Crazy for Loving You A Bluewater Billionaires Romantic Comedy - Pippa Grant Page 0,72
because I don’t believe for a minute that she doesn’t work hard.
Imogen Carter has disinherited too many people to play favorites for a hard-partying granddaughter who doesn’t actually do anything at the office.
She grins behind her sandwich. “Fine. I like my job. It’s fun, it’s different every day, and I get to meet people all over the world and travel to fabulous places. When I first started, I’d make deals because I was in all these meetings with men who never realized how easy it was to manipulate them with my clothing and a well-timed lipstick application.”
A red haze creeps into my vision.
She pats my fist, which is clenching the knife so tight I could probably melt the metal. “Cool your jets, Super West. I got bored with that after a year or two and started using genuine business tactics, much to my grandmother’s horror, because it slowed down the speed of acquisitions for a while. I do have a college degree in psychology. I know a few tricks other than pulling my blouse down and crossing my legs.”
Christ, now I’m picturing her giving out blow jobs for business deals. “Not helping.”
“Your sisters must love-hate you.”
A week ago, this conversation would’ve ended with me demanding to know if she took anything seriously.
Pretty sure we’ve covered that though, and I don’t have a single doubt that she takes Remy seriously as a heart attack. And that she’d do anything for him, and not just because she has the money to afford the world, but because she loves him. He’s sleeping happily in a baby swing by the arched windows overlooking the gently-lit courtyard, completely oblivious to how freaked out she was just an hour ago.
“Tell you a secret?” she says softly.
I tap my right ear. “Tell this one. I won’t hear it.”
That smile. Fuck.
Yeah! Ooh-rah! Commence with the fucking! my balls cheer.
Swear to god, I’m not related to them.
“Whenever someone in my family turns twenty-one, The Dame gives us a million dollars. Do something good with it, she gives you a job. Fuck—fork it up, and she disinherits you.”
“That’s insane.”
“It’s also why she’s basically disinherited eighty percent of her descendants. My cousin William tripled his million at the slots in Vegas, and she shut him down hard. Gambling isn’t the way to ensure the family business survives the next generation.”
“What’d you do?”
She clearly survived.
And if the way she’s shifting on her seat is any indication, she doesn’t actually want to talk about it. “I spent a quarter of it on initiation fees to the Sandbar Club, and—”
“I’m sorry, what?”
She smiles, and it’s full of mischief. “It’s an exclusive club for Miami’s richest businessmen.”
“Business…men?”
“Formerly all men, yes. I spent a week playing spy on some of its rumored members, dropping hints in various places that Carter International Properties was expanding into hotels, but looking for partners in the venture, and then I applied for the club. I might’ve also gotten chummy with the membership chairman’s wife, who didn’t know he was sleeping with his secretary, but he knew I knew, so…”
“You cheated your way into an exclusive club of assholes.”
“Basically. Yes. And then I convinced ten members to give me a million dollars each as buy-in for the Mermaid Grand Resort.”
“I know that name.”
“All-inclusive resorts in the Caribbean.”
“Ah. Allie. My sister. She went to one for her ten-year anniversary.”
“I’ll have to thank her for her patronage.” She winks at me. “It didn’t exist when I was twenty-one. But I marched into The Dame’s office and dropped ten checks on her desk, told her I was buying oceanfront property in the Dominican Republic to open an all-inclusive resort, and she was either with me, or she was against me. Now, we have sixteen properties, and we’re expanding to add four more in the next year. I passed The Dame’s test. And every year, she buys out one more of the original investors, because they’re idiots who thought that handing a twenty-one-year-old party girl a check for a million bucks was a good idea.”
“Why not open it yourself? You did all the work.”
She rolls her eyes. “Every last one of those men would’ve sued me to get their money back the minute they found out I was in charge. I don’t make money. My grandmother’s name makes money.”
“Alessandro says you make your grandmother’s money.”
“He’s biased. Without the Carter family name behind me…” She trails off with a shrug.
Like she honestly thinks she couldn’t do it on her own.