Page 3 of Faking It with my Small Town Billionaire

“I’m already thirty-four and a half. There’s no way I’ll be married before I’m thirty-five. I’m not even dating.”

“And therein lies the rub, son,” he says smugly. “Look at you. You’re a fine specimen of a man. You’re handsome, tall, athletic, and rich. Tell me, why are you still single?”

I ignore the question.

“There must be some compromise,” I counter. “Surely it can wait until I’m thirty-six.”

“Thirty-five or no inheritance,” the old man says bluntly.

“This is bull, and you know it,” I spit. “If you don’t want me to inherit the company, just come out and say it instead of having me jump through all these ridiculous hoops.”

“Oh, but I do want you to inherit the company, Orson,” Pops says in this serene voice. “You just have to meet the requirements. In all honesty, I thought you would have been married by now. It is you who has forced my hand.”

I have no words. Well, actually, I have plenty of words, but none that I would say in front of my grandfather. While there are times I could wrap my hands around his throat and give him a good shake, I still respect the old goat.

“Now,” he says, grabbing a pile of papers on his desk and shuffling them into a neat pile, “I’m sure you need to get going. You have a long drive ahead and plenty of reading to do when you get back to the city.”

He looks down at the papers he’s shuffled and carries on like nothing has just happened. Like I’m not even in the room. Like he hasn’t just twisted my arm so far up my back, I can now scratch the back of my head.

Without a word of goodbye, I walk through the door, slamming it closed behind me. I’m reeling from a ten-minute conversation that has turned my world on its head. I’m angry that I’m being blackmailed by a member of my own family.

I’ve worked darned hard for this company. Pinned to my desk, my days have slipped into nights, and on some occasions, I’ve woken up in the office, disheveled, disoriented, and wondering what day of the week it was. Many of my ideas have propelled the company forward, not least of which were in-office day care and better holiday pay, which has lowered sick days by over sixty percent.

I don’t have children, but I respect the female workforce and the struggles they have trying to manage full-time jobs with their families. Maybe that’s the soft side of me Pops was referring to.

Who knows? Who cares?

My main concern now is the fact that I’m being thrust back into a past I thought I had left behind, and just to make things interesting, I have to find myself a wife.

Great!

I wonder if I can get free delivery if I order one off Amazon? Knowing my luck, Pops will track my purchases and send her right back. I don’t need a wife. I’m happier on my own. My job is my life, and I love it. I don’t need a woman complicating everything.

And yet, what choice do I have?

I jump into my Mercedes and throw the file onto the passenger seat. Taking a long look at it, I scowl.

“Darn you, Willow Creek. I hate you now more than I hated you as a kid.”

2

Lily

The small dining area of my bakery looks a little like the gym at a school dance. Only there’s no disco music, and no one is dancing; in fact, everyone here is miserable. Okay. Maybe not the best analogy, but the tables have been moved, and the chairs are all in rows.

Chairs filled with angry people who have heard the news.

There aren’t enough chairs for everyone—it’s a tiny café area attached to my bakery, not a five-star restaurant—so some people are standing in the back, which is actually the front of my bakery, if that makes sense.

I’m standing in front of these people because it was me who called this meeting.

“We won’t let that happen,” I say, answering Mrs. Carter’s concerns about a takeover. “Donovan Enterprises has no right to come into our town and change the very meaning of what we’ve stood for all these years.”

There’s lots of nodding and a murmur of agreement, but the atmosphere is tense.

“We need to fight,” I continue. “But I can’t do this alone. Most of us here have businesses that are struggling.”

“We’ve been struggling for a while,” John Gates calls out.

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