Billy & The Beast (Ever After, New York #3) - Eli Easton Page 0,78
up all kinds of Mission: Impossible–type ways he could be taken out, even in the board room. But I wasn’t going to hang that fear on him. I forced a smile. “I’m glad you’ll have a police escort. What about Emmanuel?”
“He’s in the hospital. He’ll survive, but he has a lot to answer for.”
“Oh.”
Selfishly, I wished Emmanuel was dead. On the phone last night, Aaron told me how Emmanuel had shown up at Malfleur with the intention of killing Aaron with his own gun. And then there was the way he’d tried to turn Aaron against me. So I really didn’t have a shred of sympathy for the guy. But, given how terrible Aaron had felt thinking he’d killed two people with his car, it was just as well he didn’t have Emmanuel’s death on his conscience.
Then something occurred to me. “But if you go into the company to attend the board meeting, that will get out to the papers, right? There might even be photos.”
“Oh, I’m sure there will be,” he said easily.
“And you don’t care?”
He snuggled back on the bed and pulled me close, guiding my head to rest on his chest. “I’m done hiding. People will gossip. It doesn’t matter.”
That was good, right? That he was feeling confident enough to say that? Only, a chill went through me. I pulled away and laid on my back, looking up at the ceiling.
Sebastian Aaron Montgomery IV was ready to reenter the world. His old world. His old, glamorous world where he had supermodels at his beck and call. Maybe not all of them would go for the new look Aaron was sporting. But he was still rich.
“So . . . you’ll start seeing your old friends again, huh?” I said carefully.
“Maybe a few. And you know what I’ll say to them?”
“What?”
“I’ll say, ‘The funniest thing happened. There I was, secluded at Malfleur, seeing no one. And this guy started riding his bike to the top of my hill every day. And then I got to know him. And then I fell crazy in love.’”
A gush of joy warmed my heart. “You’ll say that?”
“Yup. They’ll be jealous, of course. And they’ll say, ‘Ooh, he’s hot, can I have a taste?’ And I’ll say, ‘Nope. Unlike you lot, Billy is loyal and true. He won’t be impressed by a pretty face and oodles of cash.’” He frowned. “You won’t, will you?”
I turned on my side and snuggled into him. “Absolutely not. But maybe we should both get that in writing? You know a lawyer, right?”
He chuckled. “Oh, ye of little faith. Wait and see, twerp. Wait and see.”
Epilogue
One year later
Billy
“Seb!”
“Seb, can I get a smile?”
“Billy! Look over here!”
It was still weird to me that people knew my name and wanted my photograph. Like, why?
Okay, I guess the why was obvious. I was Seb Montgomery’s boyfriend.
Last year, when Aaron stepped back into the public eye, there’d been a furry of interest in him. His photo—mask, gloves, and all—had appeared in every tabloid in the US and even on entertainment segments on channels like CNN.
SEB MONTGOMERY BACK FROM THE DEAD.
FORTUNE 500 HEIR SURVIVES NEAR-FATAL CRASH.
THE SCARRED PLAYBOY–SEB MONTGOMERY RETURNS
And my personal favorite: BENEDICT CANYON AND THE BEAST.
And then the whole Shar McGill scandal broke, the truth came out, and Emmanuel was indicted for conspiracy to commit murder. Seb was really, really hot for a few months. He had to hire a press agent to handle it all.
We spent all fall and winter at Malfleur, where the press could be avoided, and where I could be close to my mom and attend classes. Aaron only left to take a commuter flight into Manhattan two days a week, to try to untangle the mess at Montgomery Enterprises. Most other days he worked from home. He was tied up for long hours, at least six days a week. I pretty much moved into Malfleur to help out with Jack—and because we wanted to be together any spare moment he wasn’t working.
When Aaron had burst into the board meeting that day last September and told them about Emmanuel and Shar McGill, the board voted unanimously to terminate the deal. Aaron said he got the feeling a few of the board members weren’t exactly shocked. None of them were happy to give up the bounty the deal would have netted, but faced with things like the murder of their CEO and an FBI investigation, there really wasn’t a lot of choice.