The Hot Sergeant (Second Chance Military Romance) (Hargrave Brothers - Book #2)

by Alexa Davis

  Janice smiled at me with her Botox-injected lips painted red. "Why not? You can afford it. According to our joint records, you have a net worth of over a billion dollars. After fifteen years of marriage, I'm legally entitled to half. I'm letting you off easy for just a fraction of that."

  "Bullshit! You signed the fucking pre-nup before we got married. Even at the age of twenty-five, I could tell that one day you'd try to fuck me over."

  My lawyer Eddie put his hand on my shoulder again and said quietly, "The prenuptial agreement is legally binding. Mrs. Janice Porter is not entitled to fifty percent of the assets Mr. Tristan Porter acquired through his own business and subsequent investments during the course of their fifteen years of marriage. Mrs. Porter will maintain the house in Beverly Hills, the Porsche, the Cadillac, all of her clothes and jewelry (which are of substantial value), and ten million dollars. That is plenty enough for her to live on quite comfortably for all the rest of her days. Anything more is out of the question and any judge in court will uphold the prenuptial agreement."

  I leaned back in my chair with my arms folded over my chest and grinned at my soon to be ex-wife victoriously. There was a reason I paid Eddie as much money as I did, and he was worth every penny. Janice didn't have a prayer of beating that pre-nup and she knew it – except I forgot she knew more than that.

  Smiling up at our lawyers, she said sweetly, "May I have a moment with my husband alone, please?"

  Eddie looked at me with his eyebrow arched suspiciously, but I was curious to hear what the conniving bitch had to say. No doubt she was going to try and ply me with offers of sex or try and get me to feel pity with a show of tears. It wouldn't work.

  Nodding at Eddie, I told him, "It's okay. You can go."

  The high-priced lawyers with their teams of paralegals and interns left the conference room in a long line. When we were finally alone, Janice got up from her end of the table and came around to stand behind me. She wrapped her arms around my chest and spoke softly and sensuously into my ear. "We've had a lot of good times over the years. Sure, we hate each other now, but it wasn’t all bad, was it? In fact, many of those years were quite pleasurable."

  "What are you driving at, Janice?" I peeled her hands off of me and turned my chair to stare in her eyes with a hostile glare. "I'm a busy man. Just get to the fucking point."

  "But fucking is the point, darling," she said with a haughty flip of her raven black hair. "All those years of letting you have your way with me, tolerating your sick fetishes as they just kept getting sicker and more twisted, until finally I gained the confidence to tell you no. Then came your years of infidelity, sneaking off to those disgusting clubs to perform your sick and demented sex acts on innocent young prostitutes. Some of those poor girls were barely eighteen, and the things you did to them were unspeakable. I know; I have pictures."

  As I was listening to her speak, I could feel my blood begin to boil, and I clenched my hands into tight fists, trying to keep myself from choking her, but her last words made all the blood drain from my face. Shit! She had me by the Goddamn balls and the fucking cunt knew it.

  "That's right, Tristan darling. I have pictures of everything. Things you did to me. Things you did to them. Things the public will never understand or forgive you for. What do you think the viewing audience of your little television show will think when I tell my story to the media? How popular do you think you'll be in the ratings, then? What do you think will happen to all your investors, all your corporate deals, and all your high-end connections? Your stocks will plummet like stones in the sea and you won't be able to get a girl to come within a thousand feet of your dick. You'll be humiliated, all your money will drain away, and most of all, you'll be alone. Society will ostracize you for being the sick and twisted freak you are, and they will all revere me as being the source that exposed all your dark secrets to them. I'll have interviews on talk shows, bestselling novels, maybe even my own movie or television show. I will be a goddess in the eyes of the public, and you will be a cockroach, loathed by all."

  I could feel myself breaking out in a cold sweat underneath my custom-tailored suit, and I knew the bitch was right. Gritting my teeth, I looked up at her asked, "What does a hundred million dollars get me?"

  "It buys my complete silence. I won't speak a word about you to a single reporter or publisher. The pictures will be lost, and my lips will be sealed forever."

  Fuck! Why hadn't I seen this coming? I should have known the bitch would do a thing like this to me, and the worst part was she was fucking right. I had the number one rated reality game show on television. If the secret got out about the things I'd done over the past fifteen years, I'd be ruined. My show would be off the air that same day and no amount of money I could throw at the networks would be able to sway the public opinion. A few scattered people might understand, but not enough. The majority of people would hate me for it and be disgusted by me. I would lose millions of dollars in stocks and investments overnight and no one of any value would want to work with me ever again. I'd be ruined.

  Feeling fucking emasculated and pissed off, I reached into my breast pocket and pulled out my checkbook. "Fine. One hundred million dollars is yours. Get the lawyers back in here. I want a fucking non-disclosure agreement drafted up before I sign my name on this, and I never want to have to see you again."

  "You got it, baby." She grinned as I prepared to sign away my money in exchange for the divorce that would finally set me free from her forever. Janice felt like she'd gotten one over on me, but when I really thought about it, I was the one that had gotten the better bargain. A hundred million dollars was worth it to finally be free to be myself.

  Chapter Two: Tristan

  When the last document had been signed finalizing my divorce and Janice had the check for one hundred million dollars in her greedy, manicured hands, I breathed a sigh of relief I hadn't even realized I'd been holding. Fuck, it felt like a pile of bricks had been lifted from off my fucking chest and it felt amazing to be free.

  "Thanks for everything, Eddie." I shook my lawyer's hand heartily.

  "Sure thing, Tristan." He slapped me on the back in a brotherly gesture. Then, he turned to his secretary, a sexy-looking redhead named Rachel, and said, "Call the car service for Mr. Porter and tell them take him anywhere he wants to go."

  "Thanks, Eddie, but I think I'll walk today," I said with a grin.

  "Are you sure?" Eddie was shocked, but it was easy to guess by his overweight gut that the bastard never walked anywhere.

  "Yeah, it's a hell of a nice day outside, and I feel like getting some fresh air after spending hours cooped up in law offices for the past week."

  The warm spring air outside felt like heaven in my lungs and the Los Angeles smog was at an all-time low thanks to the tropical breeze coming off the Pacific. I walked the distance from Eddie's office to my production studio easily in just over an hour, feeling invigorated by the jaunt of exercise. I prided myself on keeping fit, and even though I was about to have my fortieth birthday, I knew I looked closer to thirty. I kept my brown hair cropped short to enhance my chiseled features. My gray eyes were as sharp as ever, and I kept my muscles toned with daily visits to the gym for an hour of cardio and an hour of weights. I treated myself to trips to the tanning salon and frequent facials. If I was going to be the star of America's hottest reality game show, I needed to look good doing it.

  I'd first come up with the idea for Pick Me when I was a kid fresh out of college. I'd inherited a million bucks from my old man when he died of a stroke, and I was determined to invest it wisely so it would grow. No way was I going to waste my life working my ass off like he did to make a profit, and no way was I going to just piss it all away like some Goddamn fool. I knew that to make my million grow into ten million would require smart investments, creative innovation, and shrewd business planning. Luckily, I had a natural knack for all three.

  By the time I was twenty-five, I had taken my father's million dollars and multipl
ied it twenty times over. I was engaged to my college sweetheart Janice VanMurren and the world was at my feet. Before she and I officially tied the knot, it seemed only practical to have her sign a pre-nuptial agreement providing for her to receive ten million dollars in the event of our divorce. That way, if my business improved exponentially over the years, she would only be getting half of what I started with. I'd known back then that I would find a way to make it big and that my millions would only keep growing. I'd had no idea that it would turn into billions, though.

  One night when we out to dinner and I was talking to Janice, I complained to her that interviewing for investors was a lot like being on a fucking game show. "You're in a room with a dozen other assholes and you know the investor only has enough capital to pick one. I feel like such a dick wishing and hoping that he'll pick me."

  Years later as the reality game show came into existence, I recalled that old feeling of how asking for investors was like competing for some damn game show prize. I repeated the idea to Janice, and the bitch laughed in my face. "Yeah, right. Who would go on a show like that? Better yet, who would watch it? Nobody!"

  Well, the cunt was fucking wrong. Millions of people tuned into watch Pick Me every Friday night, and people lined up around the block attempting to get on it as a contestant.

  "Who do we have on the show tonight?" I asked my executive assistant Paulina. She was from fucking Norway or some such place. Huge fucking tits, a great round ass, blonde hair, blue eyes, and an accent that was sexy as hell. Too bad I didn't believe in inter-office affairs. The last thing I needed was to open myself up to sexual harassment lawsuits, discrimination lawsuits, paternity suits, and all the bullshit that came with whipping out your cock in the workplace. I'd get my rocks off, but I'd do it someplace else. Someplace private where I had complete anonymity.

  "We have a good line-up for you today, Mr. Porter," Paulina said, and she showed me the files on each of the five contestants on the show for tonight's episode. I would let each of them make their sales pitch to me and give them the opportunity to explain why I should invest in them and give them the financial backing they needed to start their own company. Then I would turn them against each other, getting them to fight with one another to prove that they were the best. In the end, I would pick just one and the other four would leave broken hearted. The winner would get an investment deal with me, giving me a portion of their profits and gaining a chance to have their own business in return. It was a win/win situation that had proven to be highly profitable for me.

  "Great. Let's get the show started." I snapped the files shut and handed them back to Paulina. "Is everyone ready?"

  "Yes, Mr. Porter," she said. It wouldn't have mattered if they weren't. This was my fucking show and we would start taping when I wanted. If anyone wasn't ready for me the moment I was ready to start, too bad for them.

  The show went great, with one of the weaker contestants running off the stage in tears and two of the strongest ones barking at each other like rabid dogs. In the end, I had the last word, just like I always do.

  "Shut up. You're both idiots and your products are two of the dumbest ideas I've ever seen," I snapped at them, silencing their debate instantly.

  "My product idea is a good one. Why else would I have gotten this far?" the moron on the right had the balls to say to me.

  "It is a good one; that's why you can find three products on store shelves right fucking now that will do the exact same Goddamn thing," I said and I knew the sensor in the control room would bleep out my expletives just like he did every week. The network executives were always complaining that I needed to tone my language down and make the show more family friendly, but that was bullshit. Audiences tuned into my show because I was real. The advice I gave was true and so were the criticisms. I wasn't going to dumb things down or sugarcoat them because that wasn't who I was. The contestants coming on this show wanted to strike up a business deal with Tristan Porter, and I didn't get to be a billionaire by playing nice. I got it my following my gut and being true to me, and that's exactly what I was going to keep doing. Anyone who didn't like it could go fuck themselves.

  Chapter Three: Olivia

  So, maybe my parents were right. I hated to admit it, but it was getting harder to deny it. My big plans of moving to California and making it as a successful model had crumbled into dust.

  Back home in Ohio, I had been told countless times that I should be a model. I had the kind of hourglass figure most women had to go to a plastic surgeon to find, with huge breasts, a narrow waist, a firm round butt, and long legs. I kept my body well toned with daily exercise and followed a strict diet of practically zero carbs. I'd grown my blonde hair out long so it fell past my shoulders, kept my skin evenly tanned at the salon, and I figured my hazel eyes with their flecks of gold and green would help differentiate me from all the blue eyed models I saw everywhere. At the age of twenty-one I bought a bus ticket, packed up my bags, and came to the golden state to make a career for myself as a swimsuit model.

  My parents had been against it from the start.

  "We love you, sweetheart, but you'll never make it in L.A. The city is filled with thousands of women who are just as pretty as you are, with a lot more experience and a lot less morals," my mother had said lovingly.

  My father wasn't nearly so tactful. "You'll be back on our doorstep with your tail between your legs, begging us to take you back home. Or worse. You'll fall prey to those sex predators who ask you to do pornography or prostitution. It's a dark world out there, sweetheart. We just want to keep you our good little girl."

  "Well, I'm not little. I'm twenty-one years old, for Christ's sake," I had cried out. I loved them, but they were just so frustrating. "I'm a legal adult. I can drive, I can vote, and I can drink, but you two still treat me like I'm a child. I should have moved out years ago when I turned eighteen, but you wouldn't even let me do that. If I'm going to live my own life, I have get as far away from you two as possible. I'm going to California, and I'm going to be a model. Just wait and see, the name Olivia Harte is going to be famous."

  My mother had sobbed pitifully when I hugged her goodbye, but my father refused to acknowledge me at all. Then, just as I was walking out the door, he shouted out, "You'll be back. L.A. is going to turn you into a whore and nothing else."

  I pretended not to hear, but my father's lack of confidence in me hurt. Weren't your own parents supposed to believe in you?

  Well, after six months of struggling to get my first modeling job, I had discovered that making it in the city was a lot tougher than I had thought it would be. I shared an apartment with two other girls I'd met at an audition. Splitting the rent and utilities three ways was cheaper, but still expensive by Ohio standards. So far, I'd been using my savings every month to make my portion of the bills, but that money was all gone now, and I didn't know how I was going to pay my rent coming up on the first of the month.

  Clara and Suzanne were nice girls, but I doubted that would extend to supporting a deadbeat roommate who couldn't pay her share. They would have to kick me out onto the street and find someone to replace me; and I didn't blame them. I hated the fact that I'd already been stealing food from their sections of the fridge and had copped out on covering my share of the electric bill by telling Clara that I'd given the money to Suzanne and telling Suzanne I'd given it to Clara. In just six short months, I'd become both a thief and a liar.

  My one saving hope was an audition I had this afternoon for a job as an actress/model. I didn't usually go to auditions like that since I had even less acting experience than I did modeling experience, but I'd told my agent to send me on anything that was available.

  When I'd first started, I had been really picky, insisting on only being sent to high quality photo shoots for magazine ads. After getting laughed out the door for my inexperience, I lowered my standards and asked to audition for catalog work, but that wasn't any better.

  "Honey, my five-year-old kid poses better than
you do. We want natural, carefree, and sexy, not whatever the hell that was," one photographer said to me, and I went running from the studio in tears.

  After that, I lowered my standard to the wrung just above porn.

  "Give me anything you have that doesn't involve nudity or sex. I'll wear a bikini in a flyer, I'll be the cheesy girl in a car show salesroom, I'll even do lingerie as long as everything is covered," I begged, and still my agent couldn't get me a single job.

  There was always something wrong with me. Too young, too old, too blonde, too busty. I didn't think men thought a woman could ever be too busty, but apparently, I was wrong. I was wrong about a lot of things and now I was going to have to go back home and listen to my father tell me that every day for the rest of my life. The idea made me physically sick to my stomach. So, I had called my agent one last time.

  "Send me out on anything you've got. I'll do anything. Anything at all."

  "You mean that, kid?" my agent asked, and I knew just what he was asking. I stared at my bank statement, which read Closed due to excessive overdraft fees, and looked at the calendar which was counting down just a few days till the first.

  Taking a deep breath for courage, I said resolutely, "Yes. I mean it. Anything."

  "All right, kid, I've got something for you. Show up at this address at eight o'clock tonight, and they should hire you right on the spot."

  "What's the job?"

  "It's a hotel club that specializes in a unique form of socialization. They need an actress/model to entertain their club members. Dress sexy and be prepared to start immediately with a shift that doesn't end until dawn."

  "Is this prostitution?" I asked, choking on the word.

  "That's illegal," my agent said, but his tone made me certain that's exactly what it was. "This job is for an actress/model, but it pays fifty bucks an hour. From eight at night, until six the next morning; you'll make five hundred dollars in just one day."