Dirty Sexy Alphas (Twenty Book Box Set) - Hannah Ford Page 0,386

take it. Then he needed a fake fiancé and had tacked on more zeroes. I didn’t want that either.

Somewhere along the last few days I realized that I just wanted him. And I thought that was happening. Tears blurred my eyes. The ache in my chest spread. It was obviously one sided and not real.

And yet I couldn't bring myself to keep his money. Before I could talk myself out of it, I ripped the check in half and then in half again. I didn’t stop until a pile of confetti sat on the bed next to me.

Then I sank down and wrapped my arms around a pillow and cried for everything that I thought I found but had really lost.

Chapter 4

“So a few of us are going out Friday night. Want to come along? You’ll get to see a wilder side of Miami I promise. Maybe even meet someone.” Lindsay gave me a wink and took a sip of her drink.

We sat outside a small cafe a few blocks from our office building in Brickell and I was halfway through my Caprese salad. Beautiful people were everywhere, blurs of color and perfume and laughter. It had taken me a few days to get used to being around so much golden skin. People down here weren’t afraid to show it if they had it, and boy did they have it.

I glanced down at the turquoise scoop neck top and short flowery skirt I had on. Loud colors were the norm and I’d adjusted my wardrobe to fit in, thanks in part to a very generous signing bonus that had been waiting for me when I arrived.

I’d been at Sinclair Business Solutions for almost three weeks and had to admit that things were starting to finally fall into place, even though it still felt a bit surreal. The job had come with a trendy one bedroom in a hip new downtown development and more money than anyone starting out should get. I was a Junior Associate in the business development division, a job that would have taken me years to work my way up to.

I knew it was all Madden’s doing and I really wished that I could snub my nose up at it and walk away. But it was exactly what I’d dreamed of doing since I declared my major years ago. I couldn't’ bring myself to thank him, even in the deepest corner of my mind because thinking about him still made my stomach twist into knots. His actions and his words were at constant opposites.

He’d been all over the news the past few weeks. When the story broke of exactly how he became an East Coast real estate tycoon by using ties to a known mob boss to get into UCLA, people went nuts. Even TMZ ran a story on how the golden boy had fallen.

No one had mentioned any of the violence he’d been involved with in his past, and it looked like the focus was on whether or not Paulie S had bribed the university’s Dean to overlook the fact that Madden Cross did not really exist prior to his admission.

Everyone wanted to know if the rumors were true, but no one could find Madden.

Despite all the media coverage, Madden seemed to have disappeared. No one had seen him for weeks. I saw Jenna on the news a few times hurrying into the Cross building yelling no comment over her shoulder. There was speculation about where he could be, anywhere from hiding away in Switzerland to resting on the bottom of the Hudson River because of his exposed mafia ties. I just hoped he was okay. No one deserved to be torn apart by the vulturous media like that.

And despite everything, I still dreamed of him often.

I would awake, breathless and sweating, heart pounding—and missing him terribly. It was worse than hunger pains. The missing was like the deepest part of my soul had been ripped away.

“So what do you say, Sky? Dancing and hot men Friday night?” Lindsay broke me out of my reverie, lifted her arms over her head and did a little torso shimmy that drew several appreciative stares from the tables around us.

I looked at Lindsay. Like she needed any help in the man department. She was one of the beautiful people I was surrounded by. She had legs that went on for days, which she showed off in the shortest skirts allowed at the company, and her dark brown hair hung