Escorting the Groom (The Escort Collection 4)

She whooped. "Holy guacamole!"

"Right? Now can you stop being so overly emotional?"

"Definitely not!" I could hear her crying and laughing on the other end of the phone. My mother held a lot inside, but I knew how worried she always was about our situation—whether we would be able to afford groceries the next week, or which medications she was going to have to give up. This was going to change both of our lives for the better.

But there was one last detail to take care of.

"There's one other thing, and it's cr

ucial," I said after she calmed down. "Please don't tell Chelsea. If she hears that I'm making that kind of money, she'll be all over this like a vulture on a steaming animal carcass." My sister had taken advantage of both me and my mother one too many times. Not to mention that she'd stolen my fiancé, who she'd subsequently taken advantage of by marrying, divorcing, and collecting alimony.

Even though I didn't mind what she'd done to Vince—he'd thoroughly deserved it—Chelsea was not my favorite person. She would only get a dime of this money if it was over my dead body.

And not even then, if I could help it.

My mother clucked her tongue. "Of course not. You know I wouldn't do that."

"Okay. But I mean it—don't let her talk you into anything." My mother and Chelsea weren't close, but my sister still knew how to work her when she needed something. When Chelsea came begging, my mother often gave her a handout, sometimes at the expense of buying her medicine.

The thing was my sister knew it. And she always took the money, anyway.

"I promise." Mom was quiet for a second. "Do I get to… visit you? Meet this man? Come to the wedding?"

"No. I'm sorry. Nobody can know about my family or who I really am. I won't have anyone there."

"That's too bad," she said.

I grinned into the phone. "You know what? It's totally fine. We're going to be millionaires, Mom! For once in our lives, everything's finally going to be okay!"

"Woo hoo!" I could almost hear her grinning.

"Woo hoo is right!" I hung up with a smile on my own face. Then I proceeded to fire up the laptop Lucas had left for me and start researching venues where I could marry my handsome, brooding, aloof billionaire fiancé.

Chapter Five

Lucas

"I told you to close the deal," I snapped at Simon, one of the young entrepreneurs who worked for me. I was engaged in my usual yelling routine, but honestly, my heart wasn't in it today. I was thinking about Blake. I was pleasantly surprised by our question-and-answer session. I never spoke of Elizabeth and my father's relationship. It wasn't something I liked to dwell on. But it had felt good to tell Blake the truth and to know that she'd been burned before, too.

We were quite a pair.

The downside of that was becoming apparent to me. As I pretended to listen to Simon whine about his deal falling apart, I couldn't stop thinking about her. She was unbelievably gorgeous. She also seemed intelligent and kind—the total package. The guy that had cheated on her was an idiot. I didn't care how hot her sister was.

On one hand, it was good that I found her appealing. That would help our first appearance as a couple in front of my family seem authentic.

On the other hand, I needed to snap the fuck out of it and get her out of my head.

"Go ahead, Simon. I'm listening." I left him on speakerphone, jabbering and whining, while I went and jerked off in my office bathroom. My arousal was inconvenient, but it was only an erection. I dealt with it. And if I let myself fantasize about Blake—writhing in ecstasy beneath me, her hair tumbled across the bed—no one had to be the wiser.

Afterward—after I'd come, hard—I washed my hands and calmly regarded my eyes in the mirror. Don't be a fuckup. You're going to marry her, and then live with her for a whole year. It needed to be a hands-free relationship. If we started having sex, and she ended up in my bed every night…

That sounded way too much like a relationship to me.

"What did you just say?" I snapped at Simon as I zipped my fly and hustled back into my office.

"I was saying, the Nexus Group is trying to get out of the terms—"

"You know what? I don't care," I interrupted. "You're fired. I can't deal with your whining. All you're doing is spouting off a bunch of excuses and giving me a headache. I'm not paying you to do that."