Wild Open Hearts (Bluewater Billionaires) - Kathryn Nolan Page 0,7

went through a similar situation with Flawless.”

Daisy and Cameron both pinned me with a gaze that indicated their agreement.

I shifted, uneasy. My phone started buzzing away on the concrete—Jasmine calling.

“Take it,” Cameron said. “We’ll drink until you get back.”

“Plus we have to figure out what we’re going to do about the Wealthy Widows at our next HOA meeting,” Emily sighed, drumming her fingers on the concrete. In a bout of real madness, after we’d built Bluewater, all four of us also took on the responsibility of running neighborhood meetings every month that tended to drag on until midnight. They were made better with pre-gaming—although Daisy and Cameron had started publicly drinking from flasks as Emily and I tried to keep our neighbors in order.

“What’d they do this time?” The Widows occupied most of our condos and were known for their penchant for mischief and mayhem.

“We’ll tell you when you get back,” Cameron said. “But it involves rollerblades and Bellinis.”

I smiled, grateful for the brief reprieve of normalcy. “I want all of the details.” I picked up my phone with trembling fingers. “I love you guys,” I said, voice catching through the forced lightness. I kissed each one of them on the top of their heads before padding by and into my house.

“Moon,” Daisy said, “just remember. Whatever they say about you, it isn’t real, okay? We know who the real Luna da Rosa is.”

They were my best friends, the women I trusted the most on this big, beautiful planet. They really did know who I truly was.

But did I?

5

Luna

The next morning dawned golden and sunny outside my office—tendrils of Miami sun stroked through the windows and bathed Jasmine and Sylvia in a peach-hued light. I had a mug of green tea and was sitting cross-legged on my turquoise couch, pen in one hand and yellow legal pad balanced on my knee.

I’d struggled through my yoga practice that morning—found neither peace in my meditation nor wisdom curled in the flowering vines.

The corn-chip-and-organic-vodka hangover hadn’t helped either.

And all of this was worsened by the nonstop hatred spilling across my phone, my laptop, the television. Nasty comments on my social media accounts. An article with my picture in the middle: When Billionaires Lie.

Instead of cheerful optimism, I’d moved through my sun salutations and felt twitchy. Weird. Jumpy in the center of my stomach, like I was about to go over the apex of a rollercoaster. But not thrilling jumpy.

It was nerves.

Or maybe something else.

“Let’s do this,” I said brightly, clapping my hands together. “I’m ready to fix this mistake and move on, stronger than ever.”

Jasmine nodded, seemingly energized by a public relations situation she had described as “nuclear.”

Sylvia, meanwhile, wore an expression I couldn’t even begin to decode.

“I’ve got a two-pronged idea I think you’re going to love,” Jasmine said, tapping the TIME Magazine cover in my office. Luna da Rosa Believes Makeup Can Change the World. It was soothing, grounding. A shiny talisman that grabbed me by the heart and declared remember who you are.

My phone buzzed. Another article.

I stashed my phone away—attempted to focus on Jasmine. She’d been the director of Wild Heart’s public relations for the past four years, and I still struggled to get a true read on her.

“Activist. Vegan. Champion for corporate change,” Jasmine was saying. “This is your brand.”

“It’s also who I am,” I said.

Jasmine shrugged. “Sure, you can say that. But it’s your brand first.”

I sipped my tea. Felt twitchy again.

“The first prong is apologizing. I’ve seen this happen to leaders in your position before—leaders who are both CEO and spokesperson. People buy Wild Heart products because of you, Luna. They trust you. They want to be your friend. They believe if you met in real life you’d actually be their friend.”

“I would, actually,” I said.

Jasmine repeated: “Sure, you can say that.”

“Luna.” A knock at the door—Rebecca, my CFO, with a look on her face I recognized from the early days of running this company.

“What happened?” I asked.

“Stock prices for Wild Heart plummeted overnight after the news broke. We need to talk.”

“Put a meeting on my calendar.” How on earth had I gotten here? You’re going to lose it. The billionaire devil on my shoulder was the voice of every insecurity—now coming painfully true. I hadn’t expected it to develop, hadn’t expected a meteoric rise to fame and insanely lucrative success with Wild Heart to make me experience so much fear. Cameron, Emily and Daisy felt it too—this overwhelming fright that we’d wake one morning and