Page 9 of Secret Baby for Mr. Grump

And then his phone rang.

“Excuse me,” he said as he picked it up.

I watched his expression change immediately.

“What the fuck do you mean by that?” he snapped.

I nearly jumped at the barked-out words, frowning at him. I wasn’t a prude, but I could do without the swear words. And his tone was so…harsh. So cold.

And then it got worse.

“You tell that fucking piece of shit that if he keeps bothering me, I’ll snap his little twig neck and stuff it up his ass.” His growl sent fear arcing through me. Violence trembled in his tone.

My heart froze, the flutters turning into an anxious twisting as apprehension prickled my skin. That didn’t sound like the Marcus I knew. None of this did.

Make sure he’s exactly who you think he is. If you’re wrong, it won’t just be you who suffers.

It seemed that, once again, my sister was right.

FOUR

MARCUS

Annoyance trickled through me, and I internally cursed at Sean’s horrible fucking timing.

As I listened to my PA ramble on in my ears, I met Allie’s eyes.They were wide with shock before quickly looking away from mine.

Damn.

I probably just startled her. I forgot I never used to swear so much until I got to New York. Even before I left, I made painstaking efforts to only show Allie the good, gentle parts of me.

And now Sean had ruined it.

It was my fault for answering the phone in her presence in the first place.

I should have excused myself and gone to take the call outside like a gentleman.

But I’d never claimed to be one of those.

Besides, I didn’t want to leave her by herself, not even for a second. She looked far too tempting in that black dress. Combined with her innocent gaze and unconscious sex appeal, she was a bar fight waiting to happen.

And with the possessive heat currently running through me, I would deck any guy who even so much as looked at her.

“Deal with it,” I said to Sean, ready to hang up, but he began speaking faster before I could.

“You’re not listening, Marcus,” Sean said. “Either that or you’re not taking this seriously enough. I’m going to repeat myself. Darryl, Leverman’s son, is threatening to take you to court, and he’s already talking to stakeholders to deny your legitimacy as inheritor of Leverman Construction.”

“He has no right to do that.” The boy had abandoned his father and gone off to tour the world with whatever little cash he’d stolen from him. That was why, on his deathbed, Leverman awarded me full control of the company, and his son was only a blip on the will.

“I know that,” Sean continued. “Andyouknow that. And Darryl probably knows that as well. But the bad press is affecting our clients. Jackson Pharmaceuticals is now trying to pull out of our deal because of the controversy.”

“And that’s where you tell Walter Jackson to take his business and shove it up his ass,” I said, sick and tired of these fucking assholes who thought they could throw their weight around just because they owned a billion-dollar pharmaceutical company. They’d already tried to pull out of our deal multiple times, citing everything from creative differences to corporate disagreement.

It was all bullshit. The real reason was that they simply didn’t want to pay for the work already done.

We didn’t need their business anyway, but I didn’t take kindly to being scammed. They needed to know that. “Teach them a lesson, Sean. I don’t care who you have to hire to do it, but they’re not making off with my money. You understand that?”

“But Darryl—”

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