The TROUBLE With BILLIONAIRES: Book 1 (16 page)

It would seem the well of sharing was overflowing today. “Annie, would you mind getting me a hot chocolate from the cafeteria? I could use one.”

“Sure, cool, no problem,” she sang, though I knew she was trying to cover up her hurt at me asking her to leave the room. I felt bad, but there were things I needed to say to Rawn in private.

When she was gone, I faced Rawn directly. “Yes, there are a lot of medical bills, some from my sister, some of my own. We didn’t have medical insurance when I was diagnosed. And when my sister fell ill, the insurance company said it was a pre-existing condition and therefore wouldn’t cover it. We could have gone to court with them to plead our case, but my parents decided to focus their attention and finances on my sister, especially after she was put into the wheelchair.”

“I can help,” Rawn offered. “I insist.”

“That’s not why I’m telling you,” I said, horrified that he might think I was asking for charity. I was only trying to fill in the blanks after Annie raised the topic.

“I know. You’ve never once mentioned your family’s situation to me. Truthfully, you’ve resisted me almost every step of the way.”

“I don’t think so,” I said, thinking of our many nights together.

“I mean like this. On a more soulful level.”

I nodded. “No, I haven’t opened up. And neither have you. Not until today.”

Rawn couldn’t argue. “And yet I still feel like I’ve known you all my life,” he said. “Thank God I decided to take my lunch in the park that day.”

I beamed, remembering the line I’d used to pick him up.
So you're a Taurus? Does that mean you're hung like a bull?
“I was actually quite pleased with myself. You were hot. And I wanted to be reckless. I didn’t believe I’d actually go through with it.”

“I’m glad you did.”

“You should also be glad that I happened to already have a job lined up with Cepheus Scientific. Otherwise, we probably wouldn’t have met each other again.”

“Not necessarily. I went to the park every day for lunch in the days that followed, hoping that you would find me again.”

“Really?” I asked, surprised. “I thought you said you left me alone in the woods to avoid any awkwardness between us.”

He frowned, remembering. “I will spend my life making that moment of folly up to you.”

His life?
My heart raced.
Was he telling me he could commit to me after all? He said he wouldn’t leave me…

I didn’t press it, afraid of hearing the answer. It was easy to make promises. Keeping them was a lot harder. I knew. Though it was rare and unlikely, there was still a chance my MS could progress like my sister’s had.

“How did you manage to find time to take lunch at the park?” I asked, relishing the thought of him sitting at the park bench, waiting. If I were still angry at him, I would enjoy the fact that I never showed even more.

“When you want something, you find time,” he said. “And I wanted you.”

***

The following day, Dr. Phelps released me from the hospital.

Rawn was with me. I refused to get into the wheelchair, even though the nurse discharging me insisted. It brought back too many memories of my sister and of how she’d suffered with the disease we shared. To appease the nurse, Rawn carried me in his arms, setting me down only when we reached his car waiting out front.

“How are you feeling?” he asked, setting me gently into the car.

“Much better. I feel great, actually. Whatever they put in that IV, I want some.”

“You have some,” he said cheerfully. Then his mood turned. “We need to talk.”

“We haven’t been talking already?” I asked, edging to the far side of the seat so he had room to join me.

“I want you to be my assistant,” he asserted. “And this time, I’m not going to take no for an answer.”

“Well, you’ll have to,” I stated firmly. I wasn’t angry. I knew he was coming from a good place. He was concerned about my health. But as much as Rawn could control me in bed, I was still a woman of my own domain. Anything Rawn did to me, anything he told me to do, was because I let him. But us working together was one thing I was not willing to negotiate on.

“Why do you still resist me?” he demanded as the driver pulled away from the curb of the hospital. “Haven’t I proven to you that you can trust me?”

“Of course you have!” I exclaimed. “But why do you still resist me?”

“I don’t know what you mean,” he insisted.

I sighed. “Yes, you do. I thought I was beginning to understand you, Mr. Rawn Jackman. But clearly I don’t. How can you tell someone you love them, how can you open up to someone the way you did yesterday, and yet still deny them any sense of value in the relationship?”

His eyes were full of emotion. “It breaks my heart that you think I don’t value you. Everything I’ve done, I’ve done to show you how much I care.”

“Loving someone is not the same as valuing them. I worry your love is more like a boy with his toy.”

“How can you say that?”

“How can I not?” Suddenly, I wished I was back in the hospital. I wasn’t a piece of glass that would break under pressure. I was strong, stronger than I’d realized. If my stay at the hospital had taught me anything, it was that. But I wasn’t sure I was up for this conversation, not after the strides we had made in the last two days. “Even now, you still won’t commit to me. I know I was the one who pursued you, but that doesn’t mean you have free will to take only what you want of me and to leave the rest of me behind.”

“I don’t leave any of you behind. I want all of you. Please don’t push me away again.”

Now I was angry. “I’m not pushing you away. You’re pushing me away. Don’t navigate around the issue. This isn’t one of your business meetings. You are not in control. We’re in this together.”

Frustrated, he ran a hand through his dark hair, his eyes clouding over. “Madison, what is it you want from me? What is there to give that I haven’t already given you?”

“Everything!” I fell back into my seat, tired, but not because of any illness or dehydration. “I want you to commit to me. I want to know we have a future together. After talking to Dr. Phelps last night, I feel a bit better regarding my prognosis, the future of my disease. But I still don’t know. I don’t know if I have an entire lifetime to spend with the man I love. Or if my years are going to be a lot shorter. But I do know that I want to spend my days with someone who can commit to me. Who is willing to give me everything I’m willing to give them.”

“Madison, you know Cepheus Scientific is all I know. I can’t see myself working anywhere else. I don’t want to work anywhere else. But my position requires me to dedicate almost all of my time to my career. I don’t want you to go through the same thing my mother did.”

“Then what do you want me to go through? What do you plan on happening between us? Are we just going to keep meeting in our secret room until we’re both old and gray? Like Dr. Giordano. Like the CEO. Because that’s not what I want. I want you, but I’m not willing to hide our love away in a bedroom. Not forever.”

“No, that’s not what you deserve either.”

He looked so sad; I was certain I had lost him for good. That wasn’t my intention, but if he still wasn’t willing to commit to me after everything we had shared the previous day, it was better to be brokenhearted now than years later. At least that’s what I told myself. My mind was taking control while the rest of me, every other part of me, wanted him to hold me, no matter the consequences.

But I was not Pele. I was Namaka. I was wild; I could even be reckless, but I was also smart—smart enough to know that should the day come when Rawn no longer felt a need to meet me in our secret room, I would perish within his flames. The flames of a Leo.

“Rawn, I am not your mother. And you are not your father. Our relationship isn’t the same. Your mother married your father not realizing what she was walking into. I know. Hell, I’m in it with you. I work in the company, too. Don’t let their relationship ruin ours.”

He was silent, contemplating. As usual, his face revealed nothing, his composition blank, but not vacant. I worried he was angry at me for bringing his parents into our argument. But it was valid. The relationship he had witnessed between his mother and father was the whole reason he was holding back now.

Finally, he spoke. “I love you, Madison. Enough to give you everything you deserve. You’re right. Our situation is different. We’re in this together.”

“Do you mean it?” I asked, feeling my heart soar. “We can be together? Truly together.”

“We already are. But between your illness, and my stubbornness, neither of us wanted to admit it. But the universe has already woven us together. It would seem quite careless to deny the universe what it wants. I don’t think I could deny you, even if it tried.”

Experiencing a new kind of euphoria, one that didn’t require Rawn to touch my body, but did require Rawn, I pounced forward and kissed him. Never before had I kissed a man with such love and desire. It was the type of kiss that melded souls together. It was the type of kiss that lasted forever.

***

“So where are we on you becoming my assistant?” Rawn asked, carrying me into the apartment that overlooked the woods—our secret place. He wanted me to rest here for the night, one last easy sleep before I returned to the company. Sex was off the table.

That’s what he thought, anyway. I played along, for now. But I had no intention of getting as much sleep as he hoped I would.

I didn’t need him to carry me. I really was feeling better. But he had insisted. Now that he was willing to commit to me, and I was willing to commit to him, both of us setting our fears aside, it felt as if we were honeymooners, still on an amorous high after exchanging promises.

“This is really important to you, isn’t it?” I queried as set me down on the couch.

“Not only does it allow us to spend as much time together as we can, which won’t be much even then, but I want to be there for you. I know you have worries about your MS. But I also know you’re as ambitious as everyone else in this company. I don’t want to take your ambition away. You’ll need it if you want to rise within the company. In fact, once word spreads that we’re together, it’ll be harder for you. Look at Russell. You’ll essentially be in the same boat as him. The CEO doesn’t abide by nepotism lightly.”

“But what about you?”

“When I was made President of Product Development, the company was established, but it was still pretty young. That was over ten years ago. The advances in technology since then has skyrocketed the company. The CEO can hire an entire team of boy geniuses now. She’s grown selective over the years. She makes people work for their supper. I respect her for it.”

“How do you pronounce her crazily long last name?” I asked, knowing I would have to figure it out someday.

Rawn shrugged his shoulders. “I can pronounce it if I’m reading it off a piece of paper, but I usually just call her ma’am. I think she prefers it.”

“Glad I asked. That makes things a whole lot easier. But what if I try Madame CEO? It’ll make her feel like Hilary Clinton when she becomes president.”

“Go ahead, try it,” Rawn said. It sounded like a dare.

Never mind
, I thought.

“So, back to the issue of you being my assistant…”

I leaned my head back against the couch, thinking. He made a valid argument. It did mean we would be allowed to spend more time together, which would help absolve his fears. And in a way, mine too. I didn’t want any special treatment from him or from the company, but Dr. Phelps was right. I had to accept that my disease meant I had to take care of myself better. Rawn would not give me the same workload as Russell. He didn’t need to. He had an entire department underneath him.

“Is there a way I can make the transition without upsetting Ms. Goldstein?” I asked, my loyalties with the woman who had given me the opportunity to work for Cepheus Scientific in the first place. I had just come out of college and had limited experience, but she had taken a chance on me. I didn’t want to let her down.

“Of course,” Rawn said with admiration. “We can wait until she finds a replacement for you before moving you up to my office. I don’t think she’ll mind too much. Assistants coming and going is kind of the name of the game. Some leave for other companies. Some move up the ladder. Some get pregnant,” he said, referring to his own assistant. “But all assistants leave in the end.”

“Except Russell,” I said, once again feeling sorry for the CEO’s nephew.

“Even Russell. He’ll move up when his trial period is over. And don’t pity him just yet. As I said, once word gets around about us, it’ll be harder for you, too.”

“Totally worth it,” I said, smiling at him seductively, ready to lure him away from the couch and into the bedroom.

“No,” he said, even as he returned my smile. “Not tonight. You need your rest.”

I stood, showing him I was fine. “I got plenty of rest in the hospital. That was the whole point. Don’t you want to celebrate me being your new assistant?”

His eyes lit up. “So you’re definitely accepting?”