Bedding the Billionaire

Sutton

You didn’t grow up the way I had around men and let some stranger put his hands on you. I was about to hand the fancy city slicker his ass when Mad Max flew across the room and held a fork to the handsome man’s neck.

Trust Max to attack with a kitchen utensil.

“Get your damn hand off of her,” Max snarled menacingly. “We don’t handle women that way.”

Because the man hadn’t let go of my arm, I was now bent at a rather strange angle. Nonetheless, I felt a surge of affection for Max. It meant a lot to me that he cared.

“I’ve got this, Max,” I said, but it was like I hadn’t even spoken.

Throughout this, the stranger didn’t even flinch despite the fact that the tines of the fork were pressed against his jugular.

“Charming,” the handsome stranger said in an even tone. “I assume this is a friend of yours?”

Max growled at him and shoved the fork harder against the stranger’s neck. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Alice and Reena staring on with wide eyes. The last thing I wanted was for this to escalate any further. I tried to nudge Max to the side with my foot, but he wasn’t about to move.

Couldn’t he see that I wasn’t in any danger? In what I hoped was a calm voice, I said, “This is Max. He’s going to put the fork down now.” That elicited a growl from Max, but I kept going. “He was a friend of my daddy’s back in the day.”

The stranger’s brow rose in surprise before a look of incredulity entered his eyes. “Somehow I doubt that to be true.”

A spark of anger lit inside of me.

“Look, I don’t know why this is any of your business. I don’t know you, and I certainly don’t owe you any explanations.” I yanked my wrist to free, and this time he let it go.

I could still feel the imprint of his fingers and rubbed my wrist absentmindedly. I wondered why it hadn’t bothered me more. Usually I wasn’t a fan of people touching me.

Besides Max, the last person to hug me was Ruth Ann when my mama passed away. She hugged me so tight and whispered that one day I would understand my mama better. I understand my mama just fine, I had thought to myself. Hell, I knew her a whole lot better than most. But I just smiled and nodded appreciatively at Ruth Ann. She meant well, and besides, Ruth Ann had known Mama before she got sick, before the men, and before the drugs.

Max growled at the stranger with such vicious intent that I started to wonder if he just might fork the man after all.

“Listen punk, just who the hell are you?”

Neither man was backing down.

“Is there a problem over here?” Gabriel rushed over to see what the fuss was all about. As soon as he saw me, a look of disgust crossed his face.

Bastard.

The stranger’s cool gray eyes stared into my own. My heart thudded wildly in my chest and I felt as if I had been running. It was the strangest response that I had ever had to a man. I took a hesitant step backward.

stranger spoke. His deep voice was clear and insistent. “Your father was Hollingsworth Sutton, III, renowned billionaire, owner of Sutton Enterprises, and my former boss. To my knowledge he never once rode a motorcycle. For the most part, he didn’t even drive himself. I don’t know

he spoke, but Max paled and moved away from the stranger, dropping the fork to the

My voice sounded young and scared.

had said that was the only reason my father wasn’t there to raise me himself.

“Baby girl…” I could hear the sorrow in

through the air. Max was one of the good guys, one of the

gruff

my daddy?” I asked him point blank.

sigh, almost as if weighing his words before he uttered, “No,

drop down past

you, well, I tried

late at night. I didn’t realize that they were paying for sex until someone in the third grade happily filled me in. They told me my mama was nothing more than a prostitute, and I

songs on the radio.

whispered, “I knew what she was like.”

“You want me to get rid of him?” Max motioned toward the businessman who

and answered in a low voice, “I

now, you aren’t. You have a shift to work, Sutton.

asked in a clipped tone,

Gabriel looked confused.

she sits here at this table with me for that length of time, I

Gabriel’s jaw dropped before his eyes took

clip and peeled off three hundred-dollar bills and then handed

Gabriel said with a smirk. “I’d have done

beat. “I would have paid five. Now, if

Max and Gabriel ambled away, and the man motioned for me to

arms, not sure that I wanted to know whatever this man was so insistent on telling me. “Why

a thin line. “You are wasting my valuable time. Unless

hit the chair faster than a freight train. I didn’t have three hundred dollars. Hell, I wasn’t sure I had thirty dollars. With a

pinched again. Good. I liked that the was just as irritated as

he began. “I am the CEO of your deceased father’s company, Sutton Enterprises. You may call me Mr.

I laughed. It was probably inappropriate, but who goes around telling people to call them mister anything?

on as if I hadn’t laughed in his face. “Because of certain legalities,

“You are too kind,” I quipped sarcastically.

the way he was rattling off information like a census bureau official. To piss him off, I deliberately called him by his first

bit off gruffly.

walk into a girl’s life and rip it all to pieces. Shit, who tells someone that their daddy is dead and in the same

William’s jaw clenched. “Your father didn’t know you existed until

he had really pissed

slept with a woman, impregnated her, and then left them both in poverty. Yep, you are right, he sounds like a real winner to me. Perhaps things worked out how they were supposed to.”