EXES - A Second Chance Billionaire Romance Novel Read online

  On cue, Jacques’ nasal voice echoed through the rafters. “Is everything alright up there, mon chéri?”

  Alma locked eyes with Harvey. “Plus, I’ll claim sanctuary and Jacques will turn it into a media spectacle. You’ll get more bad press than it’s worth.”

  “It might be worth it,” he answered, noting the way she winced at the sound of Jacques’ use of her pet name. “If it means I get to tie you up.”

  He said it partly in jest and partly because her spitfire and stubbornness still turned him on. Mulling over the way her glasses made her look so much more prudish than he knew she was in bed, he reached out and removed them from her face and cleaned the dust from their thin lenses against the fabric of his shirt.

  “If I’m right, Harvey,” she replied, peering up at him with shiny, earnest eyes, “and that window is what I think it is, it could be worth tens of millions of dollars. One single window.”

  “I offered you a lot more than that when we separated, and you refused it.” He studied her face—the same schoolgirl idealism and glossy pink lips. He hadn’t seen her in over a year and she had barely aged.

  “I never cared about your money and you know it.”

  “Yes. You made that very clear when you divorced me,” he added, brushing the cobweb out of her bangs.

  “Twenty-four hours, Harvey,” she offered, as if she was the one in charge of the negotiation. “That’s all I’m asking for. Otherwise...” her voice trailed off with uncertainty.

  “Otherwise what?” He encouraged her with a smirk. It was hard to take any threat from her seriously.

  “Otherwise…” The words lingered on the tip of her tongue. “I’ll never forgive you,” she finally whispered.

  She held out her hand for the return of her glasses. He didn’t comply. She had never cared about his money and he never cared about making it while he was with her—until he did. And when that day had come, he knew it would be what ultimately drove them apart.

  “Uck-hem.”

  They shifted their attention to the sound of someone clearing his throat, announcing his entrance. Harvey expected to see Jacques and fought the sudden reflex to punch his lights out for interrupting the one private moment of intimacy with his ex-wife that he had been granted in over a year. But instead, his anger retreated when he turned and saw Alma’s father. How long had he been standing there? Harvey didn’t know. But at least his former father-in-law had enough decency and respect not to interfere in personal matters that were not his own.

  “You drive a tough bargain, Miss Castillo,” Harvey said, stressing her maiden name in acknowledgment that times were different and the past couldn’t be repeated or changed—and neither could the heartbreak.

  He placed her glasses back on her face, taking a moment to remember the way she looked without them, in case he never saw her again. In that moment, impulse and nostalgia had taken over his cold, rational mercenary mind. But he knew he had it in him to go back on his word, especially once he arrived home and called his real estate lawyer to relay the details of their agreement—and its domino chain of adverse implications for him.

  “I’ll give you one day,” he announced, backing away and asserting his all-business persona through the edge in his tone. “One day to entertain your little treasure hunt. But after that, be prepared to call the police, Enrique. Because at the very least, I intend to make good on one Machiavellian scheme—and that’s tying up your daughter.”

  Chapter Six

  Alma repressed her urge to vomit.

  She didn’t know which gut-wrenching emotion to feel first—unfathomable elation that she might have just discovered over a dozen new stained-glass windows designed by Louis Comfort Tiffany, or that she found it on the property of her capitalist pig ex-husband who had promised nothing more than its destruction unless she could prove their monetary worth to him—and prove it within twenty-four hours.

  He hadn’t always been a capitalist pig, she thought. That was part of the problem. There was a time, long ago, when they were college students and young lovers—both sharing the same goals and dreams. He’d always wanted to buy properties and renovate them. She had always wanted to preserve their historic treasures. But years passed and ambitions changed, and so had the mutual love and admiration that had once bonded them. Now, ironically, when she saw him again, she only recognized the thin veneer of the man she once knew, and not even that fragile connection seemed worthy of preserving.

  “That was quite a speech about the Eternal Love.”

  Alma looked up at her father like she was a teenager who had just been caught sneaking back into the house. Their drive back to the antique shop had been a silent one. Now, he eyed her as she rushed to gather up her belongings and head out the door.

  “I didn’t realize you were there, spying on us.”

  “Spying is a strong word,” her father answered, circling behind the shop’s counter. Sitting on his favorite wooden stool, he kicked off his shoes and stretched out his legs, as if the drama of the day was too much for arthritic ankles and knees. “And I didn’t announce myself because I didn’t what to interrupt whatever you two needed to say to each other.”

  “Nothing,” Alma countered, feeling the weight of the lie on her tongue. “The only thing that needed to be said was whatever it would take to get him to agree not to destroy the building.”

  “But Alma,” her father said, lowering his chin and peering over his spectacles at her with censure. “You and I both know that stained-glass window in the balcony is not a lost treasure.”

  Alma shrugged. It was true. She had bluffed. It was a remarkable stained-glass window that definitely had all the hallmarks of an early masterpiece. If not a Tiffany, then perhaps one of his collaborators like de Forest or even maybe one of his chief competitors, like John La Farge. But without closer examination in the proper light, she couldn’t be sure of anything. And without some sort of understanding of what that building was and why it had even been built there in the first place, there wasn’t any reason to believe it was Tiffany’s Eternal Love.

  The real truth: she had needed some way to stall Monsieur Asshole, and tricking him into believing he had a priceless artistic masterpiece on the property he intended to destroy was the only way to buy herself some time. Obviously, her ex-husband had forgotten how many times he’d forced her to play poker when they first had started dating in college, and how well he’d taught her how to bluff him out of his royal flush with only her pair of eights.

  But there was always one person in the world she couldn’t fool and that person was her father.

  “He trusts you, Alma,” her father continued. “You shouldn’t betray that trust.”

  “He’s a heartless greedy billionaire who’s willing to destroy priceless art for monetary gain,” she flung back, completely annoyed that her father was hinting at her own dishonesty without acknowledging the fact that Harvey Zale had become the epitome of moral corruption. “Why are you taking his side, Papi?”

  “Because he was my son-in-law before he was a billionaire, and he treated you well for as long as you would let him.”

  “So you’re still angry at me for divorcing him?”

  “No,” her father replied. “Not angry, but concerned.”

  “About what? The fact that you might lose him as your weekly baseball game buddy?”

  “Alma,” Enrique replied, spreading out his hands like he had nothing to hide. “My friendship with Harvey is not on trial here.”

  “Well, neither should my actions to stop him from destroying a collection of beautiful stained-glass windows just to make one more billionaire buck.”

  “It is true that it would be more than a shame to lose those windows,” her father agreed. “But it is Harvey’s property and so he has the right to do whatever he wants with them, and right now, he has agreed to delay their destruction by granting you an opportunity to inspect them tomorrow. What more can you ask from him, mi amor?”

  Alma fell silent
. She knew the answer, but she didn’t want to confess it. She wanted the old Harvey—the Harvey who would have relished the idea of joining her in the quest to discover rare pieces of art hidden inside a forgotten, abandoned building and who would have seized the opportunity to rescue them at all costs. But that Harvey was a myth now; almost as fictional as the myth of the Eternal Love. She hadn’t seen or recognized that Harvey in so long that it almost made her feel as though he’d never existed and her entire marriage had been nothing more than a sham.

  “Harvey is not a bad man,” her father quietly offered. “I think you are too hard on him sometimes.”

  “Maybe you’re being too easy on him,” she shot back. “Don’t you see how much he’s changed?”

  Her father absorbed her question with pensive silence. “The only thing I know, Alma, is that when you were married to Harvey, you were happy—until you weren’t. And now, you are worse than unhappy. You are lost.”

  Alma gazed at her father, feeling a frown settle upon her face. Everything he said was true, but that didn’t mean she had to acknowledge it. Instead, she lifted her backpack and turned on her heel without another word.

  “I assume you are done for the day?” he asked, noting the time on the wall clock.

  The bell chimed above her head as she threw open the front door and stopped in its threshold. “Yes, it’s getting late and I have a date tonight. I’ve moved on from my ex-husband. It would be nice if you could do the same.”

  * * * *

  She had a date tonight. The words rang in her head, partly because it was a bold-faced lie and partly because she wanted to believe it to be true.

  It wasn’t exactly a date, but it wasn’t an innocent platonic relationship either. So what exactly was it then?

  She didn’t know…exactly. And she wasn’t sure she was willing to find out. Despite the fact she had caught herself attaching more significance to her texting “encounters” with a total stranger than she likely should, she wasn’t confident that she was willing to accept his mysterious invitation to take their “relationship” to another level—a personal level. What had started as a teasing midnight exchange with subtle sexual undertones had developed into an addictive flirtatious sexting affair. But by asking her to propose a place where he could delivery something “special” to her, he had breached the fantasy of their purely digital connection and slipped himself into the reality of her everyday life.

  And now, if she chose to follow his instructions, it could mean the difference between pursuing their connection in a more meaningful way rather than simply keeping it an entertaining sexual diversion of cat and mouse. As she hurried along the winding riverfront sidewalks of Wacker Drive toward the Cultural Center, she actually wondered if that’s all it was to her—an unhealthy form of escapism—and if so, what it was exactly that she was seeking to escape?

  She glanced down at her phone. Five minutes to six o’clock. She paused to catch her breath outside the Cultural Center’s arched bronze-framed doors of the Washington Street entrance. She knew every security guard there and she knew she would be allowed to stay inside the building past its closing. She simply had to make the choice to enter. What would she find there—or not find there? The endless possibilities swam through her head, but her fear filled her chest with anxiety. What if she had put too much stock in her schoolgirl sexting infatuation with a perfect stranger, and he failed her—or her expectations of him? What if tonight affirmed nothing more than the cold, hard truth: the illusion of pretending to be someone else was easier than accepting the reality of who she really was, and the fact that she was in an insecure, fragile emotional place in her life.

  “Good evening, Miss Castillo,” the security guard said, pulling open the door as a courtesy and encouraging her through it. “You’re right on time with five minutes to spare.”

  Alma hesitated before forcing herself to pass into the building’s vaulted lobby, its walls of Carrara marble inlaid with sparkling green and cerulean mosaic glass tiles.

  “Good evening, Reggie.” She nodded with a smile. She knew he had just started working there three weeks earlier, fresh out of high school, but his silver security badge and formal navy blue uniform made him look older than she would guess.

  “You meeting someone here this evening?” he asked, allowing the door to shut behind them. His question halted her as she started to climb the grand staircase.

  “Maybe?” she replied. “Has anyone stopped by and asked you for directions today? Directions to the Tiffany ballroom?”

  “Oh, you know how it is,” Reggie answered. “Lots and lots of folks. All tourists.” He returned to his swivel chair and reclined into it with a heavy sigh. “And a man…” he finally added.

  “A man?” Alma repeated, slowly losing her confidence and backing down the staircase.

  “Yes, ma’am,” Reggie confirmed. “A man. Came by about five minutes ago. He told me he was heading up to the ballroom to meet his next wife.”

  Alma glanced upwards without a reply, as if the echo of her voice against the hallway’s white marble vaulted ceiling would announce her to whoever might be waiting for her beyond the grand staircase.

  “Did he look normal…or crazy?” she whispered to Reggie.

  “Ah, shoot…don’t know about crazy, ma’am,” Reggie answered, as if he was pondering the possibility. “But he was tall with a big smile like a movie star. And he had a package in his hand. Something done up real pretty with a white bow.”

  Like a movie star? Alma clung to the thought. That couldn’t be a bad thing, right?

  But just because he was potentially attractive didn’t mean he still couldn’t be a psychopath. In fact, all signs pointed to it. He was, after all, sexting with her—and she was acting like a phony femme fatal. But why did something so wrong feel so right?

  She quickly removed her glasses and withdrew the rubber band around her ponytail. Just in case he was still up there. But there was nothing she could do about her overalls except brush the dust off their worn fabric. It was definitely wrong to expect him to look like a Hollywood star while she looked like Dora the Explorer.

  After a moment of hesitation, she forced herself to ascend to the top of the landing and into the center of the Tiffany ballroom—one of her favorite places in the city. The soft illumination pouring through the grand ceiling dome fashioned with Tiffany’s signature Favrile glass seduced her deeper into the oval ballroom. Like a scene from a movie, she almost expected a tall, handsome man to be waiting for her. With a rose in his hand, he would flash her a warm smile, letting her know she had made the right choice. But to her disappointment, no one greeted her except the dull drone of Michigan Avenue traffic seeping through the sweeping two-story windows overlooking Millennium Park.

  In the corner of sills of the eastern windows…her own instructions to him percolated in her mind. Drawing forward, she replaced her glasses and scanned the sills, immediately spotting what she had missed all along—a powder blue gift box with a conspicuous white bow.

  Alma took a deep breath. It was not difficult to recognize the significance of the jewelry box—Tiffany & Co. Her mysterious suitor seemed to be making an effort to connect the location that she proposed—the Tiffany ballroom—with something that he thought she would enjoy, and it unnerved her until she undid the bow, removed the lid, and waded beneath the waves of white tissue paper.

  The distracting flare of prismatic light reflected off the lens of Alma’s glasses and she quickly closed the lid of the jewelry box. No, that wasn’t what she thought it was…it couldn’t have been.

  Suddenly, her phone vibrated within her backpack. She dug through it and retrieved her phone.

  Did you get it? His text pinged with expectation.

  Her palms started to sweat as she peeled back the folds of the tissue paper again and withdrew the opulent triple-strand diamond choker necklace with a stunning five-carat emerald pendant as its centerpiece.

  Clearly, he was exactly what he said h
e was—a man of wealth and importance—and he intended to prove it.

  Yes. It was the only thing she could manage to text back. Her hands were shaking.

  After a long pause, he texted her back. But you don’t like it…

  There was nothing at all that she didn’t like about it. It was both stunning and completely baffling.

  I’m trying to figure out how you got it, she replied. It’s the kind of thing that only comes up at auction once every few years.

  Every decade, he corrected her. Glad to see you appreciate fine jewelry. You’re a smart girl.

  SMART ENOUGH TO KNOW IT COSTS OVER A MILLION DOLLARS, she wanted to scream back, but she contained herself. It was a one-of-a-kind vintage Tiffany piece, and simply by the cut, carat size, and quality of the emerald, she knew it was a rare nineteenth-century gemstone, likely one of the original treasures that Charles Lewis Tiffany, Louis Comfort’s father, brought back from his trips to Europe and Russia where he had become the imperial jeweler to royal families. It was the most beautiful piece of jewelry she had ever held in her hands, and the last thing she wanted to convey was that she wasn’t grateful—even if he was a psychopathic mafia criminal.

  Okay…you caught me, he shot back after enduring her silence. It was a purchase that I made over a year ago. But circumstances changed, and well… There was a pause, like he was holding back something before suddenly reversing his decision. Let’s just say…I’ve felt the void of not having the right woman in my life who would appreciate receiving it from me—until now.

  Alma stared down at the choker’s magnificent glints of fire and ice that caught every angle of light within the ballroom. The weight of its authenticity and the significance of his confession made her realize she was no longer playing a flirtatious game of sexting. What had been a relationship born exclusively within the realm of fantasy had just shifted into something deeper from which there was no longer an easy escape.