The Billionaire's Triplets (The Billionaire's Triplets 1)

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Lissa lay back, thinking about her business and Tina’s question. It was a good one, and important. How would she deal with things after the babies were born? One baby was trouble enough, and three… She’d need help. Of course, if she applied herself to the work, she could afford to get good help. She’d need to travel, so she would need someone who could travel with her—she wouldn’t leave the children behind.

A nurse came in with a clipboard and a roll-around cart to give her some pills and record her temperature and destroy her train of thought. Hospitals were supposed to be care places, but they were nerve-wracking, with the random interruptions, odd smells, and immutable routines that seemed organized to prevent a patient from having more than ten minutes to think at a stretch.

After the nurse came a phone call. Lissa answered impatiently, but it was Tyler Walker, and her bad mood disappeared. Tyler was always cheerful and supportive. “How is my favorite economist?” he asked.

“Still pregnant.”

“That tends to be a stable situation for a period of time, I understand. It’s fairly classic. The mature female begins production, which is stable, followed by a brief period of unsustainable productivity, followed by a fallow phase.”

“With most things you can substitute capital or labor for time.”

“Ah yes, the irrefutable logic of the indifference curve analysis you love so much.”

“Babies don’t seem to get the logic of production models, unfortunately.”

“It’s a fixed and closed system. Something like betting at a race track. I’m afraid all the multivariate optimization in the world won’t save you.”

“Damn.”

“Have you heard about the big project in Milan?” Tyler asked.

“Tina mentioned something about a project Tom Acker wants some help with in Europe. She said it was big.”

There was a pause as Tyler seemed to choose his words. “It isn’t exactly the kind of thing Tom does that well.”

Lissa tried to sit up straighter in the bed. “What do you mean?”

“Tom doesn’t like Europe or the way they do things. If he gets it, he’ll make it American.”

“Is that bad?”

“Not always. Don’t get me wrong, Tom is a fine businessman and well organized. This is for a business complex that is intended to attract major high-tech companies across the EU. He’d bring it in on time and it won’t collapse the next week or anything, and he’ll probably have the lowest bid, but it will either be a clone of Silicon Valley or some variation on a strip-mall theme. It will fail aesthetically. I hope you get involved with the project, but if it’s with Tom, well, you’d be tarred with the same brush. I wouldn’t like to see that.”

Tyler stopped talking. Lissa heard the hum of the monitors.

“I appreciate your concern,” she said at last.

Tyler spoke, his voice almost sad and accusing. “You know how I feel about you, Lissa.”

“The presents you’ve sent, the flowers, the kids’ toys… I get the message, Tyler.” Lissa was suddenly very tired.

“I’m here for you,” Tyler said. It was almost an accusation.

Lissa sighed. “Right now I’m stuck here for my babies. Then I need to rebuild my business.”

“Is it falling down?” Tyler meant to be funny, but Lissa could her the concern in his voice. She suddenly didn’t want to keep things to herself anymore. She didn’t love Tyler, but she trusted him. “I don’t know, Tyler. Maybe not falling down, but there’s a crack in the foundation. I feel like there’s something Tina isn’t telling me. Something stinks.”

Tyler laughed. “You’re in the hospital. Everything stinks. Do you want me to poke my nose into things that are none of my business? Would you like me to pay attention to the industry gossip and see what lies and prevarications are floating about that might concern you?”

“Would you?”

“I’d be delighted to. I have a meeting with Tom next week myself. He loves to talk about his deals, who is using whom, and so on, and usually which ones he’s screwing. Just let me know how much salacious details appeal to you. I have other friends in low places I can count on to pass along any manner of unreliable rumors and innuendo.”

“That’s perfect, Tyler. I’ll owe you.”

“You owe me nothing at all, Lissa. Not one damn thing.”

The serious sound of his voice, its flatness, reminded her of the one uncomfortable part of dealing with Tyler Walker. The man was lovely, charming, and successful. He was also madly in love with her, and yet he didn’t stir anything even vaguely romantic in her. She’d told him. It wouldn’t have been fair to lead him on, and he had decided that it was all right for him to love her unilaterally. “I can live with unrequited love,” he told her. “Please just allow me to express it once in a while as a form of self-pity, and we can keep our glorious friendship.”

So far they had. Every so often, however, such as now, it made her feel guilty. She took advantage of him. He wanted her to, and would be hurt if she didn’t, but the one-sidedness of it bothered her.

CHAPTER THREE

Tina Peters met Tom Acker for lunch at a new French restaurant downtown. It was a perfect spot for her purposes. The place itself was elegant, and well regarded. Best of all, it was high profile. She would be seen having a meal with Acker. That would raise her stock. With a little luck, the society blogs might take note, but that would be icing on the cake.

The timing was perfect. “This Milan deal is in its early stages and it is huge,” he told her. “There is money to be made. If you are ready and willing.”

Tina was more than ready and willing. She’d worked under Lissa’s yoke far too long. Until she went in the hospital, Tina had never gotten the chance to show what she could do. Lissa came up as an analyst. She knew econometrics and detailed analysis—data collection and crunching and interpretation. That was all well and good, but Tina knew how to deal with the players, how to run a company and make it glamorous. A consultancy was supposed to hear what the client said and help them do whatever they wanted. If they wanted analysis, well, economists came cheap. She could hire all she needed to provide those detailed reports clients loved so much.

Lissa never saw the upside potential of getting into more of a partnership with her clients. She liked her independence and working on a variety of jobs. Tina wanted to become integral to a development team and ra

ke in the bucks. Lissa was happy to consult, do her analysis, show the clients better solutions and move on. Sure, she’d be panting to get in on the Milan deal, but then what? For Tina, that wasn’t the way to become high profile and make big money, the kind of money someone like Tom Acker had. He was a billionaire on his own with access to even more money.

She’d arrived late and found him waiting for her, dressed in an elegant suit. He was a dashing sixty years old, incredibly fit, with silver hair. When she came to the table he stood to greet her, kissing her cheek and complimenting her on her dress. It was a sexy dress. The nice thing about business meetings in a fancy place like this was that overdressing was acceptable, even encouraged. It was business, but…

She accepted a drink and let him waft their conversation through a few conversational niceties, before getting to the subject at hand. “I doubt you’ve had a chance to read the prospectus closely,” he said, “but I thought some initial talks might be helpful.”

“Other than the amount of money involved, I don’t understand what is special about this project,” she said. “It’s a business center. You’ve done several of those.”

“I’ve talked to a couple of the directors, and besides spending their money wisely to get an infrastructure that will serve them for a number of years, there are political issues. The EU is stumbling and they see this center as a way to attract EU businesses and companies who want a presence in the EU. Architecturally and operationally, they want to combine the efficiency of an American high-tech campus with a very European aesthetic. So Lissa’s analysis techniques will be important in putting together a coherent bid.”

“I can get you any analysis you want, Tom.”

“Will Lissa be coming back to work in time?”

“If not, we can get…”

“I really need Lissa. If nothing else, I want to make certain she isn’t working for anyone else.”