by Alexis Moore
“I’m concerned for her safety. Do you have any idea who her friends are and what their addresses or telephone numbers are?”
“I never paid much attention…” Realizing how terrible that sounded, the man left the sentence open ended.
“Are you aware of the torment you and your wife have caused Shakira!”
“We provide a roof over her head, feed and clothe her! She can’t ask for more than that!”
“She can ask for love.”
“Look, my wife never took to her when she was born. When I tried to play with her, my wife got jealous, so I gave up. I love my wife.” The man uttered the last statement with a touch of defiance.
“David, I’m going to search for her…the whole country if I have to. When I find her I’m going to marry her in the most lavish wedding London has ever seen.”
The man’s scowling face broke into a wide smile as he discarded the paper and rushed around the desk. “Welcome to my family, son!”
“No, David.” Jared sidestepped and avoided the man’s embrace. “I don’t want you or your wife around Shakira unless she asks for either of you specifically. You were blessed with an angel and you crushed her gentle spirit and denied her the chance of living a happier life with her grandparents in India. You should both be charged with reckless child endangerment. Now get your things and leave these premises.”
Jared turned and rapidly walked out of the room. He stopped at the next doorway and rammed his right fist into the open palm of his left hand. Another second in the older man’s presence and he would have rammed it into his face.
He forcibly willed himself to calm down. He didn’t have time for anger. He needed to have all airports, ferry crossing and exit points out of the country covered. It would cost money, but that was of little concern to him. He had more than he could ever spend or needed.
If he’d lost Shakira, he had nothing.
***
“Miss, beg pardon, the man is here to see you.”
“To see me?” I asked, wanting to smile at the older man’s carefully spoken English. Although I constantly reminded my grandfather’s servants that I speak both Marathi and Hindi, they always spoke to me in English. I didn’t mind if it was giving them practice, but I worried that it was because they didn’t want to offend me. “Thank you.”
It’s probably one of Grandfather’s old business acquaintances, I told myself as I hurried from the library to his massive hallway. As I passed, I admired the beautiful wooden tiles on the wall which had been laid in an intricate design and then lacquered. His house was well maintained but hadn’t been updated in over forty years. I love its old charm and hoped he’d never change it.
At first I didn’t recognize Jared. He looked gaunt as if despair had pulled at his face until it had changed his features. Our gazes met and held, and then he smiled. His eyes lit up and his features rearranged themselves into those dear familiar ones I had traced so many times in our week together.
I picked up the end of my sari and ran to him.
He sprinted towards me and then I was in his arms, being spun around and around as we kissed.
“How did you find me?” I asked breathlessly when we finally had to break for air.
“Khabi Khabie.”
Khabi Khabie? What had mine and my grandmother’s favourite movie have to do with anything? I leaned back and stared up at him, worried the scorching sunshine on the trip from the airport to my grandfather’s house had impaired his mind.
He laughed at my concern. “I watched it time and time again after you left.”
“I thought you said it was a chick flick!” I accused. The night I had cooked him dinner I had tried to interest him in the movie, having had a copy of the DVD picked up with the ingredients I’d needed.
“It grew on me. Especially the poetry.”
“You’re lying!” He had laughed the hardest at the corny poetry.
“I did watch it several times.” His face sobered and I knew he was telling the truth. “I knew if I kept watching that it would trigger something I had overlooked. Two days ago I remembered that you’d said you could play a mother or grandmother.”
“But how did you know that I travel on my grandmother’s passport?” It had been sheer luck that it had had another eight months before it expired.
“My team and I had looked through all the images of passengers leaving UK airports. We were looking for a beautiful young woman. I never thought to look for one that was slightly older, but still beautiful. When I remembered the conversation we had, I instructed them to go over the images again, looking for a mature Indian woman. If we hadn’t found you, we would have then re-examined the faces of every passenger, male or female.”
“You went to all that trouble for me?” I still couldn’t make myself believe that he was here in Mumbai, in my grandfather’s house. I’d thought he’d forgotten me the very day I’d left.
“I would have searched the ends of the earth for you, my love.”
My love! He must have meant the words when he’d said them previously. If only I had known.
“I love you, Jared,”
“I love you, Mrs Codrington.”
Jared’s lips covered mine and the world spun crazily around us.
“Who is this, Shakira?”
My grandfather’s voice boomed down on us from the first floor corridor and we hastily broke apart. I looked up to see him glaring down at Jared, his bushy eyebrows meeting in the middle and giving him a comical single straight eyebrow. I took Jared’s hand and he obediently followed me up the staircase.
“This is Jared, Da Da Gyi,” I introduced.
“You have a lot to answer for, young man!” My grandfather pulled himself up to his full height and tried to stare down Jared. If he had remained the sturdy six-footer he had been in his youth it would have been more effective. Instead, he was staring up at Jared, instead of down his slightly hooked nose at him.
“I know, sir.” I admired Jared for not laughing. I wanted to double over at the sight of my overweight, pot-bellied grandfather challenging a younger, fitter man less than half his age. “I intend to make it up to her by throwing her the biggest wedding London’s ever seen and giving her anything her heart desires.”
“She will be married here first…in Mumbai…on my birthday…on Thursday.” Each time he paused for breath, my grandfather poked Jared in the chest. “I’m too old to fly halfway around the world for the wedding and I want to see her married.”
“It will be as you wish, sir.”
Suddenly Grandfather smiled and patted Jared on the back. “I think I will like you!”
“I hope so, sir.”
My grandfather winked and patted my arm as he walked to the staircase and left us together. I could see his shoulders shake and knew he was trying hard not to laugh after playing the part of a strict grandfather. He had been a minor actor in his day and had met my grandmother on a film set. He’d soon realized that he was no Amitabh Bachchan, given up his lofty dream of being a world-renown actor and taken over his father’s steelmaking company. Since I’d come to India, he’d proudly shown me the few small parts he’d played in movies. And I’d finally found out where my mother got her acting skills.
“His bark is worst than his bite,” I told Jared, slipping my arms around his waist.
“He obviously cares about you very much.” Jared hugged me. I laid my head on his broad chest, feeling the disillusionment, the pain, the worry and heartache slip away. “Unlike your parents who simply reported you as a missing person once they’d realized that you hadn’t taken your passport, and did nothing else.”
“They never even bothered to call Grandfather.” I tried to hide how much that had hurt. I knew I could have called them, but I couldn’t help feeling that they were relieved to have me out of their house. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if my mother hadn’t already turned my bedroom into the large walk-in closet she needed for her thousands of outfits. “Not that Grandfather would hav
e told them I was here.”
“Forget about them. I’ll love you enough for both of them.”
“I love you so much, Jared,” I had suppressed the words each time they bubbled on my lips in our week together. I felt like screaming it from the rooftops now. “And the baby we’ll have in six months will love you, too.”
Anxiously, I held my breath at his stunned expression. Then his face broke into a smile wider than any I’d seen.
“Really, sweetheart?”
I nodded, too choked up to speak.
“When did you know?” he demanded, his smile suddenly fading.
“The doctor confirmed it on Monday,” I told him hastily. I would never have kept his child from him. “I was going to fly back to the UK to let you know on Friday, the day after my grandfather’s 70th birthday.”
“You’ve made me the happiest man in the world, my love.”
Before I could respond, he covered my lips with his. I kissed him back fiercely, trying to convey with every fibre of my being that he made me more than happy, more than ecstatic—he made me complete.
The End
Thank you for purchasing The Billionaire’s Payment. I do hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.
Please don’t forget to leave a review!
Regards,
Alexis Moore
Excerpts from other books by Alexis Moore
CURVES FOR THE BILLIONAIRE
Zachary was sitting on the sprawling sofa, engrossed in the newspaper, a snifter with a generous shot of cognac cradled in one hand.
He looked up as he sensed her approach and for a moment he just stared at her. Samantha revelled in his look of blatant appreciation, belatedly wishing that she hadn’t been so hasty in dismissing the young women. A strategically-placed fan set on high would have added the final touch to the fantasy. But Zachary didn’t seem to mind that the dress wasn’t blowing up around her ears and revealing the tiny thong which was the only thing she wore under the dress.
“You look incredible!”
He got up and stalked towards her like a hunter, his eyes drinking in her magnificent curves. Samantha shivered with awareness at the look in his eyes.
“You do realize wearing this dress will have consequences, don’t you?” His voice sounded strained and it filled her both with a sense of power and a frisson of fear. She’d wanted him to lose control, but she may have been rather more successful than planned she realized when he literally growled, “God, I need to have you again!”
He kissed her then, his tongue delving deeply. Samantha welcomed his touch eagerly, thrilled at the urgency of his hands as they slipped first under the top of the dress and tweaked her nipples into twin points of need before reaching under the hem, grasping her behind and grinding her hips against his. She ground hers right back and he shuddered in reaction.
“Come here.” Taking her by the hand he led her to the chair he had just vacated, bending her over the back of it and throwing the hem of her dress up over her head. She blushed as she imagined what he was seeing—the full cheeks of her bottom with just the slender string of the thong between and her full, firm thighs elongated by four-inch heels. His gasp of arousal told her that he found the sight just as provocative as she’d hoped.
Her juices were already flowing. Eagerly, she opened her legs wider at his urging, tilting her bottom upwards so that he could penetrate her deeply. Instead he dropped to his knees behind her and literally buried his face in her wetness as he began to eat her with no mercy—clamping the nub of her clitoris between his lips and tugging on it before sticking his tongue deep inside her and moving it back and forth with the same vigour he had displayed earlier.
“Yesss, ye-ss, yesss…yess, ye-ss.” Her cries and moans filled the room as Zachary gave her notice that her gentle initiation was over—she would be taken relentlessly from here onwards. She beat the sofa with her fists as he carried on without giving her a moment of respite. But just as she felt her orgasm build to the point of no return, he stopped abruptly.
“Zac, please!” she begged.
“I’m not ready for you to come yet.” He got to his feet and walked around the sofa, freeing his erection on the way. When he was standing directly in front of her he commanded, “Open wide for me, sweetheart.”
Samantha braced her hands on the sofa and did as instructed, surprised at how eager she felt to taste him again. With her hands occupied with bearing her weight he had total control of how deeply she took him. Yet, he stood slightly out of reach, letting her just tongue the tip of his shaft at first, and then inch by inch moving closer until she had him lodged firmly at the back of her throat. There was still a few more inches to go, but he wrapped his hand around the base himself before starting to thrust smoothly into her mouth.
Curves for the Billionaire – Amazon UK
Curves for the Billionaire – Amazon US
MY DAD’S BOSS
It was a Mr Hudson, but not the one I expected. This was his good-looking bastard of a son, Nicholas.
His eyes opened in surprise, then he smiled and said, “Hi, Bruiser!”
I hated that name! It was a painful reminder of the first time we’d met. I had still been wearing the stupid dental braces my mother had insisted I needed, though I’d thought my teeth were fine. People tell me I have a killer smile now, so I guess the pain and embarrassment at the time were worth it. But that hadn’t been the most embarrassing thing of meeting him that day. I had bumped into my friend, Gemma, in gym class the day before. And, I mean bumped into, literally. She was shorter then so her hard head had connected with my left eye. I hadn’t wanted to attend the stupid company picnic with an eye the colour of a rainbow, but my father had insisted, saying that I was too young to be left at home on my own. And, added to all that, I had woken up with my first ever teenage spot that same bloody morning. I had looked and felt like hell. I felt even worse when I met Mr Hudson’s eldest son, who just graduated from Cambridge and was off to work in the States on a four-year contract, the next week. He’d been dressed casually in a polo shirt and black jeans, but he’d looked so worldly and sophisticated, I’d felt like a ten-year-old and I’d wished he had bloody gone to America a week early.
He looked suave and even better looking now, sitting behind his father’s desk and wearing a light grey shirt which perfectly matched his eyes. I stared at him stupidly for several seconds, realizing in horror that except for the top which occasionally rode up and showed the undersides of my breasts and the short skirt my mother often threatened to burn or give to the twelve-year-old girl next door, I was naked to his gaze.
“So, Bruiser, what can I do for you?”
“I’m here to see your father.” My voice came out wobbly.
“My father retired three months ago. He and Mum are currently on a Caribbean cruise.”
“So who’s in charge?” I asked, hoping that I was mistaken in thinking that he was.
“I am, of course. Who did you expect to be?”
This is why my dad was worried, I realized. Old Mr Hudson had known him for years and knew how good he was at his job as an investment banker. This young upstart would only see the money he would lose if he lost Mrs North’s account. I decided it would be foolish to beg him for anything.
“Never mind, then.” I grabbed the side of the door wishing that I could back through it instead of having to turn around and walk through it. My mother claimed that the cheeks of my ass were visible under the skirt, but I disagreed totally. The only things visible were the tops of my thighs as they curved into my ass, but I didn’t particularly want him seeing that much of me.
“Come back here, Bruiser!”
I wanted to stick two fingers in the air and tell him to sit on them, but my father’s job kept me in a style to which I had become accustomed. If he lost it, I would have to find one of my own.
My Dad's Boss – Amazon US
My Dad's Boss – Amazon UK
SPANK ME, SANTA!
&nb
sp; My four-year-old niece Camille crossed her podgy arms, pouted her cupid-bow lips and said, “No!”
“Camille, please darling,” my heavily-pregnant sister Diane pleaded.
“No!” her daughter repeated, staring mulishly at the smiling Santa Claus.
“Why not, honey?” my sister asked, looking puzzled.
“Because he’s fat!”
“Honey, he’s cuddly not fat!” Diane gave Santa an apologetic smile as she crouched beside her daughter. “All Santas are cuddly, sweetheart. Your teddy bear, Mr Wiggles, is cuddly and you like him.”
Camille turned and gave Santa an assessing stare before turning back to her mother and saying, “But Mommy, he’s not a teddy bear!”
Diane straightened and caught my gaze. I tried not to laugh, but a giggle escaped my lips. This year’s Santa was much taller than last year’s and much fatter as well. Camille had been younger and less discerning the year before, and had obediently sat on Santa’s lap so that my sister could take several photographs for her ever-expanding album.
Earlier Diane had teasingly said that I should sit on Santa’s lap this year and maybe I would get my Christmas wish. And in the ruthlessly selfish way that only small children can be without an attack of conscience, Camille had demanded that she got to sit on Santa’s lap first! I had agreed and she had skipped merrily between her mother and me as we had approached Santa’s grotto. But, as soon as she had seen the outsized Santa, she had changed her mind about sitting on his lap.
I understood her reluctance—this Santa was not like the half-dead, sometimes-drunk little Santas whose laps I had sat on when I was a young girl. This Santa was a man mountain and incredibly hot! Okay, I have a Santa fantasy which I will explain later, but this Santa could have walked straight out of my dreams. I knew that most of his bulk was padding, but the breadth of his shoulders and the thickness of his thighs were all gifts from God and his parents.
