Page 30 of Owned By a Billionaire

“Darling, can I have a word?”

He let go of his wife’s waist, which he’d been clinging to all day, and followed me outside.

“What’s up?”

I bit my lip. “I’ve got a problem.”

Chapter 9

Cary

IfIweren’tsodrawn to Caroline Lovechilde, I wouldn’t have stayed, given the restlessness that always prompted me to indulge my inner T. E. Lawrence and visit the Middle East. Source inspiration for that story that refused to write itself.

I hadn’t planned for a life of domestic bliss centered around a cluster of newborns and noisy, albeit cute, kids. That was never on my to-do list. A vasectomy had seen to that.

So how did I get myself involved with a family of toddlers and adolescents? I preferred conversations that didn’t involve talking ducks, teddy bears, and silly but amusing pranks.

The magnum opus I’d set myself the impossible task of creating sat dormant. Nothing but blank pages. Most days, I either read, drifted around that impossibly beautiful estate, or fucked Caroline’s brains out.

The woman was insatiable. Despite having lost count of the liaisons I’d had over my forty-year sexual history, I’d met no one like her.

And she liked it rough too. That was a little strange, but also very arousing. I’d never been one to push a woman against a wall and fuck her hard from behind, but Caroline came like a rocket the harder I played. And so did I.

As her layers peeled away during our time together, I caught hints of a woman with a past she’d rather keep hidden, yet on occasions her mask would slip and I’d catch a real glimpse of her damaged self.

Sex, especially mind-blowing sex like the kind we shared, made us raw and thus exposed vulnerabilities. It certainly had for me, for I wasn’t sure how long I could keep up this charade I’d been performing for over thirty years.

Some days, I really thought I was Carrington Lovelace. Other days, I’d regret that name. But then, how was I to know I’d fall madly in love with Caroline Lovechilde?

Love?

Was I really in love?

Despite being the most intense woman I’d ever known, Caroline brought a sense of wholeness into my life, as though she’d miraculously unlocked the best version of me. I could finally be the man I always thought I could be, given the right circumstances.

Not having to worry about money helped. But that wasn’t the reason I was there.

She was my soulmate.

Some days, I wanted to tell her.

Tell her everything.

But how could I?

Caroline was a snob. I should have loathed that about her, but she redeemed herself often enough. I’d seen that substantial check she’d tried to hide, made out to a women’s shelter.

Her blemishes, despite being cringeworthy at times—like her bigotry toward the common classes and adulation for the royal family—only added to her charm. Like that potentially ruinous streak on a work of art that surprises by turning the painting into something unique and priceless.

Beautiful, intolerant, erotic, intimidatingly bright, and flawed was how I would have described her. And the longer I remained by her side, the deeper I fell.

Then I slipped up.

We’d been enjoying the sunshine when she mentioned something about the hallways of Oxford, and I forgot my lines. You see, I’d never even stepped onto the grounds of that celebrated college, let alone studied there as I’d told her.

Caroline, who rarely missed a thing, had creased her brow slightly and continued to read her magazine.

Like my name, I regretted that narrative too. Nothing but shabby research, enough to make a seasoned writer hang their head in shame.

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