I Married a Billionaire: Lost and Found (Contemporary Romance) (2 page)

"Yes," I said. "Well - no. Both?"

He laughed, then lifted me up onto the side of the pool and sat me there, his eyes sparkling. "You know, Maddy." His fingers hooked around the waistband of my panties, and I lifted my hips obediently so that he could pull them off and toss them aside. "Sometimes I think about what would have happened if I'd never met you."

It was an odd thing to say - to contemplate - while I was sitting there, bottomless, the coolness of the tile seeping into my naked flesh. What if we'd never met?

"You'd be living in Canada, I guess," I said. "Or married to someone else."

He shook his head. "I wouldn't have trusted anyone but you."

For some reason,
that
was what made me blush.

"Okay," I said. "But I have no idea why."

"Really?" he said. His eyes had grown darker. I shook my head as he lowered his, looking up at me as he kissed my inner thigh. It was the eye contact that killed me, every time. I shuddered, my legs instinctively parting further for him.

"No," I exhaled, wanting to look away, but utterly unable to. "I don't."

"Why don't I believe you?" His lips curved up into a smile that made something deep inside me ache. "You really never noticed?"

I swallowed hard, shaking my head.

"I noticed you the minute you walked into the office," he murmured. "You had your hair in a little ponytail, and you must have been out in the sun because the freckles on your nose were very dark. I've always liked freckles." He stopped, smiled. "You had a spring in your step, and I thought to myself,
she must be new here
."

I laughed.

"And then," he said, nodding, "then I saw that - I saw you smile. I heard you laugh, for the first time. I saw your dimples." He touched my cheek to illustrate his point. I felt my face grow red again. Growing up, I'd hated my dimples. I always thought it meant that my cheeks were too fat.
 

"And I thought to myself, if only I could be with a girl like that." He was looking at me very earnestly now, refusing to break the eye contact.
 

"So you devised a cunning scheme to trick me into marrying you," I said, smiling. "Very clever, sir."

"You were trustworthy," he said, ignoring me. "I could see it in your face. I never would have chosen anyone else. I don't know what I would have done if you'd said no."

"I can never say no to you."

It was almost startlingly true, although I wasn't sure I'd ever said it in so many words. Before I had a chance to process it, he lowered his head and went to work.

 
No matter what was going through my mind, his tongue never failed to make me forget it all, if only for a few minutes. I gripped the edge of the pool.

I was trembling within a few moments, arching my back, biting my lip hard to try and stop myself from moaning.
Quiet rules, quiet rules
. He made it nearly impossible.
We're never coming to this stupid resort again. Only places with walls, so I can scream as loud as I want to
.

My legs were kicking sluggishly in the water. I finally let out a little noise I couldn't suppress - and suddenly, his hand came up and clamped itself over my mouth. I let out a muffled squeal in protest, but I was in no position to argue, really.

When the coiling pleasure finally exploded in my stomach, I was actually grateful for the way his hand dampened my scream. As usual, he'd been right.

He climbed out of the pool, dripping all over the tiles on the side, and stripped off his shirt. I lay there expectantly, but after he undressed, he walked over to the closet and started sifting through it for something new.

"Um…" I said, unsure if he was playing some kind of game, or if that was really all we were going to do. "Did you, uh, want to…"

"Later," he said, smiling. "We have somewhere to be."

I shook my head, getting up and pulling off my wet bra to change into something a little more practical.

***

"Somewhere" turned out to be a snorkeling expedition along the coral reef that was just down the beach from our hotel. I had to laugh at the sight of him all decked out for it, squinting on the white sand beach through a pair of huge plastic goggles, with the plastic tube shoved in his mouth at a jaunty angle. I was sure I looked equally silly, but I wasn't a dignified billionaire tech mogul. But once we were underwater, I forgot to even look at him anymore - the reef was so beautiful, with the colorful fish swirling around it, that I could hardly tear my eyes away. We were told not to touch the coral reef, as it was fragile despite its appearance and a single, light touch could cause permanent damage. It was hard to resist the urge, but after a while, I found myself content to just look.

I wasn't sure how long I stayed there, with Daniel floating near me, periodically gesturing me over to look at some new creature the likes of which we'd never seen before. I kept smiling around my apparatus and giving him a thumbs-up, which he returned jovially.

The guides herded us out of the water so we wouldn't get sunburn - or maybe just to make room for more tourists, I wasn't really certain. As we walked barefoot back towards the lobby of the hotel, I wondered if I ought to say something.
That was nice, thank you
. Did honeymooning brides characteristically thank their husbands for planning activities? Why did this whole thing still feel so strange?

As I walked, I felt my foot scrape against something that definitely wasn’t sand. I stopped, turning around to look at what it was. Daniel was still going; he hadn’t noticed that I’d stopped.

I knelt down on the hot sand, poking at the little white object I could see poking out of it. When I pulled it free, I saw that it was a perfect nautilus shell. I blew on it, gently, sending the particles of sand flying in all directions.

I held it gently in the palm of my hand. Somewhere ahead of me, Daniel was looking back, shading his eyes with his hand.

"You coming?" he called out.

"Yeah, yeah," I replied, jogging over to him. "Look what I found." I extended it to him, still cradled in my palm.

"It’s a shell," he said. "On a beach. Imagine that."

"Don’t be an asshole. I thought you’d like it."

"I do like it," he said, his forehead just slightly creased. "But it’s - it’s a shell."

"All right," I said. "Then I’ll keep it, if you don’t want it."

"Was it for me?" he said, in mild surprise. "Of course I want it. I didn’t - sorry, I didn’t realize. But you might want to consider that I’m pretty sure taking shells off this beach is actually illegal."

I closed my hand around my tiny treasure. "Well, if I get tackled by security, you’ve got my back, right?"

He was smiling. "Always."

"Horseback riding," Daniel announced, proudly. I raised my arm to shade my eyes from the brutal midday sun. There were, in fact, horses standing a few feet away - a palomino, and a bay. They both stared at me, placidly.

"Have you ever ridden?" he wanted to know.

"Yeah," I said. "Don’t we have to have a…guide or something?" There was absolutely no one else around, and unless he’d impulse-bought the horses, that struck me as a little odd.
 

"Not if you put down a big enough deposit, it turns out," he said, with a boyish grin. "Should I give you a leg up?"

"Boots," I said. "I’m not riding in flip-flops."

"Come on, where’s your sense of adventure?"

"Did they really not give you boots?" I looked at him skeptically.

"That didn’t strike me as very romantic or spontaneous."

Yeah, well, neither is a shattered fibula.
"I really think we should go back there and get some boots," I said, smiling. He was trying so hard, after all.
 

He rolled his eyes, but he did lead me to the rental hut just up the beach. The horses were lashed to a post, so they certainly weren’t going anywhere - although something about their dispositions made me think they’d stand there motionless until the tide came in, no matter what.

When we were properly outfitted, I walked up to the palomino and tucked my foot into the stirrup, hoisting myself up onto his back. Daniel was already turning the bay around, holding his reins like an expert. "So what’s your story?" I wanted to know. "You didn’t grow up rich, so I know you weren’t going to riding camps as a kid."

"No, that came later on," he said. "There was this girl."

"Oh, of course," I said. "Of course there was."

He cantered up beside me. I tapped the sides of my horse with my heels, and he started to make his way down the beach; Daniel and his bay followed.

"I’m not proud of it," he said. "Although knowing how to ride does come in handy, from time to time."

"I’m not judging you," I said. "I spent two entire winters trying to learn how to snowboard for a guy."

Daniel laughed. "I always thought that must be harder than it looks."

"Well, it is if you’re me," I admitted. "I felt like one of those toy soldiers, you know? Once you fall down, how the hell are you supposed to get back up? You can’t move your legs."

"Well ideally, I suppose you have a strapping young man around to pull you back onto your feet."

"I guess that was the idea. But he just got really, really impatient with me after a while."

"This is much better," said Daniel. "Let the horse do all the work."

Before long, we reached a little copse of trees that marked the end of the private beach. I thought for sure we would have to turn around, but Daniel just kept going, and I figured it couldn’t hurt to follow him. I considered asking if we were allowed to take the horses off of resort property, but I imagined he’d have some answer related to throwing piles of money at everyone, like usual.

"Ever thought about taking it up again?" he said, after a while. "I could get you lessons."

I could get you.
I hated it when he phrased things like that. "God, no," I said. "What a nightmare."

We were starting to approach some more populated parts of the beach, and I became acutely aware that people were staring at us. I pushed my sunglasses up on the bridge of my nose and urged my horse on faster.

"What about you?" Daniel called after me, semi-successfully convincing his bay to pick up the pace accordingly. "How did you take up riding?"

"I grew up in horse country," I said, watching a little kid stop building his sandcastle and gape at us, open-mouthed, while we passed. "My best friend had stables." I wanted to keep staring out at the ocean, but the glare of the sun was almost blinding, so I turned away to give my eyes some rest.

Looking back inland, I noticed a young man with a very large camera in his hands. As soon as he spotted me looking at him, he started backing away, dropping the camera to dangle around his neck on a thick strap.

"Hey," I said, reaching out and touching Daniel’s arm. "Look. This is new."

He looked at the photographer, and then back at me.

"What?" he asked. "People taking pictures?"

"
No
, genius. He was talking pictures of you." I gestured emphatically. "Us."

"Don’t be ridiculous." Daniel frowned. "Look, he’s gone."

"Oh my God. You’re like a child." I shook my head, digging my heels into the palomino’s sides.
 

"No, you’re paranoid, is what you are," said Daniel, good-naturedly, urging his bay to keep up. "You think paparazzi are following us halfway around the world, now? I’m not exactly a celebrity."

***

We had lunch in the little bistro on the beach, picking over cured meats and cheeses and drinking some brand of mineral water I’d never heard of. I couldn’t stop thinking about the photographer. I’d been floating along, more or less peacefully, since we got here; now I felt abruptly yanked back to reality. And it wasn’t a reality that I had any idea how to handle.

Right about the time Daniel was pondering the dessert menu, I started to feel very watched. I ignored it for as long as I could, but finally I couldn’t shake the sensation of someone’s eyes burning into my back.

I turned around to look.

It was the photographer.

He spun around as soon as he sensed me moving, but I recognized him immediately.
 

"What’s wrong?" Daniel wanted to know, frowning while he chewed on something.

"It’s the guy," I said, softly. "The photographer."

The photographer who was, in a moment, standing directly next to our table.

"I’m so sorry," he said. "I don’t mean to bother you. You’re on vacation. But I think your wife is starting to think I’m some kind of crazy stalker."

"I don’t think that," I said, coolly, taking a sip of my water.
 

"Please," said Daniel, looking up at him with a slightly confused expression. "Don’t apologize. Can I help you?"

"Well, maybe." The photographer smiled, extending his hand for Daniel to shake. "My name’s Ryan Brewer, I’m a freelance journalist. I just happened to be out here on vacation, and who do you think I saw?"

Daniel’s smile was frozen. "Me?"

"You," said the journalist, pulling out an empty chair without asking. He sat down, leaning toward Daniel. "Can you believe my luck?"

"Hardly," said Daniel.
 

"I’d love to get a quick interview. No big deal. Nothing heavy, just a light piece, I’m thinking maybe Vanity Fair?"

"A quick one," said Daniel. "I suppose."

"Okay. First of all - what makes Daniel Thorne tick?"

I drummed my fingers on the table.

"A desire to succeed, I suppose," said Daniel. "Same as anyone else."

"You think you’re the same as other people?"

Daniel picked up a grape and examined it. "More or less," he said.

"So what sets you apart?"

Daniel took a deep breath, and let it out. The journalist’s foot was jiggling under the table.

"I suppose I
do
things," he said. "Other people might just be content with - thinking, or imagining. I act on it. That’s what sets me apart."

"That’s very interesting," said the journalist. "That’s very…you know, I talked to some people about you recently. They said something similar - that your ability to take action is what makes you different."