Page 33 of The Billionaire Is Back

And now it’s obvious. Of course. “Jake? Right? Jake told you to talk to me?” I roll my eyes.

“He’s just trying to help. I’m just trying to help.” I’m about to tell him I don’t need his help when he holds up his hands and says, “I talked to your suppliers this morning.”

I almost laugh at that, but it comes out like a grunt. “How do you even know who my suppliers are?”

“I looked up all the suppliers in the area, figured out prices, distance…”

“Of course you did.”

“And now that I’ve seen how you operate, I’veworked out a plan.” He pauses for a beat, tries to present himself as someone who is humble. “I think.”

“I have my own plan,” I huff out. “I operate just fine. I don’t need your help. I don’t needyou.” My voice cracks on that last sentence, but he probably doesn’t hear it over the music.

“Yeah,” says a muffled, gruff old man-voice from the other side of the door. “We don’t need you!”

“Crabby!” I can only see the top of his head through the porthole window of the café door.

“Where are my cookies?”

“Give me five minutes! Tell Vera I said you can have a free coffee while you wait!” I call out, exasperated, but that messy wave of white hair and the way he waves me off makes me smile.

I remove the fritter from the pot and place it on a layer of paper towels to drain the oil. This is how I do it. Small batch. If he criticizes me for this too, I’m throwing him out of my kitchen.

When I turn around, Grady is right there again. Staring down at me. Jaw tight. Hands on the hips. “Would you like me to leave, Claire?”

“What do you think?” I look him straight in the eyes. I want tonot wanthim to stay, that’s what I want. I want to want someone else to be here with me. I want there to be someone—anyone else that I want here with me besides him.

He studies my face. My forehead, my cheek, my earlobe, my neck. He searches my eyes. He stares at my mouth again, his stance getting all rigid. I can’t tell if he likes what he sees or if he hates it or if he doesn’t like thathe likes it. It doesn’t do me any good either way. He nods. “Yeah. I’ll get out of your way.”

He picks up his laptop, and as he is about to press against the swinging door, he says, without looking back, “You have flour on your forehead now.”

Chapter 10

Buttered Up

Grady

I can’t getClaire out of my mind.

That’s been true ever since I got back. It’s been true ever since I moved away from Beacon Harbor. But it’s so much worse now. Going to her bakery to figure out her business was probably a mistake. Itwasa mistake. But I learned a lot. I learned that it’s a huge turn-on watching her work. I learned that she sways her hips and sings along to Motown music without even realizing it. I learned that my desire to be around Claire is strong. And that my desire to help her is even stronger. She needs my help. Based on what Jake has said and on the numbers I ran, as imperfect and round as they are, shereallyneeds it.

I’m a fixer. A grinder. This is what I do. I find a problem and I figure out a strategy and I make that problem go away.

But she’s made it clear that she seesmeas the problem. I have learned over the years in business—maybe the biggest lesson I’ve learned—is that you can know the spreadsheets and the logic and the strategy like the road home, but it won’t matter because humans are emotional creatures. If I press Claire, her resistance would just harden like weeks-old bread.

It’s in my nature to want to take control of anything I care about. Anything I want. I suppose that’s one of the reasons I’ve struggled so much with caring about Claire. I see how protective her brother is of her, but if I decide to make her mine, she will be all mine.

Jake wouldn’t like that.

Claire definitely wouldn’t like it…at first…

It won’t happen. It can’t. But I never expected her to be so resentful of me. I was doing her a favor by not kissing her that night in my car before graduation. God knows, I wanted to. Surely she knew that. But I was leaving. I would never have been able to give her the time and attention she deserves. Not then and not now. But I can still help her while I’m here. It may not be exactly what either of us wants, but it’s something.

However, I’ve had to let things cool down with Claire. For her sake and for mine and for the sake of my goal—to get her to want me to help her business. I’ve spent the past few days focusing on the reason I came back to Beacon Harbor in the first place—to help my family. I’ve been running errands for my mom. When I go running at five in the morning, I make sure to stay away from Main Street and the Sweeneys’ neighborhood. I re-grouted the tile in my parents’ bathroom. I’ve takenmy dad to his doctor’s appointments. I mowed the lawn with the riding mower that Damien isn’t allowed to drive. I went to the store to buy groceries, wearing a baseball cap and sunglasses in an attempt to stay incognito. I had my nutritionist come up with a menu that would satisfy both my dad’s palate and my mother’s concerns.

I’ve been doing all this while sleeping in my old room. My parents have kept it just as I left it. And it’s here, in the bed I slept in as a teenager, that I wake up from a dream about Claire. We were in her kitchen at the bakery. She was wearing an apron—and nothing else. I don’t want to leave this dream. But my dick is wide awake and demanding attention, and this family knocks on closed doors without waiting for an answer before opening them.

So I get up out of bed, awkwardly making my way to the bedroom door to lock it.

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