Page 23 of The Billion Dollar Bet

“Yes!” he slammed the glass down, splashing the drink over his hand and the surface of the countertop. “But it was up to me to tell her the truth when the time was right. I was going to tell her everything this end of month when she met my mother and I told her about the company.”

“You haven’t told her about working in the company?”

“Yes, she knows I’m working in my family company, she just doesn’t know it’s Sampell.”

Barry scrunched his face in obvious confusion. “But why?”

“Shit,” Troy exclaimed.

Barry turned towards him questioningly, staring at him for a minute before his face lightened and he winced. “Oh. She doesn’t know who you really are. Ha.”

“No,” Devin said, now much calmer. “I was planning to come clean in a few days when everything fell into place. My mom is going announce my appointment on the thirtieth of the month. We were supposed to celebrate and I’d tell her everything.”

“Were you planning on telling her about the bet?” Troy asked.

“Yes,” Devin responded. “And that’s what makes this so fucked up. The one girl I really do like, is the one Carter messed up. Why?”

“I don’t know why he did it, if he did,” Troy said and Devin shot him a deadly look. “What if someone said something and she heard from someone else?”

“That is highly unlikely,” Barry interjected. “We have never discussed our best with anyone outside the circle and who would run to Cassie with such a thing unless they had something to gain?”

“You have a point,” Troy said. “My bad.”

“I’m heading home.” Devin started towards the door. “You tell Carter I’m coming to London. I know where his dad lives.”

Chapter 17

Cassie was out in the garden tending the rose bush that her grandmother had cared for many years. During the last couple of months she’d been busy with her work at the University, in her own lab and of course her relationship with Devin.

She jammed the garden fork into the soil and raked it, then slapped a pile of dirt around the root of the rose plant. Her movements were energetic, filled with the power of her wrath. How could she not have sensed the deceit? How could she be so easily fooled? How did he manage to fake that potent attraction she felt. Was it her imagination? Was that intense current between them al fake?

I love you Cassie. His voice played over on her head.

“No!” she shrieked. “Get out of my head, you bastard.”

Cassie stood, dropped the garden tool and started marching towards the house when a silver car pulled up to her gate. Still fuming from thinking about Devin and her disloyal heart refusing to hate him, she paused and waited to see whom it was. Her heart skipped a beat thinking it might be him. This incensed her even more and she doubled her fists at her side, waiting for him to alight the car. It was Barry who stepped from the car.

“What does he want?” she mumbled under her breath and waited for him to join her on the walkway.

“Hi,” Barry greeted with a demure smile, his silver grey eyes perusing her.

She ignored his greeting and set her face. “If your friend sent you, tell him to take his explanation and shove it up his freaking ass!”

“No Miss Cassie, Devin doesn’t know I’m here.”

“You’re Barry, right?” she asked. “We met a few times when I went out with that snake. You and your other buddies were very friendly. That was all a lie, wasn’t it?”

He shook his head. “No Ma’am, it wasn’t.”

She scoffed at him as their eyes connected. “So you were the one who thought I was worth only a thousand measly dollars.”

His mouth fell open before his face turned red. Cassie turned and began to stomp towards the front door. She heard him follow her and she whipped around to face him, her eyes deadly.

“If you’re here to apologize, I don’t need your fake ass apologies, so git!”

“Please, Miss Cassie,” he pleaded. “Please hear me out.”

“So you can tell me it was all in fun and that you were never going to collect and all that crap?” She spat. “Oh, or maybe you were going to do another round to see which one would win this time. Was it your turn next? Do you want a piece of this black ass?”

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