Single TV Dad: Billionaire Romance... Naughty Angel Style

by Alexis Angel

  Paul smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. “I know you’re jovial about it, Parker, but I didn’t want Dad to take the company away from me. You can’t tell me that he will be fine with this.”

  I shake my head. He’s right, but I can’t tell him that. “But you have the company now,” I say. “And it’s your life. You should choose what you want to do, live the life you want.”

  Paul smiles again, and it’s the same empty smile.

  “I know you think I would have told Mom and Dad, but you could have spoken to me. You didn’t have to hide behind Skylar.”

  Paul shakes his head. “It’s easy for you to say that because you’re on the other side, Parker. You might have done the same thing.”

  I don’t respond because I won’t tell him that I would ruin my brother’s life and take away the woman he loves. I’m trying to get through to him, but he doesn’t want me close to him. That much is clear. I won’t keep pushing if he’s not interested.

  Whatever he wanted to talk about, it’s not that.

  “Why did you ask to see me?” I ask. “I thought you wanted to talk about everything.”

  Paul shakes his head. “I wanted to talk about Skylar.”

  I frown. “What about her?” He can’t tell me now that I was wrong to take his woman, that I should leave her alone. She was never his woman from what I found out recently.

  “Why do you think she was so happy to marry a gay guy?”

  I’ve wondered about that, but I didn’t want to ask. It’s hard to think that she rejected me, the straight guy, for my gay brother.

  “You see,” Paul continues. “She was willing to keep my secret because I was hiding something for her, too.”

  I don’t like where this is going.

  “What are you talking about?” I ask.

  “Little underscore Minx,” he says.

  I blink at him. I have no idea what he’s talking about. I shake my head.

  “It’s her webcam name.”

  “I’m not following.”

  Paul sighs and looks around like he’s frustrated with my inability to understand it.

  “She used to work for a sexcam website when she was in college. She didn’t want anyone to know. I found out. I told her I would keep her secret if she would help me get what I needed.”

  I’m trying to make sense of what he’s saying, but it’s not working.

  “You’re saying…”

  “I’m saying the woman you’re banging behind my back sold her body online to strange men all over the world.”

  Blood drains from my face.

  “You’re lying,” I say.

  Paul shrugs. “You don’t have to believe me. Look up her cam name, see if I’m wrong. The butterfly on her hip gives it away.”

  I feel like I can’t breathe. The whole thing sounds surreal, but she has that butterfly on her hip. Why would Paul, a man who wouldn’t sleep with her because he’s gay, know about that? My head aches dully, and I blink at Paul.

  “Why are you telling me this?” I ask.

  Paul shrugs. “I thought you should know.”

  He waves at the waitress and gets up. “I don’t have time for lunch, after all,” he says. “The coffee is on me.”

  He walks to the counter by the door where he pays the bill. I watch him as he disappears through the door, sitting in the wake of destruction. I’m trying desperately to tell myself that it’s not true, but I can’t see any other reason why Skylar, a straight woman very much in touch with her sexuality, would marry a gay man.

  I feel like I’ve been hit in the gut. Slowly, anger replaces shock. I feel the rage boil beneath my skin. By the time I leave the shop, I am not dazed.

  I’m fucking furious.

  Skylar

  “That’s the last of them,” Lizzie says and closes the door that looks out on the street. We don’t kick out our customers unless we have to, but if someone runs through my door five minutes before closing time I don’t refuse them. Which is why we’re open half an hour later today.

  She locks the door and turns to me.

  “So, now that you’re finally alone, you have to tell me about your weekend.”

  I roll my eyes, but I can’t help smiling.

  “There’s not really that much to tell,” I say. It’s a lie, of course, but I don’t want to turn my relationship with Parker into gossip. The weekend was perfect in every way, and I want to keep it that way, hold the memory tightly, roll it around in my mouth whenever I want to revisit it, taste it again and again.

  “Come on,” Lizzie says. “You can’t hold out on me like this. You’re already not telling me everything.”

  “What am I not telling you?” I ask, giving her big eyes.

  She sighs. “Really? You’re going to be like this?”

  I open my mouth to say something, but Parker appears in front of the glass door. Lizzie turns to see what I’m looking at. When she sees Parker, she hurries and unlocks for him.

  “Speak of the devil,” she mutters before she pulls the door open and pastes her customer-smile onto her face.

  “We’re closed, but the boss says to let you in.”

  She grins at me. Parker smiles at her joke, but it’s an empty smile. Something’s wrong.

  I haven’t spoken to Parker since this morning. I don’t know how his conversation with Paul went. I don’t know anything. My stomach twists.

  “Well, I’m off,” Lizzie says and shoots me a look that tells me I owe her a story later. I greet her, and she leaves, closing the door behind her.

  When we’re alone, Parker stands on the other side of the counter in silence. He looks around the bakery like he hasn’t seen it before.

  “Are you okay?” I ask.

  Parker turns his eyes to me, and they’re icy cold. He looks upset.

  My stomach twists again. He’s not speaking to me. That’s a bad sign.

  “You’ve really made something of the place,” he says. “It was a good investment.”

  I frown. Why is he referring to the money he gave me to start up the place?

  “What’s wrong, Parker?” I ask. “Talk to me. You’re so closed off.”

  “You want me to talk to you?” he asks as if I didn’t just say it.

  I nod. “I want us to be open with each other.”

  Parker blinks at me. He laughs, but it’s a bitter sound, and I cringe.

  “You want us to be open with each other?” he asks.

  Is he going to keep throwing my words back at me like this? It’s pissing me off. I want him to talk to me. I don’t need to hear my own words again. I’m asking him questions for a reason.

  “Parker, please.”

  I realize I’ve said those words so many times, begging him for release during sex. It’s ironic that I’m asking for a release of another kind the same way.

  “All right, let’s talk about being open,” he says. His words are full of menace. He’s angry, I realize. I recognize it. I’ve seen it before. His anger crackles around him like an electric charge. His eyes are void of life, and he’s scary when he’s like this. “Let’s talk about how you sold yourself online and didn’t bother to tell me about it.”

  He speaks the words carefully, and they hit me like physical punches. I can’t breathe. It feels like the walls are closing in around us, and my blood rushes in my ears so loudly the only thing I can hear is my racing heart.

  “So, it’s true?” he asks, but I think he’s challenging me, rather than really asking for an answer.

  What can I say to that? Paul betrayed me. He ratted me out when I didn’t even tell his secret. He went to the one person I really care about and ruined my image in his eyes.

  Or maybe I did that the day I signed up to do sexcams. Maybe I threw my own life away, and it’s just taken this long to catch up with me.

  “Parker.”

  “Answer me!” he shouts so loudly that I jump. I can taste my heart in my throat.

  “I don’t want to do this if you’r
e going to shout at me,” I say. “We’re both adults.”

  Parker looks like he wants to say something, his rage surfacing for a moment so that I’m terrified of what he might do. But then he swallows it down and manages to gain control of himself.

  “Just tell me if it’s true,” he says. His voice is calm, but the anger is palpable in the shop, and I know there’s no way I’m going to get out of this one.

  Something inside me flips, and I can push away my emotions now. I do this when things are too difficult to handle. Like when Paul found out about the videos and threatened to out me unless I agreed to marry him so many years ago.

  I nod, not caring about what Parker sees or thinks now. I’ll worry about it later. I know I will, but right now, I’m invincible.

  “It’s true,” I say.

  Parker’s emotions are raw on his face. For a moment, he looks like he’s about to lose it. Emotions cross his face at record speed, and I can’t read any of them except pain.

  When he opens his mouth again, he says, “Why?”

  The way he says it isn’t a question of why I did it. It’s deeper than that, a question of why me, why now, why not anyone else on the godforsaken earth? But I don’t know how to answer that for him. I don’t know how to explain to him that sometimes, good people make bad choices.

  I don’t know how to tell him that I couldn’t let him know because he would look at me the way he looks at me now, with irreparable disappointment.

  So, I answer the obvious question.

  “Because I needed money to get through college. My parents didn’t have the money, and I wasn’t going to ask them to do something drastic. My waitressing job, and any other job that I searched for, didn’t pay enough. I had to get out of that life and make more of myself. I had a dream I wanted to chase.”

  Parker shakes his head. “Don’t tell me it was about money. You can make money doing other things.”

  “You’ll be surprised what students do to get by,” I say. My voice is level, calm. Somewhere deep down, my emotions are churning, but for now, it doesn’t matter. I will deal with that later.

  “I don’t believe you,” Parker says.

  I frown at him. “Why else would I do something like that?” I ask.

  Parker looks at me without answering, and that is its own answer.

  “Do you think that I’m one of those girls? That I’m a whore?”

  I’m angry now. I can push away shock and horror and fear and sorrow and pain. I can’t push away anger.

  “Are you implying that I fuck for fun?”

  Parker shrugs. “Well, you do seem to be the kind that will fuck her husband’s brother.”

  My ears start ringing, and I know if I don’t hold onto my control with both hands, I will lose my shit all over the place and do something I’ll regret later. I fold my arms over my chest and squeeze tightly, as if I can physically keep myself from falling apart. I don’t dare let go for fear of what I’ll do.

  Parker has sunken into that quiet rage that’s so dangerous. When he speaks again, his voice barely sounds like his own.

  “I want you to go back home and pack your shit. Get the fuck out of my life, and don’t come back.”

  His words are like more blows raining down on me, but I can’t shield myself with my arms because it’s all emotional.

  “You’re kicking me out?” I ask. I surprise myself by how calm I sound.

  Parker nods. “I am. Looks like I have a lot more in common with my brother than I thought.”

  That last comment is like he pushes a knife between my ribs and twists it for good measure. He turns and leaves.

  “I’ll be home in an hour. I hope that by then, you’re gone.”

  He closes the glass door behind him. I stay upright, watching him until he disappears behind the wall before I double over. I’m gasping for breath, and the tears that I’ve been biting back come like a dam wall has broken.

  I fall to my knees and sob on the floor. His words bounce around in my head, and I can hear my heart shatter.

  When I reach his apartment he’s not home, just like he said. I walk into the bedroom and find my suitcase. I start packing my clothes, throwing them into the bag without folding them. I can’t see through my tears. I would have liked to push the emotions away for longer, but there were too many of them. This is all too real.

  I don’t think anyone has hurt me as much as Parker did with what he said to me.

  I walk into the bathroom and collect my makeup. It’s hard to think that in such a short time of living with Parker, our worlds have merged so much. I have to concentrate on all the places I might have left more things, and thinking is hard when I’m crying this much. I wipe my cheeks with the back of my hand and try to get the suitcase shut. With everything spilling out, I can’t get it shut properly, and that makes me cry harder.

  Finally, I manage to get my suitcase closed. I walk to the living room, dragging my bag along when the door opens, and Parker walks in.

  I freeze. I’m caught in the middle of the living room with my suitcase packed, makeup streaks running down my face.

  “You’re packed?” he asks in a cold voice.

  I nod.

  “Good,” he says.

  I take a deep breath and steady myself. I can’t help that I look like an emotional mess, but I can make sure I don’t sound like one, too.

  “Can we at least talk about this?” I ask.

  Parker shakes his head. “What’s there to talk about? You lied to me, about my brother and about this. And I don’t want you.”

  The last words hit me so hard I can barely breathe.

  Parker doesn’t seem to care that I’m such a mess, that I’m leaving, that he’s hurting me this much. I don’t even know if it’s the same irrational anger as the night at the bar when he saw Paul. That kind of anger blows over, but this?

  It’s more like quiet hatred, and it looks like it’s here to stay.

  Parker steps to the side, showing me the door. I let out a shaky breath and walk toward the door, struggling with my heavy suitcase. He doesn’t help me. He doesn’t say goodbye. Hell, he doesn’t even look at me.

  I’m barely outside when the door clicks firmly shut behind me. I start crying again, tears rolling over my cheeks. I fish for my phone and dial Lizzie’s number while I walk. When she answers and she hears me cry, she tells me she’s coming to get me right away. I give her the address and hang up.

  At least I have somewhere to go. It doesn’t make me feel any better.

  Yesterday, I was coming back from a honeymoon-like weekend with Parker, and everything was right with the world. Now, it feels like a century ago. How did my life fall apart in such a short span of time?

  Parker

  The only thing worse than being ripped apart is not being able to fall asleep and forget about it for a few hours. When I’m an emotional wreck, I can’t fall asleep. Not only does it mean that there’s almost no end to the torture, but it also means that I’ll be tired and groggy when I go to work, and my mind won’t stop running over everything that’s happened.

  By Tuesday night, I’m a complete mess. I look like shit, I have dark circles under my eyes, and I haven’t shaven since Monday morning. I snap at anyone trying to contact me, and they’ve started avoiding me at work.

  Fan-fucking-tastic.

  It’s all about Skylar, of course. And Paul. I can’t get over my brother and the woman I love playing me like I’m a fool. Did they think I wouldn’t eventually find out? Of course, it’s taken me long enough. There’s just so much to wrap my head around.

  After everything has settled, my mind starts running through all the conversations: what Paul said, what Skylar said, what I said.

  I’m starting to regret my words. I was so angry I couldn’t think straight, and in my fury, I said things to Skylar that I really shouldn’t have. I’m not going to call her to apologize, though. She lied to me. Not only did she withhold from me that my brother is gay, she married the guy wh
en she was going to date me. And this shit about her being online in sex videos? Fuck, I don’t even know how to deal with that.

  We had so much together. I think about every time we’ve had sex. In her office at the bakery. In Paul’s house. In my place, repeatedly. In Colorado. Everything we’ve done was so amazing, so erotic.

  And now? How many other men have seen her naked? How many other people have jacked off watching her doing… whatever?

  God, I can’t even think about it. I feel betrayed. I feel like she took something sacred, something personal, and threw it out there for the world to see.

  I think that this was before I met her. I know that it’s got nothing to do with the sex I’ve had with her, but it makes it feel like my most intimate moments have been thrown out there, anyway.

  I can’t get over it.

  I was ready to tell Paul he was lying and he was talking through his ass. I was ready to tell him I didn’t think she’d ever sink that low. But then he mentioned her butterfly tattoo, and Paul is gay and way too proper to be around naked women just because he’s harmless.

  I roll over in bed and stuff my head underneath my pillow. God, if only I could drown out the thoughts. My room is almost completely dark. I can only make out the outlines of the furniture. Because my eyes have nothing to do, my brain flashes on Skylar’s face, her long auburn hair that’s slightly wavy if she dries it naturally, her smooth skin, her dark blue eyes that follow me around the room.

  Fuck! The only thing worse than losing her is losing her because she’s not who I thought she was.

  I can’t lie still anymore. I can’t have these thoughts in my mind on repeat. I will go crazy. I sit up, switch on the bedside lamp, and look around. When I look at the clock, it’s four in the morning. She’ll be waking up now, getting ready to be at the bakery at five. It’s Wednesday morning.

  I shake my head, trying to get rid of the thoughts. I don’t care what she’s doing right now. I need a distraction.

  What Paul said pops into my mind. Little underscore Minx. Her webcam name.

  I get up and find my laptop, powering it up. If I can see what she did, see how bad it was, maybe it will be easier to get over her. Maybe, if I realize that she really isn’t the one for me, I will be able to get on with my life.