The Billionaire Next Door (The BAD BOY BILLIONAIRES Collection) (2 page)

Well, if she was complaining about that then she would
soon have a whole lot more complaining to do because he’d already planned on
having the guys over next Tuesday to celebrate the start of the NBA season.  As
far as he was concerned, October twenty-nine could not come fast enough.

And if a certain dark-haired beauty with flashing ebony
eyes and pouty lips had a problem with him and the guys hanging out in his new
gazebo, then too bad.  His crew was not a quiet bunch and he was not about to
apologize for it. 

As he thought about the girl he was actually smiling as
he grabbed his bright yellow hard hat and went out the door, pulling it closed
behind him.  At least she couldn’t be accused of being boring.  When it came to
neighbors she was one of the most interesting he’d ever had, even if not the
most friendly.

Ransom had never been one to glory in his wealth and
when he’d decided to move out of his penthouse suite in Miami Beach to settle
in Fort Lauderdale he’d had no regrets.  He’d grown up in a humble home in Iowa
and it was only through drive, perseverance and sheer luck that he’d made it to
where he’d now reached, one of fewer than five hundred billionaires in the
entire United States.  He’d always loved the construction industry and had
started his business twelve years earlier, building low income homes in rural
communities.  Despite the economic recession, or perhaps because of it, his
business boomed throughout the first decade of the twenty-first century until
he was constructing homes in forty states as well as Canada and Mexico. 

His massive break came in 2009 when he landed a huge
government contract that doubled his business in the first year and by year
three he’d secured a place in the nation’s exclusive list of billionaires.  The
business had him travelling all over North America and he soon ended up with
homes in Toronto, Dallas, Washington D. C. and Miami, all of them luxurious,
but for this project in Fort Lauderdale he wanted a change.  This time he was
ditching the image of the grand CEO of Kent Industries and going back to his
roots.  In Fort Lauderdale his plan was to be ‘hands-on’ and he wanted to live
like it, too.  No exclusive dwellings for him.  He’d be mingling with the
regular crowd.

Pity he hadn’t realized that this mingling would include
a wicked witch on his west side, a pretty little one at that.  Too bad she had
a mean streak that he would do best to avoid.

And he would avoid her, all right, at least until the
end of the day.  He would leave his men at their task while he headed for his
latest construction site in the heart of Fort Lauderdale’s business district, a
fifty-storey building that would house the corporate headquarters of one of the
largest clothing retailers in the United States.  At that height it would
become the tallest building in the city’s skyline, beating Las Olas River House
by eight floors.

This was a big move for Ransom, stepping out of the
construction of residential homes and into commercial buildings, but as far as
he was concerned it was a timely move.  He’d never been one to remain stagnant
and was always challenging himself to try new things and that was part of the
reason his business had grown at warp speed.  With his venture into commercial
construction he could only imagine how much farther he could go in the next ten
years.

As he drove he reached over and pressed the speed dial
on his cell phone.

“Yeah, boss?” 

The voice of his second-in-command for the project boomed
loud and clear, drawing a small smile from Ransom.  If there was one person he
knew he could count on it was Trevor Jones, his chief construction and project manager. 
In over seven years of working with him he’d been nothing less than one hundred
percent dependable. 

“How’s the home project going?” Trevor asked.

“Pretty good.  It will be ready long before my NBA
launch party.  You’re coming, right?”

“When you say party do I ever turn you down?”   He gave
a deep, rumbling chuckle into the phone.  “I’ll be there and I’ll bring the
beer.”

“You know I’ve got that covered.  Just bring yourself. 
But a word of warning.”

“What’s that?”

“I’m having the usual crowd, probably close to a dozen
of us, and you’re by far the loudest.  This time you’ve got to tone it down.”

“Why’s that?” 

“I’ve got a pit bull living next door and she doesn’t
like noise.  She’s likely to fly over the hedge and rip your face off if you
get her riled up.”

Trevor laughed.  “Speaking from personal experience?”

Ransom gave a grunt.  “You could say that.”

“Well, boss, all I can say is, bring her on.  I doubt
she’d have the guts to stand up to a three hundred pound former linebacker like
myself.  I’ll have her shaking in her boots.”

Ransom could only grimace.  He had a feeling his feisty neighbor
would prove Trevor dead wrong.

CHAPTER TWO

 “Soledad, it’s for you.” 

At the sound of her name Solie deposited the tray of
syringes on the desk and turned to see Kyra, her old friend and long-time
co-worker, holding out the phone to her.  “Dr. Gupta?” she asked as she hurried
over to take the receiver from Kyra’s hand.  At her friend’s nod she put the
phone to her ear.  “Yes, doctor?  Did the results come in?”

“Yes, and I’m afraid it’s not good.  You'll need to
monitor Mr. Gerritsen very carefully.  He's getting close.”  The doctor’s
heavily accented voice was grim.

Solie felt her heart tighten in her chest.  “You mean
there’s nothing we can do for him?”

“Nothing except make him as comfortable as possible.”

Her heart, already tense and choked, now dissolved into
silent tears for her beloved patient but outside of an involuntary sigh and the
sag of her shoulders she gave no outward show of emotion.  How could she?   The
reality of illness, the loss of a patient - this was her life every day that
she worked in the palliative care unit.  She’d known that with all his health
issues Mr. Gerritsen’s time was limited but she’d hoped…prayed…that he would
live to see Christmas.  The man was only fifty-five and had a brand new grandchild. 
Couldn’t he be spared long enough to make it to the little one’s ‘Baby’s First
Christmas’ party?

She’d hoped against hope that the test results would have
shown that the new medication was slowing the progress of his disease but he
was moving as rapidly toward death’s door as he’d been before their desperate
experiment.  It was not meant to be.

But now there was no time to stand there dwelling on her
patient’s plight.  The buzzer on her desk was going off and she knew what that
meant.  Another emergency to deal with.  Dr. Gupta would be meeting with Mr.
Gerritsen soon so for now all she could do was leave things in his hands while
she ran to attend to another cry for help.

By the time Solie finished her shift and left the
hospital eleven hours later she felt like she’d been wrung and put out to dry. 
No matter that it was only seven o’clock in the evening, all she wanted to do
right then was dive into bed.  If she never heard another buzzer or call for
‘code blue’ it would be too soon.

When she got home she didn’t even bother with dinner but
went straight to the bathroom where she had a warm shower, threw her window
open to get some air then climbed into her soft, sweet-smelling bed.  Heaven. 

Her head had just touched the pillow when the space
outside her window erupted in a burst of laughter and cheers that had her
springing up.  What the heck?

She dashed over to the window and stuck her head out. 
The sun had already set but she peered through the red-tinged shadows and what
she saw made her exhaustion fly out the window on the next breeze.  Her
neighbor, that beast of a man, was at it again.  She was staring right at his
newly built gazebo and it looked like he had a hundred people, all men, hanging
out in his backyard.  Didn’t he know that in this residential neighborhood a
crowd like that was against the law?

Immediately, she swung away from the window and grabbed
her robe from the back of the chair.  It didn’t matter that she was wearing
oversized pajamas that flapped around her legs.  She didn’t care what she
looked like.  She just wanted the party over.

Muttering under her breath she marched out of the
bedroom and down the hallway.  When she got to the back door she flung it open
and stomped across the grass toward the oh, so familiar hedge, the place where
she’d been having so many heated conversations lately.  Climbing on top of the
rock by the shrubbery she peered over the hedge.  From that vantage point she
had a perfect view of the men milling around in her neighbor’s backyard.

Okay, so it wasn’t a hundred of them back there, more
like a dozen, but still…with the noise they were making it was just too much. 
And on top of all that there was that dog again.  As soon as her head popped
over the fence he bounded toward her, barking like he’d gone mad and bouncing
around like he thought it would make her jump over and have a romp with him. 
Yeah,
right
.

And there, following right behind the dog was its owner,
loping toward the border between their homes, his mouth set in a grim line like
he was ready for a fight.  Well, he could bring it on because she was ready and
she’d be the first to get the ball rolling.

“Excuse me, but you and your rowdy crowd are creating a
major noise disturbance.  I’m trying to get some sleep over here.”  Her voice
carried across the space loud and clear, making the men turn to regard her with
curious eyes.  Some of them grinned up at her, some stared then turned back to
whatever they were doing, but a couple of them looked surprised by her
outburst.  She didn’t give a damn. She wasn’t the one at fault here.  Their
host was to blame.  “Either you tell your people to be quiet or I’m calling the
police.”

The man had bent over to pat his dog’s head but at her
words he straightened to his full height which couldn’t have been less than six
foot one or two.  His brows fell and he was opening his mouth to respond when
one of his party walked over and slapped him on the back.

“So this is the feisty little neighbor I’ve been hearing
about.  She’s pretty.”  Nodding, the big man gave her an indulgent smile like
she was a cute little school kid and not a grown woman, and the fact that she
was sensitive about what her friends called her ‘baby face’ did not make his
comment any more palatable.  “So what gives, little lady?  Has my friend here
been bothering you?  Just say they word and I’ll tackle him for you.”

“Thank you but just stay out of this.  I can handle my
problems myself.”  She gave the man a withering look.  If he was in the company
of the beast then he was one of the enemy. 

The man’s face fell.  He was obviously taken aback by
her bitter rejoinder.

His startled look actually made Solie feel bad.  If the
man weren’t the color of hot chocolate he probably would have turned red in the
face.  Okay, so maybe she didn’t have to slam him that hard.  After all, it was
that other man who was pissing her off.  She drew in a deep breath.  She really
had to get a hold on her emotions.

“I’m sorry," she said quickly.  "That was
uncalled for.”  She shook her head then turned her attention back to the man
who was now regarding her with a face as dark as thunder clouds.  “It’s you I
have a problem with.  Do you do these things to annoy me?”

   Almost casually, the man folded his arms across his
chest, tilted his chin and looked at her through narrowed eyes.  “Maybe,” he
said, his voice deceptively soft.

Her brows fell and, with a pout added, her frown turned into
a scowl.  “Maybe?  You mean you’re doing these things deliberately?”

His expression made it clear that he thought she was
daft.  “You’ve got a mind of your own.  Think whatever you like,” he said, his
tone little better than a scoff.  “Just don’t come pissing your anger all over
my lawn.  I’m within my rights and you know it.”

“I know no such thing.  If you don’t shut this party
down right now I’m calling the police.”  The nerve of him.

He jerked his chin at her.  “Go do what you have to
do.”  With that, he turned and strode away, his bewildered-looking friend by
his side.

Solie clenched her teeth and balled her hands into
fists.  If she could only get her hands on him she’d show him who he was
dealing with.

With a frustrated growl she hopped off the rock and
stomped back into the house.  He was right.  The noise wasn’t loud enough to be
a public disturbance so she didn’t dare call the police.  But she knew he would
mess up again and she was sure it would be soon.  And when he did she would get
him. 

He could bet his butt on that.

***                        

The days were flying by so fast Ransom couldn’t believe
it had been a week since he’d last visited the construction site.  He’d been
caught up in the office for days and the need to make a quick trip to his New
York office hadn’t helped.  Today, though, he would not let it slide.  He hated
to feel out of the loop on such an important project.