Waking Up with a Billionaire (The Overnight Billionaires Book 3) (27 page)

T
he house that sat only steps away from the Louisiana bayou looked nothing like an old fishing shack. The front steps that led up to the large porch didn’t have one missing board or protruding rusty nail. In fact they were made with some newfangled composite material that looked like wood but wouldn’t warp or peel in the humid temperatures…or in a flood like the one they’d had last fall. The multitude of windows on both levels had not one crack. The pristine white siding no peels. And the screen door no squeaks…even after all the use it received every summer, when the entire Beaumont family converged on the vacation home for three weeks.

Donny John didn’t even jump anymore when the screen door slammed. He just sat there sipping his sweet tea as two little girls came charging out the door.

“Mine!” three-year-old Althea yelled as she tried to grab the doll from her cousin’s hands. But Tulip was having none of it.

“But you said you would share,” Tulip whined. “’Sides, you already have a baby in yours tummy.”

A little surprised by the statement, Donny John leaned forward in his rocker. Sure enough, Althea’s shirt showed the lumpy outline of a baby doll. He tried not to laugh as his granddaughters continued to bicker.

“But I wants two babies like Aunt Chloe.” Althea jerked the doll away from Tulip and stuffed it under her shirt with the other doll, completely oblivious to the fact that the dolls’ plastic legs were dangling beneath.

Tulip started to bawl, and the little girl could cry louder than an evangelist’s wife giving testimony. Donny John was about to get up from his rocker and comfort her when the screen door opened and the Beaumont women stepped out. There was Olivia looking cool and collected in her pretty sundress. Eden looking like the writer she was with her glasses perched on her head. And Chloe looking extremely pregnant in her maturity muumuu, which appeared to be dusted with potting soil. The woman loved playing in the dirt. So much so that Grayson had built her a flower nursery on her father’s vineyard when she’d graduated from college.

But of all the women who stepped out the door, it was Donny John’s wife who reached Tulip first. Suzanne looked as beautiful as the day he had married her. She scooped their granddaughter up in her arms and gave her a kiss.

“What’s the matter, angel? Did you fall?”

Tulip shook her head. “Noooo, Gamma…I just want a baby in my tummy too.”

The women exchanged shocked looks before turning to Donny John, who was having a hard time keeping his laughter in check. “Don’t look at me,” he said. “I didn’t put that idea in her head. I think it has more to do with wanting to be like her aunt Chloe.”

Chloe looked down at her protruding stomach and frowned. “Believe me, Tulip, it’s not as fun as you think,” she said. “Especially in this awful heat.”

“I’ll get you some iced tea,” Eden said before she glanced at her daughter. “And if you’ll stop crying, I’ll get you girls some of your grandmother’s homemade peach ice cream.” Tulip stopped crying, but only long enough for the screen door to slam behind her mother.

“But I don’t want ice cream. I want a baby!” She pointed at Althea, who was trying to conceal the dolls under her shirt…but not very successfully. Her mother quickly zeroed in on her daughter.

“Althea Deirdre Beaumont,” Olivia said. “You get those dolls out of your shirt right now and give one to your cousin.”

Althea’s lip protruded, but she listened to her mother and took the dolls out, holding one up to Tulip. The crying stopped instantly, and within minutes the two girls were sitting on the steps playing. Now that the crisis was over, the ladies went back inside to help Eden. And only moments later Donny John was enjoying peach ice cream with his sweet tea as he watched his granddaughters. Because of the heat, the women had opted to eat their ice cream inside. But Donny John enjoyed the humid heat. Of course he had also come to enjoy the cool ocean breezes of San Francisco—not to mention the big ol’ boat his boys had bought him for his last birthday.

Having finished their ice cream, Tulip and Althea came and crawled onto his lap with their dolls, bringing with them the smell of fresh peaches and precious little girls.

“Tell us a story, Gampa,” Tulip said.

“Yes,” Althea agreed. “Tell us the story of the three little hillbilly boys who became princes.”

Donny John gave each of his granddaughters a kiss on the head. “Are you sure you want to hear that one again?”

“Ple-e-ease!” they sang out in chorus.

Donny John smiled. “Once upon a time, there were three little hillbilly brothers named Valentino, Lothario, and Romeo. They lived in a run-down shack next to a bayou very much like this one. And one day the brothers decided to go fishing.”

“Just like Daddy and Uncle Nash and Uncle Grayson did today,” Althea said.

“Yes, just like that. But instead of catching fish in the bayou, each brother caught a—”

“Magical mermaid!” Tulip yelled as she looked up at him.

Donny John tapped her button nose. “Exactly. And each mermaid granted each brother only one wish. They could have money. They could have fame. Or they could have love.”

Althea sat up and raised her hand. “I know what they chose! I know what they chose!”

Before Donny could call on her, three little hillbilly brothers walked out of the big cypress trees that surrounded the house, looking nothing like the lingerie billionaires they were in their camo pants, tattered T-shirts, and full beards. Like everything else, the beards had become a little bit of a competition among the brothers, to see who could grow the fullest beard by the end of the month. Surprisingly, it looked as if Grayson was winning this time.

Tagging behind the Beaumont brothers, with fishing poles on their shoulders and a string of fish in hand, were three little boys. Each with the dark hair and violet eyes of their fathers. His granddaughters finally noticed their fathers and brothers and released earsplitting squeals as they clamored off Donny John’s lap and headed down the porch steps. Their feet had barely hit the bottom stair before Deacon and Nash were there to scoop their squealing daughters up. The noise alerted the womenfolk, and they came out the screen door and stood on the porch. At the sight of their moms, the boys stopped lollygagging and ran past their fathers and sisters, thumping up the porch steps like a herd of fishy-smelling elephants, each punching and pushing to get the honor of showing his catch first.

It was the youngest grandson who won the scuffle.

“Lookee what I caught, Mommy.” Cameron Picasso held up his string of fish.

Chloe looked duly impressed by her son’s accomplishments. “All of those? Why, I think you’re a better fisherman than your uncle Nash. Now the question is who is going to clean them and cook them?”

“I’ll be happy to clean.” Grayson climbed the porch steps and took a handkerchief out of his back pocket, a white handkerchief with tiny purple flowers embroidered on it, and wiped the smudge of dirt off his wife’s nose. “But Nash will have to do the cooking.”

Nash carried Tulip up the stairs and placed an arm around Eden. “I don’t mind frying up some fish.” He looked at his son. “Do you want to help, Cash?”

Cash Tristan didn’t exactly look thrilled by the prospect. “Do I have to, Dad? Mikey and I were going to set up a lemonade stand like Grandpa Harrington’s. He gave me three juicers the last time I saw him, and we want to try them out.”

Michael Paris nodded in agreement. “I figure if we set up next to that construction site in town we could sell ten glasses every fifteen minutes. And at a dollar a glass that would be forty dollars an hour.”

“That’s a fortune,” Cameron said in awe.

“Can I help?” Althea wiggled out of Deacon’s arms.

“Me too,” said Tulip, before she looked at Donny John. “But first Gampa has to finish the story. What do the brothers choose?”

With his heart and eyes brimming with joy, Donny John got up from the rocker and made his way over to his family. A family that had survived and thrived…and would continue to survive and thrive.

Taking Suzanne’s hand, he smiled. “Why, the brothers chose love, of course. Because only love can give you this kind of happily ever after.”

D
eacon Beaumont had pictured his second meeting with Olivia Harrington much differently. In his fantasies he was always dressed in an expensive designer suit and either helping a supermodel out of his brand-new Maserati or sitting behind a massive desk in his penthouse office. Olivia was always dressed in hand-me-downs and begging for money…and mercy. Of course in the fantasy he gave her neither. Money and mercy were for people who deserved them. And as far as he was concerned, Olivia didn’t deserve anything but his strong dislike.

His hatred was reserved for her stepfather.

Nash took a towel off the rack and handed it to him. “I’m going to make a guess and say that you and our cousin decided to take a swim. And while I would love to hear the story, I think it can wait until after we show Olivia some Southern hospitality and let her get out of those wet clothes.”

Olivia’s clothes were soaked. Her white T-shirt was completely transparent, showing every detail of the lacy bra beneath. And when Nash’s gaze lowered, Deacon had to squelch the desire to wrap the towel around her. Fortunately, his brother had never been much of a gawker and quickly averted his gaze.

Grayson, on the other hand, was out-and-out gawking. He had always had an almost reverent fixation on women. He had trouble talking to them, but he loved to look at them. And paint them. It didn’t matter if they were beautiful or plain. Skinny or fat. Young or old. Or covered in bug bites and lichen. If you were a woman, Grayson wanted you as one of his subjects. For some reason—his brother’s pretty-boy good looks or his innocent blushes—women didn’t mind posing for him, usually with their clothes off.

Well, it wasn’t happening with Olivia. She wasn’t staying long enough for Grayson to paint her, or for Nash to show off his Southern hospitality. And Deacon made that perfectly clear when he shoved both his brothers out of the bathroom and slammed the door behind him.

“She’s not staying,” he said as he strode into his bedroom.

Nash and Blue followed, Nash flopping down on the bed Deacon had painstakingly made that morning and Blue dropping to the floor in a puddle of loose bloodhound skin. “We can’t just throw her out, Deke,” Nash said. “Especially when she came all the way here to visit her Louisiana cousins.”

Deacon glanced back to see Grayson standing in front of the closed bathroom door, his hand twitching as if he were sketching Olivia. “Jesus.” He walked into the hallway and grabbed his brother by the collar of his shirt and pulled him into the bedroom before closing the door. “There is no way prissy Miss Olivia Harrington trekked from California just for a visit. Especially after the way she treated us the first time we met. And we’re not her cousins. Her gold-digging mother just happened to marry our filthy-rich asshole of an uncle.”

“I don’t remember being treated that badly.” Nash stretched out on the bed and tucked a pillow behind his head. “If Donny John had shown up at my California mansion begging for money with his three urchin sons in tow, I would’ve called the cops too.”

Deacon pointed a finger at him. “Get your dirty boots off my bed.” After Nash rolled his eyes and complied, Deacon pulled open the top dresser drawer and took a clean pair of boxers from the neatly folded stack. “No, instead good-hearted Uncle Michael took pity on his poor hillbilly relatives and invited us to stay the night before kicking us out the following morning.”

“Only after you molested his stepdaughter.” Grayson finally pulled his head out of the clouds and entered the conversation.

Deacon slammed the drawer. “I did not molest Olivia!”

Grayson raised his hands. “I believe you, Deke. But you have to admit that the evidence was pretty damning.”

“Damning evidence seems to be the bane of the Beaumont brothers,” Nash said dryly. And if anyone knew about damning evidence, it was Nash. He had spent months in jail after being falsely accused of a crime.

Olivia hadn’t accused Deacon, but she hadn’t spoken up for him either. She had just stood on the balcony like a spoiled Juliet and watched as the neighborhood security officers escorted him and his family off the property. Now she wanted to offer him and his brothers some kind of proposition. Well, as far as he was concerned, she’d had her chance to talk.

“One of you can take her back to town.” He pulled on the boxers. “I need to head out to the work site.”

“What work site?” Nash asked. “I thought you couldn’t break ground until you reeled in a new investor. Did you find one?”

Deacon had. Unfortunately, the one investor he had on the line was the one he didn’t want to reel in. Francesca Devereux had made it very clear what she wanted from the deal. And it wasn’t a return on her investment. She wanted a cougar cub—a man she could parade around her social events like her froufrou pet poodle. Deacon had never been pet material. But he wasn’t the type of guy to give up either. The project had taken him years to pull together, and he was convinced the lakeside condos would make money. If he had to prove it by becoming some rich woman’s arm candy, then so be it.

He pulled open another drawer. “Speaking of catching, you need to catch a job, Nash—instead of living here for free.”

“Free? I cook all the meals, and I believe Grandpa willed this house to all of us. Besides, I’m working on an idea that could make us filthy rich.”

“Is that what you’ve been doing on your laptop? And here I thought you’d been playing games.”

Nash grinned. “Maybe a few. But I’m telling you, big brother, that apps are the wave of the future. And I have this idea for a great app that will work in conjunction with all the new electronic sensors they have out. With just a tap of your phone, you can dim your lights, turn on music, and start up your gas logs.”

“Dim your lights, turn on music, and start a fire? Are we talking business or seduction, Nash?”

Nash laughed. “Why can’t we talk both? And I don’t need an app to seduce women, Deke.”

It was the truth. Nash didn’t need anything to seduce women. There was something in his DNA that made women do things they would never do with another man.

“And when will this app be ready to make money?”

Nash got to his feet. “Unfortunately, I find myself in the same boat as you’re in. In order to start making money, I’ll need an investor.”

Great. Maybe Francesca wouldn’t mind three pet poodles.

Grayson, on the other hand, wasn’t thinking about needing money or making it. As if he were sleepwalking, he opened the bedroom door and moved out into the hallway. “I need to paint her. Now. While the afternoon light is still good.”

Nash laughed. “I don’t blame you, baby brother. Despite the bug bites, she looked pretty hot in that wet T-shirt. Of course I’m interested in doing something other than painting her…now, while the light is good.” He glanced at Deacon. “Or would that be considered incestuous?”

“She’s not our damned cousin!” Deacon snapped just as the door to the bathroom opened and Olivia’s head peeked out. She looked much cleaner. Almost squeaky-clean with her wet hair and steam-flushed skin. Her eyes were as green as he remembered them and still seemed to cover half her face.

“Do you think I could get something to wear until my clothes dry?” she asked. “A robe? Or a T-shirt, perhaps?” Her gaze drifted over to Deacon and then sizzled down his bare chest to his boxers. “Ahh, I was right. Cotton boxer briefs mid-cut.” She tipped her head to the side and the door cracked open a little more, revealing a naked shoulder. “Nice fit in the butt, although they’re a little too snug in the crotch area.”

Before those innocent eyes could make his crotch area even snugger, Deacon grabbed a pair of jeans from the drawer and held them in front of himself. “Grayson, find Olivia something to wear.”

While Grayson went to do his bidding, her gaze finally lifted to Deacon’s eyes. “You’re right. I’m not your flesh-and-blood cousin.” She looked at Nash, who now stood next to Deacon. “But alas, I still can’t have sex with you, Nash. I’m in a relationship.” Grayson returned with a stack of clothes, and she gave him a soft smile as she took them. “And yes, you may paint me. But only if you bring me a comb.” With that she pulled her head in and closed the door.

While Deacon’s features hardened, Nash laughed.

“I think I like her better now that she’s all grown up.”

Deacon had always thought of California girls as having long, straight, bleach-blond hair and tanned, leathery skin. Olivia had neither. Her hair was shoulder-length, but a deep golden wheat color and wavy, and her skin was pale and smooth. She wasn’t what he would call a stunner, especially in the baggy T-shirt and jeans Grayson had loaned her. Which didn’t explain why he couldn’t seem to look away.

“Thank you,” she said as Nash handed her a glass of sweet tea before sitting down at the table across from her. Grayson sat on the couch, flicking a nubby piece of charcoal over his sketchpad. Deacon preferred to stand. He leaned against the old stove with his arms crossed, trying to look bored and uninterested. It was difficult when every cell in his body seemed to be on high alert.

The shower had helped Olivia’s hair, but only agitated the leech hickey on her neck and the bug bites on her arms. Deacon didn’t doubt for a second that they itched like hell. Or that she was sweating her butt off in the humid heat. But Olivia showed no signs of discomfort. She sat with a placid smile on her face as she took a sip of her tea.

“So the reason I’m here is because—”

“Don’t move,” Grayson said as his hand flew over the sketchpad. “Stay right where you are for just a second.”

“I apologize for my baby brother,” Nash said. “He’s so busy thinking with the right side of his brain that he doesn’t know how to socialize.”

“Because we all know which brain you think with, Nash,” Deacon cut in. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to work.” He took a step toward the door, but she stopped him.

“Please, Deacon. Just give me five minutes.”

The
please
had him taking his cell phone from his back pocket and glancing at the time. With the crack running down the center, it wasn’t easy to read. “You’ve got two.”

Taking another sip of her tea, Olivia cleared her throat as if preparing for a long speech. “I’m sure you were surprised by Uncle Michael’s death and the details of his—”

Nash cut her off before Deacon could get his mouth closed. “Uncle Michael is dead?”

Her eyes widened in surprise. “Michael’s lawyers haven’t contacted you?” She glanced around, and then answered the question herself. “I guess it makes sense, seeing how hard it was for me to find you.” She looked back at Nash, and tears flooded her eyes. “I’m sorry. Michael died two weeks ago after a severe stroke had hospitalized him.”

Deacon waited to feel something. Hurt. Pain. But all he felt was disappointment. Disappointment that he hadn’t been able to achieve success before Michael died. Disappointment that he could never rub that success in his uncle’s face.

“So if lawyers were supposed to tell us about Uncle Michael, why are you here?” he asked.

She turned her gaze on him. “Michael put you in his will.”

And there it was. After all the years Deacon had waited to be recognized by Michael, the man had waited until he was dead to do it. There was a moment when Deacon wanted to hit something. Instead he shoved down the anger and spoke in a deceptively calm voice. “Now why would he do that?”

Olivia shrugged. “Believe me when I tell you that I don’t have a clue. I can only guess that with you being his blood relatives, he thought it was the right thing to do.”

“The right thing to do?” His anger flared. “Your stepfather wouldn’t have known the right thing to do if it bit him in the ass. He disowned his family and never looked back—even when they needed him most. And I will never forgive him for that.”

“Stop it, Deacon.” Nash got up from his chair. “The man is dead. You don’t need to point out his flaws now. And you certainly don’t need to take it out on Olivia.”

But that’s exactly what Deacon wanted to do. Now that he could no longer confront his uncle, there was only one person to take his anger out on. He glared at her, but she only stared right back with those deceptively innocent eyes.

“I don’t know what happened between my stepfather and your father,” she said, “but Michael must’ve felt badly about it because he put you in his will.”

“I have no use for guilt money,” he said. “So you can take the will and go to hell.” He strode to the door, but again she stopped him.

“Not even for fifty million dollars?”

Olivia’s words had his hand freezing on the worn wood of the screen door. He slowly turned. “Fifty million dollars? Uncle Michael willed me fifty million?”

She shook her head. “Not just you, but your brothers as well. And he didn’t will you money. He willed you shares of his lingerie company.”

“How does that equate to fifty million?”

Instead of answering she reached for the backpack by her feet. The same one that had been strapped to her back when he’d pulled her from the swamp. It was soaked, so it took her a while to get it unzipped. Once she had it open, she pulled out a damp file folder. She unhooked the loop and opened it, taking out a stack of legal papers that were surprisingly dry.

“I’m willing to offer you and your brothers fifty million dollars each for your shares.” She set the stack of papers on the table before pulling out a pen. “All you have to do is sign these contracts, and then once the will goes through probate and the shares transfer, I’ll give you the money.”

“Fifty million dollars?” Nash’s chair creaked as he sat back. “This is a joke, right?” He glanced around. “There has to be a hidden camera somewhere around here.”

“It’s no joke.” Olivia held out the pen. “With a simple signature, you could be a millionaire.”

“So what’s the catch?” Deacon asked.

“No catch.” Her innocent eyes stared back at him. “I want your shares of the company.”

It was rumored that the Beaumont men had an uncanny ability to read women’s minds. Deacon didn’t believe in such hocus-pocus. He believed in General Patton’s theory of knowing your enemies. He’d done his research on Michael…and Olivia. In numerous interviews she had made no bones about the fact that she ate, slept, and breathed her job. She loved the company. Loved it enough that she wouldn’t want three men who knew nothing about the lingerie business having any kind of control over it.