Laurel's Bright Idea (Billionaire Baby Club Book 3) Read online

  Kat wrapped an arm around me. “Not yet you’re not. But something tells me the moment he gets you alone, you will be. A lot, and hard, and well.”

  “Once upon a time, that would have sounded great,” I whispered, “now, I’m not so sure. I’m not so sure my heart would survive that intact.”

  “What do you have to lose, Laur?” Kat asked.

  “Everything,” I breathed; realizing I was still touching my lips, I jerked my hand away.

  “Oh, well that explains it,” Kat said, her tone dripping with snark.

  Autumn and Lizzy both laughed, coming alongside me and putting their arms around me.

  “Actually, it does,” Lizzy said.

  Autumn kissed my temple. “My advice, babe? Just go with it. Fighting is useless.”

  Teddy joined on one side, and Zoe the other, so the whole group of us were in a line abreast, arms around each other’s shoulders.

  I pushed away from the group hug. “Can we just go get drunk, please?”

  Lizzy just laughed and hooked her hand around my elbow. “I understand, Laurel, trust me I do.”

  “Yeah, but it worked out for you,” I said. “That stuff never works out for me.”

  She just laughed. “Yeah, well, it never worked out for me either, until it did.”

  “You wanted it to.”

  “And you don’t?”

  Yes, I did, deeply, desperately, down in the lightless depths of my secret soul.

  “Nope,” I said. “Not at all.”

  Lizzy just cackled. “You’re a shitty liar.”

  “Goddammit, I am not!” I protested. “You’re the second person today to say that. I’m a terrific liar.”

  Lizzy just laughed and herded me onto the party bus, with the rest of the group trooping on behind us. Kat had a bottle of Patrón in one hand, a bowl of lime wedges in the other, and behind her, Zoe had a stack of red Solo cups, and behind her, Teddy was carrying a case of lime LaCroix and a case of hard seltzer.

  “Oh, shit,” I breathed. “We’re getting turnt up.”

  Autumn took the bottle of tequila, uncorked it, propped one foot up on the nearest seat and slugged from the bottle. “Yes, my love, we certainly are. This wedding marks two down, four to go,” she said, her voice hoarse from the liquor, and then shoved a lime wedge in her mouth; she handed the bottle to me. “And you’re next, Boo,” she said to me.

  “The fuck I am,” I muttered, and pulled on the bottle.

  For tonight, at least, I could ignore, forget, and pretend.

  If only through the blessed, despicable means of a lot of alcohol.

  I’m a grown-ass woman—you’d think I’d know better by now. But no. Tonight, we party, tomorrow, I regret.

  3

  I locked up the condo I’d just finished showing, sent a text to Kat to meet me for lunch, and headed down to my car. I hadn’t sold it, but the clients I’d shown it to were considering it, along with one other option, a little two-bedroom ranch in San Diego, which I, for obvious and selfish reasons, was advising against.

  I mean, my reasoning was sound—they were a young couple with a child, and they’d need more than two bedrooms, and the condo they’d just seen had an extra bedroom for fifty grand less than the house—no yard, granted, but their little nugget was four months old and didn’t need a yard yet, and there was a nice park within walking distance. Save the cash for a bigger house in a few years. That was my advice. It was good advice too, it just had the additional bonus meaning I’d get a nice little commission out of the deal.

  I left the condo parking structure, mentally trying to figure out what else I could do to entice these people to spring for this unit.

  My phone rang, an unknown number, but an LA area code. I put in my wireless earbuds as I waited at a red light and answered it. “Hello, this is Laurel.”

  “Laurel, hi,” a smooth, older female voice said. “My name is Alaina and I represent the interests of Troubadour Enterprises. My client is interested in looking at a couple properties you have listed for sale in the Malibu area. Can I schedule an afternoon of your time?”

  “Who did you say you represent?” I asked.

  “Troubadour Enterprises,” she answered.

  “I’m assuming your client wishes to remain anonymous, then.”

  “For the moment, yes. In the interest of privacy, as I’m sure you understand.”

  “Certainly,” I answered. “Send over your NDA and I’ll look it over, sign it, send it back, and then we can get your client on my schedule. I’m booked for this week, but I could probably carve out a few hours next week.”

  Complete bullshit—I did have several showings this week, but I wasn’t so booked I couldn’t make time for more. But if you make it seem like you’re booked solid, it puts a little pressure on the buyer to commit sooner.

  “My client only has time this Saturday, eleven a.m. I should add, my client is a cash buyer, with the ability to write a check on the spot, should they see a property which strikes their interest.”

  I mentally high-fived myself. “Hmmm, hold on, let me look at my schedule.” I had it memorized, obviously, and knew I had the morning open—I muted the call for a good thirty seconds, then popped back on. “I can do Saturday at eleven. Does your client have a particular property or properties in mind?”

  “Yes, indeed. I email you with a list, in order of priority.”

  “Very good.”

  “The NDA should arrive in your inbox soon, I just sent it over. It’s standard language, but my client has and will enforce it, being a very, very private person.”

  “Understood. Discretion is an utmost priority for me personally, and for all of us at Six Chicks Real Estate.”

  “That’s the word on the street, which is why my client chose you.”

  “Well, I’m honored to be chosen, and if none of the properties on your client’s list work, I can promise I’ll find something that does. Thank you, and thank you to your client for the opportunity to earn your business.”

  We ended the call, and I finished the drive back to the office. I printed out the nondisclosure agreement, read it—it was indeed standard language, meant to make sure I didn’t sell to tabloids or anyone else any details of the client or the showing or anything at all. I signed it, and sent it back; NDAs were standard fare in the luxury market, especially in this area, as we’d all shown and sold homes to high-profile clients and we’d all had to sign our share of NDAs.

  There was nothing in any of the emails to give away who “Troubadour Enterprises” was, and my admittedly mediocre internet sleuthing skills turned up nothing.

  Well, I’d find out who it was on Saturday. Probably some aging record executive with money to burn and a bald spot. Whatever—his, or her, money would spend the same, right?

  Saturday, ten-fifty in the morning, and I was pulling up to the first property on the list. I’d been emailed this morning that the client themself—that was the word used: “themself” would meet me there and we’d see the rest together. I figured I’d be a few minutes early, turn on some lights, maybe set up a Keurig. I always kept one in my trunk, along with an assortment of pods, bottles of filtered water, and nondairy creamer.

  When I pulled up into the driveway, though, there was already a car parked on the left side. The car intrigued me—it wasn’t the car of a moneybags, cash-flasher industry exec; it was a classic pickup, big, red, burly and beefy, with oversize knobby tires, and not a single piece of chrome. Masculine and macho, without being the kind of truck that screamed: “I HAVE A TINY PENIS.”

  I parked my Aston Martin DB6, itself an understated piece, sexy and cool without being flashy, beside it. As I exited the car, bending in to retrieve my purse from the passenger seat, I felt something ripple over me.

  I straightened slowly, noticing for the first time the figure kicked back in the rocking chair that was part of the staging—the house featured a huge, deep-covered porch that had just begged for a pair of antiqued rocking chairs.
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br />   Frayed cutoff khaki shorts, the frayed ends hanging below his knee. Slouchy, untied combat boots, faded and battered from years of wear. A black Rolling Stones shirt, the classic ’75 tour concert logo with the sticking-out tongue, sleeves cut off. Amber bead bracelet, a hemp bracelet, and a thick leather strap with a chunky watch face on it adorned one wrist, a profusion of rubber bracelets on the other, as well as more bead bracelets, of the kind you’d get at one of those crystals and reiki healing stores on the other wrist. A backward ball cap, the brim heavily curved and fraying.

  Loose black ringlets under the cap, touching his sharp hard bare shoulders.

  Mirrored aviators hid his eyes, but I felt them on me as I ascended the steps.

  Every inch of him screamed rock star. He just drew the eye, absorbed attention. I’d have eyes only for him even if he wasn’t the only other person on the porch with me.

  Titus Bright.

  “Troubadour Enterprises, huh?” I said, leaning against the railing in front of him.

  He just grinned. “It’s my corporate front. Easier to do business with that as my DBA than using my real name. People see my name on an email or something, and they see dollar signs. You see the business name and talk to my gal Alaina? I get proper business treatment.”

  “Makes sense.” I gestured at the house, a five-million-dollar, five bedroom, five and a half bathroom, six thousand square foot property designed for entertaining. “And this is, what? All a ruse to get me alone?”

  He stood up, unfolding in a single lithe movement to his full six feet, six-inch height. “Maybe. Or maybe I’m actually interested in seeing it. It’s a gorgeous home. Imported African Teak hardwood floors, Carrara marble counters throughout?”

  So he’d actually looked at the listing. Interesting.

  I’d play. Why not?

  “Okay, well, let’s see it, then.” I punched the code into the lockbox on the front door, withdrew the key, unlocked the front door. He immediately took the storm door from me, reached around me, and twisted open the main door. “Thanks.”

  Inside, the foyer was bathed in natural light from the rosette window over the front door, and you could see into the kitchen and through to the backyard view of the Pacific. He wandered past me, pulling his sunglasses off and setting them upside down on the brim of his backward cap.

  “Nice,” he said. “Pretty sweet kitchen.”

  I watched him as he trailed fingertips over the counter, toyed with the gas range grate, opened the sub-zero fridge, closed it again. “My question is whether you really need six thousand square feet and five bedrooms, though.”

  “Does it matter what I need? If I like it, and I want it, and I can pay cash, who gives a fuck if it’s too much house for lil ol’ me?” He shoved open the door to the back deck, which was the true piece de resistance, being a massive outdoor living area with built-in seating, a full kitchen, an infinity pool with a glass bottom that cut into the actual interior of the walkout basement, so the pool water would reflect and refract the sunlight and cast rainbows on the whole basement. It was a cool effect, actually.

  “No, I guess it doesn’t. But I have to let the sellers know when they have a showing, and these people are super motivated to sell, so if you’re just using this as a way to get to me, then I kind of resent the manipulation. I take my career seriously, Titus.”

  He closed the door and went past me again, ignoring me as he moved for the stairs to the second floor. Of course, I followed him. Upstairs, he peeked into the four bedrooms before heading into the master suite, which occupied a full third of the upper floor. It was fully staged, with a king bed and sitting area.

  Titus wandered through the bathroom, his and hers walk-in closet, checked out the view from the balcony, and then came back into the bedroom and sat heavily onto the bed.

  “I am looking,” he said. “Just not for me.”

  Leaning against the doorframe, I tilted my head. “Oh? Meaning?”

  “Troubadour Enterprises employs twenty-four people. I have a whole recording arm, distribution, booking, merch, all that. Alaina is my PA, and she’s indispensable, but my real top dog is Jeremy Mullins. He just turned thirty, he’s got a beautiful young wife and four little kids already, and she’s about to pop with their fifth.”

  My eyes widened. “Busy couple, huh?”

  He nodded. “Yup. I pay them well, maybe a little too well, but they’ve been holding off on buying a house suited to fit their needs. Jeremy grew up dirt-ass poor and he’s a hell of a cheapskate, and his wife isn’t much better. I don’t think they’ll ever go look for houses they can actually afford, so I’m looking for them. Jeremy started as a guitar tech for Bright Bones, and when I do a set that needs an actual band, Jeremy is in it. But he’s a wizard with logistics, and he can talk anyone into anything. And he’s just a really cool guy.”

  “So you’re looking at houses for Jeremy and his wife and their four, almost five, kids.”

  “Yeah. Last couple years, he’s really gone over and above for me, working a shitload of hours, scrambling to get my last-minute flash concerts up, and I figure I should do something to say thanks.”

  “A house is a pretty nice thanks.”

  He grinned. “What can I say? I’m a nice guy.”

  I gestured at the room. “So, is this it?”

  He shrugged. “Maybe. Their kids are young—the oldest is, like, seven, and their youngest is just barely two. I’m not sure an unfenced infinity pool is going to fly with Mrs. Mullins.”

  “Obviously I don’t have kids, but my clients with younger kids usually don’t end up going for the places with pools like this. Too much risk, I guess.”

  “Right, that’s what I’m thinking.”

  “So, on to the next one?”

  He nodded. “In a minute.”

  “And in the meantime, what? Is there another feature in the house you’d like to see?”

  “Sort of.” He stood up, his movements leisurely, languid. “Come here. It’s something I wanna show you.”

  I pushed off the doorframe, following him into the walk-in closet. The “hers” closet featured a boutique-quality full-length mirror, the three-panel kind so you could see yourself from every conceivable angle.

  He stood in front of the mirror, glanced at me as I entered the closet. Gestured for me to come closer, to where he was standing.

  My heart thumped.

  Play it cool, Laurel.

  “It’s a mirror,” I said. “You see these kinds of mirrors mainly in the kinds of stores that sell wedding dresses. It’s so you can see—”

  “I know what it’s for,” he murmured, cutting me off.

  He was behind me, somehow. Towering over me. His hands slid down the curtain of my platinum blond hair, which hung loose over my shoulders. Not quite touching my hair, but close enough I could feel his touch, almost.

  “Just wanted to see you in it.”

  “Titus…”

  He ducked behind me, and I watched in the reflection as he pressed his nose to the side of my neck. “You smell so fuckin’ good.”

  “Custom perfume,” I whispered, “mainly jasmine and vanilla.”

  He straightened. Gathered my hair in his hand, pulling it through his fingers so it lay behind my shoulders, down my back. I was wearing a white, tight-fitting, knee-length dress, knee-high tan leather boots, a matching belt under my breasts, and a jean jacket with the sleeves pushed up to my elbows. Turquoise bangles on my wrists and a matching necklace.

  He just stared at the reflection of me. “So fuckin’ gorgeous, Laurel.”

  “We should go if we’re going to see the next house.”

  He wrapped his arms around my middle, his hands palming my stomach, his hips pressed against my backside. “We have plenty of time.”

  I swallowed. I felt him, his hard body, the heat of him behind me…his erection a thick ridge.

  “Titus.”

  “Laurel.” He drew his fingertips lightly up my body, over the belt buckle
, over the swell of my breasts and against the exposed dip of my cleavage, up my throat. To my chin. He pressed my chin up, and I was looking up at him, into his deep tawny eyes.

  “Remember at the wedding, when I didn’t kiss you?” he whispered, his voice a rough, dark buzz.

  “Uh-huh.” I was falling into his eyes, falling upward, somehow, drawn into the roiling heat of them, into the expressive wilds of them. I felt incoherent. Intoxicated.

  “Not gonna miss this time. Just giving you fair warning.”

  “Okay.”

  And there it was, that mouth that could sing such beauty, that could growl and scream with such tortured anger, it was slicing across my lips, fusing to my mouth. His lips were firm, warm, strong. His kiss was slow, exploratory. I tasted him, tasted coffee, and just him. He didn’t relent, but continued to deepen the kiss, to slither his tongue into my mouth, to demand my desire.

  And desire I had, in spades, to show him.

  His body behind me was hard and taut, and his hand played at my waist, toyed with the buckle of my belt. His kiss created desire in me, his body elicited need out of me, brought it raging to life within me. Not that it was hard to do under even the worst of circumstances, and these were far from the worst of circumstances.

  I felt his fingers move, and my belt dropped to the floor.

  His tongue tasted my teeth and my tongue, and I was dizzy with his kiss, and then my jacket was falling to the floor at my feet. What drug was in his kiss? It had to be a drug, to so completely fluster me, to drown me, to eradicate my senses and my wits.

  All I knew was Titus. His mouth on mine, his tongue against mine, his body blasting heat, his hands busy here, there, everywhere.

  My dress was stretchy, molded to my body. Titus’s hands stole over my curves, from hip up to waist, to bust, then back down. His kiss continued, a relentless onslaught, and I knew I’d never been kissed quite like this, and I wondered in the faint fuzzy back of my head if he kissed all his conquests like he was kissing me.

  He caught at my shoulders. At the neckline. Pulled, stretched, and the material of my dress skimmed lower, and the white cups of my bra peeked out, and then my breasts, still contained in the bra, bounced out from under the tight prison of the fabric, and then the dress was stuck on my hips. Not for long. He now broke the kiss, only to press his lips to my neck, to my shoulder. He was so tall he had to bend to reach my shoulder, which put his hands at waist height. Let him tug the dress down further, past the bell of my hips. God, I was really going to let Titus Bright strip my dress off, right here in this client's home? In front of this three-way mirror?