Shopping for a Billionaire's Honeymoon Read online

  “Why, yes.”

  I clap him on the back. “Then I do believe there is one favor I might ask of you. An introduction? My new business is a chain of coffee stores, and I have been unsuccessful in communicating with Koshigiri.”

  “He is quite reclusive, but of course.” Miyadori pulls out a smart phone and taps out a text. “I will ask for his direct number for you.”

  If you spend enough time in high-level business deals, you understand how important a role networking and connections play in business.

  But for the really big deals? You need plain old dumb luck.

  Miyadori’s phone buzzes. I pull my own out of my pocket. He asks for my number and in seconds, a forwarded message from Blanton Jean-Pierre Koshigiri himself is in my text box, with his personal number.

  Score!

  “Thank you.” I bow. “I will speak to Andrew as soon as we return to Boston.”

  He looks deeply relieved. “Thank you. I am glad we could be of mutual assistance to one another. And now, for the diamond earrings.”

  Humming with unexpected victory, I’m pumped. Pumped and ready to go back to our suite and turn Shannon into a quivering mass of pillow biting lushness.

  Decorum, however, requires that I give Miyadori five more minutes.

  He draws me to a room service cart next to the railing, right by the elevator. With a flourish, he removes a large cover, revealing an assortment of chocolate-dipped fruits, all chilled in a special refrigerated tray.

  “Before you leave, Declan, we planned to bring the diamond earrings to your suite. As you can see, the Champagne is here.” He pulls a velvet box out of his breast pocket and hands it to me. “Your earrings.”

  I open the box, grinning like an idiot. Koshigiri’s personal number, Shannon’s surprise diamond earrings, and the whole day to make love on a yacht on the coastline of Hawaii.

  That is one hell of a hat trick.

  I pull the earrings out of the box and examine them in the light, my voice loud and strong. “These look good.”

  “May I have them for a moment?”

  I hand them back to him. He sets them on the tray, then opens a bottle of Krug. Next, he reaches for a crystal flute and pours two glasses, filling each halfway.

  “Chance favors the prepared,” he says. “A lovely presentation to a lovely woman. She will enjoy the surprise, I’m certain. This always makes the women choke up.”

  And then he plops the two earrings in one of the glasses of Champagne.

  Every drop of triumphant adrenaline in my body turns toxic, as if a complete reversal of the laws of chemistry were taking place within my bloodstream. All that victory turns to horror. Images of Shannon choking on her engagement-ring-filled piece of tiramisu when I proposed flood my mind until all I see is her pleading eyes and my future goes white.

  Without thinking, working entirely on combat impulse, my rat brain engaged for life-or-death battle, I grab the crystal flute and fling the contents, earrings and all, over the railing.

  Crisis averted. Shannon can’t choke on that. Protection complete.

  Danger is gone. I saved Shannon.

  I saved myself.

  A stream of angry words in a foreign language I don’t understand bubbles up from below. And then --

  “WHAT ON EARTH!” bellows a man from below us. “HOW DARE YOU!”

  Miyadori and I look down. I drop the crystal flute onto a cloth napkin on the service tray and grip the railing, my heart in my throat, my eyeballs pounding out a drumbeat.

  A very angry face looks up, one bordered by a middle-eastern headdress.

  A headdress covered in Champagne.

  “Oh, my goodness! I am so sorry, Your Highness.” Miyadori shouts below as several people, likely the man’s servants, begin patting him to clean the mess I’ve created. He’s wearing a Western suit, well-tailored, in a light linen of uncompromising taste. Slim and tall, the man has a goatee and the finely finished look of someone privileged and powerful.

  Like me.

  He reaches into the headdress, pulls out what appears to be the diamond earrings, and flings them angrily in the face of a bodyguard, who catches them one-handed without flinching.

  I am not asking for those back. Ever.

  Miyadori gives me an open-mouthed, shocked look. “Your father said there was a series of problems in Las Vegas and we’re hosting him here as an apology. That’s the Sultan of Al-Massi!”

  Of course it is. The very man my brother blew off back in Vegas. The one with the power to green light a nine figure deal for Anterdec.

  Dumb luck giveth.

  Dumb luck taketh away.

  Chapter 7

  Shannon

  You ever attend a luau alone? It’s not fun. At all. By dinnertime, all I have is a text from Declan that says, On conference call with legal. Turns out half the landscaping staff are undocumented immigrants, and our rivals turned it into a page one story. Sorry. Will be back by nine.

  Nine comes and goes.

  Declan’s just gone.

  Where are you? I text again, giving the luau dancers a weak smile and another round of applause. The performances are impeccable. The food is fabulous. The atmosphere is romantic and relaxed, couples enjoying each other, holding hands, sharing bottles of wine.

  And I’m staring at the roasting pig like he has my husband’s face.

  Still in meetings. Almost done.

  We need to go home, I text back. This is ridiculous. I want sex.

  They won’t leave us alone! he replies. Might as well work.

  If all you’re going to do on our honeymoon is work, I reply, then we might as well go home so we can have sex!

  He doesn’t reply.

  That’s it.

  I call Grace.

  “Hi, Shannon. What’s he done now?”

  Grace is Declan’s second mother. Sure, she’s his executive assistant, too, and she practically runs his life, but more than any other role, she’s a mother hen.

  “He won’t stop working.”

  “Tell me about it. I was supposed to have a light week. Jeannie and I are celebrating our fifth anniversary in P-town and at this rate, she’ll divorce me.”

  “No, Grace, I mean he is ignoring me. On our honeymoon. He’s been in meetings all night for some emergency here at the resort in Hawaii. I’m pretty close to getting an annulment.”

  She laughs. “You can’t do that. You guys already had sex.”

  I stay silent.

  “Oh, no! Oh, honey—is that the problem?” Something in her voice gives me pause. Do I hear a repressed laugh behind her words? Does she know what’s going on here already? Did Declan tell her?

  Pfft. No way. Declan doesn’t share his feelings with anyone but me. I’m being paranoid.

  Clearly.

  “Well, we only had sex once. Ok, twice.” I frown, recalling details. “Well... not enough!” I fume.

  “What’s going on?”

  “The resort management is sucking up to us. Couple’s massages and cheese courses and chocolate and lobster lunch buffets.”

  “Oh, you poor thing.” Grace has a master’s degree in Sarcasm, with a minor in Boo Hoo.

  “This isn’t remote enough,” I hiss to Grace. “I need someplace where there are no cell phone towers. No cell phones. No way for him to communicate with the outside world at all.”

  “You need a serial killer’s lair.”

  “YES!”

  “That wasn’t a serious suggestion, Shannon.”

  “But it would work!”

  Silence.

  And then I swear I hear her mutter, “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree,” but that can’t be right.

  “Let me see what I can do,” she says in that clipped, officious voice she uses when it’s time to get down to business.

  A man with three flaming spears walks by, oiled up and impressively muscular, making my mouth water.

  I wonder what Declan would look like in that?

  “Can you
get him outside?” Grace asks. “Pretend you’re doing a helicopter volcano tour?”

  “Pretend?” Maybe if I act like the volcano has coffee growing in it, I’ll have a shot.

  “I have a plan.”

  “You have a plan? We haven’t been on the phone for twenty seconds, Grace, and you already have a plan involving a helicopter escape?”

  “You and Declan set a precedent for that, Shannon, when you escaped your Boston wedding and your mother.”

  Ha ha.

  “Do you trust me?”

  “To unwind Declan from his workaholism? Yes.”

  “Then get him to the heliport tomorrow morning. Ten a.m.”

  “Great. And don’t say a word to James. Please.”

  She snorts. “As if I talk to him at all.”

  “He’s the one turning our lives into one big free PR junket.”

  “Don’t worry, honey. I’ll be your wing woman.”

  My throat goes dry. “Uh...”

  Deep, throaty laughter is all I hear when the line goes dead. Grace knows how to end a crisis call.

  “I would give your husband one million dollars for the pleasure of one wild night in bed with you, madame,” says an unctuous voice to my left as a man in a neon Hawaiian-print shirt sits on the stool next to me, manspreading as he settles in, his tan linen shorts opening enough to make me see that those are not macadamia nuts falling out of the crotch.

  Someone’s enjoying his commando status a wee bit much.

  He looks at the ring on my finger. “Do you believe he would accept?”

  “He would tell you to go to hell.”

  “Not ask me to up the price?” He smiles, his thick mustache reminding me of my mom’s old celebrity crush, Tom Selleck.

  “If you have to up the price, you must not be very good in bed.”

  “Ohh, this is what I love about American women! So cheeky. So playful. My name is Mohammad, but all of my friends call me Moe.”

  “You have friends?”

  “I have many friends!” He isn’t fluent in Sarcasm. “You are one of them, miss...”

  “Mrs. No.”

  “Moe and No! We are meant to be together.” He reaches for my hand and begins stroking it, looking deep into my eyes. He has the longest, curliest eyelashes I’ve ever seen up close. Too bad his eyes are so out of focus from all the alcohol he’s been clearly consuming. They float in his sockets like apples in a bobbing bucket at Halloween. “I would like to share my bed with you tonight.”

  “You’re...direct.”

  “It is the best approach.”

  “No.”

  “You already told me your name. Noooooo.” He purses is lips as if to kiss me.

  Ignoring him, I pull out my phone and start two different text conversations.

  To Declan: WHERE ARE YOU?

  To Amanda: OMG, I’m getting hit on during my honeymoon.

  “I meant no – I will not sleep with you, Mohammad.”

  “Ah. I love this game.”

  “It’s not a game.”

  He pulls out his phone and taps on it. Waits. Reads, then smiles at me. “Would you like to see my etchings in my hotel room?”

  The barking sound that comes out of me sounds nothing like a laugh. “What kind of etchings. Do you carve pictures into the walls using the blood of your victims?”

  He pulls back, confused. “I do not understand.”

  We’re mercifully interrupted by the bartender, who brings me another fruity drink with a giant slice of pineapple in it while Moe the Schmo reads a text. With a giant grin, he says, “Tell me about yourself.”

  “I’m married.”

  “Yes, yes, you already said that.”

  “You want to sleep with a married woman?”

  “Those are the easiest. They are ignored by their husbands and desperate for a real man to give them attention.”

  Ouch.

  I check my phone. Text from Amanda:

  Duh. Declan’s supposed to hit on you on your honeymoon. By the way, I still haven’t gotten the Cheeto stains out of my underwear.

  I type back:

  Not Declan! Some creepy dude who says married women are his favorite to sleep with. Invited me to his hotel room to see his etchings.

  She quickly responds:

  Where is Declan?

  Good question.

  Moe reaches out to touch my ring finger, then my ear. I shrink back. “My brother tells me American women have tongues so long they can swallow earrings. Is this true?”

  Oh, come on. Screw it. Declan’s not answering my texts. The Matrix sucked him in. My Red Pill Alpha is gone, so I might as well play mind games with Moe Money here.

  “Yes. All of us. You should see what I can do with a pair of shoelaces.” I look down at his feet. He’s wearing flip-flops. “Well, not yours, obviously. And also, your shoes are very small.” I make eye contact. “You know what they say about a man and the size of his feet.”

  “Of course.” He puffs up. “I thank you for the compliment.”

  Something got very lost in translation there.

  “Mrs. No, may I ask what kind of food you like? Do you enjoy tapas?”

  Creepy crawlies clamber up my spine like little spiders using rock-climbing equipment. Hold on. Is Declan punking me? On my own honeymoon?

  “Did someone pay you to hit on me?” I ask, looking around the room, scanning the crowd for Declan.

  “What? No! I am offering to pay you for sex.”

  “That’s prostitution.”

  “You finally understand! Oh, good. We can put that behind us and move on to the part where you let me sniff your shoe.”

  I quickly type, He wants to pay me to let him sniff my shoe and hit Send.

  Except instead of sending that text to Amanda, I accidentally text my mother.

  “Noooooooooo!” I moan.

  “Yes, yes, I know your name, Mrs. No. Now, name your price. I will go as high as two million just for regular sex. No anal.”

  “No anal?”

  “Just for you.”

  “Um....thank you?”

  “You are very welcome. It is settled then.”

  Bzzzzzz.

  Mom’s reply: Husbands are weird, honey. Once they put a ring on it, they show their true selves. Declan’s just like the rest of them. In fact, your father --

  I delete the text.

  “What do you like to do in your spare time?”

  “What?”

  “Your spare time. What do you do with it?”

  “I spend time with my friends. My husband. My parents and sisters and nephews.”

  “You love your family?”

  “Yes.”

  “That is nice,” he says softly. Our eyes meet. “You truly will not come to my bed, will you?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I love my husband very much.”

  “You are afraid he will have you beheaded if you commit adultery.”

  “Not...exactly. I won’t sleep with you because you’re creepy, too.”

  “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  “So no shoe sniffing?”

  “No.”

  “No two million dollars?”

  “No.” I grab my purse and start to leave.

  “I cannot believe you are walking away! No woman has ever said no so many times before.” He pauses, thick eyebrows forming a train of forest above those handsome lashes. “And meant it.” Tilting his head, he studies me, intrigued.

  “There is a first for everything.”

  Declan

  Calming down a sultan requires finesse.

  And lots and lots of twelve-year-old Scotch, which Miyadori brings like it’s water although Sharia law forbids alcohol. When I mention this – covertly, of course – Miyadori gives me a knowing smile and simply says, “Whatever the sultan wants, the sultan gets.”

  I like the man more and more with each passing moment, which is good, because
he’s saving my ass.

  One shot at a time.

  After a sprint down four flights of steps and a few hundred feet of deck pathway, I found him. Profuse apologies helped, but balanced with tempered dominance. A strong man acknowledges when he screws up.

  But he doesn’t go submissive.

  Here we sit, in a large cabana on the water, bodyguards surrounding us. They’re placed in strategic locations, mostly behind large green plants. No pretense – the men are in traditional garb – while the sultan, who is my age and tells me to call him Omar – complains about his father.

  “He abdicated and yet the man thinks he can still control everything!” Omar groans before he downs a shot.

  We’re bonding.

  “Sounds like our fathers were separated at birth.”

  Omar laughs and claps me on the back. “I love this phrase,” he says in British-clipped English. “Separated at birth. Like dogs in a litter. You are funny, Declan.” He pronounces my name with a strange emphasis. Dick-LAND.

  “My father wants to make my bride and I find a monkey and take it to a luau for a video.”

  He gives me a sharp look, with dark, piercing eyes. “Why?”

  “To make a scandal for our company. So the company will get more media coverage.”

  “Bah! Who needs more media coverage. The devils do enough damage. They say I sleep with three women at once, you know? All so they can create a scandal and sell more newspapers. Liars!”

  “Liars,” I repeat, wondering where this is going.

  He pours another shot for each of us and holds up his glass. I do the same. He leans in, clicks the glasses, and whispers, “Three women? It was four.”

  Wink.

  Drink.

  The sultan is unmarried. His picture graces the cover of every major European tabloid rag. He’s also rumored to be “a bit” unstable. “A bit” in the same way that Marie can be a bit intrusive. A quick memory scan and I recall a sultanate rumored to be decadent, ruled by benevolent oppression, with a mercurial leader who cannot be easily managed by handlers.

  I suck down my shot. I’ve lost count of how many we’ve had. “Four women? I applaud you. I can barely manage one.”

  “But she is a good one?”

  “She is a fabulous one.”

  “And what about your wife?”

  “Excuse me?”