His Secret Request: Billionaire Secrets - Book Three

BOOK: His Secret Request: Billionaire Secrets - Book Three
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His Secret Request

The Billionaire Secrets Series - Volume Three

 

Copyright © 2014 by Drew Sinclair

First Printing, 2014

 

All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the author.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

Published in the United States of America.

 

 

 

 

Acknowledgements

I bow down before those who have gone before me. I thank my discerning readership who make all of this craziness possible.

 

Prologue

 

Yes.
She thought.
Yes you bastard, I've got you now.

She pushed her ass back against him and for a second she was sure she heard a stifled moan, but quickly the tables turned as his hands began to slide sensually down her arms, then to her hips, before coming together at her lower abdomen, his fingers reaching tantalizingly down to her pubic mound before separating again to rise up underneath her full breasts, causing her nipples to harden further to the point of pain.

"Fuuuuck." She hissed out slowly, uncontrollably. His hands stopped moving instantly.

"Shhh." He blew into her ear, making it even worse for her. "This is your reward for being a good girl. Don’t spoil it or there will be punishment as well."

Something in her wanted to know what that punishment would be, something in her suddenly wanted the punishment more than the reward.

 

Chapter One

 

Suzy listened to the rhythmic thudding of her feet in the sand below. The beach was still empty despite the time of year and the time of day. It was one reason she loved it so much - guaranteed solitude. And today of all days, she needed it.

Badly.

The tide was out and as she rounded the last bluff her rented beachfront apartment came into view. The North Oregon coastline had become a place of refuge for her in the years since she had moved there.

Redmond, her Golden Retriever, raced along the shoreline barking at the waves and then snaked over towards her as she headed up the steps to her apartment. She stopped briefly to take a look around. There wasn't a single person on her side of the bluff.

"Perfect." She murmured and then jumped for cover as Redmond raced up the steps, shaking off sand and salt water in all directions.

"Redmond! Redmond, no!" She screamed and ran into the house. "Stay outside boy, until you dry off a little.

She went to the kitchen area and opened the refrigerator door. There wasn't much inside but there was soy milk and fresh fruit for her protein smoothie. It would have to do for lunch until she could get to the market, but first she needed to catch up on her work. She fixed the smoothie, her specialty of cacao, spinach leaves, banana and avocado, and was heading to the shower when a call came through at her work desk. A picture of her client Katy Maldon came up on the screen and she felt relieved. She always did when Katy - or rather Nadia - her friend's former name - called.  She was a valuable client but also her oldest friend and in their line of work friends were a rare commodity.  

She took the call on her cell phone and flopped into an armchair - one of the perks of working from home - just as Redmond came bounding into the living room.

"What's going on?" She said, with Redmond's loud barking in the background.

"Information." Was the reply. It was enough to let Suzy know that things were serious. One of the first thing Nadia did with any new client was a background check. Suzy was a little disappointed but at least it would mean money and she sure as hell could do with some of that.

"Who is it?" She said, getting in front of her massive work station. The four panel display of 24 inch monitors wouldn’t have look out of place on a financial trading floor.

"Clayton Hargrave."

"Of Hargrave Robotics?"

"You've heard of him?"

"Who hasn't?" She turned to her dog who was still barking. "Pipe down Redmond, I'm speaking here." Redmond immediately went quiet. He knew not to interfere in his owner's business. She turned back to her phone. "Not everyone lives like a hermit you know. Are you going to be working with him?"

"Come on, you know better than that. No details. Just get me whatever you can on him and then send it via the usual channel."

"Ouch. No problem boss." She said with a twang of playful sarcasm. "Did you run out of coffee this morning or something?" 

"You could say that."

"Hmmm, mysterious as always. Don't sweat it boss, I'll have information within the hour. Just hang tight."

"I'm not tight." Nadia said defensively.

"Uh… whatever. I'll be in touch. Look, just remember, stay low, stay clean--"

"Leave no trace, I know, I know. Don’t worry. Call me when you have something."

The call ended abruptly without even a hint of a goodbye. It was something Suzy had gotten used to. She let a lot of things slide for old time's sake, a lot more because she couldn’t imagine what the stress of living like a dead person must be like. Sometimes it  got to her as well, especially when mutual acquaintances talked about what a great girl Nadia
had
been and speculated as to what might have happened to her.

The two women went back a long way and Suzy was the only person from her friend's old life who knew for sure that she was still alive. 'Stay low. Stay clean. Leave no trace.' That was their mantra now. They had grown up together, studied together, they had been the only two girls in a class of over one hundred socially challenged male engineers together. After graduation Nadia had gone into design of high-tech surveillance equipment while Suzy had found a way to pursue her interest in ethical hacking and ultimately earn a living from it. The problem was that sometimes the 'ethical' in ethical hacking put her on the wrong side of the law. It was getting harder and harder to be both honest and law abiding at the same time.

However, with her friend Nadia, she didn’t have to think. If she needed it then she would do her level best to get whatever information she wanted and so she set to work right away. Whatever could be found legally through the usual channels, the internet, public records, etc, she had automated on her computer via programs she had written herself. She set the wheels in motion and headed to the shower. By the time she had returned just minutes later she already had pretty much everything the internet could tell you about Clayton Hargrave.

She went through the information looking for any what she called 'rabbit holes', meaning red flags that would suggest something worth digging into. She paged through hundreds of pictures and articles about Clayton Hargrave and his brother Dale with various news sources running in the background on her wide display of computer monitors. Suzy had no problem multi-tasking and liked to keep abreast of world events with CNN, Fox, Euronews, France 24 and Aljazeera running all at the same time.

"Who the hell is this guy?" She mumbled to herself as she stroked Redmond's head. The golden retriever had quietly crept his way across the living room floor and was currying favor after his misdemeanors by resting his head on her knee.

In almost every picture of the Hargrave brothers online they were accompanied by an equally striking, tall, dark and handsome man of about their own age. Sometimes he was standing shoulder to shoulder with them as though he was part of their organization, sometimes he was far off behind or out in the periphery, but it was rare that he wasn't around. Even in many of the tabloid pictures of the brothers with their many socialite girlfriends he was often there and never in the company of a woman.

"Maybe he's their hot gay bodyguard." She muttered to herself. Still, something about him suggested 'rabbit hole' material, so she clicked open her facial recognition software and then watched as the mysterious man's face flashed rapidly across the screen from every possible angle as her customized programs sifted the World Wide Web. One picture stopped abruptly in front of her and she glanced down at her hands to see that she had clicked to halt the program by accident. The picture was a full screen headshot of the man and filled the entire central monitor on her screen.

Looking back up at it she sat back and then opened her mouth in rapt amazement, gazing at the larger than life portrait. This guy wasn't just good-looking, he was perfect. If he was truly gay then it would be a tragedy for every straight woman in America.

"Wow." She whispered. "Just who in the hell are you?"

Clayton and Dale were magazine model material, unfairly good-looking for people so successful and wealthy, but the mystery man had a depth and gravitas that she had rarely seen in any man, saving perhaps the occasional head of state - except that heads of state were never as hot as this.

"You're a mystery now superhot guy, but not for long. Suzy Falstaff always gets her man." Redmond began licking her thigh to get her attention. He wasn't happy being completely ignored, especially not for some guy on a computer screen.

"Redmond! I've already told you boy, you aren't supposed to be in here, go on, get, into the kitchen. You still have sand and… oh my God, seaweed all over you." The dog slunk away and she turned back to her screen. The program continued running in the background but she remained looking at that one picture.

It reminded her of something but she couldn't quite put her finger on it.

She looked around the room and then over to her bedroom door. The room inside was pristine. She liked to keep everything tidy and in its place, particularly there.

Not that anyone ever sees the inside of the damn place.
She thought and then shook her head.

"Focus Suzy." She looked back to the screen and to the oversized headshot still in front of her. The man's dark eyes were captivating. He had just the lightest of five o'clock shadows in this particular shot and his dark hair was lightly tousled by the wind.

"What I wouldn't do to you if I got the chance." She murmured. There was a yelp from the kitchen. Redmond was on the very edge of the threshold, watching her with miserable hound dog eyes.

"Don't worry baby." She said to him. "It's only a man, he's not worth it and besides, when was the last time you saw one of those around here?"

The dog barked happily in response.

"If only they could be as simple and reliable as dogs." She said as Redmond wagged his tail furiously, anticipating some kind of affection. "But a girl can dream, right?" She looked at Redmond who stopped wagging his tail. Sometimes she was sure her mutt could speak English. She looked back to the screen, allowing the program to finish, and basked in the gaze of this being from the highest professional leagues of good looks, far, far beyond her grasp.

"God." She whispered. "Imagine having those eyes look at you in the morning and say: I love you, I want you, now I'm going to fu--"

Her attention was diverted away to the panel on her screen running CNN.

"What the hell?" She turned up the sound to hear a recent ongoing story about some jackass football player who had been the victim of a sting operation. The guy had been caught with hookers and cocaine but for some bizarre reason he was blaming Katy Maldon for his troubles.

'What I do in my own time is nobody else's business. Hell, most of what I'm being accused of is legal somewhere in the world or even right here in the USA. I even paid good money to this so called privacy specialist Katy Maldon to keep my name out of the press but  instead she set me up.'

'The woman you paid to keep your illegal activities secret set you up?' The reporter asked.

'Yeah, sure, maybe. I mean, I'm not accusing her, but I'll make damn sure she pays if it was her. And no I don’t do illegal stuff God damn it. Stop making me say things I don’t want to.'

The young man looked like he was still on something but there was no mistaking the clear reference to her friend.

"This is not good. Oh no Katy Maldon, this is not good at all…"

She tried dialing her friend on their secure line but there was no answer.

'Katy Maldon,' the football star continued, 'don’t waste your money on her. She was supposed to keep it all secret, I could do anything I wanted and none of you media snakes would ever know about it. That's right, if you're thinking about hiring someone to keep your name out of the press then don’t call her. Katy Maldon. Hell, she's the one you should be talking to, the things that woman gets up to are waaaay more illegal than consenting,' he turned to the camera to emphasize the word, '
consenting
adults having a little party together. Hey, if you're watching Katy, did you like the little visit from the cops you got today? Up there in the woods outside of Lovett, Maine? That's right baby, I know where you live.'

The man's minders bundled him away into a waiting people carrier and the reporter came into shot.

'There you have it. Troubled ex-football player Jack Patterson in trouble with the authorities again and this time bizarrely blaming hitherto unknown female accomplice Katy Maldon for his indiscretions--'

Suzy muted the channel and got to work. Her friend was in trouble. Big trouble. First she would find out everything she could about the Hargraves. Then she would find out whatever she could on the mystery third guy. In the meantime she would keep trying to get in touch with Nadia to give her the heads up she needed about her assumed identity becoming unusable. Katy Maldon, Privacy Specialist, was no more.

Hell, if things got out of hand and they produced pictures of her then the FBI, NSA and of course her old friends in the Russian Mafia, Mikhail Boyevik and Co. would be all over the town of Lovett, Maine like hair on a Wookie.

This was a crisis and idle fantasies of hot, powerful mystery men in her bed would have to be put on hold. Friendship and business come first and second - lusting over superhot, unattainable guys, a very distant third.

 

BOOK: His Secret Request: Billionaire Secrets - Book Three
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