The Billionaire's Wife Read online

  “Of course, you would have all the time in the world to work on your artwork, as well. No more working as a bartender. No more taking gifts from your mother. No more shoving your creations down a flight of stairs because you have to move and can't afford to take the big pieces with you.”

  My chest constricted. That had only happened once. But it had hurt. Oh, it had hurt.

  He drew closer and closer and I backed up until I hit the floor to ceiling window behind me and flattened myself against the glass.

  He reached out, running a finger over my cheek, down my throat, down between the valley of my breasts.

  “There are a few small clauses in the contract that I thought you might find... distasteful,” he said. His voice had taken an almost dreamy quality, but I could barely hear him over the roar of blood in my head. “But given how much you want me, I don't think that will be a problem.”

  How much you want me. Yes, I did. Oh god, more than I had ever wanted anyone. If kissed me, I was sure I would spontaneously combust.

  “I don't want you,” I said. Even to my own ears, I could hear my throaty arousal.

  His lashes fluttered. His finger traveled across my breast, and when it found my nipple, he rested his thumb and forefinger around it.

  “What did you say?” he asked me.

  I swallowed around my dry tongue. “I don't want you,” I told him, louder this time.

  He pinched my nipple and twisted.

  The effect was electric—painful pleasure shot from my nipple, through my heart and straight down to my clit. I cried out and my legs buckled. My purse and the contract slipped from nerveless fingers.

  “Don't lie to me,” Anton Waters said.

  I didn't answer.

  He moved in.

  He didn't touch me. Not really. He ran the tips of his fingers over my body, but he avoided my skin, as though touching my directly would cause him pain. His lips traversed the fabric of my sweater, over my waist, traveling over the outside of my hip. His hands skimmed against my ass, finding the sensitive creases where my ass met my thighs. He scraped dull fingernails down the backs of my legs. I could barely feel them through my jeans.

  I wanted to grab his face and shove it into my crotch. I needed his mouth on me, his cock in me. My hands hovered near his hair, at the tips of his ears, but I was afraid to touch him.

  The tip of his nose met my hip, scraping over the front of my jeans. He stopped, just at the cleft of my thighs, and inhaled deeply.

  Putting his hands against the glass behind me he stood up and leaned in. His lips brushed my ear and his body moved forward until, at last, I could feel his cock, trapped in his pants, push against my belly.

  “I can smell you,” he whispered in my ear. “Your pussy is already begging for me to fuck it.”

  Yes. God, yes. My clit ached, and my cunt felt like it was about to explode. I couldn't even try to hide my arousal any more. My breath came hot and fast. His body hovered over mine, furnace-hot, and the thick swell of his erection pressed firmly against my stomach.

  I couldn't get enough air. I was going to pass out.

  “Sign the contract, and you will have everything you desire.” He rolled his hips, rubbing his cock over me, almost but not quite brushing against my pussy. My panties were soaked and slick with my juices. Then his lips found my throat, brushing over my hammering pulse.

  Flames licked over my body, radiating out from where he touched me. My hands came up, gripping his shoulders. He felt as good as he looked, all hard planes and firm muscle underneath that white linen shirt. My hands curled into fists as he let his fingers drift along the hem of my sweater. Then, slowly, torturously, he slipped them beneath and trailed his fingertips against my stomach.

  I wanted to tell him to stop. I couldn't tell him to stop.

  His wrist rotated and he flattened his palm against my belly, sliding his hand down, under the waistband of my pants, past the elastic of my panties.

  My head lolled and I pushed against his hand. Smoothly he parted my outer lips and slid his fingers along the outside of my slit, but he didn't touch my swollen clit, the place where I needed him most.

  He curled his fingers, coating them in my juices. Withdrew his hand, slid his other two fingers along my slit, grazing against sensitive flesh, but not quite touching.

  Mad with need, I tried to maneuver my hips over his hand, trying to capture him, but he avoided me deftly. His teeth scraped against my collarbone, and he spoke into my skin.

  “Beg me to take you,” he murmured. His voice was rough, reverberating through my bones. “Beg me to bend you over that couch and fuck you.”

  The words were out of my mouth before I could think about them. “Oh, yes,” I whispered. “Please.”

  He paused.

  Then, to my everlasting dismay, he pulled back, removing his hand from my pants and leaving a wet, cold trail behind. A deep chuckle rumbled through his chest, turning my knees to pudding.

  “No,” he said.

  It took a second to register. “What?” I cried. “Why? You asked me to... why?”

  And he laughed. He laughed at me.

  “Miss Dare, why on earth would you buy the cow if you could get the milk for free?” And he brought his fingers up to his lips. Without taking his eyes from mine, he licked them clean one... by... one.

  I turned and fled.

  I barely had the presence of mind to grab my purse—and the contract—as I left my dignity behind. Bursting through the double glass doors, I didn't even pause to fix my hair. Instead I just made a beeline for one of the pairs of wooden doors and crashed through them.

  I ran past Arthur. I didn't even turn to tell him goodbye. My gait was awkward as I rubbed my thighs together, rushing to the elevator. I slammed my hand against the button and, mercifully, the doors opened immediately. I stumbled inside and they closed behind me, beginning their descent.

  I was so close to coming, I didn't care that I was in an elevator. I shoved a hand into my jeans, parting my pussy lips and revealing the nub of my clit to my questing fingers. Desperately I rubbed my fingertip in tight, quick circles, my other hand snaking its way up under my shabby sweater, slipping beneath the strap of my bra. I squeezed my breast and pinched my nipple, sending a stab of need straight down through my belly. My knees buckled and I staggered against the hand rail circling the small space, my body on fire with need. My moans filled the elevator, my face numb with heat and my cheeks burning with shame.

  Dipping my fingers into my slick folds, I dragged moisture over my clit, slipping and sliding, my hips bucking against my hand. In the dark of my head, I imagined Anton Waters scraping his large, rough fingers over me, and with a final thrust I dragged myself over the edge. My back arched and I cried out, my head banging against the wall as I thrashed, waves of pleasure crashing into me, threatening to drag me out to a deep and hungry ocean I had only begun to realize was there.

  My whole body seemed to contract with the force of my orgasm, my hungry passage squeezing tight around nothing. It wasn't enough. It couldn't be enough. Not when I could have been fucking him. I almost sobbed with disappointment, even as I rode it out, my body locked in tight spasms.

  The pleasure faded, and I barely had enough time to pull my hand out of my pants before the elevator doors opened.

  A group of business men stood in the foyer, waiting. They pushed their way inside, and I barely had enough presence of mind to slip by them and make my escape.

  I had just masturbated in an elevator. And I'd come in record time.

  Gulping, I wiped my sticky fingers on the inside of my sweater and hurried past the receptionist and out the door. The cool air of fall slapped me across the face, sobering me.

  Couldn't have even waited til you got home, huh? I thought. Pathetic.

  My mind reeled as I wound my way through the burgeoning lunch crowd, and I took three wrong turns before I found my way to the subway station. When I finally boarded the subway car, I buried my face in my ha
nds and tried to think. The smell of my own juices clung to my fingers, reminding me of how salaciously I had behaved. I tried to pick through my feelings, but by the time I got home, the pickings were still slim.

  I only knew two things. I hated Anton Waters. And I was going to fuck him.

  Maybe in more ways than one.

  Chapter Two:

  Bartered Seduction

  The next morning found me sitting in a lawyer's office and nursing a powerful hangover.

  ...Okay, fine, I was still drunk. After my encounter with Waters and my subsequent shameful display in his elevator, I'd knocked around my little studio apartment, feeling dazed and useless. I even went on a cleaning binge to try to make myself feel better, but when I realized I'd moved the same dirty plate back and forth from my futon to the low coffee table where I ate five times without even skirting my tiny kitchen area, I gave up.

  Sitting down, I'd opened up the contract and begun to read, and made it about ten minutes before I cracked open a beer to go with it. I'm very mature when it comes to handling my problems. During my meeting with Anton Waters, my father had left me eight voicemails on my phone and I'd deleted all of them. I knew what he was going to say. Had I accepted Waters' proposal? Had I? Had I? Had I?

  I'd downed a six pack in short order—way more than I usually did—and as a consequence I woke up with nacho cheese in my hair, a new sculpture of a goat tied up and blindfolded, and a browsing history on my computer full of websites about kinky sex.

  Yeah.

  That's why I was at a lawyer's office. I wanted to see if this was actually... well, binding. Should I choose to sign it.

  Which I wasn't. Because, come on.

  Don't get me wrong, I like a little spanking now and then, but the things codified in Waters' contract—and my god, he had to have ice water running through his veins to dictate that sort of shit to a lawyer, and the lawyer who drew it up had to be stone-cold to have typed it up without renouncing his license and retreating to a mountaintop to seek a cleansing of his defiled soul—were definitely out of my realms of experience. I'd had to look a few of them up, just to make sure they were what they sounded like.

  I shifted in my chair, staring at the contract in my lap and trying not to think about what was in it. There was no way it was legal. I was, like... ninety-five percent sure. He couldn't actually take me to court if I didn't "play the submissive" for at least seventy-five percent of our sexual encounters. Could he? And was he going to be keeping track? A vision of Waters bending me over a table and fucking me while entering it into the record or ticking off a bead on the Sex Abacus first gave me a fit of the giggles, then set my cheeks aflame as I remembered that he had told me to beg him to fuck me in exactly that way.

  And I had.

  Shit.

  I rubbed my face vigorously. I was so glad the lawyer I was consulting was a woman. I needed to come up with some demands of my own.

  Not that I was thinking about doing this. That would be ridiculous. Haha.

  And yet the knowledge that my mother was now another twenty-four hours without treatment was a rock in my gut.

  Shit.

  "Miss Dare?"

  My head shot up, and I saw a handsome young paralegal standing in the doorway. "Yes?" I said.

  "Ms. Gray will see you now."

  I stood hastily, throwing my purse over my shoulder and clutching the contract like a shield. On unsteady feet, I tottered through the door.

  I was never very comfortable around lawyers. I had friends that had gone to law school, but they weren't lawyers, they were friends who had studied law. And most of them weren't lucky enough to get jobs in law and ended up baristas instead of barristers. My father, however, loved to have lawyers around, provided they were on his side, of course. I had even liked some of them when I was younger, before most of them started hitting on me when I turned sixteen. And I knew for a fact that my father had used the law to screw people over, people who couldn't afford it, people whose only crime was ignorance or need or just being poor.

  So it was with trepidation that I stepped into Ms. Gray's office, and when the kindly old lady in a tweed business suit rose from her seat at her desk and strode forward with a warm smile to shake my hand, I had to make a concerted effort to smile while my brain screamed at me: It's a trap!

  "Hello, Ms. Dare, how are you this morning?" she said in a chipper voice. She looked like a librarian more than a lawyer. Iron-colored hair streaked with white was pulled back into an elaborate coiffure at the back of her head, and her bright dark eyes shone in her face.

  I paused to think. "Been better," I said truthfully.

  "But have you been worse?" she asked.

  I had to think about that, too. "Yes."

  "Then it's a good day," she said. "Now what can I do for you?"

  Wordlessly I held out the contract. "I need you to look over this for me. It's a contract. Or a prenuptial agreement. I'm not sure."

  If she had worn glasses, I'm sure she would have given me a sharp look over the top of them. "You don't?"

  I shrugged. "That's why you're the lawyer and I'm not," I said.

  "Your fiance didn't tell you which it was?"

  "He's not my fiance yet. He's just this guy that wants to marry me."

  Her eyebrows shot up. "And do you want to marry him?"

  "Not really," I told her. "But if I did it would solve a lot of problems."

  For a long moment she looked at me. I could practically hear what she was thinking, which was unsurprising because I had thought many of those things myself.

  Finally she gestured for me to sit down, and I did, sinking gratefully into one of the rich leather chairs in front of her desk. She sat across from me and began to thumb through the contract. The pages ruffled loudly in the quiet of the room, though through the thick windows of her office I could hear the city going about its business. My father had worked in New York all his life, but commuted from out of state. My mother currently lived in San Francisco. The sounds of the city were usually comforting to me, but as the silence between us stretched out longer and longer I began to wish I'd brought some headphones. I wouldn't even have to plug them into anything. Just stick one end in my pocket and pretend I didn't care about how this ridiculous contract made me look. Pretend I didn't care about anything. I tried to ignore the few times she cleared her throat and looked at me, opting to study the law tomes lining her walls, which were just as dull as I thought they would be.

  At last she set the contract down and folded her hands in front of her. She appeared to be searching for words. My stomach, still on the mend from the abuse I'd put it through last night, clenched, and I tried to shrink into my clothes.

  "Miss Dare," she said at last, "I haven't ever quite seen a contract like this. I can only assume your reasons for considering it are good ones, but it is my professional opinion that this contract is not legally binding."

  I sat up. "So... that's like a loophole, right? I can sign it and get married and then divorce him?"

  Her lips twisted, and I knew her answer wasn't going to be quite that simple. "The problem, you see, is that it is a prenuptial agreement in the strictest sense. If you choose to divorce Mr. Waters for any reason, you will get nothing. That he wishes you to, ah, allow him certain liberties and wishes to codify them into a contract, then he may choose to terminate the marriage if you do not agree." A frown creased her face, traveling along well-worn lines. "Sexual provisions in prenuptial agreements cannot be enforced, as the refusal of one spouse would render said sexual interaction as rape rather than consensual sex, and the law cannot condone nor enforce rape. This clause would be found invalid in a court of law, should Mr. Waters choose to sue you."

  I felt the last shred of hope slipping through my fingers. "But... wouldn't that invalidate the whole contract?" I asked plaintively.

  Ms. Gray sighed. "I'm afraid not. There is a severablity clause included. Should one part of the contract be rendered invalid, it will be removed, bu
t the contract is still valid. Therefore, should you choose to sign this contract, Mr. Waters will be able to terminate your marriage for any reason he desires, and you will be left with only the assets with which you entered. If you terminate the marriage, the same thing will happen."

  I bit my lip. I didn't like this one bit. "What does it say, exactly?"

  She leaned back in her chair and steepled her fingers. "Well, it's fairly standard outside of the, ah, sexual provisions. Both parties are expected to be faithful. You will be given an allowance, both for yourself, your vocation, and for various projects you choose to pursue. In the event of Mr. Waters' death, you would receive very little, I'm afraid. He also appears to have included a clause wherein should his death be suspect, you will receive nothing." She sniffed. "He is a very... thorough man."

  "You mean he's totally bugfuck," I said.

  "I have not met him," she replied primly. "I'm sure you would know more about that."

  "I only met him yesterday," I said.

  Her lips thinned and she appeared to be debating something. She inhaled and leaned forward. "Miss Dare, may I speak frankly with you?"

  Hooboy. Here it came. The motherly lecture. "Sure. Why not?"

  She laid her hands on the contract. "As far as sexual perversions go, the ones in this contract are fairly light."

  I raised my eyebrows. "Oh?"

  "Yes. There's nothing in here about sex with animals or other people or even a sexual schedule, which I have seen before. Well, not the sex with animals part," she amended. "That is highly illegal. But the other things, yes. Are you doing this for the money?"

  I felt like crying. "I don't know if I'm doing this at all yet."

  "But there is a good reason?" She glanced down, then back at me and said, almost gently, "There is a clause in the contract that covers any medical expenses you might need. I noted that it does not mention you specifically as the recipient of medical attention. Is that it?"

  I nodded miserably.

  She sat back. "Then you should do it."

  My mouth dropped open. I closed it, then opened it again.