Billionaires Dollar Series

“He yells at me to cover the slack. So now I’m working two stations, and I’m not doing either particularly well. Orders keep coming in, and Chef’s losing it. The man couldn’t keep a cool head if it was snowing inside.”

“On deck,” Liam corrects.

“On deck,” I agree. “Anyway, then I manage to slide a boning knife through my hand.”

“Right here,” I say, lifting up one of my hands. “Between these two tendons. It went straight through and into the cutting board on the other side.”

Liam goes white underneath the tan of his skin, but the fingers gripping my hand are steady. The scar is faint and white-unremarkable now. “Fuck, Maddie.”

“I tell him that I’m sorry, Chef, but I really think I need to go to the hospital. It’s not just a minor cut.”

Liam’s fingers tighten around mine. “Don’t tell me he made you keep working.”

“Oh, of course he did. Told me I was being a pussy and to suck it up. We actually put glue on my hand and wrapped it in gauze from the first-aid kit.”

“The fucking bastard.”

“The fucking pirate,” I tease, wrapping my fingers around his. “I finished the shift like that, and when it came time to get my pay-yes, this might have been an under-the-table kind of thing-he only gave me half.”

“He what?”

“Considering I was only working one-handed, as he said.” I snort. “Like a real pirate.”Text property © Nôvel(D)ra/ma.Org.

Liam’s eyes are murderous. “Tell me you’re making that up.”

“My imagination is good, but it’s not that good.” I shrug. “I went to the hospital the next day. Turned out all I needed was disinfectant and more gauze-didn’t even need stitches. But they frowned at the whole superglue thing.”

“One wonders why,” Liam murmurs. “Christ, Maddie.”

“I never went back to that restaurant again. Didn’t even get a reference.”

His hands tighten around mine. “That’s not a common occurrence, is it?”

“Asshole chefs? Or slicing through your hand?”

“Both. Either.”

“Both are common,” I say. “That’s one of the reasons why I love my job at Marco’s. His kitchen runs like a smoothly oiled engine.”

Liam grimaces. “We were on the seas.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. I was getting into deep water there.”

“Much better,” he says. “My head was swimming with the mixed metaphors.”

My hands curl around his shoulders, pushing him back onto the bed. He falls against the linen with a smile. “I’m going to board you.”

His smile widens. “Are you now?”

“Yes.” I straddle him, his skin hot against mine. “Which means you have two choices. Fight or surrender, but either way, I’m going to plunder your bounty.”

“Wait a second.” He reaches up and fits one of his hands over my left eye, making me one-eyed. “There,” he says. “Now you’re more believable.”

“I should have a sword, too,” I say. “Perhaps a saber?”

Liam’s smile turns crooked, his hips bucking underneath mine. “I think I have the sword in this scenario.”

He pulls me down to kiss me, and I lose track of metaphors and stories and old scars, losing myself in him.

It’s a while until he speaks again, but when he does, it’s to murmur a statement. “My niece’s birthday party would be far more bearable if you came with me.”

“But then your brother would find out about this little charade.”

“At the moment,” Liam says, hands gripping my hips, “that doesn’t seem like such a bad thing.”

I run my nails down his chest. “I can’t, in any case.”

“Do you have a hot date?”

“Yes,” I say, just to see his expression, the rising eyebrows and darkening gaze.

“Maddie…”

“A hot date with the food shelter on Forty-eighth.”

He groans. “No.”

“Can you stop being so good? If I had a conscience, it would be smarting right now.”

I shriek when he flips us over, settling between my legs and bending his head to my nipple. My fingers slide through his hair. “Good thing you don’t, then.”

His laughter is rough, and then we stop talking altogether, both of us lost in an ocean of sensation.

My brother’s house in Greenwood Hills, with its neatly trimmed hedge and high wrought-iron fence, usually only conveys one thing. Domesticity.

Today, the pink balloons tied to the gate tell a different story.

Evie’s turning four, and judging by the cars parked all along the street, my brother has gone all in.

My phone vibrates in my hand with a text.

Madison: What did you settle on?

Liam: I got her a really large stuffed unicorn.

Madison: Define really large.

Liam: Currently-occupying-my-entire-backseat-large.