Page 3 of The Billionaire's Buy-In

Startled to see me running towards them, their reaction time is surprisingly slow. I nimbly sidestep the pair and duck quickly into the open elevator doors. As the doors close, I reach into my small clutch and pull out my trusty pepper spray. A gift from my NiNi because she worries about me walking around campus on my own. It’s always on me, but I’ve never had to use it until now. And Iwilluse it. I’m not going down without a fight. There’s no way I'm going to “casino jail,” real jail, or whatever the hell these freaks of nature have planned for me.

The doors begin to slide shut, but before they can fully close, a well-dressed foot in an expensive leather shoe halts their progress. I blindly point the top of my small pink canister and press the button. In an instant, a loud hiss fills the air as a burning mist of pepper spray shoots the intruder. Immediately, curses, choking, and wheezing echo off the walls as he struggles to draw a breath.

In hindsight, using pepper spray in a small, enclosed space wasn’t the brightest move on my part. Despite closing my eyes, I’m feeling the burning effects of the spray in both my eyes and lungs.Daring to squint my watering eyes open and gasping for fresh air like my victim, I swipe at the tears streaming from my eyes to inspect the damage I’ve caused. As my vision focuses, I can finally make out the blurry image of my intended target.

Oh shit. Standing in front of me, still gasping on the fumes, with pepper spray, tears, and what looks like snot dribbling down his angry face, is the one man in New Orleans you don’t want to piss off. One you definitely don’t want to humiliate. He’s also the man who has plagued my every living moment for the past two months.

Chord Gallo.

Chapter 3

Chord

Imakeherwait.

She’s sitting and waiting in the cold, windowless concrete room with the one-way mirror and bright fluorescent lights in dreaded apprehension of what’s going to happen to her.

She’s lucky I want to fuck her so damn bad. If I didn’t have such a hard-on for her, she’d need to fear for her life. Her little attack has rendered me blind for the last hour and caused me to have snot streaming out of my nose like a goddamn toddler. Not a flattering image for a man like me.

Grown men walk into this room and, more often than not, leave with a reminder of why someone shouldn’t fuck with me, my family, or my business.Ifthey get to leave, most end up with a broken limb, black eyes, and reek from the stench of their piss streaming down their legs because they thought they might not make it out alive.

So, yeah, she should be nervous.

To top it off, I'm pretty sure I’ll never get the pepper spray out of my Armani suit, which pisses me off because it was new. After changing, I immediately head downstairs to confront the troublemaker. Pausing before entering the room, I put on my most intimidating game face for her. The scary, mafia, I-could-make-you-disappear one. The expression that makes grown men cry.

I move to take a single step inside when I hear the whoosh of an object hurtling through the air. I duck out of instinct and my eyes widen as something hard connects with the top of my head before sailing down the hallway, bouncing off the wall behind me.

“What. The. Actual. Fuck?” I bark, looking over my shoulder at what clocked me.

A shoe? She threw a goddamned shoe at me?

Seeing red, I take a deep breath. She attacked me. Again.

“Yeah, I threw a shoe at you, you big ass. If I had a gun, I’d useit, too,” she spits the words out contemptuously, then bends over to take off her other shoe. “Oh, look! I have another one!” She winds up like a pitcher on the mound. “You are the most arrogant, insufferable asshole I’ve ever met!”

I’m forced to dodge another shoe sailing over my head and again, bouncing harmlessly off the wall. At least she gave me a heads up with that one, but I’m certain I’m going to have a lump the size of a golf ball from the first missile.

“You have a shitty aim, firecracker.” I can’t help but smirk, intentionally pissing her off. She looks around, frantically searching for another weapon. Grabbing her small clutch, she has second thoughts and sets it back down. Guess she doesn't want to risk the contents. Instead, she rounds the interrogation style-table bolted to the floor to stand toe-to-toe with me.

My six foot-four inches tower over her small five-foot frame, dwarfing her, but my pint-size fury isn’t intimidated by me. If anything, she’s more fired up.

“Fuck you, Chord.” She glares at me, standing, hands on her hips, head tilted up to meet my gaze. Her amber eyes flashing fire at me.

If I wasn’t so pissed right now, I’d think she was adorable, but she threw a fucking shoe, no, make that two shoes at me. That’s undeniably a punishable offense. I run my gaze over her petite form in her curve-hugging dress and my anger cools, but my desire grows to monstrous proportions. Remembering Ryker’s warning, I take a step back before I do something crazy, like spin her around, bare her ass and paddle her for all the shit she’s done tonight.

Instead, I advance on her, forcing her to take a step back in caution. I adjust my suit sleeves in a deceptively casual gesture, and using a cold, calculating voice, often reserved for my enemies, I confront the little troublemaker. “You have had a big night, firecracker. So many punishable offenses," I tsk at her. "Let’s take stock of the situation.”

I lift my hand to tick off her crimes with my fingers. “In an hour’s time, you have almost blinded me, ruined my suit, compromised my respiratory system, and most likely caused some sort of trauma to my head. Any other person might beg for their life right now, Miss Bates, but you appear to have an attitude.”

“You can go straight to hell, you…you control freak!” she points her finger in my face, stepping towards me once more rising on her toes. “I’m not scared of your threats, you know. Everyone else might fear the 'mighty' Gallos, but I don’t,” she says bravely. “I demand to see my attorney. I know my rights. You can't keep me. This isn’t a jail, and you can’t lock me up.”

Angry Abbie is so fucking sexy. Damn, I'm a sick fuck because I love it when she challenges me. Easy is no fun, and Abbie's certainly not easy.

“Firecracker, you don’t need an attorney in this room. That's not a right to which you are entitled. You seem to be under the impression that this,” I hold out my arms to indicate the room and all it represents, “is a democracy, when it’s actually quite the opposite. Inside this building, it’s really more of a dictatorship.” Her eyes widen a fraction, cracking her confident mask.

“Me,” I point to myself, “being the said-dictator.You,” I point at her, “have no rights here on this property, Miss Bates, because no one cares what I do at Chord’s Crossing.”

Then, I give her a dangerous smile, prowling towards her once more, backing her up against the table in the center of the room. I’m not above using my size and my height to intimidate her. Dick moves, but with her, the gloves are off.

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