Page 311 of The Billionaires

This time, he’s the one who kisses me, and we imbue this kiss with all the things we haven’t yet gotten the chance to say to each other, like how I also hated it when we didn’t speak. Or how I dreamed of kissing him again, and not just kissing but also?—

As if reading my thoughts, Adrian begins to undress, first himself and then me—all without stopping the kiss.

When we’re naked, he whispers, “It shouldn’t hurt this time around.”

And he’s right. It doesn’t.

It’s like the best scene in every romance I’ve ever read, only infinitely hotter because it’s him.

JANE

A YEAR LATER

The movie theater is brimming with VIPs, but all I care about is my husband sitting to my right. Yes, Adrian and I decided to stay married, so he really is my husband now, not just one in the eyes of the law.

He grasps my hand, and between that and the movie starting, my heartbeat skyrockets. Adrian has worked tirelessly on this project but has kept it a secret from me, all so I could enjoy this viewing tonight. All he’s told me ahead of time is that I inspired him to do this, and that he thinks I might like it. Oh, and that he personally wrote the screenplay, composed the score, designed some of the costumes, and a whole laundry list of other accomplishments.

Put another way, I’m more amped than a kid after a tiramisu-eating contest.

I watch, enthralled, as the first scene unfolds. If Adrian’s goal was to please viewers like me, he’s totally nailed it.

The setting is England circa mid-1830s—one of my favorites—and there’s a great love story in the film, making it a historical romance. The lovers in question are Ada Lovelace and Charles Babbage, real historical people, though the relationship is fictionalized. Charles was an eccentric genius inventor who—and this is hard-to-believe-but-true history—developed plans for a mechanical computer, a machine that, sadly, was never built (or else cat videos might’ve become a favorite pastime of humans a hundred years sooner). Ada was a talented mathematician and the only legitimate daughter of Lord Byron. Because she wrote programs for Charles’s machine, she is now credited as the world’s first computer programmer. That’s right. She was the first in a field in which women today still hold only about thirty percent of the jobs, and she was in it at a time when women were considered incapable of learning mathematics with their feeble, tiny lady brains.

Needless to say, by the time credits roll, my eyes are teary. Leaping to my feet, I clap, and the rest of the audience joins in.

“You’re a genius,” I tell Adrian fervently.

He grins at me. “You really liked it?”

“Yeah,” I say. “It’s now my favorite movie.”

Before he can reply, a reporter who introduces himself as a movie critic for The New York Times begins gushing to Adrian about how much he loved the film.

As soon as the reporter finishes, the mayor congratulates Adrian on a job well done, and then one of the actors stops by to thank Adrian for giving him a chance to be part of such an amazing project. Other people come by too, and it goes on for almost an hour.

When we get to the lobby, everyone we know is already waiting for us—the only person missing is Piper because bringing a toddler to a movie premiere is against the Geneva Conventions.

“That was actually watchable,” says Bernard.

“For a movie without car chases and explosions,” Michael corrects.

“Hey, it’s the best sappy romance I’ve ever seen,” Warren chimes in. “Not that I’ve seen all that many.”

“You three are crazy,” Mary says without ungluing her gaze from her phone. “The movie was the GOAT. Don’t you think so, sis?”

The “sis” in question is Sydney—who’s been getting along with Mary extremely well. It might have something to do with the fact that Mary has hit preteen-hood hard this past year and is drawn to Sydney’s Queen Bee vibes. Mom and I are grateful to Sydney because she’s thus far been able to talk Mary out of pink hair (what are you, an anime character?), a pierced nose (you’ll look like a cow), and a tattoo of a dolphin (you’re not enough of a tramp to get that stamp).

“You did a great job,” Sydney says to Adrian with exaggerated graciousness.

“Thanks,” Adrian replies, and I can tell he’s doing his best to sound friendly—which is still a work in progress for these two. Hard work. But the fact that she’s here today is evidence that she is trying.

On my end, I get along with my newfound half-sister pretty well considering she tried to sleep with my husband a mere year ago. It does help that she’s started dating someone new, and that she’s a good mom to Piper… and that she gets along with my own mom.

Hell, I think a few years from now, I might even like her.

“Great job?” Mom exclaims. “Understatement of the century! That was Oscar material.”

“I agree,” Tristan says. “Golden Globe too. That score was a work of high art.”

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