The Billionaire's Valentine Vixen

He heaves out a breath, shoving his phone back into his inner suit jacket pocket, and shoots me a smile.

“Trouble at the office?”

He shakes his head on smirk. “Naw. That’s everyday bullshit.” He comes back over to the sink, wets a clean cloth under the faucet, and moves to Linnie, gently wiping the sticky chocolate and syrupy mess from her cheeks while she protests in German.

“How about you?” Roan takes Linnie’s last bite and puts it into her open mouth. “You going to go into business with your super-secret family pancake recipe?”

I smile, the way he looks at me making my tummy flutter. “No, I’m pre-med at Marygrove. It’s just a step above a community college, but I have a half scholarship. It keeps me busy, I have to keep my GPA up or I’ll lose it.”

“So, are you all work and no play?”

“Just like you,” Linnie says, looking my way. “Alice said that to you. You’re all work and no play.”

I giggle on a quick shrug. “Yeah. It’s been my only focus since I was in high-school.”

“Half-scholarship? Do you work too?”

A flash of heat nearly melts me from the inside and before I can think of what to say, I lie. “No. I had some money saved up. I’ll probably have to find a job though for next year.”

“We’ll see,” Roan replies, and I give him a quizzical look as Linnie climbs down from the stool and comes over and grabs my hands.

“Let’s go swimming. Roan said we could go swimming today.”

“He did? Well, then can he come with us?”

Linnie screws up her face, but then breaks into a smile.

“He never comes. Renata always takes me, he watches sometimes but he’s always on his phone or working.”

“Okay, well, let’s go upstairs and get changed. I don’t have a suit with me though…”

“It’s okay. You can wear one of Mommy’s.” Linnie’s eyes soften. “She has bunches with tags still on. She wouldn’t mind.”

Roan gives me a soft smile as Linnie tugs my hand and we head up the stairs to get changed.

Linnie pulls me into her room, then into her closet which is larger than the house where I grew up.

“What’s your favorite color?” she chirps as she leads me to a cabinet in her closet and swings open the doors, exposing a hanging bar full of adult-size bathing suits, and just below on another bar, child-size matching suits.

“Yellow,” I answer and she beams.

“Me too!” She reaches in and takes a lemon-yellow little one-piece from the lower rack and points at the similar adult-size one above. “That one’s yours.”

I ease the hanger off the rack and follow Linnie back into her bedroom.

“I’m going to go change in my guestroom. I should check my phone before we go swim.”

“Okay,” she answers, already pulling off the old t-shirt of her father’s she wore to bed last night. “Last one down to the pool is a vergammeltes ei.”

“A what?” I turn on my way to the door.

“German for rotten egg. It’s my third language, so I’m not fluent yet…”

I shake my head on a smile as I work my way down the hall and into the guestroom. Before I strip and change, I take my phone from my pants pocket and look at the screen. The only notification is from the potential buyer of my grandmother’s wedding brooch, so I quickly flip open my laptop and navigate to the secured site that is hosting my listing.

I click on the little red message icon.

I’m fully prepared to walk away. I am the highest, and only, bidder on your item. The other bid looks like a sock puppet account. The clock is ticking.

God, why is he such an entitled jerk about it?

I fume for a moment, staring out the window of the bedroom at the morning light, wondering again what it would be like to not think about money every waking moment.

My phone buzzes with a text and I expect it to be my sister, so my stomach knots, but when I look down at the phone the knot turns into nausea.

Popcorn: Just found out something interesting. That school of yours has a morality clause for scholarship students. Not thinking they’d take kindly to your sort of work. I’d surely help you keep that all just between us. Tit for tat.

Fuck. What the fuck now?

Fury swirls inside of me. I’m not one to postpone problems so I fire off a reply.

Me: Sounds like a threat.

Popcorn: Facts. Not threats. Aren’t you going to ask me what the favor is?

Me: Not interested.

Popcorn: You should be. Your sister isn’t in the best position with me either right now. You want to lose your scholarship? She loses her job, maybe worse…

Me: What do you want?

I hate being backed into a corner but Lydia’s already told me she’s in deep with him so drawing all his cards onto the table is in my best interest right now.