Giving In To Love (Strong Brothers 2)

The following Monday when I walked into my office, I was feeling on top of the world. Several more of my paintings had sold, and the article hadn’t even come out yet. Once it did, I’d surely sell more. In six months, my deal with Hunter would be over, and I hoped I’d be able to be a full-time artist. Yes, things in my life were looking up, and nothing would bring me down.

There was a knock at my door. Gavin poked his head in. "Hey, have you seen this?" He held his phone up with the screen toward me, presumably wanting me to see something on it.

I waved him in. "Seen what?"

He walked into my office, but he left the door open, I suspected, so that Hunter wouldn't think he was trying something he shouldn't be. He handed me his phone.

I looked down at the screen. At first, I wasn’t sure what I was looking at. It was a picture of a well-dressed man and woman looking like they were making out somewhere. And then it hit me, like the proverbial two-by-four; That was me and Hunter.

Oh crap. I scrolled up the page to check out the headline and the article. It was a short paragraph that talked about how lucky Natalie Nichols was to have a billionaire fan to support her art. The idea of having a billionaire patron didn't bother me so much. After all, throughout history, patrons are what supported the arts. What bothered me about this paragraph was that it suggested that the only reason the showing occurred was because I was sleeping with Hunter. It completely dismissed my talent. It basically read as if Hunter was appeasing his new hot piece of ass.

I jerked my head up to look at Gavin. "Has Hunter seen this? Has anyone seen this?"

Gavin shrugged. “I don't know who specifically has seen it, but it's making the rounds. And I don't just mean it's making the rounds here at the office. It's getting buzz over the Internet as well."

I dropped the phone onto my desk and covered my face with my hands as I realized the magnitude of what was happening.

"At least I know why Hunter looked like he was going to throttle me the other night."

I managed to look at Gavin, who had a sympathetic shrug for me.

"This is a disaster." I stood up and came around my desk. "I'm going to go talk to Hunter."

As I made my way to Hunter's office. I pulled my phone out and did a search on my and Hunter’s names, and sure enough there was more than one place picking up the picture and the little blurb.

I barged into his office not caring what he was doing or if his secretary would mind. "Have you seen this?” I held up the phone for him to look at.

He frowned at me, but stood and came over to look at my phone. Like me, it took him a moment, but then it hit hard.

"Jesus fucking Christ." He walked away running his hands through his hair. "Where did the picture come from?"

"I don't know but at this point it's already out there. So that seems kind of moot."

"I'm going to kill whoever it is." He paced a little bit more and then stopped to look out the window over a nice view of San Diego. "I can't believe I'm in the press connected to a woman."

I flinched as his words shocked me. That was his concern? That it would look like he wasn't a playboy anymore?

I gaped at him. "You really do think the world revolves around you, don't you?"

He stopped, and turned to look at me with a quizzical look on his face.

"This is totally dismissing all my talent and work. For a minute I thought I might make a living as an artist. Now I'm just a new talent piece of ass that you've been indulging." Unable to stand there a minute longer and deal with his sorry ass ego, I turned and walked out, heading home. They could fire me if they wanted to, but I suspected they wouldn't, because while Hunter might not care, the other brothers and Margaret might be concerned that Hunter had been fucking one of his staff.

19

Hunter

Natalie wasn't even all the way out the door, before I was inwardly kicking myself for being so insensitive. She was right, I hadn't thought about the impact this gossip would have on her and her career. Then again, she'd only been thinking of herself as well. Of course, she had more to lose than I did. This article simply made me look like a clichéd Playboy indulging his newest conquest. For her, this could stop her career before it even had a chance to start.

Fueled by anger for the both of us, I went to my phone and began calling anyone and everyone I knew who could put a stop to this salacious news. Unfortunately for both of us, I was told there was almost nothing I could do. And in fact, making an attempt to make it go away, could make it worse, as it would draw more attention to it. The advice I got was to ignore it.

"Fuck."

And then bad went to worse, as the calls started coming in from other media outlets wanting me to comment on the story. That was

n't going to happen.

I stood, put on my coat, and strode out of my office telling my secretary that I was going to be out for the day, and for her to ignore any calls that came in from the media or gossip rags.