The Billionaire's Fake Girlfriend - Part 2 (The Billionaire Saga) Read online

  Chapter 16

  Nothing was ever the same after that night. The perfect few days of me staying with Marcus at the villa turned into the perfect few weeks. The renovations were long since completed at my apartment, but neither Amanda nor I ever fully moved back in. She was happy as a clam staying over at Barry’s Westwood townhouse, and as for me? Well, I don’t think either Marcus or I had to say it, but if I was ever crazy enough to want to move back to East Hollywood, he’d probably just move there with me.

  Augustina was staying comfortably at her country estate, and both my mother and Max had flown back to their respective homes—leaving Marcus and me to settle into a euphoric Los Angeles “winter.” Every day was seventy degrees and every evening we went for a midnight swim. That is, if we weren’t too busy doing other things.

  After a few days, both he and I had to get back to work. Every now and then in the evenings, he’d have to take a video conference. But after the first one, where I’d discreetly snuck under his desk and started to…play—he generally did those locked in his study.

  The initial buzz about the wedding had started to fade, and as much as I enjoyed the freedom to actually date my fiancé, it all came bubbling back again when my mother arrived. She had flown down on the sly—probably hoping for another huge family get-together—and wanted to meet at an upscale bakery in Beverly Hills for a cake tasting.

  After we made love, I knew I had to get going.

  “Do you really have to go?” Marcus pouted. He was lying on his stomach on the comforter, stark naked, looking hotter than ever.

  “I’ll only be a few hours—the tasting itself isn’t too long, but I’m meeting Amanda right after for lunch. In fact, if she and I over-indulge on the cosmos, there’s a good chance she’ll be coming back with me.”

  “I’ll plan on seeing both of you then.” He grinned, holding my gemstone bra up teasingly as I reached for it on the floor.

  “Give me that,” I reprimanded, snatching for it through the air.

  He pulled it away too quickly and sat back against the pillows, laying it across his naked chest. “Come and get it. And I’m not going to make any promises—you might be late for your tasting.”

  I chuckled and glanced at the time on my phone. “You know I want to, but I can’t. Hey, do you want to come along?” I threatened when he pouted once more. “I’m sure my mother and her platoon of bakers would be thrilled to see you.” The bra sailed apologetically through the air, landing in my outstretched hand. “Yeah, that’s what I thought.”

  I quickly finished dressing as he watched approvingly from the bed. When I was finally headed out the door, he called out once more.

  “A goodbye kiss? Do I at least get that?”

  I glanced back inside and couldn’t help but grin at the sight of him the bed. He was still stubbornly naked, holding a pillow innocently over his lap as his eyes danced and sparkled beneath dark, messy hair.

  How would I ever be able to resist that?

  I swept back inside and leaned down over him, planting a huge kiss right on his lips.

  “There.” I grinned. “Satisfied?”

  “Never.”

  His arms came up and the next thing I knew, we were lost in a tangle of pillows and sheets. What can I say? Some things are worth being late for.

  * * *

  “Rebecca! We’ve been sitting here for the last twenty minutes!” my mother reprimanded as I hurried into the cake shop. Three expressionless women sat beside her, each one wielding a carving knife and a spoon.

  “Fifteen,” I corrected breathlessly, “but who’s counting. Terrible traffic today.” I slipped out of my coat and took a seat across the table. “Who are they?”

  I had recently been so heavily indoctrinated into a strange world of constantly revolving people that I had been basically numbed to strangers.

  “This is Terry, Carry, and Mary,” she said stiffly. “They’ll be helping us today.”

  I blinked. “Really?” No one blinked back, so I cleared my face with a quick smile. “That is so helpful—thank you. I really don’t know much of anything when it comes to cakes.”

  “By the time we’re through with you, you will,” one of them replied in a heavy Russian accent. I couldn’t tell if it was a threat. The look on her face never changed.

  Two hours and fourteen cakes later, I was in a pre-diabetic coma. In the end, we (and by we, I mean my mother and her automatons) had narrowed it down to three different choices that I’d vowed to show to Marcus at his earliest convenience. They’d told me the names repeatedly, but as I swept out of the bakery and hailed down a cab, I promptly forgot each of them in turn.

  One was German chocolate…or maybe that was the one I’d said tasted like the bottom of a shoe…? Why the hell hadn’t I written any of this down?!

  I was still trying to remember when I got to the appointed café and spotted Amanda waving to me from an outside corner. She flashed me a huge smile when I sat down and pushed forward a pretend plate.

  “Cake?”

  I groaned. “That is not even remotely funny. I think I gained ten pounds in there. My stomach is still reeling.”

  And it was true. With all the processed sugar inside me, I felt like I might hurl.

  “That bad, huh?” She flicked carelessly through her menu before settling on the appetizers. “Glad I didn’t come. I was debating it but…I really don’t like cake, to be honest.”

  “After this morning, neither do I.”

  She snorted but looked up at me curiously over her menu. “So…now it’s back to cake-tastings with Sharon? How long exactly do you and Marcus think you can keep this up?”

  I’d met with Amanda for an emergency “how am I feeling” discussion the day after Marcus and I first had sex, so she knew all about our present situation. She had been a lone voice of support for both our fake and now our genuine relationship. (Then again, she was the only one who knew about the fake side of things, so she was going to be a lone voice either way.) When we’d taken things to the next level, she’d been thrilled, but now, as our long engagement stretched out even longer, she was starting to ask the same questions that we were asking ourselves.

  What the hell comes next?

  “I suppose it doesn’t help that your mom is throwing that huge engagement party. I got my invitation over at Barry’s the day before yesterday. Very…colorful. Loud, I think is what they’d call it.”

  I almost spat my water back into my glass. “Your invitation? What are you talking about?”

  She gave me a blank stare. “It isn’t supposed to be a surprise. Sharon called me the other day just to gush about it. Apparently you’d told her that you wanted a wedding in summer or fall, so she worked out a day with Marcus’ people when she could throw you a party?”

  “Oh my gosh…” I leaned back against my chair, feeling suddenly weak.

  The waiter came by to take our drink orders, and Amanda took my hand with concern. “I think it’s definitely going to be a cosmo morning,” she told him. “And keep them coming.”

  “Actually, just water for me, thanks.” I pushed back my chair as he disappeared. “I think I’m actually going to be sick.”

  As a wave of nausea hit me, I hightailed it for the bathroom, kneeling on the ground and emptying the sugary contents of my stomach. The door creaked open and locked shut a moment later as Amanda knelt down behind me, wiping my neck with a cool paper towel and holding back my hair.

  “Geez, how much cake did they make you eat?” she asked sympathetically as I retched again.

  I leaned back on my heels and wiped my mouth with a piece of toilet paper. “Actually, not that much,” I admitted. “Just a bite of each one.” I sat back against the cool tile wall with a groan. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

  Amanda bit her lip and studied me with concern. “Could you be pregnant?”

  “What?” I scoffed. “No.”

  But a stabbing feeling of doubt hit me in the gut.

&
nbsp; She leaned forward as her face grew grave. “Becca…?”

  “No, it’s not possible.”

  “Okay,” she nodded seriously, “how is it not possible? Facts, not feelings.”

  “It’s not possible…” My voice broke off in terror as a thin layer of sweat covered my forehead. “…because I can’t be pregnant.”

  Fifteen minutes later, we were back in the bathroom. Only this time, it was a grimy unisex shack in the back of a drug store. We paced back and forth in front of the sink, counting the seconds and ignoring the pounding of another customer on the door as we darted anxious sideways glances at the infamous “stick.”

  “Is it time yet?” I asked frantically. “How much longer?”

  It felt like an eternity.

  “Another thirty seconds.” She tried to calm me, speaking in soothing tones. “Back the hell up, lady. It’s not your turn!” she screamed out the door. “Seriously, Bex,” her face once again transformed, “it’s going to be fine.”

  “How? How is it going to be fine? I’m somehow stuck in the middle of both a real and a fake relationship that’s unravelling on a global scale, living in a hilltop mansion with a man I’m rapidly falling in love with, and being nightly stalked by a psychotic bird. What part of this is going to be fine?”

  “Bex.” Her jaw dropped open. “Who you’re rapidly falling in love with?”

  The words hit me like a slap to the brain, but before I could begin to process them, the alarm on her phone went off. I glanced briefly toward the counter, but lowered my head between my legs, panting softly.

  “I can’t look. You do it.”

  I saw her legs moving out of the corner of my eye. A second later, she was helping me straighten up, her face pale but determined.

  “Well?” I asked, feeling as though I was about to cry.

  She squeezed my hand and gave me brave smile.

  “You’re pregnant.”

  Chapter 17

  Pregnant. With a baby. Marcus’ and my baby. Pregnant.

  I don’t remember getting home. For that matter, I don’t know when I started referring to the villa as home. Amanda loaded me up in a pre-paid cab and gave them my address. I don’t remember walking up the stairs. I don’t remember what Marcus was doing before he leapt up excitedly and took my hand.

  “How was the cake tasting?” he asked in a rush. “Doesn’t matter,” he answered his own question. “I’m sure it was really boring. Hey listen—I want to talk to you about something.”

  He led me to the bed and I sank robotically down, unblinking, with a single word running through my head.

  Pregnant.

  He was too caught up in his own excitement to notice.

  “Rebecca.” He sat down beside me and took both my hands. “I’ve been thinking a lot about our situation. We’re all caught up with each other, but now everyone we know is getting involved, and it feels like we’re in too deep, and now we have all these actual feelings for each other…blah, blah, blah.” And I know what you’re thinking—he is as eloquent as he is beautiful. “But anyway, I’ve been really thinking about it. In fact, I was thinking about it when this invitation arrived this morning.”

  He waved something colorful in front of my face. It looked like an invitation.

  “Now, don’t apologize—don’t say anything at all. I know you had nothing to do with it. This has your mother written all over it, and to be perfectly honest, I think the fact that she wants to throw us a congratulatory party is very sweet. But it got me thinking—what if we use the party as a moment to announce…our wedding date?”

  I think I might have blinked.

  “I know what you’re thinking.” He held up his hands. “And I’m not saying that we actually get married. I’m just saying…what if we didn’t necessarily not get married? People have one year, two year, even three-year engagements all the time. Why don’t we just pick some far-off date, so everyone will stop pestering us about it, and just…see how it goes?”

  My eyes dropped to my lap.

  “I get that it’s only been a few months,” he clarified quickly, “I do get that. And I swear I’m not one of those people who’s like, ‘let’s just get hitched and see what happens,’ it’s just—”

  He took my hands in his.

  “I know we haven’t known each other long, but we have this amazing connection.” He gripped my hands and looked into my eyes. “I love you, Rebecca. And it’s not too soon to say that. There’s no magic length of time before saying, ‘I love you.’”

  Wow! He just said those three little magic words to me. My heart was racing so fast. Shit! He just told me he officially loved me. Not I’m falling in love with you, but the actual, “I love you.”

  “When I look into your eyes, I just know you’re the only woman in my life,” he said. “There’s this emotion that completely overtakes me, and I’ve never felt like this with anyone.” He softly kissed my lips. “I love you so much, always and forever.”

  “I love you too,” I said.

  Our eyes locked and we stared into each other’s eyes. It was a beautiful moment, one that was etched into my mind forever.

  “I know it hasn’t been that long,” he said. “I’m just saying that I don’t see why we would call this whole thing off and derail everyone’s lives when…when things are going so well between us.”

  He must have interpreted my silence as panic because he backpedaled quickly.

  “You hate the idea,” he guessed. “I know. It’s crazy. I wasn’t even really considering it. Unless…you don’t completely hate it. Because the great thing about keeping a date but just pushing it back is that we could change our minds at any time. The second you decide you’re actually sick of me, you can pack up your bags and walk away. There’s absolutely nothing stopping you. But if…if you decided you wanted to stay. Well…” His eyes glowed at the prospect. “…then we might actually have a real shot at making this work. And by this, I don’t mean our master deception. I mean…us. You and me, Rebecca. Something real.”

  I opened my mouth, but no words came out. The longer I was quiet, the more color drained from his face. Eventually, he let go of my hands and pulled back, giving me some space.

  “Okay, say something. Please. You’re killing me here.”

  My eyes came up to his, drowning in an ocean of tears.

  “Honey, please don’t cry!” he exclaimed, pulling me close once again. “We don’t have to keep the date—we don’t have to do anything you don’t want to. Just tell me whatever you’re thinking.” His eyes focused manically on my mouth. “Say anything…please!”

  All the breath left my body in a broken gasp.

  “I’m pregnant.”

  To be continued…

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