The Billionaire's Unwanted Virgin (5 page)

He looked her up and down with such
disgust, she was glad she was sitting.

"A man like your brother, you
mean? Would he have used me for those ends? And if he would have done, what
does that make you? You're marrying me, but at the end of the day, it's the
same thing, just dressed up, is it not?"

She jumped at his reaction. In the
blink of an eye he crossed the room and stood in front of her. With his hands
on the arm rests of her chair, he caged her in, his nose inches away from her.

"You are going into this with
your eyes open, lady. It was your choice to come here and claim your payment.
It is your choice to walk out of that door. I am not forcing you to sign those
papers."

As if to make the point he released
her and stood next to the bell that would summon Brian in an instant.

"Just say the word and you're
free to go. Without your money of course, and if you breathe one word of this
to anyone, your cute little ass will land itself a one way ticket to jail, and
I will make your mother rue the day she ever gave birth to you."

His quiet and controlled manner made
the words even more chilling, and Alice could do nothing but stare at him. How
had she thought she could deal with him?

"You would do that to people
you've never even met?" she asked.

"In a heartbeat, sweet little
Alice, in a heartbeat."

Something broke inside Alice at those
words.

"You really are a cold-hearted
bastard, aren't you?"

****

Alice curled her slender fingers
around the armrests with such force they turned white. Judging by the storm
clouds crossing her expressive face she wished her hands were wrapped around
his neck instead. He didn't even know why he was being such an ass, but
something about her got to him. Just by sitting there, all prim and proper,
stoically facing her fate, made him feel things he had no business
feeling.
 

The fact that she wasn't the money
grabbing whore he'd first thought her to be just made it all so much worse. At
Percy's insistence he'd finally read that file, and what he'd learned about her
had rocked him to the core.

Highly intelligent, she'd dropped out
of her university degree when her niece had fallen ill, the year her father had
had his heart attack. With no income coming in, it had fallen to Alice to
provide for the family. And she had, admirably so, working two, sometimes three
jobs, yet they were drowning in debt. Her niece's illness did not help. The
experimental treatment she needed was not available on the NHS.

For that reason Lakota had made Percy
up the settlement offer considerably. He knew it would take more than that to
ease his conscience screaming at him, but he'd had to do something to chase
away the shadows in her eyes. He couldn't offer her any part of himself, but he
could certainly provide the money. And with her reluctant agreement to his
terms, he would finally get his revenge on the piece of scum that fathered him,
and left his mother and him to rot after the arrival of Zeb.

Lakota crunched his teeth together in
disgust at his maudlin thoughts.
 
He
couldn't change the past, but he could damn well pave his own future. It's what
had made him into a billionaire, and no little Alice in Wonderland would de-rail
him from his purpose, no matter how much her unshed tears tore at his gut and
made his chest feel tight.

"You're only just now figuring
this out, my sweet little Alice?"

Her eyes widened, and she fixed him
with such a glare of defiance, he almost squirmed under that silent censure.

"I think you're trying far too
hard to convince me of that fact, Lakota. What I think or don't think is
irrelevant anyway. As you've been so at pains to remind me, you've bought me. I
get it. I'll be the image of the doting society wife, don't you worry, but if
you think for one minute that I will let you threaten the people I love, then you
have got another think coming."

She'd gotten up from her chair during
her impassioned speech and now stood in front of him. With her hands on hips,
her face flushed, and her whole body trembling in outrage, she looked utterly
stunning, even in her ill-fitting ensemble of clothes, and he shoved his fists
in his back pockets to stop himself from crushing her to him and kissing her
senseless. She'd likely make him sing soprano if he tried, and giving in to his
body's urges would just confuse the issues in hand.

She wasn't experienced enough to
accept sex for what it was. A mere physical transaction to leave him and his
bed partner well sated. The few women he allowed himself to indulge with knew
the score. He offered them hot sex and nothing more, breaking off the
entanglement as soon as it wasn't mutually beneficial anymore to either party.
He treated them well, but he never made his affairs public knowledge, and he
certainly never allowed his emotions to get involved. Not that they'd ever been
in danger of getting employed. Not until little Miss Alice here. She made him
look at himself, and he didn't like what he saw.

"If you don’t mind, I would like
to go to bed now." She looked up at him, defiantly staring him down, and
when he was going to say something she put her hand up. "Spare me any more
insults. You can't have anything else to say to me, and I'm not hungry. Please
send my apologies to the cook."

"I hope your appetite will
improve, little Alice. I don't want you wasting away." He smiled to take
the sting out of his words, and she rolled her eyes.

"Don't worry, I shan't. I'm sure
that eventuality, too, is going to be covered in the contracts Percy is drawing
up. I get the impression neither you nor he are ever leaving anything to
chance. It's been a long day that's all. I am allowed to sleep, I take
it?"

The sarcasm stung, and Lakota stepped
back to allow her to pass.

"Let me ring—"

"No need, I can find my own way
to my gilded prison." Alice interrupted him and strode out of the room
with all the quiet dignity that seemed ingrained in very being. It left him
staring after her. An uneasy feeling settled in his gut at the thought of being
married to her for the next twelve months. As much as it would solve his
current problems, it would create a host of new ones. The ache in his groin was
an unwelcome reminder that marriage to his very own Alice in Wonderland would
test his patience to the limit.

Alice swatted the insistent fly
buzzing in her ear away. Cocooned in Lakota's arms she sought to rekindle the
erotic fantasies playing out between them, but it was no use. The dream slipped
away until it was nothing but a wisp of smoke, the insistent throbbing between
her legs and her sweat-slicked body, the only physical evidence of the erotic
dream her phone had wrenched her out of.

Disoriented in the complete darkness
of her room, Alice fumbled for the phone. She groaned out loud when it
clattered the floor. Face up, it danced like a demented gnat, and a stone
crashed onto Alice's chest, obliterating any left-over arousal, when she read
the lighted display.

There was only one reason her mum
would call her at four AM in the morning. Heart pounding in her throat she
scrambled out of bed, and went down like a sack of potatoes. With the sheet
twisted around her body she had no way of saving herself, and the air whooshed
out of her lungs.
 
Tears sprang to her
eyes and she struggled to sit up. The buzzing sound stopped, and, plunged into
pitch darkness again, Alice couldn't see a thing.

"Fucking hell."
          

The curse echoed around the still
room, and the phone started buzzing again. The dim light from the display acted
like a beacon, and Alice tried to get closer, but only succeeded in shoving the
phone farther away from her.

"Damn it all to hell and
back." Alice bit back the tears of frustration as the phone once again
stopped. The door to her room flung open, and she blinked in the sudden light
from the hall way. Silhouetted against the light like an avenging angel, Lakota
stood in her doorway. He flicked the light switch and scowled down at her,
every imposing inch of him, screaming his annoyance at having been wrenched
from his slumber. With his dark hair hanging loose around his face, and wearing
nothing but low slung pajama bottoms, Alice had a far too arousing view of her
husband to be. Just as she'd suspected he was all muscle, with a light dusting
of dark hair over his chest, narrowing down to an enticing trail that
disappeared under the elastic of his nightwear, that barely hid his arousal.

Alice swallowed nervously as his dark
eyes connected with hers, all too aware of her own state of undress under the
twisted sheet. The phone lying halfway between them pinged to let her know she
had a voice mail message, and it galvanized them both into action.

With one fluid move Lakota crossed the
distance, picked up the phone and pulled Alice up with his other hand, while he
read her phone display. His scowl deepened, and Alice snatched the phone away
from him. With his other arm still ‘round her waist she was far too close to
him, and her wayward body reacted to his nearness with embarrassing
predictability. Moisture coated her thighs, and her nipples beaded against the
sheet. His nostrils flared as though he could smell her need for him, and Alice
wanted the ground to swallow her up. She sought refuge in anger instead.

"Give me that, and let go of me,
now."

Lakota's eyebrows rose, and his gaze
zoomed to her breasts. They ached under his heated perusal, and Alice swallowed
her groan. Instead of letting her go, Lakota picked her up and dumped her on
the bed instead.

"Forgive me for saving your sorry
ass. You made enough noise to wake up the dead. Next time I hear you scream and
there's a crash in your room, I'll leave you to it, shall I? You were doing so
well for yourself after all. Make it a habit to sleep on the floor, do
you?"

"Of course not. I stumbled trying
to get to get the phone and dammit—?"
 
Her mum's phone was now unavailable, and she
feverishly punched the button for her voicemail. The thing froze on her, and
she swore again. Lakota's large hand closed over hers, and tugged the phone
away from her.

"Let me. You'll break it at this
rate." She would have resisted, but something in the compassionate tone of
his voice let her relinquish control—just this once.

In no time at all he brought up her
messages, and her heart missed a beat when he raised the phone to her ear.
Sirens were blaring in the back ground, and she barely understood her mum's
thick voice.

"It's Beth. Alice, she can't
breathe. I need you. Where are you? I've got to go…"

Fear froze Alice to the spot for one
horrifying moment, before she tried to get up. She had to get away. Away from
him and this nightmare situation and she had to help her mum and Beth.
God,
little
Beth. She had to be all right, she just had to be. The doctors had warned of
this complication, the tumor so close to her lungs could cut off her air
supply, but it was too dangerous to operate, unless they absolutely had to.

"I have to go. I have to get away
from here. My mum, my niece, they need me. Damn it, let me go."

Tears blinded her vision as the whole
horror of her situation crashed down on her. She was a few good hours' drive
from London, completely at the mercy of this man, who just sat there and
watched her with that unsettling dark gaze that stripped away all of her
defenses. And he wouldn't just let her leave, would he?

"Where have they taken her?"

"What?" The question
confused her, and she tried to focus past the rushing in her ears.

"Your niece? Where have they
taken her? Do you know?" He cupped her chin to focus her attention on him,
and some of her anxiety fled.

"I … I don't know. She didn’t
say. It's an emergency, so I guess our local one, but they wouldn't have the
expertise to deal with her."

"Is she not under the care of
Great Ormond Street? Alice, focus. Is she or isn’t she? Because if she is, they
will be transferring her there. "

The calm words made sense, yet they
didn't. How did he know that?

"I can have us there in half an
hour. I just need to make some phone calls. Get yourself dressed and meet me in
the hall way. Can you do that for me?"

"What? I mean … yes I can, but I
don't understand. You're helping me?"

Lakota's harsh laugh settled over her
like barbed wire, and his fingers dug painfully into her skin.

"I told you before I'm not the
ogre you think me to be. She's your niece. Of course you need to be with her.
Lucky for you my money will make that happen."

****
             

His fingers were going numb in the
death grip Alice had on his hand, and he rubbed his thumb over the back of her
hand in a silent effort to reassure her. She'd been dressed and downstairs in
record time, so fast in fact that he'd only just beaten her. He doubted she'd
even brushed her hair in her haste to get dressed. It fell round her pale face
in enticing waves and ripples and tumbled halfway down her back, and he had to
suppress the urge to bury his hands in the fragrant mass and kiss the worry
lines off her face. Every time she moved the subtle fragrance of a summer's
meadow tickled his senses. In the artificial light of the helicopter her
expressive face looked so pale it was almost translucent. Her full lips set in
a grim line, she was barely holding it together.