BetweenTwoBillionairesCompleteStripped (5 page)

I'm lost in thought,
trying to get the display just right. I'm anal like that. Everything
has to line up perfectly. Apparently, I'm too into my job, because I
don't even notice a customer walking up. He taps on the glass to get
my attention. When I lift my eyes to look at him, my heart falls to
my feet. Those blue eyes.

He seems equally
surprised to see me, but as soon as that passes, he smiles broadly.
“Is this your day job?”

“
It's my only
job.” I scowl at him, though I don't know why. Maybe I should
keep my mouth shut, but now that I'm not upstairs in his bedroom, I
feel a lot safer about telling the truth.

“
Now you're
being honest,” he quips.

“
What do you
want?” I close the display case door and move over to man the
register.

He pulls his wallet
out of his pocket and opens it up, extracting a card and tossing it
out on the counter between us. It's the At Your Service Strippers
business card Ethel made for us. My cheeks heat up as I look at it.

“
I called the
number on this. It belongs to a residence,” he tells me.

“
That's
because it's fake,” I confess, taking the card, ripping it into
pieces, and quickly throwing it in the trash before anyone can see
it.

“
You know that
fraud is a criminal offense. So is trespassing.” My chest
tightens from his words. Is he actually threatening to call the
police on me?

“
It wasn't my
idea to be there,” it's the only thing I can think of to
counter with, and it's hardly believable.

“
No. I don't
imagine it was. Last I remember, you tried to flee the scene as soon
as the actual stripping began. Isn't that right, Cinderella?”
He glances down at my name tag, and I weakly move to cover it with my
hand. What does it matter if he knows my name now? It's not like it
will hurt for him to know it . . . unless he's trying to figure out
who to tell the cops to come pick up after he calls them.

“
Can we not
talk about that,” I grumble. “I just want to forget the
entire night.”

“
Shame. I
rather enjoyed myself, Sarah.” My name sounds strange on his
lips. When my eyes flit up to meet his, he's gazing at me intensely.
It's intimidating and a bit disturbing. Every time he looks at me
like that, I want to cower.

“
What do you
want?” I grab an empty coffee cup from the cup rack, preparing
to write down his order. I need a distraction. Any kind of
distraction.

He snaps out of his
trance, looking up at our drink menu. “What do you normally
have?”

I turn toward the
menu as well, though I know the whole thing by heart. Heck, I've been
working here since high school. If I didn't know all the drinks on
the menu by now, I'd be in trouble. “I usually have the caramel
decaf iced coffee. Sometimes I get the chai tea.”

“
I don't think
I could handle decaf.” He shakes his head.

I stare at him for a
moment. The mouthy part of me wants to gritch about why he asked in
the first place, but I refrain. That wouldn't be very good customer
service.

“
I'll take a
large caramel iced coffee with a double shot of espresso and your
phone number,” he says finally.

I begin writing his
order on the cup and then pause when he gets to the
and
your phone number
part.
“What?” I look up at him stupidly.

“
I can't ask
you out on a date if I don't have your phone number,” he says
matter-of-factually.

I set the cup down
on the counter, steadying myself against it as I use my other hand to
brush a strand of hair behind my ear. My cheeks are warm. For a split
second, I wonder if I heard him right. “You want to ask me out
on a date?”

“
Mhm. Did I
stutter? Because I don't think I did.”

“
Now you're
being rude.” I avert my eyes.

He guffaws. “Is
there no pleasing you?”

I'm not sure what to
say, so I say nothing. As excited as I am at the prospect of seeing
him again, the timid part of me just wants him to go away. Being
around him seems to turn my life upside down.

“
I'd like to
take you out on a date, Sarah. The least you can do is accept after
you broke into my house and lied to me.” His lips curl into a
confident smile. He knows he has me. How can I say no?

If nothing else, the
fear of going to jail causes me to respond with a quiet, “Okay.”

“
Excellent.
You can jot your number down on my receipt. Here's mine.” He
thumbs through his wallet to pull out another business card, tossing
it on the counter between us. “That's my card. And yes, it's a
real
business card. My
cell phone number is on the back.” He smirks.

I quirk my head to
look at the card, since it landed sideways, as if touching it will
give me some kind of skin disease. The card is surprisingly plain,
with the words Locke Aircraft in the middle and a name on either
side. On the left side is Shawn Locke. On the right is Tristan Locke.
“Which one are you?” I ask.

“
I'm Tristan.”

“
Shawn is your
father?” I take a guess.

“
My brother,”
he sighs. I can't tell if he's annoyed at my questions or if there's
something more behind it.

“
Well,
Tristan, I'm Sarah. It's nice to finally trade names.” I offer
him a weak smile.

“
Indeed.”
His expression brightens as I show him the first sign of kindness
since we began talking.

“
I suppose you
want that coffee now.” I pick up his cup, writing his name on
it.

“
That would be
nice. You're going to make it for me, right?”

“
Y-yes. Why?”
I quirk an eyebrow at him.

“
Cause that
would make it extra special.” He winks, and I can't help but
laugh at how cheesy he's being.

“
Alright,
Tristan Locke, I'll go make you a special coffee.” I turn
around with his cup, grinning like an idiot. Only a few minutes ago,
I would have wanted to make it special by spitting in it, but he's
such a charmer. And he's definitely every bit as handsome as I
remember. Well groomed blonde hair that's slicked to the side.
Amazing blue eyes. He's tall and broad with the slightest five
o'clock shadow. If I had met him anywhere other than that party, I
might have been smitten with him right away. As it is, I'm still a
bit wary of him, but my guard is slowly coming down.

I'm all smiles while
I'm making his coffee, still in disbelief that he asked me out on a
date. Will it really be okay? He tried to make me strip for him in
his bedroom, but at the time, he thought I was a stripper, so is it
really that odd? Still, it speaks about the kind of man he is. He's
the kind of man who hires strippers. That's a bit of scummy. Not my
ideal type. Oh well. I'm thinking way too far into this. I owe him a
date for trespassing. I can't get out of it, so I might as well enjoy
it.

When I finish making
his coffee, I bring it to the register and ring him up, taking the
receipt and penciling my cell number on the back of it. I can feel
him watching me. He's always watching.

“
That better
be your real phone number, because if it's not, I'll just hunt you
down here again.” There's only the slightest hint of humor in
his voice, little enough to let me know he's serious.

“
It's the real
deal, Bill.” I hand the receipt to him.

“
My name is
Tristan,” he reminds me with a hurt look.

“
It was a
joke. It rhymes, you see. Real. Deal. Bill.” Oh my God, that
was lame. Am I really that crappy at jokes?

“
Ah, gotcha.”
He points at me, making a clicking noise with his tongue before
taking the receipt and putting it in his wallet. “Well,
Cinderella, this Prince Charming needs to go to work. I'll call you
tonight to set something up for the weekend.”

“
Alright.
Sure.” I push a strand of hair behind my ear again, watching
him walk away. As soon as he's out of the building, I sigh deeply,
staring at the door as if I could will him to come back. He's such a
strange guy. I can't help but be intrigued by him.

“
I wish a dude
that hot randomly wandered in here and asked me out on a date,”
Jennifer, my co-worker for the day, comments.

It only makes me
smile more. He is hot. Smoking hot. The kind of guy I bet Ethel
wished she had picked up at the party instead of me. While she was
shaking her butt in the hopes that a guy would take interest in her,
I didn't even have to try. I one-upped her, but I'd never have the
guts to tell her that.

CHAPTER FOUR

I keep my phone next
to me like I'll die if it's out of reach. While I want to tell myself
that I don't really care if Tristan calls me or not, the truth is
that I do care. Perhaps way more than I should. He's so different. So
exotic to me.

I'm used to getting
asked out by high school guys. Well, when I was still in high school,
at least. Since then, only one other guy has asked me out, and he was
a co-worker who I wasn't interested in at all. I'm not used to being
asked out by older men, especially handsome ones with money. Not that
the money matters, because it doesn't. All that really matters is
that he's a good man with morals. Tristan's morals are questionable,
but he seems to have everything else going for him. Why not give him
a chance?

I want to chastise
myself for bending my dating requirements because of his good looks.
But it's not just that. I owe him this date. That's what I keep
telling myself, at least.

I spend my afternoon
waiting by the phone like a pathetic fool. Every fifteen minutes or
so, I pick it up to look at the screen, checking for a missed call.
There's no way I wouldn't have heard it, considering that the phone
is right beside me, but still, I check it. Again and again and again.
Throughout the afternoon and into the night until it's time to get
ready for bed.

I'd be lying if I
said I wasn't disappointed. Even though I don't really know Tristan
and have been acting disinterested, I'm admittedly a bit upset that
he didn't call me. I sulk to bed, frowning and wondering if I did
something wrong to make him lose interest in me. Maybe he hated my
joke so much it made him think I'm stupid. Perhaps when he saw me the
second time, he decided he didn't like me after all.

I let
self-deprecating thoughts carry me off to a dreamless sleep. Then I
wake up and check my phone again. Nothing. He lied to me. He's not
going to call.

I go about my day,
trying to keep my head up—trying to think positive. If it was
meant to be, it would have happened. Everything happens for a reason.

I abandon hope of
receiving a phone call from Tristan, put my phone on silent, and head
to work. I'm working an afternoon shift at the coffee shop, and it's
rather dead. That gives me plenty of time to reflect on the past week
and my life in general. I think of how big Tristan's house is,
wondering if I'll ever be able to afford something as nice. That's
why I need to keep working hard. I need to make sure I can go to
college next year. I just wish life was easier. It's not like my
parents can't afford to send me. Ethel's father controls all the
money though, and he says he wants us to work for what we have. Life
isn't about getting handouts. I can't help but think he'd change his
tune if Ethel wanted to go to college. While her father has always
been nice to me, he's never really treated me as his own. He gives
her money to go out and blow on expensive clothes and whatever she
wants. He gives me nothing. It seems like an oxymoron. He doesn't
want us to live on handouts, yet his hand is always out for Ethel and
her childish desires. His hand is closed to me, and all I want is a
college education.

By the time my shift
is over, I feel defeated by life. It's a dumb thing to think. I know
I still have it better than a lot of other people, but it's easy to
feel pity for your own situation, especially when it's all that
you've known.

I drive home and get
changed, then I pull my phone out of my pocket to check my messages.
To my surprise and delight, there's a missed call from Tristan. I
quickly plant myself in front of my computer and dial his number,
waiting with bated breath for him to answer.

He picks up on the
second ring. “Hey, Cinderella.”