darling. Please no comments about my last name.”
He stepped closer towards me to allow me to shake his hand. His body became illuminated by the lights of what must be a very large pickup truck. His truck seemed to match the man. Even in the shadows, Trent appeared huge. I’m five foot seven but I needed to crane my neck to look up at him. With the light reflecting off the back of him, I couldn’t make out his features. He seemed to be smiling in a genuine way. Hopefully, that meant he wasn’t a serial killer.
“Raisa Hughes.” I shook his hand with the confidence that comes from growing up around powerful men. “I’d never make fun of your last name. I’m no cabbage.”
“Cabbage?”
“Oh, uh, sorry.” Why the fuck do I keep apologizing? “It was the stable master’s favorite term when I was growing up. I keep forgetting I’m in America. Cabbage is slang for a stupid person.”
Stranded With a Billionaire Boxed Set Page 8
