Holly McDonnell
A Billionaire’s Way Of Saying I Want You
Copyright © Holly McDonnell
All rights reserved. This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance of characters to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. The author holds exclusive rights to this work. Unauthorised duplication is prohibited.
A Billionaire’s Way Of Saying I Love You
Driving through the narrow streets of Nice, Julia Garner and her best friend Sharron Reese were excitedly taking in the picturesque view of the majestic old French city. It was summer, the sun was shining warmly, and the ocean breeze whispered of adventure and holiday romance. What more can a woman ask for?
“Wow, is that the La Grande hotel?” Sharron asked the taxi driver when he pulled up to the entrance of a very luxurious looking hotel.
“Yes mademoiselle, it is the La Grande hotel,” the taxi driver answered with a proud smile, almost as if he was the owner of such an impressive hotel. “Beautiful, isn’t it?”
“Beautiful doesn’t even begin to describe it. I can almost not believe that we are able to afford staying at a place like this,” Sharron said whilst paying the taxi driver, taking in every grand detail of their new lodgings.
Climbing out of the taxi, two porters immediately came to welcome them and assist with their luggage. Following the porters through the hotel entrance, both women suddenly found themselves in a dazzling world of luxury. Marble tiles covered the floor, a large crystal chandelier hung from the roof, marble statues were placed in strategic positions, along with other lavish finishing, all working together to give the hotel the appearance of complete elegance and style.
“We are definitely moving up in the world,” Sharron whispered joking while they walked up to the front desk, softly giggling at her own joke.
At the front desk they first had to wait for the clerk to finish helping some other guests, before they could follow up on their reservations and get themselves booked in. Leaving Sharron waiting at the front desk, Julia strolled through the lobby, looking out the wall-sized windows and admiring the panoramic ocean view. She was so deep in thought that she didn’t hear a well-dressed gentleman addressing her; she only became aware of him when he sharply readdressed her in an arrogant tone:
“Are you quite finished admiring the view?” the well-dressed gentleman asked in a sarcastic tone from behind Julia. “We don’t pay you to stand around the lobby. We have enough statues to decorate the area. Get back to your post immediately, and do the job we pay you to do!” the gentleman snapped, speaking in a low, hushed voice, trying not to draw any of the guests’ attention.
Taken aback by the unexpected attack from the unknown gentleman, Julia momentarily stood frozen before she slowly started turning around to face the unknown man. Infuriated by the lazy female’s slow response, Gabriel Durand, the owner of the posh La Grande hotel, grabbed the redhead by the shoulders and spun her around to face him. Looking down into the stormy electric-blue eyes of the woman in front of him, he jerked his hands away from her shoulders as he realized that she was not part of the hotel staff, but was in fact a guest!
“Oh… uh…I am… I mean…” Gabriel Durand stammered embarrassed, struggling to regain his composure. Looking at the gorgeous woman before him, he couldn’t help the surge of desire that suddenly started pulsing through his veins. She was extraordinarily beautiful, with copper red hair, arctic blue eyes, full rosy lips, and a well-proportioned figure. “Mademoiselle, please forgive me. I accidently mistook you as part of the hotel staff. As you can see your clothing closely resembles their uniform. I am Gabriel Durand, the owner of this humble little hotel,” Gabriel said introducing himself using his most charming smile, hoping to erase his little mishap from her mind.
“I would have said it was a pleasure to meet you, but then I would be lying, and I hate lying,” Julia answered coldly, heading back towards the front desk with burning cheeks.
“Excuse me mademoiselle, I didn’t quite catch your name,” Gabriel said in a smooth voice, thinking that the little redhead was only playing hard to get, as no woman has ever refused him.
“Don’t worry, you won’t need it,” Julia answered looking over her shoulder, giving him one last contempt-filled look before she joined up with Sharron, who had just finished with the booking in process.
“What?” Gabriel asked astonished, unable to believe that the little redhead was not interested in getting to know him. Feeling as though he had just been splashed in the face with a bucket of ice cold water, he watched the little chili pip walk away. What in the world just happened, he asked himself with a frown between his chartreuse-green eyes. No woman has ever talked to him in that manner, leaving his ego feeling a bit bruised after her rejection of him. Though, while stood watching her walk away, a smile started appearing on his face, he was very much intrigued by the fiery redhead and definitely wanted to get to know her. He was sure that if he pursued her, she would still warm up to him. He was confident of that, as every woman he has ever come in contact with has always fallen over their feet to get to know him, and he didn’t believe the little redhead would be any different. Whistling lightheartedly, he headed back to his office, looking forward to getting to know the fiery ice-queen.
It was already late in the afternoon when Julia and Sharron had finished unpacking and settling into their suite. Excited to go out exploring Nice, they started getting ready for a fun filled evening. On their way to the hotel earlier that day, they had seen a zillion restaurants they wanted to visit; the only problem was that they couldn’t decide which restaurant they wanted to visit first. While they were busy getting ready for their evening out, there was an unexpected knock on their door. As Julia was still in the bath, Sharron went to answer the door and was surprised to find a waiter at the door with a complimentary bottle of champaign, along with a dinner invitation from Gabriel Durand. She immediately accepted the dinner invitation without checking with Julia first.
After the waiter had left, Sharron ran to Julia’s bedroom, bubbling with excitement while she told her the good news.
“You should have checked with me first,” Julia said with unmasked displeasure. “There is no way I’m going to have dinner with that self-conceited jerk.
“You can’t do that, I already accepted his dinner invitation,” Sharron retorted, unable to understand her friend’s deep dislike of Gabriel Durand. Granted, he did make a mistake in the lobby and embarrassed Julia somewhat, but that was no reason to become so heavily set against the man.
“Nothing is stopping you from going. Since you are the one who accepted his invitation, you can go have dinner with him,” Julia said with finality, grabbing her purse off the bed and aiming towards the door.
“Julia, sometimes you drive me absolutely crazy,” Sharron said angrily, feeling as though she could slap some sense into her friend. “You know I won’t let you go out on your own. Wait for me, I just quickly want to fetch my purse,” Sharron said heading towards her room, returning a couple of seconds later, ready to go paint the town red with her friend.
“Okay then, let’s be on our way then,” Julia smiled and started heading towards the door.
“We must just remember to go past the front desk and leave a message for Mr. Durand saying that we won’t be able to join him for dinner,” Sharron said as they climbed into the elevator, but by the time they reached the ground floor they were so wrapped up in the excitement of exploring Nice, that both Sharron and Julia forgot to leave a message for Gabriel at the front desk.
At the hotel restaurant a bit later that evening, Gabriel sat at his private table, patiently waiting for his two guests to
join him. The minutes ticked past one after the other, and still there was no sign of either of his guests. After an half an hour of waiting, Gabriel started getting slightly irritated waiting for the two women and called one of the waiters closer, ordering him to check on room 505 and then report back. However, before the waiter had even left the restaurant, Gabriel already knew that he had been stood up by the redhead chili pip and her friend.
So it was going to be like that, he thought to himself with a deepening smile, his chartreuse-green eyes glinting with determination. The more he thought about the fiery Julia, the more fascinated he became with her. She clearly set a challenge for him and he was not going disappoint. After he was done with her, she was going to be eating out of his hand. While eating dinner on his own, Gabriel sat working out a plan to sweep Julia off her feet. He was going to use every trick in the book if he had to, flowers, chocolates, and the whole nine yards. She wasn’t going to know what hit her…
Returning back to the hotel in the early hours of the morning, Julia and Sharron were both so tired that they could just fall over. They had an awesome evening exploring the nightlife of city, but as with all good things, their evening also had to come to an end. Feeling thoroughly partied out, Julia and Sharron unlocked their suite door, wanting to head straight off to bed, but as they entered their room, both stopped dead in their tracks, gawking at the hundreds, if not thousands, of roses placed all over their suite. There were bouquets of roses, vases filled with roses, as well as single stem roses, placed all over the room. Even the floor had rose petals strewn all over it. Their suite looked more like a botanical garden than a hotel room. The sweet scent of the roses hung fragrantly in the air, seducing their nostrils with every breath they took.
“What is all this?” Julia asked Sharron, as if she expected her friend to have an explanation.
“I think this is for you,” Sharron said handing Julia a card, which she found on the lounge table. “What does it say? Who is it from?”
“Ugh. Who do you think it’s from?” Julia answered irritated with the man’s persistence. Crumpling the card in her hand, she walked over to the lounge phone and arranged with the front desk clerk to send a couple cleaners to remove the roses from their suite at once. She wanted each and every rose sent back to the arrogant Gabriel Durand.
Though, after she had finished making arrangements for the removal of the roses, she started feeling unexpectedly guilty with her behavior. Unable to understand the sudden mixture of emotions in her heart, Julia said goodnight to Sharron and headed off to bed, feeling angry with herself. What was going on with her? Why was she feeling so guilty for rejecting his gift, she asked herself while climbing into bed. Struggling to fall asleep, Julia tried to convince herself that she wasn’t being ungrateful or churlish by rejecting his gift. Tossing and turning, she later fell asleep, feeling confused by the clashing emotions within her heart.
The following morning Gabriel was very displeased to find out that Julia had all of the roses removed from their suite. Sitting in his office drumming his fingers on the desk, he tried to understand the reasoning behind her refusal of his gift. Most women would love receiving flowers, he thought baffled, but the more he thought about her, the more it became clear to him that Julia was nothing like other women. Rethinking his strategy a bit, Gabriel picked up the phone and placed a large order of assorted chocolates from their local confectionary store. She might not like roses, but he was sure that she would not be able to resist the sweet taste of chocolates.
Returning to his office after his normal morning rounds, Gabriel was baffled for the second time that day. Packed in neat stacks on top of his desk, stood the boxes of assorted chocolates he had sent to Julia’s room. On top of one of the boxes was a note reading:
Mister Gabriel Durand,
Firstly, I need to thank you for your gifts. I can however not accept these gifts from you. Therefore, I am returning them to you. Please do not insist in sending me any more gifts, as I am not one of those women who can be so cheaply bought. You will merely be wasting your time and your money.
Regards,
Julia Garner
Reading the note for a second time, Gabriel impatiently tossed it in the rubbish bin. What was it with that woman? He invites her to dinner, but then she doesn’t show up. He sends her roses, but she orders the staff to immediately get rid of it. He sends her chocolates, but then she sends it straight back to his office. Nothing seems to be good enough for her. And what did she mean with that statement that she couldn’t be so cheaply purchased, he asked himself with a deep frown. Drawing his own conclusions, he decided that her statement could only have meant that she thought he was being cheap in his choice of gifts. The word gold digger briefly came to mind, but he swiftly pushed it aside. He did not want to believe that of her. No, she wasn’t a gold digger, he thought with a shake of the head, all she meant with that statement was that she was not one of those cheap women and that he would have to put some effort into winning her friendship. That was all she meant with that statement, Gabriel nodded convinced.
So, she thought his previous attempts were unoriginal, uninspiring, or maybe even cheap? We’ll see if she would still be thinking him cheap after he was done with her, he thought with determination. Over the next couple of days Gabriel really stepped up his game and started sending all sorts of expensive gifts to Julia, but each and every day she rejected his gifts and sent it straight back to him. Getting nowhere with her, he became increasingly frustrated and was fast running out of ideas, but then it suddenly hit him that he was approaching the situation wrong. She was most probably rejecting his gifts because it was impersonal, showing no real effort from his side. Perhaps she wanted to see more of a personal effort from him. Giving the matter some thought, he came up with a brilliant idea to sweep her off her feet. With his eyes glittering with anticipation he picked up the phone and started making arrangements for a romantic cruise on his private yacht later that evening. He figured that since he already had a cruise planned for that afternoon, he might as well invite Julia and her friend along for the cruise, and then once he and Julia had become a little better acquainted, they could extend the cruise to a romantic evening cruise under the stars.
Julia and Sharron were having an awesome time exploring the narrow streets of the older part of the city, which had so much to do, see, and buy, that even the pickiest of tourists would find themselves spoiled for choice. There were hundreds of shops filled with anything and everything a tourist would be interested in buying. On their way back to the hotel to have lunch, they first visited the local flower market, which was bustling with the live and vivid colors of an array of domestic and exotic flowers.
There was such a variety of things to see and visit, that they feared that they wouldn’t get to experience half of the things Nice had to offer before the end of their holiday. Both women agreed that vacationing in Nice was the best holiday choice they could have made, as it offered every activity any tourist would be looking for. Babbling excitedly they left the flower market and headed off towards the hotel, as it was almost midday already and they were both starving after all the exercise they got that day.
When they got back to the hotel, they first went up to their suite to freshen up for lunch. Thoroughly footsore from the day’s walking and sightseeing, Julia and Sharron both flopped down onto the plushy sofas the moment they got back to their suite. They just wanted to relax a bit, before getting ready for lunch. Flopping down on the sofas, they immediately saw the large bouquet of roses standing on the lounge stable, along with a beautiful card, inviting them on an exclusive cruise upon Gabriel’s private yacht that afternoon, mentioning in brackets that the cruise could be extended to a private evening cruise if Julia so wished.
Reading the contents of the card, Julia irately crumpled it up in her hand and threw back on the table. She was completely exasperated by the persistence of the man. Doesn’t he know when to give up? Didn’t he receive her message loud and clear,
Julia thought incensed with Gabriel. Sharron, on the other hand, was excited to have received the invitation and wanted to make use of the opportunity, but no matter how much she begged, pleaded, or argued, Julia did not want to hear anything about going on the cruise. She was dead set against the cruise and blatantly refused to go.
After having a huge argument and freshening up, Julia and Sharron started heading down to the hotel restaurant patio, which had a breathtaking view of the beach. All the way down to the patio Sharron was noticeably quiet, not saying a word to Julia. It was obvious to Julia that Sharron was feeling more than slightly peeved with her refusal to go on the cruise, but she wasn’t going to waste her time by trying to explain her feelings towards Gabriel. She just knew that Sharron wouldn’t understand her reasoning and thought process. From the moment she met Gabriel, her intuition had warned her against him. He was nothing but trouble, and the further she stayed away from him, the better off she would be.
Ignoring Sharron’s foul mood, Julia picked out a corner table on the patio for them to sit at. The restaurant was extremely busy at the time of their arrival, with most of the patio tables occupied by guests, all enjoying the fresh ocean breeze while enjoying delicious french cuisine. A couple of tables from where Julia and Sharron were sitting were a large group of kids eating ice cream, laughing jovially and babbling endlessly. Watching the kids entertaining themselves and having a good time, Julia couldn’t help to notice that they were very poorly dressed, especially in comparison with most of the kids they have previously seen staying at the hotel. It was with growing sympathy that she wondered where the kids were from, deciding that they had to be from a children’s home or something in that line.
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