Bared to the Billionaire: The Complete Series

by Sylvia Pierce

  Jared laughed, his mind roiling with a single, unshakeable thought that both terrified and invigorated him—a thought he hadn’t even consciously invited, but felt its rightness as soon as it formed.

  I’m going to spend the rest of my life with this woman.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Ari was in heaven.

  Brawler. Burritos. A marathon session of making-up-for-lost-time sex with the most amazing man she’d ever met. It had been just over two weeks since they’d first brought each other to ecstasy in that forbidden closet, and in that time they’d gotten to know each other’s bodies more intimately, more perfectly. It was true what they said about absence—their brief time apart last week had only served to intensify the chemistry between them. Being with Jared felt so perfect, so right, Ari could hardly imagine a time without him in her bed.

  Or in her life, for that matter.

  Whenever her brain fired off one of those thoughts about this dangerous game of hers, about the house of cards upon which she’d built her most recent hopes, she dismissed it, distracting herself with another tantalizing kiss, another perfect touch.

  She didn’t want to leave his embrace. His penthouse. His life. Not tonight. Not tomorrow night, either.

  So instead, she closed her eyes and pretended all of it was hers.

  “What happened, love?”

  Jared’s question brought her back to the moment. Hours after dinner and their final Brawler match, they were entwined on the game room couch again. He’d been covering her naked flesh with light caresses, but now she felt his fingers lingering on the scar just above her hip, a thick silvery gash about the size of her pinkie. It wasn’t the first time he’d touched it, but it was the first time he’d asked about it directly.

  “Just an old war wound,” she said, unable to meet his eyes. She’d tried to sound flippant, but it came out strained, and he picked up on it immediately.

  Maybe she’d wanted him to.

  “What war was that, love?” he asked.

  Still in his arms, she turned over onto her back, staring up at the ceiling for so long she thought Jared might have fallen asleep. But when she turned to face him again, his eyes were wide open, watching her, patient and concerned.

  Ari sighed. Lying to him, even in small doses, was getting more difficult by the hour.

  “Remember when I told you that my job sometimes puts me in the path of dangerous information?” she asked.

  Jared’s eyes widened in horror. “This happened at work?”

  Ari nodded. “I was looking into the collection of an elderly woman in Murray Hill suffering with dementia. Her daughter had asked for the appraisal—she wanted to sell everything before her mother went completely senile. I was in the process of connecting the daughter with a few interested buyers, but it turns out that parts of the collection were stolen.”

  “Was it the old woman?”

  “No—she and her daughter had no idea. But I knew, and the buyers I’d lined up apparently knew, too.” Ari shuddered at the memory. She’d known the pieces were stolen—it’s why her father had sent her to retrieve them, thinking those pieces had been off the radar so long, they’d be much more difficult to trace if anyone ever reported them missing. Ari acted as the broker, while Lilah and Keens were posing as the buyers. They were prepared to con the woman and her daughter, making off with the artwork for a song, then turning around and selling it all to the highest bidder.

  They made the deal, then Ari, her father, and Davidson arranged to meet with the “highest bidders” the next night.

  But those highest bidders were conmen, too, and they’d shown up to collect their spoils without payment. Her father was prepared to walk away—Like Ari, he had great instincts, and he knew trouble when it stared him right in the face. Davidson, ever the money-grabber, still wanted to make a deal. He and Ari’s father argued.

  It went downhill fast after that, and she got caught in the crossfire.

  But Ari couldn’t get into all of that with Jared, so she gave him as much of the truth as she could.

  “Obviously the deal went bad,” she said. “The three guys who were supposed to look over the collection and make me an offer decided they wanted to take their pick of the artwork, free of charge. One of them pulled a knife on my colleague. I got in the middle, just as he…” Ari closed her eyes, her body tensing with the memory. While Davidson was busy arguing with Ari’s father, one of the other men had lunged at her father from behind.

  She’d acted on pure instinct, protecting him from the blow that would’ve pierced his heart. She’d thrown the assailant off balance, catching the blade just above her hip, saving her father’s life in the process.

  The whole story was there, written on her hip in a silver scar for all eternity.

  Her flesh erupted in goose bumps, despite the fact that she was sweating.

  Jared pulled her to his chest, wrapping her in his arms.

  When he finally spoke, his voice shook with rage, even as his arms held her strong and firm. “Where are those bastards now?”

  “Who knows.” Ari closed her eyes, because that was a lie. In the chaos, her father had turned around and shot the man who stabbed her, killing him instantly. Davidson shot another one, hitting him in the arm but not taking him down. That guy and the third man fled the scene.

  “My God, Arianne. I’m so sorry this happened to you.” Jared pressed his fingers against the scar again, tracing a slow and gentle path back up to her shoulder. “Look at me, love.”

  Ari opened her eyes, meeting his gaze. His honey-brown eyes were full of concern, of fear, and something that made Ari’s heart skip.

  Love.

  She closed her eyes, trying to tell herself she’d imagined it, because admitting the truth was too painful. He can’t care about me like that. He just can’t….

  “I don’t like the line of work you’re in, Arianne,” he said.

  “Neither do I. Believe me.”

  “Why don’t you leave?”

  Ari sighed. She knew Jared meant well, just like Tasha had meant well every time this topic came up at home.

  “It’s—”

  “Complicated,” Jared said. “I get that. Everything about you is complicated. But you’re not going to reveal much more than that, are you?”

  He didn’t seem angry, just frustrated, and maybe a bit sad. Ari wanted nothing more than to tell him, to open up the flood gates and let it all out.

  Never in her long life of crime had she ever felt so close to baring her soul, to spilling her secrets. She was safe in his arms, a bubble of happiness that the outside world couldn’t burst.

  But it was only temporary. Telling him wouldn’t change that. It would only make things worse—not to mention more dangerous for both of them.

  “I’d like to tell you someday,” she said, finally opening her eyes to meet his gaze. “But I’m not ready. Can we leave it at that?”

  Jared sighed, but eventually nodded, pressing a kiss against her temple that told her all was right with the world again.

  “I’ve got something to tell you,” he said. “It’s about your work. But whatever you make of it—whatever you decide to do with the information—I’m not letting you get hurt again. We’re in this together, do you understand?”

  Ari sat up on the couch, her stomach bubbling with new fear. “What is it?”

  He sat up next to her, running his hands through his hair. “I followed up on the artwork, like you asked me to. I’ve got a few names for you.”

  Ari’s eyes widened, her heart jackhammering.

  “Come on,” he said, rising from the couch and holding out his hand. “I’ll show you.”

  Buzzing inside and out, Ari followed him to his home office. From a stack on his desk, he produced a printout, a list of four or five names and addresses she didn’t recognize.

  “The top one is my buyer,” Jared explained as he handed it over. “The next one is his contact, then his, etcetera. I went down the chain
, tracing the LaPorte and the Hermes statue to the last name on the list, but that’s where the trail went cold.”

  “Kyle Errington,” Ari said. Ari knew a lot of art dealers, both criminal and legitimate, but that name didn’t ring a bell. “He wouldn’t talk to you?”

  “He didn’t know anything,” Jared said. “I grilled him, believe me. Pretended I was a buyer for the Queen of England.”

  “You didn’t.”

  Jared smiled. “Not exactly. But I was pretty damn convincing. He’s called me three times since, telling me about new pieces he’s got. I’m half considering buying something, just to see if I can get a meeting with him, do a little snooping.”

  Leave the snooping to me.

  Ari handed back the printout. “Why didn’t you tell me sooner? Why didn’t you—”

  “I had to be certain.”

  “Certain of the names? This Errington guy?”

  “No, it’s not that. Just…” He took her hand in his, and pressed it to his lips. When he spoke again, he looked her right in the eyes, unwavering. “Whatever it is you don’t want to talk about is your business, and I’m trying to make peace with that. It’s obvious that you’re in some kind of trouble, whether it’s your work, or something I can’t even begin to comprehend.”

  “Jared, I can’t—”

  “I know. I know that, Arianne. And as much as it goes against my nature in every way, not to mention the warnings in my head, I won’t force you to tell me anything you don’t want to.” Jared gave her a small but reassuring smile. “But when I asked you to come home with me tonight, and you said yes, I needed to know it was because you wanted to be here. With me. Not because of the information I’ve got.”

  God, Ari wanted so badly in that moment to open herself up, to confess everything: her snooping. How Davidson had sent Lilah and Keens to FierceConnect’s offices, posing as investigators for the Hastings firm, finally bringing them in on the deal. How they’d already begun infiltrating the staffing firm that employed his Annandale housekeepers and groundskeepers.

  But she knew she couldn’t. That would only get her in trouble, and Jared too.

  There was so much she’d had to keep from him, so much she’d have to continue keeping from him until their relationship reached its inevitable end, whenever that day would come. But somewhere beneath all her lies, there was one truth, shining through the murky mess.

  Now, she reached down deep, pulled it out, and polished it off.

  “Jared,” she said, leaning into his embrace, “I swear I want to be here with you.”

  “I want you to be here with me too.”

  “I want you to want me to want—”

  Jared pressed a finger to her lips, following it with a kiss that made her melt.

  “Come on,” he said. “There are better ways to show all of this wanting. Starting with you, spending the night in my bed, where I can keep a very watchful eye on you.”

  Ari smiled at his gentle teasing, but inside she was wired, her mind racing with the new intel. Who was this Errington guy? Did he know her father? How much more could she learn? How far would she go?

  Tomorrow, she told herself. She could deal with this tomorrow.

  Tonight, she had a date with Jared Blackwell. One she intended to enjoy, all night long.

  “Lead the way,” she said, leaning into his touch. “I’m all yours.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  “You claim to love ‘Sleepless in Seattle,’” Jared said, “yet before now you’ve never been to the top of the Empire State Building.”

  “So?”

  “So that makes you a quintessential New Yorker. I’ve been here a half dozen times already.”

  “Yes, and that makes you a quintessential tourist.” Ari looped her arm through Jared’s and leaned forward, peering down on 34th Street far below. From the observation deck on the Empire State Building, 86 floors up, the city looked miniature and quaint, a doll’s universe to be broken and remade at the hands of a child.

  “Admit it.” Jared wrapped his strong arms around her from behind, pressing a kiss against her bare shoulder. “You love playing tourist with me.”

  “Okay, fine. It’s the most fun I’ve had in a long time. This whole week has been amazing, actually.”

  Today was their fourth date this week. When she’d confessed to him the other night that she’d missed out on almost all of New York’s most famous sites, he’d promised to take her to every last one of them, giving her the New York experience she’d never had growing up here. Since then, he’d been making good on his promise, planning one amazing date after another.

  Ari drew the line at climbing aboard a double-decker tour bus, but everything else was fair game. Times Square at night, Grand Central Station by day, Rockefeller Center, and now the Empire State Building—Ari loved seeing the sites through Jared’s eyes. It was like falling in love with her home all over again, and she couldn’t get enough.

  Ari used to adore the city. The energy here was palpable for her, an endless current that never failed to sweep her into its seductive tide. But since her father’s death—more accurately, since the darkness that followed his death—Ari had felt suffocated by New York. What was once a thrilling adventure had become a maze of dirty alleys and dark corners, danger lurking in every storefront. The air was no longer spiced with the sweet richness of the roasted nut carts, but by the noxious sewer gas that endlessly steamed from manholes and street grates, everything smothering her, choking her, killing her slowly.

  Davidson had done that to her.

  And in a matter of days, Jared Blackwell had undone it.

  She knew they were likely being watched—Davidson would never trust her as the sole source of intel on such an important target as Jared Blackwell—but as long as they kept their distance and didn’t blow her cover, she no longer cared. As far as Davidson’s men were concerned, she was putting on a spectacular show, seducing Jared into a sense of security and lust that would blind him to their nefarious plans.

  But Ari knew the truth. Even as she was pretending to case his home, to spy on him for her boss, she was falling for him. Hard.

  Thinking about it too much made Ari sick to her stomach. Besides, from what she could gather, her intense stalling tactics with Davidson had bought her at least another month before he’d make his move. That meant at least a month to follow up on the names Jared had given her for the men who’d procured the artwork from her father’s cache—names that so far had led only to more dead ends. It meant a month to figure out what to say to convince Davidson to further postpone his plans. And most importantly, it meant a month to decide what to do, how much to tell Jared, and how to head this disaster off at the pass with the least amount of collateral damage.

  “It’s such a different perspective up here,” Jared said, murmuring softly in her ear. “Sometimes I come up here just to get a change, even for a little while. I mean, yes, the tourists. But if you can see past it, it really is quite extraordinary.”

  Ari nodded silently, watching hundreds of tiny colored boxes—cars and trucks, the obvious yellow taxis standing out against the rest—shuffle along the street below, a complicated dance with no beginning or end. In a way it made her feel small and insignificant, all of her problems no more than a blip in the grand scheme of things.

  Like everything about her feelings for Jared, the feeling of insignificance simultaneously frightened and exhilarated her. She loved it.

  Everything about this week had been so perfect, so normal, she could close her eyes now and pretend, just like she had after the auction that night of their first meeting, that they’d always been together. That they’d always toured the sites of New York, finding their favorite restaurants and secret oases amidst the ceaselessly encroaching masses.

  Her stomach grumbled then, breaking their momentary silence with such a vibration that Jared felt it in his hands and laughed.

  “I’ve got a brilliant idea,” he said. “Dim sum in Chinatown?”


  “That is brilliant.” Ari could already taste the sticky rice, the steamed buns, the hot and sour soup that was in her immediate future.

  From midtown, they took a cab down to Canal Street, and this time Ari led the way. She knew the perfect spot, a tiny four-table restaurant on Mulberry Street that she’d discovered alone a few months ago. From the street, the place was nearly impossible to find, with only a tiny white sign in the window to mark its location. But after a few false leads, she’d finally tracked it down again, her mouth watering at the delicious smells wafting out from the kitchen in the back.

  After a 10-minute wait, a table by the window freed up, and she and Jared ordered a feast, pointing at things on the Chinese-language menu they’d hoped would be tasty, as neither of them knew the language and there wasn’t a word of English in sight.

  “Your sense of adventure is commendable,” Jared said.

  Ari laughed. “It’s taken you how many dates with me to figure that out?”

  “None. I’ve always known that about you,” he said. “Since the very first time I looked into your eyes at that bar on the Upper West Side.”

  “Ah. You mean when I saved your ass from all those bored socialites.”

  “Excuse me, but I was handling myself just fine.”

  “Lies.” Ari pointed at him with her chopsticks. “You were about five seconds from a complete meltdown, and those women would’ve devoured you.”

  “Now that’s a bit harsh, don’t you think?”

  “Harsh? I believe your exact words at the time were, ‘I feel like a magnet for self-involved dullards.’”

  “I was. Hey, don’t laugh!”

  “Admit it. I saved you.”

  “Okay, fine. I admit it.” Across the table, Jared grabbed her hand, holding it tightly. In a low voice that felt much more serious than their earlier banter, he said, “Thanks for saving me, Arianne.”