Marriage of Convenience (The Raven Brothers 1)

She blushed. “Yes.”

“Because if you’d prefer to wait and see if this took, we can. I meant it when I said I could go without.” But as I said it, my dick revolted. He liked being inside Sara. He might have been able to pass on other women, or be content with my stroking him off in the shower, but clearly, he wasn’t done with Sara yet.

Before she could respond, Mrs. Childs appeared. “Mr. Raven, you have a call inside from your father.”

I groaned. “Thank you, Mrs. Childs.” I wiped my mouth with my napkin. “You can let me know about the matter later,” I said to Sara.

She nodded.

“Have fun today, Sara. I look forward to finding out how much you were able to spend and on what.”

She laughed. “Okay. I’ll try not to let you down.”

I left her on the terrace and went inside to take my father’s call in my office. I wondered if he’d somehow heard about my marriage. I hoped not. I’d have to tell him and my brothers eventually, but I was still grappling with the whole situation myself and needed time to get my head around it so it would be plausible to my family that I’d married for legitimate reasons.

14

Sara

I was definitely in the Land of Oz. The last clothes I bought were from the thrift store, and now I was looking at a five-hundred-dollar pair of jeans. Jeans! The cheapest I’d found so far were two hundred dollars. Did people really spend that much on their clothes? Even with twenty-five thousand to spend, I couldn’t bring myself to spend that amount of money on casual wear.

I did find a beautiful champagne colored, lace cocktail dress that was originally seven hundred dollars but was on sale for three hundred. I decided to buy it in case Chase took me to any sort of party or formal event that required me to look nice. I figured the people in his world would know the difference between expensive and cheap clothes, and a fancy dress on sale seemed like a good compromise. The perfect shoes to go with it were fifteen hundred dollars, and even though I loved them, I couldn’t bring myself to buy them. I found strappy heeled sandals for five hundred, which still seemed too much since they cost more than the dress, but I bought them anyway. I couldn’t wear my ugly old black pumps with such a lovely dress.

I made my way through all the well-known stores on 5th Avenue looking like a dork as I stared in awe at the beautiful clothes and accessories and then gaped at the prices. I swore I could feel the clerks looking at me and wondering if I was a shoplifter or something. I didn’t belong in these stores.

Back in the car, I wanted to cry, I felt so out of my element.

“Would you like to try some specialty boutiques that aren’t so… highbrow?” James asked from the driver seat. I guess he could tell how out of place I was.

“Yes, thank you.”

We wove through the city, and I wondered how I was going to pull off being a billionaire’s wife. Perhaps Chase could just leave me home whenever he had to go to fancy parties. If all went to plan, I’d have to care for a baby, anyway.

The car pulled up to a trendy looking little shop with clothes that looked like someone my age would wear hanging in the window. I wondered if that would be okay. I was nineteen, but I was married to a rich sophisticated man. I probably needed to dress older.

I decided to go in and see if there were items of clothes that could work. These were still more expensive than I could afford before I married Chase, but way more affordable than the other stores. I bought jeans and a few shirts.

When I came out, James put my bags in the trunk, and pointed out other shops in the area I might be interested in. I’d need to tell Chase how helpful James was being.

I spent another few hours shopping, not just getting clothes, but also picking up accessories, such as a purse and jewelry, as well as necessities, like underwear and socks. I even spent a little time in a lingerie store.

When I arrived back at Chase’s penthouse, he wasn’t anywhere to be found, so I went to my room to put away my new clothes. When I came to the undergarments, I decided to put on the sexy red bra and panties. Mostly I gravitated to pastel, lacy pieces, but bought the red set because it was sexy and I thought it might be something Chase would like. I hoped he’d touch me again, although it wasn’t clear to me if he would. His goal was to make a baby, not get his rocks off. Still, it couldn’t hurt to see if I could entice him.