BIG SHOT LOVE: 5 Billionaire Romance Books Bundle
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Authors: Kristina Weaver
Copyright © 2016
All Rights Reserved.
This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law.
This is a work of fiction. All characters appearing in this work are products of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to events, businesses, companies, institutions, and real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
Table of Contents
The club that Linda and the other girls have brought me to is my worst nightmare. It’s hot, crowded, and smells like booze, vomit, and something that I know isn’t the sweaty armpit of a bear but smells like it.
And the lights. They’re flashing, strobes that gave me a headache the moment I teetered in on the high-heeled death traps Linda had shoved on my feet—after squeezing my size eight butt into a dress that looked small enough to fit an eight year old.
“Isn’t this place great!” one of Linda’s many friends yells into my ear, her vodka-scented breath hitting my cheek in a hot puff of air and spit combined.
“Sure,” I mutter with a fake smile, as I lean against the bar and signal the bartender for another water and a round for the rowdy bunch sitting in one of the lounge areas.
This is not my scene, and I would have avoided it at all costs if I could have, but Linda—my college roomie, all round pain in my ass, I-love-her-she’s-a hyperactive-party-girl—refused to leave me alone in the dorm and had practically twisted my arm.
So here I am, pretending to drink while fighting off a migraine and hoping that I make it out of here alive and with at least some hearing left thanks to the music and the screaming, writhing crowd on the dance floor.
“So Lin says you’re done. You finished your studies three months early?” she yells, leaning over and shaking her bust at the grinning barman.
I don’t even know why she’s bothering to ask since she’s obviously not interested enough to pretend to wait for my reply, but I bite back my annoyance and wait for the order, while trying to block out the din around me.
Yeah, I have finished three months early. It’s something I’ve worked my ass off to accomplish so that I can be a shoo-in for the internship at the museum of natural history.
The program isn’t new, but it’s so sought after that only a few students know about it because the school and lecturers have singled them out as suitable candidates.
You’d assume that I’ve spent the last four years of my life studying for something I’m passionate about, but that is just not true. I chose the field of History and Archaeology because, not only is it a very stable one, but the money isn’t bad. At all. And that will mean that I’ll always have a job and a decent income.
That’s important to me since I come from a broken home that’s run by a mother whose only goal in life is to torture not only me but my twin brother Alec, too.
He’s away at Tulane, thank God, and free of her tyranny so that just leaves me. I’d elected to stay in the dorms at school—even though the house is only two trains away—and you better believe I’d sever an artery and endure a hospital stay before going home during breaks.
I have a definite plan for my life and nothing will stop me from getting there. That’s why when my professor had advised me to try and finish sooner than is actually humanly possible, I’d taken his advice and worked myself half to death to get done.
Now I’m almost positive I’ll get that internship.
“Hey Shaw! Are you growing roots girl? Where are the drinks?”
I grimace and shoot the bartender a look to get his eyes out of…Ann’s...cleavage and get cracking with the order before Linda can yell at me again.
Seriously, this blows. I’d really rather go back to the dorm and finish packing my stuff so that I can get a head start on moving tomorrow. I’ve got a tiny, one-bedroom apartment waiting for me, thanks to the money I’ve saved all through college.
As I said, I’ll do myself harm before living with my drunken, verbally abusive mother again.
“Here you go, baby.”
“Thanks,” I mutter, throwing down the money and glaring at Ann to help me carry the glasses over.
I spend the next hour trying to avoid Linda’s drunken whooping, but it’s hard. The bar is ironically the only place I can go to get away, and it’s as I’m ordering another water that I feel a tingling sensation creep up my spine and settle at the nape of my neck.
When I turn to look, I meet a pair of the bluest eyes I’ve ever seen. They’re smiling—yeah, I know what you’re thinking, but this guy’s eyes are truly happy—and focused solely on me.
“Hi.”
I swallow my drool and nod back because I can’t speak as I’m checking him out. He’s got sandy brown hair and his features are…I can only describe them as angelic.
But it’s the mouth that seals my fate because his lips are puffy and red and curved in a smile that is at once nice, and yet not. He’s what I’ve avoided my whole life…a bad boy to the bone.
And I want him so badly that I am blindsided by a shock of lust and the immediate urge to grab his hair and pull him down to my lips. I’m not drunk, not even close, and maybe that’s why instead of making a fool of myself, I smile and turn away, taking a deep breath to still my racing heart.
“You’re shy?” I hear from a point over my right shoulder, and I turn back, surprised to see Mr. Blue Eyes standing so close I feel his breath feather over my shoulder.
“No.” Because I’m not. I’m just not sure I like this instant attraction I feel for a guy who could be a douche at best and an ax murderer at worst.
“Then why the brush off, angel?”
I sigh and turn back, cringing when I spot Linda over his shoulder, making a beeline for us.
“Look, I’m not into picking up men in bars, okay. And F.Y.I. unless you want to be stuck between me and a rabid coyote, I’d leave.”
A quick glance over his shoulder tells the story, and he turns back with a smirk and a raised brow.
“Why hello there, handsome.”
Great, she’s reached her target and is locked on and in the process of batting her lashes and climbing him like a vine. I may as well just head out because, as always, Linda has seen something she wants and she’s going after it.
Part of the problem is that it seems that the blonde bombshell always wants whatever I have, and she takes a lot of pleasure in proving that she’s got the goods to kick me to the wayside and lure any guy I like into her web.
“Good evening.”
“So do you wanna dance? Shaw hates dancing. Real drag if you know what I mean.”
I roll my eyes and start turning away when a hand slides around my back and locks over my hip, pulling me into a warm, hard body.
“No thanks. Shaw and I were just leaving,” he says amiably, nodding once before chucking my chin to close my gaping mouth and pulling me away.
I regain my senses only when we’re outside in the cold, fresh air and he opens the door to a waiting car.
“No way. I am not getting in a car with a stranger who, by the way, has yet to tell me his name,” I say with a gasp, pulling away to glance around for a cab.
This is unreal and thrilling and everything I have never experienced. First time ever that a guy has chosen me, Shaw Mallory, the mousy chick who wears glasses and only brushes her hair twice a week when she remembers.
And he wants me to get in a car with him and, and…
“Robert Stone. Call me Rob,” he drawls, smiling down at me with a look that tingles all the way from the tips of my hair to my curling toes.
“Well, Robert Stone, I don’t know you, and I don’t want to. I don’t have time for relationships and—”
“Give me a chance, sweetheart. Give me one night to prove to you that I’m a good bet and I swear you won’t regret it. What’s the worst that can happen? We spend one night giving each other mutual pleasure, and if you don’t want more, I’ll disappear.”
I shouldn’t. This is all wrong and way too risky to even contemplate, but instead of turning away and leaving the blonde bad boy in my dust, I find myself placing my hand in his and following him, my entire body caught in the thrall of the promise shining in those blue eyes.
I can’t say why I do it, only that I can’t resist the chance to do something I’ve never done before. I’m always busy, aware of what I need to do to achieve my goals, and always conscious of never doing anything that in any way detracts from my calm, orderly existence.
I get in his car and let him take me away because I want one night, maybe more if I’m lucky, to collect on the promise in those eyes and experience every thrill I’ve denied myself.
“Trust me, sweetheart. I’ll give you what you need.”
Famous last words
, I think, staring into his eyes, as he leans forward to seal his mouth over mine.
