Worth Billions (Worth It 1)

Stillsville wasn’t much different from where I grew up, and I wondered why the hell I was bothering. Maybe this place wasn’t worth my time. Maybe it would be better if I called my mother and asked her to send me enough money for a bus ticket home. I didn’t have to stay with her. I didn’t want to stay with her. But sleeping on the streets of a familiar town felt a little better than sleeping on the streets of a town I didn’t give a shit about.

A town that my ex lived in.

But the thought of returning back to the oil town made me want to throw up. The idea of going back to that damn trucking company and living in my crackerjack box apartment and boasting that I was ‘making it’ made me nauseous. I had felt trapped in my hometown, and Andy had provided a way out. I loved him, sure. But if I was truly honest with myself, that wasn’t the real reason I left with him. Love was not the real reason I agreed to go off with a man I’d only known a few months. All of my friends had gone off to college and never came back—not that I blamed them. They all got scholarships or took out loans. But me? I couldn’t do either. I stayed and worked my way through my two-year degree in some pointless venture to prove to myself that I was better than my mother. That I could survive without a father figure in my life. That I could make something of my world despite the fact that he had just fucked my mother and left.

Leaving me behind, like some unwanted trinket.

Going home brought back so many painful memories. But if I couldn’t find a job in Stillsville, I’d have no other choice.

I refilled my drink and walked back around to the stores. I caught some of the managers and talked to them, just to inform them that I’d put in an application. Most of them looked shocked before they started asking me questions, and I quickly found my stomach plummeting to my toes. I had no retail experience, so I wasn’t qualified for a bulk of the sales associate positions. Most of the entry-level jobs were filled by the high school girls who needed the experience at their age.

Which I knew was code for ‘that job isn’t for slacker twenty-four year olds.’

Some of the managers straight-up told me they weren’t hiring and had no plans to until the holidays. Some advised me to come back at Thanksgiving and Christmas when they made seasonal hires.

But I didn’t have until the holiday season. It was the middle of summer. I didn’t have time to wait until December for a damn job.

Refilling my drink, I started the long walk back to Anton’s house. My prospects for a job were dismal, at best. I stopped at a few random businesses still open along the three-mile stretch and put in my application, but most people just looked at me with a blank stare before tossing it off to the side. I felt defeated. Worthless. Useless.

Maybe my mother was right when she had called me all those things.

Maybe the only reason I left with Andy was because I was just like her. Useless and pathetic without a man at my side.

My eyes welled at the words as the sun beat down on my back.

I was a failure, and it was obvious to everyone. That was why no one wanted to consider my resume. That was why everyone kept throwing them in the trash can. Andy knew it, and he’d kicked me out. My father knew it before I was even born, and he left. And soon, Gray would come to know it and he would kick me out as well. Hell, he probably already knew it, since he had agreed to let me hang around for a few days. A handout to the neediest, most pathetic person in town, coming right up!

That was it.

I’d made up my mind.

In the morning, I’d call my mother and ask her for the money for that bus ticket.

I walked up onto Anton’s porch and stared in the window. I looked at the reflection of the woman staring back at me and almost didn’t recognize her. The lifeless eyes. The forlorn stare. The downturned lips. At one point in time, a vibrant young girl had looked back at me. Full of life, with prospects and pride as she spent her money on her own degree that she just knew would take her places. But as I stared at my carcass of a reflection, I saw why Gray felt sorry for me.

Saw why he felt I needed a handout.

Gray looked and talked like a successful adult. Held himself with pride and carried himself with confidence. But me? I was a twenty-something stereotype. No wonder he offered me a place to stay. He probably felt like he’d be kicking a wounded puppy or something if he put me out. I closed my eyes and drew in a deep breath as sweat trickled down my back.

What I wouldn’t give to have met him on equal footing.

Maybe then, I’d have a chance with him.

I couldn’t deny how attractive he was. But nothing was going to ever come of it. He was a tall, intelligent, well-spoken man in his thirties, probably. And I was a bullshit excuse for an adult in her twenties that kept floundering around with her life. Hitting dead ends, hoping to climb up some imaginary ladder that seemed so slick it must be coated in oil. But him, his bright blue eyes seem to look right into my soul, and the way his thick dark hair swooped back was so sexy. Those broad shoulders padded with lean muscle did me in.

And his arms. The way they throbbed with strength. The way the strong lines of his torso had disappeared beneath his jeans that morning.

A shiver ran through my body as I opened my eyes.

Yep. In another time—in another reality—I would’ve jumped his bones. I would have rolled my shoulders back in confidence and brought a meal to the table so delicious he couldn’t turn it down. Back when I felt more confident in myself. Back when I felt indestructible.

Back when life hadn’t pummeled me into the ground.

Drawing in a deep breath, I stepped away from the window and opened the front door of Anton’s house.

I needed a fucking shower to wash off the bullshit from my afternoon.

Chapter 9