Page 25 of My Cruel Billionaire

I called on another reporter.

“You there, the tall woman in the gray jacket.”

She stood up and faced me head-on.

“I have to know, why did you do it? Why did you leak information about this merger to the press in the first place?”

“I’m not sure I understand your question,” I said, frowning as if I were confused. In reality, I had expected that exact query. I was just indulging in my penchant for the theatrical.

“Wouldn’t a press release have been a more, well, normal option for this kind of news?”

I laughed and looked her dead in the eye.

“Answer me in all honesty now,” I said carefully. “When is the last time that you actually read a press release? Or for that matter, how many members of the general public would even deign to read something like that?”

A ripple of laughter rolled through the gathered crowd of reporters.

“See, it never happens,” I said. “Never. Why bother with a press release or official statement when you can fake a leak and get easy PR? Now everyone, the whole world is watching to see what these two companies will do next.”

A murmuring susurrus hissed over the gathered crowd. I was enjoying myself quite a bit at that point.

“In fact,” I said “I think that all of you should be thanking me for handing you a red hot topic to get eyeballs on your webpages and hands on your newspapers.”

I saw a reporter with a plaid jacket raising his hand desperately into the air, trying to get my attention. I admired his enthusiasm and I kind of felt sorry for him, too, so I pointed at him.

“You there, with the, ah, interesting fashion sense.”

Another wave of laughter rolled across the crowd. I was really on a roll. I put my hand over the mic and spoke to Michael as an aside.

“I’ve got them eating out of the palm of my hand. Maybe I should have been a stand-up comedian?”

He frowned, but otherwise offered no comment.

The reporter I’d called on cleared his throat. I guessed that he didn’t feel too bad about my veiled insult of his apparel, because he didn’t seem to be upset.

“I’m confused as to why you didn’t keep this a secret? Aren’t you worried about your competitors? Now they know what your plans are and they can act accordingly.”

“Secrecy and subterfuge are the tools of those who lack confidence,” I said with a smile. “We want to project confidence to our shareholders so they know that this is the most exciting thing to happen in the world of sporting goods in, well, ever.”

I called on another reporter.

“Why didn’t Evan Jones deal with this matter personally? Does he not have confidence in the deal?”

Now there was a question I hadn’t been counting on. As a woman in the world of high-stakes finance, I knew well how much of a ‘good old boy’ network was really at play. Misogyny ran rampant in that sector, so I should have been expecting such a query. Alas, I had not.

Before I could answer, Michael put his hand on my back and stepped up to the microphone. It was the first time he’d touched me in years, since that fateful day in the boardroom when he’d fired me and broke up with me on the same afternoon.

His fingertips lit up rippling fires which surged through my skin, spreading like a disease to infect the rest of my body. My mouth parted slightly, and my eyes half closed. I struggled to take deeper breaths, because suddenly I felt like panting.

I hated and loved that he could still make me feel that way. The hate part seemed fairly self-evident. It meant that he still could exert some form of control over me, whether I let it affect my judgment or not. He could still make me feel that way. That… good.

The flip side of that coin? I loved the way he made me feel. I had forgotten how good his touch was. I never could figure out why he had such a sway on me, but I adored the way he used to make love to me. It was like I was the only woman in the entire world.

I never said the obvious out loud to him back then. That he could do better. I wasn’t knocking myself, but a man like him could have literally any woman in the world he wanted. Any supermodel, any Oscar-winning actress, any heiress or sports star or musician. Yet he had chosen to spend his time with me. He had chosen to make love to me.

That touch was wonderful, and yet it proved to be its own form of hell. His touch reminded me of what I’d been missing for so long. I was so busy with work and my son that I rarely had a chance to date.

And it never seemed to go anywhere, either. Was I secretly holding out on myself? Sabotaging the dates I did get to go on in hopes that someday Michael would come back into my life? Or were the men I dated just a bunch of jerks?

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