DATES I LOVE TO HATE

Chapter 1

Belle

The chat app made that noise I hated, the slightly sharp tone that said, Greg Svensson is summoning you.

I deleted the message without bothering to read it.

If I wasn’t using an official company laptop, I would just delete the app altogether.

I didn’t look through the glass wall that separated us. I knew what he was doing: sitting at his desk, back in the correct alignment as dictated by that brochure from the ergonomics “expert” Svensson Investment had hired to tell us all we sucked at sitting.

Greg was going to reach for his pen, one of those pretentiously expensive fountain pens all the cool billionaires used, the one with the screw-on lid that made a horrendous noise.

There it went—that grating, squeaking, screeching noise as he unscrewed the cap from the first of a row of neatly laid-out pens.

God, I hated that sound almost as much as I hated him.

Could I play music to cover the noise?

Yes, but then he would know how much it annoyed me. I didn’t want him to know that. Greg already had too much power over me. I wasn’t giving him an ounce more.

It was a tortured game we played, suitable for underlings and assistants, not two people at the top of the finance world.

Well, I used to be, anyway.

The anger burned in my stomach as I relived the shock I’d felt when I found out he’d played me.

Yeah, part of it was my fault. I shouldn’t have shorted that stock. But how was I to know Greg would purchase Bram DeHaan’s company and drive the stock price up, thereby tanking Artemis Investment?

I should have known, though—should have known he’d never let go of the other deals I’d won, the other clients I’d stolen from him, or the fact that I had walked away from him.

I forced myself not to reach in my desk for the stash of chocolate I had hidden there, needing something to take the edge off the shame.

I knew that he knew my tells, knew that he knew that I knew. I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.

I could picture it—his stupid, smug, handsome expression, that same triumphant smile from when he’d walked into the Artemis Investment office and offered me a deal to save face, to keep from having to file for bankruptcy and let down my investors.

The only catch? This glass cage.

Maybe I should have just let the investors sue me for fraud.

I could have ended up in jail, though. This was better than jail, right?

At least in jail, I wouldn’t have to listen to that stupid squeaking noise.

How many times a day did he have to clean those fucking pens?

Eeek-eek-eek!

The noise clawed at my eyes as he unscrewed another one.

I stood up, smoothing down my jet-black skirt suit, and slipped my feet back into the four-inch-high stilettos. Comfortable? No, not at all. I would rather be in tennis shoes and a sweatshirt. But Greg always dressed in an impeccable suit, his blond hair parted neatly to the left, and I wasn’t going to let him have the upper hand in the clothing department, so feet torture it was.

The message app dinged again.

I ignored it and strode out into the wide hallway and seating area in front of the executive offices.

Greg could have moved me into the office on the left side of his, the one that didn’t have a transparent dividing wall, which would have meant I wouldn’t have to walk right past him whenever I wanted to escape the glass cage.

He had a triumphant look on his face when he noticed me leave my office.

As if.

I kept on walking.

I knew he wouldn’t run after me. That would mean he’d have to admit he’d lost this round.

The executive break room wasn’t some smelly closet with a Campbell’s-soup-encrusted microwave. Rather, it was one more obnoxious display of the financial wealth of Svensson Investment. It looked out over the tiered lower floors filled with rows of investors, all in suits. They sat in front of a billion-dollar view of the Manhattan skyline framed by the three-story glass window—a crown jewel of an office in a crown jewel of a tower.

Before I had fucked up—no, not shorting the stock and losing my business but before that, when I’d met Greg Svensson and let him into my heart—I had dreamed of owning my own tower. Finally, everyone would know that I was someone, too, someone important.

Angry all over again, I mashed the button on the fancy espresso machine. Too bad it didn’t dispense tequila shots.

The machine whirred.

I crossed my arms.

The acquisition contract said I had to stay at Svensson Investment for three years before I could take a job at another investment firm or start my own. If I left before then, I forfeited all my stock options and walked away with nothing. Also, Greg could and would sue me. So there was that.

Three years.

It felt like a life sentence. I checked the timer I had set on my phone.

Two years, eleven months, and fifteen days to go.

Yeah, I was not going to make it.

I drank the espresso in two sips, set the cup in the sink, then headed back to my glass prison.

Greg was waiting for me in the sitting area in front of our offices.

I tried to step around him.

He moved in front of me. “You have been ignoring my messages.”

This moment here? This was why I tortured my feet.

I hated being six feet tall, hated being the weird, large, awkward girl in school, hated the comments from randos on the street asking if I played volleyball, hated the men whose eyes slid right past me to land on the petite cutie who was five feet, zero inches tall, tee-hee!

But now? Now I was glad to be tall.

Even with his six-foot-five height, Greg and I were practically eye to eye.

My blue eyes met his gray ones.

His jaw twitched.

Greg liked to do this thing where he tilted his head up oh so slightly so he could look down on you like a Greek god about to smite the mortal who had dared breathe on his “special” patch of grass.

But if he tried that now, to look down on me when we were eye to eye, he would have to crane his neck back and look like he was having a stroke.

“You didn’t write me a message.” My eyes didn’t leave his.

“Yes I did. Exactly seventeen minutes ago.”

He wanted me to look when he held up his hand and tugged lightly at his starched white cuff to reveal a watch that cost more than most people’s houses.

I already had his large hands memorized—already knew how it felt to lace our fingers together, how it felt to have those hands all over my body. I didn’t need to see them again.

“If you will step into my office, I will show you,” he added.

I didn’t budge.

“Hm …” I tapped my mouth, noticing how his eyes stayed glued to mine. A normal person, even if they weren’t interested in me, would have instinctively followed the motion. But Greg didn’t.

Another tell.

“Actually, yes, I seem to recall a message. It just said you wanted to see me. Didn’t say when or about what. Thought maybe the printer was jammed. Then I didn’t hear from you and assumed you had figured it out.”

A very slight flash of teeth from Greg. “I sent you a follow-up message.”

“I’ve been out of the office. Coffee break. But how can I help you?”

“You’re in my parking space.”

Ah, yes. The parking-space war. I had wondered how long he’d be able to resist that particular battle cry.

“Per the acquisition contract, I’m allowed to park in one of the executive spaces,” I reminded him.

“Yes, one of the spaces, not my space.”

“It’s not your space.”

“In fact, it is.” More teeth this time.

“I asked the office managers, and there are no officially assigned parking spots as long as you are in your zone.”

I paid an ungodly amount of money to own a car in Manhattan. But it was worth it just for this. I had parked in Greg’s space the last two days—woken up early to do it, too—and I had been rewarded.

“It is my spot,” he said, his deep voice echoing off the glass walls of the corporate prison. “The office managers have been informed, and the documentation will be updated.”

After a moment, I said, “You know, you could have just told me all of this in an email. I don’t think an in-person meeting was necessary.”

I stepped around him, the glee of knowing he would follow me making me forget I was in four-inch foot-torture devices.

“You know I don’t put any information in writing,” he chided, striding into my office. “So when I message you to tell me that you need to see me, assume that it’s important and come to my office. I shouldn’t have to chase you down. You shouldn’t need to be reminded that communication with me is part of your job description.”

I didn’t say a word; I walked up to him, so close I could smell his familiar cologne, like smoky desert nights. Then I turned and headed past him to the file cabinet.

A copy of the acquisition contract was in the top drawer. I pulled out the thick binder organized with colored tabs and opened it with a snap.

“Let’s see,” I said, running my finger down the page. “This contract very clearly lists my assigned tasks, workloads, and performance measures. You are correct,” I said, giving him a bland smile. “It does, however, say all messages must be responded to—”

He opened his mouth.

“Within twenty-four hours,” I added and held out the contract to him. “I’ll make sure I do that in the future.”

Under that corporate marble mask, I knew he was seething.

“Can I help you with anything else?” I asked sweetly.

“No,” he said, turning on his heel.

I forced myself to turn back to my desk so I didn’t stare at his retreating form.

It was unfair that he looked like an apex predator in that suit.

The wool was perfectly molded to his broad shoulders, and while most guys would look like they were wearing diapers under their suit pants, Greg’s ass looked amazing. Or it would if I was staring, which I absolutely was not.

“Hi, newbie!”

Damn it.

Usually, I paid better attention. If I’d seen her coming, I would have pretended to take a call out on the balcony. But she ambushed me. Those cursed sneaky, short girls.

“How are you settling in?” Mags asked with that fake niceness that had gotten me on the wrong side of mean-girl bullying more than once in middle school.

“It’s great,” I said without an ounce of emotion.

“It must be hard,” she continued, wrinkling her nose. If I had made that expression, people would have thought I was possessed by Baba Yaga. But on Mags, it was adorable, like a kitten.

“You know, having to give up your company, but hey, you can still be a girl boss! Everyone fails. You’re so blessed that Greg was generous enough to come save you.”

There was that bitter anger, the shame.

“That’s why I just love that man,” Mags gushed. “He’s so generous and intelligent. Every time I’m around him, I just can’t believe how much he teaches me about finance.”

Baaaarrrrffff.

“He’s the most amazing, wonderful man I’ve ever met. You’re so lucky that you get to sit across from him every day. I don’t know if I’d be able to keep my hands off of him if I had this office.” Another obnoxious giggle.

“Maybe you can go tell him you’d like to trade with me,” I suggested.

“Maybe I will!” She rapped her pink-painted nails on the glass wall and blew Greg a kiss. Mags teased up her big black curls and pranced into his office.

Don’t look. Don’t look, I told myself. You’re not going to make it if you can’t just ignore it.

Her laughter, as grating as the sound of the fountain pens, filtered through the glass.

I gritted my teeth, but my self-control was gone.

I glanced over. Mags was perched on Greg’s desk, legs swinging softly, as she leaned over the papers.

If I sat on his desk, my feet would be on the floor.

Her delicate hand stroked his face; I resisted the urge to look down at my much-larger hands. Instead, I watched him smile at her, softly, like she was perfect and amusing, a balm to his soul.

This was the worst part of being stuck in this prison with its glass walls—witnessing the courtship play out on a life-sized screen, as they flirted and fell in love. God, three years. They’d be married with a baby on the way by then.

I opened my desk drawer.

I needed chocolate.

Chapter 2

Greg

I had read a story the other day about how, as punishment for poaching, park rangers in Kenya locked a man in a tiny jail cell–a barred wall–the only thing separating him from a lion. The man spent the next three years huddled in the corner of the cell, avoiding the swipe of the claws through the bars.

On the other side of the glass wall, Belle was sitting at her desk. Her four-inch black patent leather stilettos were off. Her platinum-white hair was in a ballerina bun, and a thin dark headband adorned her head like a crown, as if she were the queen of distracting men from work.

If she would actually read one of my messages instead of just deleting it, I would tell her to come see me just so I could tell her to keep her shoes on. Svensson Investment did a hundred billion in investments last fiscal year. She couldn’t kick her shoes all over the office.

She arched one of her feet on the metal spoke of the chair, her toenails painted with a sparkly purple polish that was not what a proper corporate worker would wear.

Belle picked up a bar of chocolate, which was almost the same color as her suit, and took a bite.

I picked up a fountain pen and unscrewed it.

She took another bite out of the chocolate bar.

I hadn’t studied that particular chocolate bar, although I would bet money that it, like all chocolate bars of that size, was scored so that one could break pieces off neatly and not be forced to eat uneven chunks from it. 

A dull snap resounded as she bit off another jagged piece. 

You need to get it together. She is doing this to aggravate you.

It was working.

I never should have put Belle in that office. As soon as she had slammed the first box of her stuff on the streamlined mahogany desk, I realized I had made a grievous error.

I had thought it might be a way to keep her on a tight leash, really hammer in how absolutely I’d won, but it was a Pyrrhic victory.

I had assumed it would put her off-balance.

But she barely acknowledged me at all. It was like I wasn’t even there.

And yes, I had to spend an inordinate amount of mental energy trying to ignore her.

As much as I wanted to, I couldn’t have her change offices. It would look like I had surrendered. I should have at least had blinds installed. But I couldn’t now. Then she’d know that she was affecting me.

After finally, finally getting the upper hand, finally winning after all these years, I wasn’t going to give it up because I wasn’t man enough to deal with my ex eating chocolate on the other side of a glass wall.

It wouldn’t be so bad if she would just break the chocolate bar along the score marks.

I stood up abruptly.

Belle didn’t even react. She was scrolling through Pinterest.

Is she shopping? I fumed.

Do not go into her office.

I wasn’t going to heel to her like a dog. I ran one of the most sought-after investment firms in the country. I had bailed out her company like it was nothing—after crashing it into the ground, of course. It had been child’s play.

I felt better remembering what a huge win that had been. Nothing was better than winning.

I checked my watch.

If I were running a vanity investment firm, I would go take a long lunch then go golfing. But I was here to make money, to rule this city, and that meant I actually had to put in the work.

Lesser men who did not know how to run a business thought that striding around the office like an overgrown toddler and yelling at employees was the way to garner respect and fear.

But that was not the way. Knowledge was power.

I knew what all of my employees were working on, the projects they ran, their deadlines, and how much money we stood to make on any potential deal.

“Chad,” I said, walking up to a pudgy middle-aged man who was ineptly trying to tell a joke to several interns.

I didn’t even have to narrow my eyes before the interns scattered, leaving Chad there to face me alone.

“The deadline you promised to meet for the Andreessen series B funding. Are you on track?”

“You mean the one on the tenth?” he stammered.

“The eighth,” I corrected.

“Right.” He was sweating.

I blinked at him.

“Um, actually, I’m not …”

“You’re not?” I raised an eyebrow.

The rest of those idiots out there in the city who liked to think they were powerful would have started screaming at him. Instead, I lowered my voice.

“And why might that be?”

Chad stuffed his hands in his pockets, pulled out a wad of tissue, and mopped his brow. “Ah, well, um … I guess Belle didn’t talk to you?”

“She what?”

He gasped at the snarl. “She said I could have another week.”

“Ms. Frost does not have the authority to—”

“I know,” he squeaked, “but she said that if we waited an extra week, then she didn’t think the other Wall Street firms the company was meeting with would give Andreessen good terms. She said the CFO they have managing their funding is a hothead, and he’s going to scare those stuffy sixty-year-old Wall Street guys, and they’re not going to want to invest with terms as good as ours.”

“It’s a gamble,” I growled.

“Belle says it’s worth the risk, but I have everything ready to go when Andreessen comes crawling back.”

She was right, damn it. That was the annoying thing. I could go into her office and complain to her about undermining my authority, but then I’d have to admit that I’d missed something.

Better to just pretend it hadn’t happened.

“Very well,” I told Chad. “Make sure you meet your new deadline.”

“Yes, sir!” He saluted and dropped the wad of tissues.

I was more annoyed than I should be.

When was Belle having these meetings? All she did was sit in her office, eat chocolate, and fidget in her chair. Did that woman ever sit still?

Calm down.

It was lunchtime. I was hungry. I hadn’t eaten enough breakfast because my little sisters had gotten into a screaming fight over which of their identical purple leotards belonged to whom.

Marnie, my assistant, should have my lunch by now. However, she wasn’t at her desk.

She answered on the third ring.

“I’ll be back in an hour,” she said in a rush. “I’m trying to find a replacement for the pitcher your brother broke. The store wouldn’t ship it, so I had to pick it up in person.”

“Not a problem,” I assured her. “I was inquiring about my lunch.”

“Oh!” she said in surprise. “She didn’t give it to you?”

“Who?” I asked, though I should have known the answer.

“The deliveryman texted me and said he gave it to a, quote, super-duper-tall lady.”

Damn it.

Belle was sitting at her desk, bare feet half tapping on the black stilettos turned on their sides on the floor.

“That is my lunch,” I said.

Belle didn’t look up from her computer. I knew from the slightly glazed look in her eyes that she was shopping online or reading some vapid online magazine.

“Was it?” she asked absently.

I strode over to grab the fork out of her hand.

Our fingers touched. I ignored the electric shock.

You won. You should lose interest in her. You have lost interest in her.

I stabbed a slice of the steak from the salad—not that there were many pieces left, since she’d picked out most of them—and lifted it up to my mouth.

Her lips parted. “Oh no, is someone in a bad mood? Do you need some Goldfish crackers?”

My phone rang before I could say something that would have me pleading my case in front of HR.

“Hello, Magdalena,” I said into the receiver, taking the salad from Belle.

“Hi, Greg!” Magdalena’s perkiness grated on my nerves. Belle had been a number of things, all irritating, but she could never be described as perky.

“Just wanted to check in.”

I wasn’t stupid. I knew what Magdalena was doing. She was far from the only woman in Manhattan who wanted to be the next Mrs. Svensson. While I normally tried to keep my interactions with the petite woman friendly but businesslike—I had, after all, purchased her company, Brooklyn Fintech, just like I had Belle’s, placing them both in high-up executive positions at my company—today, I let her draw out the conversation.

On the other side of the glass wall, Belle was studiously ignoring me. I loved to win. Lived to win. Belle had stolen several clients and contracts from Svensson Investment. Now I owned her company. She had rebuffed me and paraded men of lowly caliber in front of me for years, taunting me. Now it was my turn.

I laughed at something Magdalena said and glanced through the glass wall at my ex.

Belle was annoyed. No, she was jealous—it ate at her.

The opposite of love was indifference. I shouldn’t let her affect me. I should just ignore her, enjoy my billions, maybe even start dating Magdalena, someone easy who would be happy to bow to my excellence. But after spending several years chasing Belle, trying to win her back for no other reason than that I hated to lose, I now wanted to consume her thoughts, be the only thing she wanted. To finally put her off-balance like she had me.

Another bar of chocolate came out of Belle’s desk.

Magdalena’s words on the phone didn’t even register as Belle stared right through the glass wall and took a sloppy bite right out of the top of the bar.

Chapter 3

Belle

“Today was the worst day ever,” I said.

“You said that yesterday,” Emma reminded me over the sound of the cocktail shaker.

“Greg was just standing there, watching me eat a chocolate bar like it was the most distasteful thing in the world,” I fumed.

“He should come down to my office and watch me drink my way through Svensson Investment’s collection of fine wine,” Dana said, pouring the rest of the bottle into a stem glass.

“He’s out there with Mags right now,” I declared, pacing in front of the windows of Dana’s condo as if I could see Mags and Greg across Manhattan at whatever fancy restaurant he had taken her to. She would giggle and look at him from under her eyelashes and make him feel big and important.

“I wonder if any of the gossip sites have photos of them.” I scrolled through my phone.

Dana grabbed me by the arm and hauled me back to the kitchen island.

“When you take out the trash, do you check on it in the middle of the night to make sure the empty milk cartons and rotting carrots are still doing okay? No. Stop checking up on your ex. Have a cocktail.”

“It’s a new recipe,” Emma said happily. “I spent all day looking up trendy new cocktails. Svensson Investment’s expense account paid for all the ingredients. And the cheese.”

I cut off a slice from the wedge of brie.

“I’m not going to make it another three years,” I mumbled around the cheese. “Especially not if he gets her pregnant.”

“I highly doubt they’re actually sleeping together,” Dana said, taking a sip of Emma’s cocktail and making a face. She stood up and went to the wet bar at the corner of her living room, where she grabbed a bottle of gin.

“If Greg wants to spend the rest of his life being led around on a chain by a Chihuahua with a Birkin bag’s worth of extensions, let him,” Emma said with a sniff. Emma and Dana had founded Artemis Investment with me, and they’d been there for the fall from grace. A fall caused by me and my terrible idea. Most nights, I could barely sleep from the guilt.

The worst of it was that neither of them had ever expressed any anger at me. They had continued to be good, supportive friends. Well, sort of.

“If you seriously want him back that badly, walk into his office one evening and give him a blow job,” Dana suggested, pouring gin, the bottle glugging, into her glass. “Contrary to what you and Emma believe, Greg doesn’t look like a man who’s ejaculating on the regular. He’s too stressed out.”

“I added a lot of gin in there already,” Emma said delicately.

“If I can’t taste it, there isn’t enough.”

“These are supposed to be high-end cocktails,” Emma complained. “You’re ruining the flavor.”

“I’m not drinking this for the flavor.” Dana poured more gin into my glass. “You look like you need that.”

“Maybe you can switch offices with me?” I begged Emma.

“Oooh nooo,” she said. “I don’t need Greg Svensson breathing down my neck day in and day out, wanting to know what I’m doing on Instagram, ‘why is this corporate credit card maxed out?’, ‘what are all these Amazon boxes doing here?’ Blah blah blah. To be honest, I’m shocked you haven’t drowned in all the testosterone he’s spewing out.”

“He could absolutely be your fuck toy again if you went in there and flashed your tits,” Dana said, taking a sip of her cocktail. “His behavior is clearly the result of pent-up sexual repression.”

“No, I’m sure they’re sleeping together.” I choked on the words. “They flirt all day long. She comes up to his office any chance she can get. She’s always touching him—his face, his tie—she even touched his belt once. He wouldn’t let that go on unless they were hooking up. They went out to lunch two days ago for an hour and forty-three minutes, and this afternoon, they went out for coffee even though there is an espresso machine in the office. They were gone for fifty-six minutes.”

“Not that you’re counting, of course,” Emma said.

“The first rule of war is to know your enemy,” I reminded her. 

“Yeah, and the second rule is not to sleep with your enemy,” Emma countered.

“Just be a grown-up and take what you want. If you have to work with that man, you might as well have dick on call for your trouble,” Dana said with less urgency and the-sky-is-falling panic than I needed her to express.

“I can’t do that if they’re dating. Then that would be cheating. I would be a homewrecker. Besides,” I stated, “I am over him. I hate him. He stole my company.”

But it was one more knitting needle in the ribs. Not only did Greg steal my company out from under me, but now he was parading Mags in front of me, tormenting me, reminding me of all the ways I was inferior, all the ways I was never what he wanted, what his heart truly desired.

It meant my parents had been right, that no man would ever want me, that I was just an oversized loser, that I never should have tried at all.

“Gin,” Dana said firmly, sloshing the clear liquid into my cocktail glass. “We’re going to chill over the next three years, and then we’re going to walk out with big fat paychecks and go vacation somewhere nice, with beaches and hot men in skimpy bathing suits.”

“I’m not waiting three years,” I said darkly. “I can’t just let him get away with this. You should see him. He’s so smug, so sure of himself. He just wants to keep me in a tank as a prized possession. He’s like those Victorian dukes who locked exotic animals in big birdcages just to prove their dominion over nature. He needs to feel as small and insignificant as I do.”

“You’re not small and insignificant,” Emma said, patting me on the arm.

I glowered.

“If I’m going to be stuck with Greg for the next three years, I’m going to make sure he regrets every second of it.”

Chapter 4

Greg

“Everybody, run! He’s here!” Liam yelled when I stepped off the elevator. We were on one of the lower floors of the Svensson Investment tower, where I warehoused my younger sisters. I had already earmarked several of them to run my empire once they were a bit older.

It would be a cold day in hell before I entrusted my investment firm to one of my brothers.

While Beck, the second oldest after me, had an acceptable level of competence with finance, he would look at any problem from a financial lens only. Mike, the third oldest, had stolen one of my pens yesterday and still hadn’t admitted he had it. Walker, next in line, was pissed that I had commandeered Belle’s company and had moved out of 101 Park Place, along with Liam. When they’d walked away, it had shaken me more than I wanted to admit. Helping one of our sisters with her PowerPoint presentation was the youngest, Carl, who was becoming increasingly uppity and had even dared to talk back at our last board meeting. All in all, though my little sisters had been expelled from the expensive private school we’d enrolled them in, they were still preferable to my brothers.

It was late in the day, and my sisters were antsy. After escaping from my father’s desert compound, they still retained some feral behaviors that became increasingly unmanageable the longer it had been since their last meal. While the rest of my younger half brothers lived in Harrogate with Hunter, he had shipped our sisters to Manhattan with me. Although I didn’t want to pat myself on the back, I was much better at raising our sisters than he was our brothers.

Well, mostly.

The two toddlers, Coco and June, were fighting over a giant stuffed unicorn with sparkly hair. They crashed into my legs, and I picked them up, one under each arm. Coco tried to fight me off to go after her sister.

“How about I cut it in two and give you each half?” I offered, causing them to start sobbing.

“God, you’re terrible with kids,” Liam said, rolling his eyes. He made kissy faces at the toddlers.

“Don’t worry. I’ll buy another one for you. Ow!” he yelled as June screeched and whaled him in the face with the stuffed animal.

“I tried to be nice to the little girls, and they reciprocated by flushing my cuff links down the toilet. After that, I keep them on a short lead,” I told my brother.

“I think she broke my nose.” He gingerly pressed two fingers on either side of his nose.

“I told you all to stop buying them toys that could be repurposed as weapons,” I reminded him. “These are the consequences of your own actions.”

“I didn’t buy it,” Liam complained.

“Can we go see Belle?” the eldest sister, Enola, begged.

“I don’t think Belle wants to see any of us,” Walker said, leveling his gaze at me. His girlfriend was friends with Belle, and he was angry by proxy. Idiot. He should have been bowing before my brilliance. Purchasing Artemis Investment was worth it just for the Shaw account.

“She just hates Greg,” Enola argued as we herded the girls out. “She’s friends with me.”

“Yes, but not with Svensson Investment.” Mike glowered. “I have concerns about Belle having so much access to Svensson Investment. She hates you. She’s going to go after you as soon as you drop your guard. Greyson Hotel Group will need a cash infusion from Svensson Investment over the next five years for our hotel expansion plan into DC and Boston. Belle’s not stupid. She could wreck the firm’s finances.”

“Fortunately for you,” I stated, “I’m not stupid either. Of course, I have a contingency plan. In fact, I’m going to turn her into one of our best employees. Don’t worry, I know how to manage Belle Frost. She’s not going to get her revenge.”

Chapter 5

Belle

The glass door of my prison opened with a whisper. Greg’s footfalls were hushed on the expensive carpet.

The barely-there smile that promised he knew something that would make your life miserable, the cocky swagger—he had come to yank my chain, just to prove he could.

“I can tell by the way you are ignoring my messages that you already know what I’m coming in here to reprimand you about.”

“Oh no, the billionaire’s going to punish me. I should have known a man who gets stressed out when someone wears a Windsor knot would resort to trite clichés.”

His grip tightened on the leather portfolio he carried.

I leaned back in my chair. “Well? Go ahead. Reprimand me.”

He loomed over me. “You need to understand, Belle, you are only here and not being fed to the wolves of Wall Street because of my generosity. I was very lenient on you during the sale of Artemis Investment.”

“A moment of weakness, I’m sure.”

The tendon on his neck was prominent. He opened the leather portfolio and set it down in front of me.

“You’ve only been here a week. How have you already spent almost twenty thousand dollars? And before you go and pull out your contract, I have also reviewed it, and per the agreement, you are not allowed to embezzle money.” Greg was triumphant.

I took a long, slow sip of my coffee, slurping it just because I knew it would annoy him.

“Childish,” Greg said in a clipped tone.

“You’re so predictable,” I told him, standing up and smoothing down my suit skirt.

His jaw tensed, but his eyes stayed on mine.

I stepped around him, the click of my heels muffled on the carpet. A metallic clack punctured the quiet when I stepped off the carpet onto the slate tiles of the office floor. I opened the file cabinet and pulled out a binder.

“I’m so glad you came to talk to me, Greg,” I said, walking past him to the round glass table in the corner.

I dropped the heavy binder on the table.

Greg didn’t flinch at the noise.

“Let’s talk about finances. Come on over here. Yes, my binder is bigger than yours, but I won’t tell anyone.” I smirked at him.

The anger flashed in his eyes.

“All of those expenses were fancy dinners, wine, and other bribes to procure this information from the various assistants and, of course, your little sisters.” I tapped a fingernail on the binder. 

Greg scowled, his pretty mouth twisting as he snapped, “You bought that unicorn. You owe me. My sisters put it in the dishwasher and flooded my kitchen.”

“Yikes. Sounds expensive. Not as expensive as the amount of money being siphoned from Svensson Investment by your brothers, several of whom don’t even work here.”

“Hunter works part-time and meets with clients,” Greg argued.

“Yes,” I said, “but what about the other twenty-odd brothers? Crawford, for example. Crawford owns his own company. Why are we processing expenses from him? I’m sure your investors would be very interested in the misappropriation of funds.”

“What the fuck?” Greg cursed. “Goddamn it. Why is Crawford taking money? Where did you even find this? How is this even happening?”

“Looks like they’ve been submitting expenses under various marketing projects,” I said, showing him the proof. “Word to the wise: the next time you invest money into one of my brother’s companies, we are not paying for anyone to fly to Cabo for the privilege of conducting a meeting.”

His motions were tense as he flipped through the binder.

“Now,” I said, turning to another section in the binder, my hand barely brushing his, “when all of your brothers pay the company back, I think you’ll see that it more than covers my expenses.” I closed the binder and slid it across the table to him.

“Keep it. I have my own copy.”

Greg picked it up.

I did not admire the veins on his hands as he gripped the hard plastic.

Those hands have been all over Mags. They’re contaminated. You’d probably break out in a rash.

“I’m going to murder someone. I hope you’re not attached to any of my brothers,” he said, body tense, primed for a fight. 

I sat on the edge of my desk, enjoying the show of Greg going ballistic on the phone as he paced around his office.

Belle: After I bask in the glowing sun of Greg’s incompetence for another five minutes, let’s get celebratory drinks.

Dana: We should go shopping too. You need more shoes.

Belle: Yes to drinks, no to shopping.

Dana: You can’t keep wearing the same three suits.

Greg threw open the glass door to his office and blocked my path as I was leaving.

I hate this office.

“Where are you going?” he asked in a low voice.

“A working lunch with Dana.”

“No you’re not,” he said brusquely.

“Don’t you need to go find the rest of that money?” I argued.

“We have a meeting.”

“We just had a meeting.”

He took my arm. “I just sent a calendar invite. Let’s go. Text Dana and tell her she needs to attend.” 

I yanked my arm out of his grasp. I hated this, hated him, hated jumping whenever Greg snapped his fingers. He could have sent that calendar invite earlier, but he did it now just to show he had power over me.

Screw him. I’m ordering the most expensive cocktail on the menu after this meeting.

Actually, I decided when I walked into the conference room, I was going to need the whole bar.

Mags was sitting at what I had come to know as her spot on Greg’s right hand.

“Hi, Belle,” she said in a drawn-out greeting with a touch of vocal fry at the end.

“Hello,” I said tersely.

Greg had left early yesterday. I knew he had been with her.

Mags beamed up at Greg when she saw him. His adoring fan.

Gag.

“Are you sure this couldn’t have been an email?” I sharply asked Greg, sitting down next to Dana and as far away from him and Mags as I could get in the conference room.

Amanda, one of the other women who had started Brooklyn Fintech with Mags, turned up her nose when I sat across from her.

One of Greg’s college-aged brothers, Ronan, who was doing an internship, raced to pour me a glass of water.

“Bring me a whiskey, sweetie,” Dana said, giving him a feral smile.

He gulped and sped to the wet bar. 

“Let’s start the meeting, Greg,” I barked. “This company wastes too much money on overhead as it is. The number of meetings here is excessive.”

 “Why? Are you going out to spend more expense-account money?” Mags had a “gotcha” smirk on her face. “I know it must be fun to finally have an expense account worth something now that you’re at a real investment firm. Just don’t go too crazy.”

She flinched when I smiled.

“I guess Greg didn’t give you the pillow-talk update, huh.” Of course they were lying in bed and talking shit about me. “I’m sure he’ll fill you in the next time you fake an orgasm to make him feel better about his shortcomings.”

Ronan flinches as he handed Dana the whiskey.

Carl’s mouth dropped open, and he quickly pretended like he had to answer a very important email on his phone when Greg sucked in a breath.

Dana didn’t even pretend to hide her amusement.

Greg flexed his hands.

“Since we have several new members at the firm, we should have a proper welcome,” he said. “Other companies might plan a retreat, but in keeping with our company culture, I propose a contest instead.”

“A dick-measuring contest?” Dana asked, sipping her whiskey. “I win.”

Carl disguised his laugh as a cough.

While Greg might make snide comments to me, I knew he wasn’t saying shit to Dana Holbrook. He hated the Holbrooks, and the feeling was mutual. If he crossed Dana, it was a ticking time bomb before she started selling state secrets to her brothers. Half the acquisition contract was filled with shall-nots directed at Dana.

“I think Greg would actually win,” Mags said hotly. Her lackeys nodded along.

“How long is it, exactly?” Emma asked. “I’m making a spreadsheet.”

“You’d really need to test them under all sorts of conditions then average it for each person,” Dana mused.

“What if they used a penis pump?” I said calmly, knowing this entire conversation was about to give Greg an aneurysm.

“Oooh, you don’t want to do that.” Emma made a face. “My ex used a penis pump once, and I had to take him to urgent care after it turned the color of an eggplant.”

Ronan looked a little green.

“How did they fix it?” he asked in a horrified whisper.

Emma pulled one of the hairpins out of her braid and said, “Pop!”

“I think I’m going to be sick.” Greg’s little brother raced out of the room.

“Wait,” Carl said, confused, “are we seriously having a dick-measuring contest? Does HR know about this?”

“We are not,” Greg boomed, then continued in a lower voice, “doing anything of the sort.”

Mags sneered at me. “No wonder your business failed if this was what your meetings typically devolved to. We run a tighter ship here. Isn’t that right, Greg?”

So she and I were past the fake-niceness phase. Perfect.

“Seems like it’s hot-dog-in-the-hallway-level tight, based off the conversation he and I just had,” I said.

“You know, they have surgeries to correct that sort of thing,” Dana told Mags.

“They do?” Carl asked uncertainly. 

Ronan was back, still looking queasy.

“My sister-in-law, after a very quick and bloody labor, needed several stitches,” Dana continued. “She claims she could feel the needle.”

Ronan made retching noises.

“Honestly, Greg,” I said, “don’t these meetings have agendas? Carl, isn’t that your job?”

He glared darkly at Mags. “She took over my job.”

Looks like there’s trouble in billionaire paradise.

“We don’t need an agenda,” Greg snapped. “This meeting should have been over right now.”

“Great,” I said, standing up. “Just send an email.”

“Sit down, Belle,” Greg thundered.

Several people at their desks paused and looked over to the conference room.

He let out a breath.

“There will be a competition,” he said to us, “since all of you—no, not you, Carl—are high-powered investors. Whoever brings in the most new business in the next three months will win.”

“I love a friendly competition,” Mags gushed. “What do we win?”

“Hopefully a vacation from Greg,” I quipped.

The temperature in the room dropped ten degrees. Greg’s voice was brittle as cold steel.

“The prize is to be determined.”

“You should just let people pick their own prize,” Mags said. “I already know what I want.”

Oh my god, did she just feel him up under the table?

She looked at me and flashed her best mean-girl smile. “You all shouldn’t even bother. My numbers for last quarter were the best in the company. You won’t stand a chance.”

Chapter 6

Greg

“Hunter just called me to complain about a traumatizing conversation that Ronan had with several of your employees,” Liam declared, ambling into my office, followed by Walker.

Belle had left early, fortunately, because when she was deep in concentration, she liked to kick off her shoes, sit with her legs folded under her on her chair, and run her fingers along her lower lip. It was deeply annoying.

Maybe I could smash the glass wall, blame it on one of my siblings, and have plywood installed while waiting for replacement glass.

“Are you listening?”

“Of course I’m not listening to you,” I said brusquely. “I don’t have anything to say to you until you return all the money you’ve been siphoning out of Svensson Investment.”

Instead of looking properly guilty, Liam just laughed.

“I can’t believe it took you that long to figure it out. You really are losing your edge in your old age, big brother. You start rounding the corner to forty, and it all goes downhill.”

“What tipped it off?” Walker asked with a grin.

“Why, so you can try to get around it the next time?” I demanded.

Walker gave a shrug and a smirk.

“If you must know,” I said, opening the binder that Belle had given me, “apparently, one of our sisters ratted you out in exchange for a large stuffed unicorn.”

“Man, you really just can’t trust people like you used to,” Walker said, shaking his head. 

“No shit,” I said and slammed the binder shut.

“We can just take the money out of the next check you write Quantum Cyber,” Walker said, leaning back in his chair.

“Absolutely not. I expect a transfer in three business days. And stop coming over here just to harass me. Some of us actually work.”

“As much as we love to see your bright and shining smile, we came to see Belle, actually,” Liam said. “But I guess she got tired of you and ran off.”

“Why do you need to see her?” I asked darkly.

My brothers looked at each other then back at me.

“I do not have the patience today.”

After looking around to see if anyone was listening, Liam said, “Well, the trial’s coming up. Do you know if she’s still going to testify? She won’t return Crawford’s messages.”

“If Dad walks free because you couldn’t leave well enough alone …” Walker said, a warning in his tone.

“Don’t try to threaten me.” I snarled, low in my throat, feeling the muscles on my back bunch up as I rose from my seat.

Walker cleared his throat, watching me warily.

I smoothed my tie and sat back down. “Belle will testify.” She had to.

Chapter 7

Belle

Emma plopped down next to me at the small table in the low-key bar and looked over my shoulder at the research I was doing on my laptop. “You can’t be serious,” she said. I’d left work early to go sit someplace where I didn’t have to deal with all of Greg’s masculine energy barely contained behind that glass wall.

Maybe I could buy some plants to block him.

“We’re not doing Greg’s stupid competition,” Emma said.

“To be fair, we were going to be looking for new investment opportunities anyway, so might as well,” I told my friends, though the excuse sounded lame even as I said it. 

“Dana!” Emma tapped on the table as our friend took her seat and opened the drink menu.

“Belle, honestly, have some self-respect. Greg did this to bait you.” Dana clucked her tongue. 

“I know!” I wailed. “And it’s working. I can’t let Mags win. I have to beat her.”

“Except you don’t. I bought a mini fridge for my office and a subscription to a Japanese-snack-food-of-the-month club.” Emma reached over and grabbed several fries out of the bucket.

The waiter came by and added more drinks and bar snacks to the tab.

“The only way to win this game is not to play,” Dana told me. “Let me see your list,” she added, motioning toward it.

I turned my laptop toward her.

“Ugh, you’re seriously going to give Svensson Investment the Morella condo project?”

“We can’t do anything with it,” I countered. “Also, I pulled all of Mag’s numbers, and she hasn’t brought in a big condo project. Just seeing her face when I bring this in to Greg will be worth it. The Morella project alone is equal to half of what she brought in last quarter. I can absolutely grind her into the dust.” 

Dana slowly shook her head. “If it weren’t for the fact that Greg is a self-absorbed alphahole, then you two would be a match made in corporate sore-loser heaven.”

“She has no right.” I clamped my mouth shut.

“We’re going to need to hold an exorcism. I’m not sure if I’m going to make it another three years with you pining after Greg and trying to impress him after he screwed you over,” Dana remarked. She ate the booze-soaked cherry that had come with her cocktail in one neat bite.

“I’m not doing it to impress him,” I grumbled, stabbing at a goat cheese fritter with my knife. “I’m doing it to put Mags in her place.”

My phone buzzed.

Crawford: Can we talk?

I deleted the message.

Dana speared a coconut shrimp with her fork.

“You know, you have a royal flush here with the trial. You could get Greg to do anything you want in exchange for testifying. Or shit, you could even tell him you’ll speak in favor of his father if he—”

“I’ll never do anything that will help his father,” I said, cutting her off. “I know your family hates his, but I can’t have that on my conscience. You weren’t there at that compound. Leif Svensson is evil; he deserves to rot in prison.”

“Then why are you ignoring Crawford and the lawyers?” Emma asked, catching a drop of beer cheese before it fell on her blouse.

“Because I’m busy right now,” I said tersely.

I didn’t want to admit to my friends that I was terrified of facing Leif again.

I needed to get it together. Being scared wasn’t logical. I was six feet tall. I had raised my five younger brothers. I had—well, used to have—one of the city’s top up-and-coming investment firms, which had funded a large condo tower development.

About a year ago, I had snuck into the Svensson compound under an alias to load malware onto Greg’s father’s laptop so one of Greg’s brothers could find incriminating evidence to put Leif in jail.

I shouldn’t be scared.

I wasn’t scared.

I was the person who went in to rescue people. I was going to call Crawford back … tomorrow. Maybe. After I figured out my strategy for beating Mags.