The Billionaire's Christmas Bride

by Lara Hunter

  There was a picture of my parents in my wallet. I was probably the only person my age in the world who carried an actual photo in their wallet, the way people did back in the day, but I couldn’t risk putting a photo of them on my Brazilian phone. I didn’t want to run the risk of anybody tracing me.

  There they were. Smiling, happy, in the little apartment in the retirement village I’d set them up with years earlier. They could finally stop working themselves into an early grave. They were only in their late fifties, but could have passed for at least ten years older. I’d never seen either of them complain. I’d also never seen them take a vacation until I was the one paying for it. It had been a joy, taking care of them. They could finally rest and enjoy life. I owed them that much.

  That was why I picked up my phone and dialed the number Frank gave me. My heart raced as I waited for them to answer the phone. Who would it be? A boardroom full of stuffed shirts, plotting their takeover of the world? The early stages of a job were always the most exciting. There were just so many possibilities.

  “Hello.”

  My eyes opened wide at the sound of the electronically altered voice. It was deep, low, and clearly coming through some sort of device. Creepy, really. The sort of thing a person usually heard in horror movies.

  I forced myself to get over the surprise. “Hello. A friend of mine told me to call you. He said you have a job for me.”

  “Yes. A job for someone of your considerable talents.”

  Unnerving. I felt like I was talking to a machine.

  “What do you want me to do, exactly?”

  A chuckle. “You are to infiltrate a Brazilian corporation by any and all means necessary. The De Rocha Medical Group.”

  I took notes. “To what end?” I asked.

  “You are to uncover evidence of illegal activity conducted by the company’s corrupt CEO, Lucas De Rocha.”

  I wrote it all down, picturing the man in my head. Probably some fat cat hiking up the costs of healthcare for the poor of Brazil. The thought made my blood run cold.

  “What’s the purpose of this?” I asked.

  “What do you think, Selena?” came the sarcastic reply.

  I managed to hold back a gasp. How did he know my name? I knew Frank was professional enough to keep personal information to himself. He would never give my name to a potential client without my permission. We didn’t have a deal yet. Whoever was on the other end of the line had the means to find out whatever they wanted. Of course, they also had the means to offer a lot of money for the job.

  I reminded myself to stay cool. “You want to take them down.”

  “I want information that will cause a scandal. I want to rock the world. I want to take down the company and ruin De Rocha for good.”

  I hoped it would be easy, fast, since the voice on the other end of the line had gone from creepy to menacing. They had a real beef with De Rocha, I could sense that much. What had he done to them? Wronged a loved one? Cheated them somehow?

  Whatever it was, I would need to use my skills quickly. I didn’t want to do business with this client any longer than was absolutely necessary.

  “Fair enough. Of course, you’ll understand if I ask about the fee for the job.”

  They chuckled. The voice was deep, but I couldn’t be sure if it was a man or a woman. “I would be surprised if you didn’t ask, Selena. I’m prepared to offer three-quarters of a million American dollars.”

  My mouth went dry. Seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars. I’d never made that sort of money for a single job, ever. All my troubles would be a thing of the past. I could get out of the industrial sabotage game. I could do what I wanted, go where I wanted, and never have to worry about how to support my parents again.

  “Are you there? Or did I shock you?”

  I took a deep breath. “I’m here.”

  “I take it my offer appeals to you, then?”

  It did more than appeal to me. It made me want to run screaming through the streets. Maybe naked.

  “It does.”

  “Good. Then you accept.”

  “Not so fast,” I said, getting hold of myself again. “Where will I go? When does the job start?”

  “You’ll go to De Rocha headquarters—you’ll find it in the middle of Rio—two days from now at eight-thirty in the morning. They’re interviewing candidates for De Rocha’s new PA. You will be that PA. It will be the perfect opportunity for you to become close with him, to be inside his office.”

  “So the job’s already mine?”

  “It will be by then. You’re a plant. And from what I know about you, De Rocha will like you very much.”

  My stomach turned at little at the thought of a slobbering, lecherous old man chasing me around the desk, trying to get me to sit on his knee.

  “Good to know,” I smirked. It probably wasn’t the best idea, showing the client my sarcastic side, but I couldn’t help myself.

  “You accept, then? I’m a busy person, Selena, without much time to banter—even though I’m enjoying this immensely.”

  I rolled my eyes. I was sure he was. He was a breath away from taking down his rival, or his enemy, or whoever De Rocha was to him. He was enjoying the hell out of himself.

  I thought about all that money. The idea of setting Mom and Dad up permanently was too good to pass up. The thought of being free to live my life, to go wherever I wanted and do whatever I wanted, tempted me more than anything else ever had. I could travel. I could live around the world and work as I needed to, the cost of living in many countries being much less than it was in America. Even the cost of my beachfront hotel had been shockingly low compared to what I would have paid back in Florida.

  All of that went through my mind in the blink of an eye before I said, “Yes. I accept.”

  “Excellent. I expect a progress report from you two days in. This should be a fast job. I’m sure you won’t have to work hard to find what you need.”

  I sure hoped so.

  THREE

  Once I decided to take the job, I could breathe a sigh of relief. Knowing what I’d have to do, finally accepting that I would do it, made everything that came afterward a lot easier.

  For instance, doing in-depth research on my target. It wasn’t my first rodeo. I knew where to look to find out everything about Mr. De Rocha and his dirty deeds. If I got lucky, I might come across some of my favorite keywords in relation to his name. Divorce. Mistress. Girlfriend. Scandal.

  Instead, when I entered his name into Google and hit “enter,” a completely different picture than what I’d held in my head greeted me. I leaned forward, closer to my laptop screen, glass of wine in hand.

  “Well hello, handsome,” I murmured, looking him up and down. He was gorgeous. Instead of the middle-aged, sweaty, obese billionaire I’d imagined, what I saw was a young man with a killer smile and steel-gray eyes that looked as though they could undress a woman from across the room. Black hair, just long enough to flop down a little over his forehead. A tanned complexion that made his smile leap from his face. A jawline for days. Dimples. He had that air of “Who, me?” about him that women found charming. I sure did. Like he couldn’t believe his luck. God had given him looks and money.

  Of course, it was all a façade if there was dirt for me to uncover. It couldn’t be real. He probably had a million skeletons in the closet. A closet otherwise full of custom-tailored suits that seemed to mold themselves to his tall, chiseled body. I was almost disappointed that there weren’t any photos of him in a T-shirt and jeans…or, preferably, even less. The suits were enough to pique my interest and then some, and I didn’t take my eyes from his photos as I sipped my wine. A distinct warmth spread through my body, seeming to culminate in my core.

  “Get it together, Selena,” I whispered. It would have been so much easier if he were old and ugly with a barely-legal girl on his arm. I could have been grossed out by him and eager to see him suffer for whatever he’d done. So I told myself he was probably a self-
obsessed creep, somebody who thought the world revolved around him and his money. Yes. He probably used women like toys, throwing them away when he got tired of them. He treated his employees like garbage, too, and he was a bad tipper. A very bad tipper. That helped me hate him a little bit. I felt better.

  Until I started digging a little deeper, and my heart sank. He wasn’t a creep—at least, not on the surface. And he hadn’t been born with that money, either. It wasn’t a family company in the sense that he’d inherited it. No, he’d built it himself.

  “Are you freaking kidding me?” I asked as I scanned an article written about him for Forbes. Lucas De Rocha was perfect in every way, at least according to what I was reading. I was sure the writer hadn’t exactly been unbiased—when I saw a girl’s name on the byline, I had the feeling he might have charmed her a little bit. Still, facts were facts. The guy grew up in a rural village, dirt poor. Now, at the age of thirty, he was a billionaire. Wasn’t life funny?

  I finished off my glass of wine and poured another before getting back to my digging, sitting on the sofa with my feet tucked under me. The door to the balcony was still open, the night breeze cooler than it had been earlier. I loved it so much. Wherever I went, it couldn’t be far from the ocean. I wanted to be able to hear it through the night, letting the sound of the waves soothe me.

  So, Lucas De Rocha was pretty much a freak of nature. Tall, gorgeous, and a rags-to-riches story. He gave generously to charity, too. I wondered if he made a habit of rescuing orphans from burning buildings. No, I discovered, but he did start a foundation which helped children with cleft palates get corrective surgery for free. I couldn’t help admiring him for that.

  So he was perfect. Well, nobody was perfect. I had to put aside the good things he did and get to the meat. The reason my client wanted to take him down.

  The De Rocha Medical Group specialized in plastic surgery. That made sense when I thought about his charity. A man like him would be aware of the number of babies born with the defect and what it could do to a life. But that sure as heck wasn’t his bread and butter, not if he was a billionaire. No, he made his money off of people willing to pay any amount of money for perfection. I’d seen enough beautiful bodies in my three weeks in Brazil to know how many of them weren’t completely natural. Plastic surgery seemed like a common practice among the wealthy, just like it was anywhere around the world.

  According to another article written about De Rocha’s rise to fame and fortune, all he wanted to do was find ways to help those who’d grown up in the conditions he had. The way he made it sound, they had been destitute. He couldn’t forget those people and what he’d seen as he grew up. He’d always looked up to his big brother, Diego, who had made his own fortune in the deforestation industry. By the time Lucas had reached college age, Diego had been in a position to put his brother through school, and he now served as the Vice President of De Rocha Medical.

  A family affair, huh? I wondered how close the brothers really were, being eight years apart in age. They sure seemed chummy in the photo taken for the article.

  I compared one to the other. There was no question: Lucas was far and away the better looking. Diego had the same eyes and smile, but his face was softer, rounder. He didn’t have the chiseled elegance of his little brother. Still, he was wealthy in his own right. I was sure he didn’t lack for girlfriends.

  So that was my target. A thirty-year-old billionaire who believed in helping the poor. Somebody who hadn’t forgotten his roots and didn’t hesitate to talk about them—I was surprised at his candor during interviews, his openness. He wasn’t the type that tried to hide where he came from. There was no shame. He wanted to give hope, I realized. He wanted others to know it was possible.

  I wanted to hate him, but it was getting harder by the minute.

  Well, there was one comfort. The bigger the man, the better he looked to outsiders, the more likely it was that he had huge secrets. It was always the guys who nobody thought had it in them, wasn’t it? The ones who gave to charity and talked about their desire to help those less fortunate. They were the ones the rest of the world clucked their tongues over when the secrets hit the public eye.

  Lucas was no different. He was intriguing, no doubt, but still only human. He probably had the same vices other men did. He might have girlfriends everywhere, or a secret opiate addiction. He could be laundering money or cheating his investors. He could even be cheating his brother, for all I knew.

  It wouldn’t be long before I found out.

  By the time I finished my research, it was nearly midnight, and I’d polished off three glasses of wine. Still, my mind was sharp, ready to get started on my new job. I could hardly wait to see the sort of dirt I’d uncover on Mr. Wonderful once I met him in person and had access to his office. The world had already had so many of its heroes dethroned. There was always room on the list for one more.

  FOUR

  My ride to the headquarters of De Rocha Medical Group was long, full of traffic and noise and headaches. I’d left my hotel with plenty of time to spare, but by the time my cab driver dropped me off in front of the tall, white building, I had to rush to make it up to the top floor in time. I made a mental note to leave even earlier the next day; I couldn’t stand out for being late to work. I needed to blend in.

  That was always rule number one. Blend in. When people looked back and wondered how something had happened, how secrets had ever been revealed, they couldn’t remember me. They needed to skim over my memory. A blurry face without a name.

  The inside of the elevator doors was reflective, and I gave myself a once-over to be sure I looked my best. I had pulled my long, thick hair back into a smart twist. I smoothed my fingers over it, making sure there weren’t any stray hairs sticking out. My makeup was minimal, tasteful. My earrings, small pearls to go with the single strand I wore around my neck. After a lot of deliberation, I’d decided on a simple sheath dress in a shade of light blue that complimented my tanned skin. It also hid my curves a little, taming them, making me look less like a pin-up model and more like the sort of girl who could be a PA to a billionaire CEO. I looked great, and unmemorable, right down to my nude heels.

  The doors opened just as I finished smoothing my hair, and I stepped out into a beehive of activity. I hadn’t expected the top floor, the executive floor, to be so busy. They were usually much more quiet, reserved only for the very top brass.

  Not the case here. I jumped back to avoid getting run over by a guy with a stack of file folders balanced in his outstretched arms. Then there was the girl racing down the hall, calling out somebody else’s name, telling them there was a call on line three. I heard voices, both murmurs out outright shouts, filling the air. It was more than a little overwhelming.

  The receptionist, a pretty, dark-haired girl, rolled her eyes good-naturedly. “Sorry,” she said in husky Portuguese. “You arrived on a crazy day.”

  “Evidently,” I laughed. Then I stuck out my hand. “Selena McCarthy. I’m here to see…”

  “Mr. De Rocha, of course. Boy, will Dani be happy to see you. Right this way.” She pressed a button on her switchboard, removed her headset and set off at a near-run toward the other side of the floor. I had to trot to keep up with her.

  When we reached the corner office, we were greeted with rapturous excitement by a redhead who looked like she was at the end of her rope. The phone rang off the hook and she struggled to keep up with the calls while typing frantically on her keyboard.

  “That’s Dani,” the receptionist whispered. “And I’m Catia. Welcome aboard. When she’s finished, she’ll show you the ropes. She’s so glad you’re here.”

  Catia trotted off on her stilettoes, leaving me looking around in wonder. I’d been in a lot of offices before, but the grandeur around me was breathtaking. Lucas certainly knew how to create a sense of luxury. The rich, dark wood along the floor and walls called to mind Diego’s involvement with deforestation—had he provided the materials for his brother’s
offices? Meanwhile, the floor-to-ceiling windows along one wall allowed visitors to look out over breathtaking views of Rio. The sky was a deep shade of sapphire blue, and I could see for miles.

  “Selena?”

  I turned to find Dani pulling off her headset, flashing me a tired and grateful smile.

  “That’s me,” I said cheerily, shaking her hand. “I guess I came on a crazy day, huh?”

  “So crazy. There’s a major investor coming in in a matter of days, so we’re really jumping.” She showed me her desk, covered in files and correspondence.

  “Are you Mr. De Rocha’s normal PA?” I asked, wondering why they’d hired me if they already had somebody else for the role.