Billionaire Brothers 01-04 The Complete Serial Box Set

by Meg Watson

  “At your party? Friday?”

  My mind whirled. The party was… Friday? In six days? What was I giving him a tour of?

  “Of course,” I stammered, trying to cover my confusion. “I would be happy to repay your kindness in any way.”

  Jackson sidled next to me and I leaned against him, trying to keep my thoughts on an even keel.

  “So!” Peter exclaimed, clapping his big hands together. “I really must be going, I do so apologize… I am sure you can be discreet about wandering the galleries unattended before we open. Jackson knows the collection well. Regrettably, I must return to business. Will I see you for supper?”

  “Of course, Peter,” Jackson answered. I jammed a smile on my face and tried to remain polite. With a snappy salute, Peter turned and strode regally from the enormous Prussian blue vault, his footsteps echoing wildly against the gilded ceiling.

  “Jackson, what was he talking about?” I breathed when I was sure Peter was out of earshot.

  He glanced around, not meeting my eye.

  “What, the party?” he said breezily. “Oh, Declan has some people he wants you to meet. Didn’t he mention--”

  “Yeah, he did, but,” I said quickly. Why did this feel like an ambush? “OK, what ‘tour?’ What did Peter mean?”

  He shrugged. “You’ll talk to him about your work, I suppose.”

  I shook my head, rattling my thoughts and fears like dice, hoping they would settle. “That’s not what I do… I don’t talk. Bridget talks. Is Declan going to get me into a room full of people who expect me to talk?”

  “Well…”

  “Seriously?” I said, listening to the pitch of my voice rising. “Jackson, no… I can’t do that. I can’t.”

  “You can do anything,” he said reassuringly, taking the back of my arm and pulling me toward the adjoining wall with a different, suddenly overwhelming masterpiece that I didn’t think I could stand to see. The museum felt like an impending avalanche.

  “No, no,” I muttered, blinded to the painting in front of me. Suddenly the room started to seem like a too-small, too-solid thing. The air was unbreathably dense. “I actually can’t. I get… um…. Look. The whole reason I work in a visual medium is so I don’t have to talk, you see? I’m not an actor. I don’t perform.”

  “I’ve seen you perform all sorts of things,” he said with a cheeky wink.

  “No, be serious!” I shot back, unable to control the volume or timbre of my voice anymore. I sounded like a little kid, irrational and obstinate. He wasn’t listening and if I couldn’t get through to him, I was pretty sure I would be losing my shit in 4… 3… 2.... “I won’t be able to… I won’t…”

  “OK, OK,” he whispered, taking me into his arms and holding me still. I felt my chest quaking against his as he kissed the top of my head.

  “Talk to Declan,” he counselled. “You don’t even know what he has planned yet. It won’t be so bad, and I know you, Margot. You really can do anything. Anyone you meet just wants to get to know you. You’re special, and they just want to get close.”

  “Really?” I half-whimpered into his chest.

  “Really,” he said, drawing back and looking into my eyes. As soon as I felt that connection, everything seemed to soften, like a sudden ending to a storm. The threat of disaster seemed to pass. The klaxon horns went mostly mute. He dipped his head toward me, his lips so near to mine that I could feel their heat.

  “Just being close to you, Margot. That’s all they want and you will be magnificent. I know you will. Be yourself. I can’t imagine what anyone else could need.”

  Then he covered my mouth with his, sending away the last of the clouds. I melted against him until I was saturated with his strength.

  CHAPTER 4

  WE LEFT THE MUSEUM and I felt numb and uncommunicative for about as long as it took us to walk out onto the Museumplein and see all the tourists climbing all over the “I Amsterdam” like a bunch of kids at recess. Their enthusiasm brightened my spirits considerably. Admittedly, I’ve never been great in crowds and my avoidance of them is a sure-fire way to not embarrass myself in front of them. But what did I really have to fear? If a grey-haired woman in a kerchief is willing to scale a giant, red ‘A’ while the wind whips her skirt up over the back of her head, how could I be so wimpy about a little cocktail party?

  After ogling the old woman’s powder blue, polyester briefs for a while, I slipped my hand back into the crook of Jackson’s strong arm and we walked along the reflecting pool in the morning sunshine. He seemed content with the silence and so was I, wanting to make sure my mood was all rainbows and wiffle balls before speaking again. I felt bad that I had spent so much of the last 24 hours so churlish when my life was really like some kind of fairy tale.

  We walked out of the park and onto the street just as the Bentley was pulling up. Jackson stepped ahead to open the door for me.

  “Your carriage, madame,” he said with a wink.

  Gratefully I slid into the lush leather interior and slumped against the seat. I realized it was probably the middle of the night in California and though I had slept through most of the flight, I could have fallen right back into dreamland if there wasn’t so much to look at. Jackson climbed in next to me and tugged my chin forward for a soft, sweet kiss, his hand encircling mine firmly, his lips delicious to taste.

  “Well, this is pretty all right,” I sighed as the driver took us into traffic.

  “Yes, it really is. But…”

  “Uhoh.”

  “No, nothing big, but I have a few meetings yet this morning. There are… oh a million things I wish I could show you here if you can be a little patient.”

  I shook my head. “Patience is not really my thing,” I teased.

  “I’ll be back before you know it. Dec will show you the house…. Oh there’s shopping nearby you might want to hit… I think you’ll find plenty of distractions.”

  “None quite this good, though,” I insisted, lightly dragging the point of my tongue along the crescent of his upper lip.

  “I certainly hope not,” he whispered, his hand sliding behind my neck and pulling me forward. Instantly I could taste his lust in his mouth, that savory shift of hormones. He tasted like hunger and my whole body responded like it had been lit from within.

  The moment his fingers lifted the hem of my dress I was wet. He slid his hand across my belly and drove his fingers down the front of my panties, immediately finding my clit and working it assertively. I moaned and bucked my hips, instantly on a mission to come on his hand.

  He sucked at my lips and I drank him in, high on the cocktail of his lust. Submitting completely without hesitation, I flung my legs out wide across the leather seats. He pushed himself over me, forcing me to lean back as he massaged my clit into an explosion.

  Moaning into his mouth, I felt the orgasm coming on like a freight train and just laid myself right across the tracks and waited for it. His fingers made wet sounds against my slippery folds and the next thing I heard was my own voice, a desperate howl bursting from my lips, filling his mouth.

  “Oh!” I whimpered. My back arched and my hips heaved against him, them I clamped my thighs around his hand, trying to keep him still against me.

  “Patience isn’t always required,” he teased as I shuddered and wriggled against him. “Sometimes you get exactly what you want, when you want it.”

  My legs felt like rubber and my pulse still punched insistently against the pit of my throat as Anders drew the car to the curb. We climbed out of the Bentley and onto the sidewalk, my eyes shyly averted from Anders, who must have heard or seen every moment.

  Jackson looped his arm around my waist and pulled me close, my back to his front so I could feel the rock-hard reminder of his beautiful cock against the crack of my ass.

  “You really do something to me, Margot,” he growled against my neck.

  “You really do something to me too,” I whispered, rubbing my ass back and forth against his trousers, weak
and full of joy.

  “And you should really, really give me that,” he said, pulling me tight against him so I could feel his dick nudging between my ass cheeks.

  “I’m saving that for someone special,” I teased.

  “Perfect,” he replied. “I’ll accept your ass as an engagement present.”

  “Wait, what?” I stammered, stumbling forward slightly as he released me and held out an arm to the driver for the bags.

  “Come on inside! You’re going to love this place!”

  “Hey, hold on!” I objected, commanding my legs to obey as he sprinted up the steps of a plain-looking, flat-faced rowhouse. My mind whirled. What the hell did he just say?

  Declan flung the door open from the inside and grinned at us both. “Hey there, early birds,” he called. “Coffee’s on!”

  “We just had some, thanks,” Jackson replied curtly.

  “Well… More would be great,” I added as I walked in the front hallway, watching them stare at each other from half a pace away. There seemed to be a silent conversation bouncing back and forth between their identically squinted eyes and knotted jaw muscles.

  Then they broke apart, both turning to me suddenly as though nothing had just happened. I tried to control a reflexive flinch.

  “You still shaky from the flight?” Declan asked.

  “No… I’m fine,” I replied uncertainly, trying to assess the situation further. But whatever had passed between them had evaporated like smoke. There was no trace of it.

  “Then let me show you around!” he grinned. “You gotta get on the road,” he added to Jackson.

  Jackson instantly stiffened. “I’m aware,” he said. His eyes flashed again as he stared Declan down. Then he came over to me, kissing my forehead while his hand slipped behind me and pulsed suggestively between my ass cheeks. I drew back, staring at him with my eyes wide.

  “OK,” I choked. “Have fun, then, I guess.”

  “Oh yeah, a blast,” he growled as he angled toward the door and was on his way.

  I took a deep breath, trying to compose myself. Jackson’s brazen hint was so… unlike him. And sizzling hot, I had to admit.

  “What was that all about?” I asked pointedly as Declan held his hand toward the opening to the next room.

  “Oh, Anneka needs Jack for some paperwork. You know how he hates to sign his name. A fear of pens, or something, I don’t know,” he said dismissively, then jerked his head toward the room. “Come on, babe. Tour’s leaving.”

  “Yeah OK,” I said, brushing aside my nosiness. I wanted more information but of course, if Declan knew that I would never get it anyway. Better to just bite my lip and wait for the day to unfold.

  Inhaling deeply, I looked around the foyer, finally seeing it. Like everything else in the Netherlands, it looked somehow different than any house I had ever been in. The air felt different too: moist but not musty. Thick, as though saturated with plaster dust.

  “This is gorgeous,” I said softly, walking toward the room Declan indicated. “This is… whoa.”

  “Right?” he said, an eager sort of pride in his voice.

  I walked into the long, high-ceilinged room with my mouth hanging open. Floorboards over a foot wide creaked beneath my feet and I gawked openly at the enormous chandelier over my head.

  “This is… how old is this house?”

  He drew himself up, his eyes twinkling. “Sixteen seventy.”

  “What? No!” I breathed, following the perfectly papered walls through another set of open double doors. A grand piano was lit to blinding brilliance in the corner by a bank of stained glass windows. Every wall was panelled in some kind of deeply aged wood.

  “Declan this is…”

  “Magnificent,” he finished, nodding as he came up behind me. He looked around with pride, his hands hung on his hips as though he had built the place himself. “It’s one of a very few remaining in the whole country in this condition. I had to practically knock off the prior owners to get my hands on it.”

  Wouldn’t put it past you, buddy, I said silently as I touched every surface with my fingers trembling. Years in museums had trained me not to touch things that were this obviously fine and rare. Some voracious beast in the pit of my soul wanted to lick the moulding, though, if I’m being honest.

  I darted through another door to another small parlor, this one papered in a rich, hand-painted brocade. Gilded borders trimmed the upper parts of the tall walls, while panelled wainscoting in a buttery shade of yellow stretched along the bottom.

  “I’ve never been in a three-hundred-fifty year-old house before,” I mused. “Boy, these people really knew how to live.”

  “As do I,” Declan crowed.

  I laughed, finding myself more and more eager to explore. “The staircase?” I inquired, gesturing down.

  “Oh, yes, go! You’ll love it!”

  Suppressing the urge to slide down the thick bannister like probably hundreds of derrieres before mine, I made my way to the lower level into a gorgeous, marble-tiled kitchen. Huge stainless steel appliances lined one wall, flanking a wide, arched fire-pit.

  “Amazing,” I muttered.

  “All restored where possible… Improved where prudent,” he intoned, sounding like the announcer on one of those luxury home tour shows. “Even the foundation was replaced. These canal homes require a certain amount of investment to keep them serviceable.”

  “Oh sure,” I nodded. “A few hundred years of water probably does a number on the foundation.”

  “But it’s fantastic for the property value. And now...” he said solemnly, his arm extended toward the glowing, glass-encased room adjoining the kitchen. “The second-best part.”

  I stared at him in exaggerated awe and anticipation, then pattered over the marble slabs toward the enclosed conservatory. One of the few furnished rooms so far, it had sumptuous wicker garden furniture arranged for conversation among a half dozen lush, potted palms. Through the glass, I could see a wavy, distorted garden. I just had to see it.

  I heard Declan’s appreciative noises as my fingers found the door handle and pushed open the conservatory door. A wave of humid, peaceful air surrounded me, perfumed by flowers.

  “Oh my gosh,” I whispered, grinning madly. It was a perfect, pristine, precise garden. Set in terraces of carefully sculpted hedges, layers upon layers of room-like areas nested with a beautiful sculpture as the centerpiece of each. It was like a fairy tale.

  “Now this is an artist’s garden,” he drawled. “Not like that mess at Giverny.”

  “It really is,” I agreed breathlessly.

  He winked at me, his cheeks flushed. “I just knew you would love it,” he nodded.

  I nodded back, carefully saying nothing. Why did he care what I thought?

  “It’s looks like every painting I ever saw,” I laughed, practically beside myself. Flowers bloomed in pots and along borders and draped over stone arches. I could have spent a week there.

  “Well then let me show you the best part! Come on!” he exclaimed and I heard him turn. When I looked, I saw just the back of his shirt disappearing through the kitchen.

  “Hey wait!” I laughed and ran after him. His enthusiasm was irresistible. How could someone not be excited about all this beauty?

  Going just as fast as I dared on my weary wedge heels, I jogged through the kitchen and up the stairs, then back through the ground floor parlours. I heard him on the steps and ran to the foyer and up the front stairs, pausing at the landing of what looked like living quarters. But still I heard his steps above my head and ran down the hall to another stairway that climbed for a while, becoming steeper as it went. When I finally made it through the short, rustic door, I couldn’t believe what I saw.

  White plaster walls stretched to the peaked ceiling, crossed and crossed again by aged timber beams. A fire crackled merrily in the center of the big wall behind an enormous spinning wheel that looked like it belonged in the Smithsonian.

  “Come here!” h
e called from a far window. “Look!”

  I spun in place, trying to absorb the entire room at once. This was the original “artist’s studio” from all the Dutch masterpieces I had ever seen. A private, rustic apartment in an attic. Even the softly filtered light from high, north-facing windows was perfect.

  I jogged toward the small side room where he stood facing the windows. As I entered, I stepped past a few tall stacked crates and tried to see what he was seeing.

  “Look, there,” he said. “What do you think?”

  I peered over his shoulder into the garden we had just been in, far below. From this vantage point, the design of the garden made perfect sense. It was a set of interlocking geometric shapes, perfectly balanced and harmonious.

  “It’s beautiful!” I agreed. “Thank you for showing it to me.”

  “Well, not just that,” he persisted, walking out into the room with his hands out and making a wide, sweeping gesture.

  “OK,” I said, not really getting the point but trying to follow him.

  “All of this,” he said, leading me to the center of the room. I mimicked him, turning slowly and seeing it all again in more detail: the antique trestle tables, the inset shelves, the beautiful windows, and the crates and crates of…

  “Declan, what is this?”

  “This is yours,” he whispered dramatically, his eyes wide like he was letting me in on a triumphant secret.

  “This is my what?”

  He shrugged as though irritated by my slowness. “Your studio, Margot.”

  I glanced again at the crates. Those were my crates, from home, now here in Amsterdam.

  “OK, let’s pretend for just a second that I am like, really, really stupid…”

  He quirked an eyebrow at me.

  “Explain it to me like I’m five. What is going on here?”

  He crossed his arms in front of his chest.

  “Are you saying you don’t like it?”

  My head started to feel overfilled and wobbly.

  “There is no way in the world I could say I didn’t like it.”

  “Well, then,” he grinned.

  “Yeah OK… I’m going to need a little more information than that.”