Melody Anne's Billionaire Universe: Refuse to Settle (Kindle Worlds Novella) (2 page)

Chapter 3

Colin finished his workout then hit the shower. The café didn’t open for another hour, and he couldn’t wait to get those damn cookies. Last night he’d scarfed the six he’d taken home and still wanted more. At this rate he’d need to double his gym time to keep up with the extra calories. They may be vegan, but they sure as hell weren’t low fat.

But he didn’t care. It was damn worth it. And not just for the cookies.

Another gorgeous spring morning, Colin arrived at The Rhubarb before Jilly and waited outside for her. He couldn’t stop looking in the direction in which she’d come from yesterday, checking every 10 seconds to see if she was there yet.

He distracted himself with his phone, but when the hairs on the back of his neck stood, he knew she was there. He turned his head and watched her. As if in slow motion, she strode toward him, her hair shimmering in the morning sun, flowing over her shoulders in soft waves. Lavender was now his favorite color.

“Hi,” he said as she approached, hoping he didn’t sound like a lovesick teenager.

She avoided his gaze as she pulled out her keys. “Yeah. Hi to you, too.”

“You’re in a pleasant mood this morning.”

She stayed quiet as she pushed on the door and walked in then disappeared around the counter. A minute later she returned, bakery box in hand.

“With tax it’s $217.50”

He handed her his credit card. After punching his numbers into an iPad, she turned it toward him and presented it for his signature.

“Can I get you anything else?”

He might not know her well, but this was not her norm. He was compelled to ask. “Is everything okay?”

“It’s nothing. I’m fine. I had a rough night, but I’ll survive.”

“I can listen if you need to talk.”

“I don’t want to talk.”

“Come on. Let me help.”

She closed her eyes and breathed deep, but when she opened them, her fire was back.
There you are.

“You really want to know what happened? My best friend was totally fucked over by the guy who claimed to love her. He was screwing around behind her back
and
stole a bunch of her money.”

“What? Did you have him arrested?”

“No. She willingly lent him the money and he was supposed to pay her back, but now she’ll never see it.”

“That’s her own fault then. You should never lend money to friends or boyfriends.”

Jilly’s hands gripped the edge of the counter, jaw clenched tight. “You can go now. I don’t need someone like
you
giving me or my friend relationship advice.”

“Someone like me? What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Don’t pretend you’re some stand-up guy. I know different. And if I hadn’t, there are a million pictures online that prove it. You’re probably just like him. A fuck ’em and leave ’em kind of guy. How many women have you slept with, cheated on, and tossed aside?”

Now it was his turn to get defensive. “You don’t know anything about me. You don’t know how I treated the women I dated. You’re just pissed off and taking it out on me. Some guy must have really messed you up. That explains why you’re so hostile toward me.”

“I’m hostile because you’re a jerk. Now take your damn cookies and get out of my store.”

He grabbed the box. “You’re gonna have a really lonely life if you keep judging people based on things you know nothing about.”

“Fine by me, as long as it keeps assholes like you out of my life.”

He walked away but as he got to the door, turned back. “See you next Sunday.”

The look on her face was pure hatred.

*   *   *

Jilly wanted to hurdle the counter and pummel Colin like she was kneading bread dough. The nerve of him. Did he seriously think she was still going to bake cookies for him?

After her awful night, and now this, she was ready to collapse. She’d only managed two hours of sleep, spending the majority of her night consoling a hysterical Charlene and brainstorming ways to get away with murder.

When Charlene had finally calmed down and fallen asleep, Jilly tried, but couldn’t find her own peace. She kept thinking about her mother and how many nights she’d listened to her cry. It had been a while since she’d thought about her, and almost ten years since her death. Jilly wasn’t even eighteen yet when it happened, still in high school. A kid should never have to come home to find paramedics at their house, mom on a stretcher with a sheet covering her.

Jilly’s dad had taken off when she was four, so it was just her and Mom for a while. She worked two jobs to keep them in shitty apartments, but then, just like in the fairytales, a white knight had saved them. When Jilly was eleven, her mom married the super rich hotelier who owned the property she worked at as a bartender. He swept them away into his fancy lifestyle and her mom never had to work a crappy job again.

But the fun didn’t last. The arguments started and she heard her mother accuse him of having girlfriends. He didn’t deny it. And Jilly wasn’t stupid. She knew what that meant. She saw how hard it was for her mother to fit in, to keep up with the snooty women in their circle. The plastic surgery she endured, the bruises she hid that didn’t come from the surgeries. She watched her mom drink and do drugs to cope.

Jilly’s mother may have taken her own life that dreary winter day, but her husband had put the gun in her hand.

The bell above the door dinged and Jilly wiped her tears with the palms of her hands. She grabbed her apron and looped it over her head. Time to stuff it all back down where it belonged and get on with her day…her life. Like she’d been doing for the last decade.

“I’m sorry. I just couldn’t stay home by myself.”

Charlene stood in the middle of the café wearing polka-dot fleece pants and a ratty tee from a concert they’d gone to years ago. Her eyes were ringed in black and there were still remnants of her lipstick. She’d spent too long making herself pretty for that jackass. A jackass that was too stupid to erase naughty texts from his piece of ass on the side.

“It’s okay.” Jilly took her into her arms and held her tight as she cried.

When she calmed down, she sat her at a table in the corner with some coffee and a few cookies. Jilly hated to leave her, but she had a business to run.

After a late morning rush, she looked over and Charlene had fallen asleep on the table. She decided to leave her there. She wasn’t bothering anyone, and she surely needed the sleep.

Jilly moved a stray ringlet that had fallen over Charlene’s cheek. Her tear-streaked face brought back too many awful memories. She couldn’t save her mom, but she could try her damnedest to make sure no one else she loved was hurt by a selfish piece of shit.

And that included herself.

If Colin Rutherford wanted cookies, he’d get them, but she didn’t need to see him to make it happen. That’s what delivery services were for. He could afford it.

*   *   *

Colin slammed the door on his 55 Chevy pick-up, and stalked toward the back entrance at Ragtop Restorations

“Hey, man. Don’t take it out on the truck.” Joe, his top upholstery guy, was making a trip to the dumpster with a garbage bag full of leather scraps.

“Sorry.”

Joe tossed the bag in and joined Colin. “Shitty morning?”

“You could say that. Cookie?” He offered the box.

“Don’t have to ask me twice.” He took it and Colin followed him into the shop. He set it on the break room table and took one out. “Damn, that’s a good cookie.”

“I know.”

Colin didn’t have the energy to rave about them, the café, or Jilly. He was still too pissed off about their encounter. And the worst part wasn’t that she’d wrongly judged him. She’d tapped into his biggest fear and hadn’t even known it. His dad was the kind of guy she accused him of being. The playboy type who thrived on female attention, regardless of the ring on his finger. He was the kind of guy Colin tried so hard not to become. But people saw what they wanted. He’d known that for a long time. He just expected her to be different.

“Hey, boss.” One of the engine guys came in and snagged a cookie. “I got that Bizzarrini running yesterday.”

“Yeah?” That perked Colin up. He’d found the rare gem last month in a junkyard outside Venice. It cost him five times the cost of the vehicle to ship it to the States, but when it was done, it would be worth a whole lot more. “Let me hear it.”

He took him to the car, still in desperate need of bodywork and a complete overhaul of the interior, but when Rico sat inside and turned the key, she roared to life. A thrill raced through Colin’s veins and he yearned to get his hands on her. Get them dirty. He didn’t know nearly as much as these guys, but he was learning.

After changing into some work clothes he kept in his office, Colin checked in with each of the current projects. He hated making his staff work on Sundays, but the demand for their services was so high, he had to. They didn’t mind though. He paid them well, and double time on a Sunday was something few of them passed up.

Colin watched Joe sew together pieces of beige ostrich leather for the driver’s seat of a black ’61 Jaguar. The man was a God in the car upholstery world and worth every cent. Then he helped Tommy install the exhaust on a 1970 Plymouth Hemi Superbird. He just loved being there, observing, helping where he could. This is what calmed him, centered him. It was his happy place, for lack of a better term. It was just him, his team, and the cars they loved. No one judged him. No one compared him to his father, either on purpose or accidentally.

Colin sat with his crew for lunch—pizza and chicken wings on the company’s dime—and checked his phone. A voice mail from an unidentified number. He hit the triangle to play it.

“Um. Hello. This is Jilly…in. Jillian. From The Rhubarb. I’ve decided to have your weekly cookie order delivered each week, so you don’t have to come to the store. Please call me back at your earliest convenience and let me know where you’d like them delivered. Thank you.”

Unbelievable. She couldn’t even stomach seeing him once a week for five minutes? He should just cancel the whole order. He didn’t need her damn cookies.

But the thought of not seeing her made his gut twist. And so did knowing she hated him for reasons that weren’t his fault.

Man, the Internet really sucked sometimes. Being a member of a high profile family meant your life was constantly under a magnifying glass, and the paparazzi just love to snap away. He had dated a lot of women, and had a lot of fun, but that didn’t mean he was an asshole like his father. In recent years, he’d actually dated a lot less. The women in his circles were looking to snag a rich husband and he wanted no part of the Stepford trophy wife thing, despite urging from his family to pick one and “settle down.” It felt more like settling in general. Not his style.

If he was going to marry someone, she needed to excite him, challenge him. Be an equal. And it had nothing to do with money. It was about attitude. He needed someone with drive, determination. Not a high society snob who did nothing but sit on her lyposuctioned ass and spend his money. Someone independent and smart.

Someone like…Jilly.

But she also needed to see past exteriors, and Jilly obviously had no desire to do that.

Maybe it was best if he did cancel his order. Forget about her. But as his finger hovered over the button to return her call, he stopped himself and put his phone away.

Chapter 4

Jilly’s week flew by in a blink. Probably because she was exhausted beyond belief. She’d spent too many nights staying up way too late with Charlene, burning Eddie’s things, crying, cutting his face out of photos, more crying. She’d hit a breakthrough in the breakup process midweek and entered the I-hate-him and revenge-sex phase. So there they were on a Thursday night, downing too many drinks so Charlene could find some liquid courage and a guy to take home. It was all drunken fun and games until they saw Eddie and some girl making out on the dance floor.

After Charlene puked in the ladies’ bathroom, Jilly took her home and she spent another night sobbing in Jilly’s arms.

Men were pigs. No, worse. They were the dirty assholes of pigs.

And speaking of pig assholes, Jilly’s asshole had yet to call her back and arrange delivery for his cookie order. Which meant one of two things. A: he was going to stiff her on two hundred bucks he owed her for the cookies she’d already made. Or B: he was going to show up at the café to pick them up. She wasn’t sure which option was worse.

Jilly looked at the clock. It was almost noon. The café was only open until one on Sundays. If he wasn’t there by one on the dot, she was locking up. Too bad for him.

A few more customers came in and distracted her while time slowly ticked away. As the minute hand hit the eleven, she was pretty sure she was in the clear. And yeah, she was a little disappointed, but not really sure why.

It sucked to be out the cash, but the cookies were a hit and she was sure she could get rid of them next week, even if she had to do a special. So that wasn’t it. Did she miss Colin? No. That couldn’t be it. He aggravated her. They’d spent more time arguing than getting along. Her life would be much simpler if he just disappeared from it.

But simple wasn’t going to happen. With two minutes to spare, the door chime rang and in strode Colin. Jilly tried to tell herself the erratic beat of her heart wasn’t because he looked really sexy in ratty jeans and a dirty gray tee. Nope. And it wasn’t the fact that he smelled of citrus and grease and masculinity, either. Had to be some other reason.

Wait
. Why was he filthy and smelling like that?

Colin avoided her gaze as he pulled two hundreds and a fifty from his wallet. He set them on the counter, took the bakery box, and mumbled “Thanks” before turning toward the door.

“That’s it?”

He looked at her over his shoulder. “Should there be more?”

“Why are you dressed like that?”

“I came from work and I’m heading back there. I do have a job, you know.”

“I know.” She did…sort of. “I’ve never seen you dressed like that. I don’t even know what you do.”

“There’s a lot you don’t know about me.” He then continued toward the door and out onto the street.

Seriously?
Flutters gone, she stomped through the café and out the door. “You don’t need to be so rude.”

“
I’m
the one who’s rude? You know nothing about me but think it’s perfectly fine to judge me and make assumptions. So go back to your shop and I’ll go back to mine, and we’ll forget all about this cookie thing. You’ll never have to see me again.”

He walked away and her heart sunk. Because he was right. She didn’t know anything about him. People judged her all the time and she hated it. Her hair, her clothes, her lifestyle. She’d judged him based on pictures she saw online. She’d judged him based on her past experiences with wealthy men. Neither were fair.

Jilly ran after Colin, reaching him just as he opened the passenger door of a really shiny but really old red truck. “I’m sorry,” she blurted.

He didn’t even face her. Just shook his head as he said, “And I’m too tired to care.” He set his box of cookies on the seat and closed the door. Head down, he made his way around to the driver’s side and got in. Not even one glance at her as he drove away.

So maybe her original judgment was correct. Asshole.

*   *   *

Colin hadn’t expected the encounter with Jilly to be so tough. She’d disappointed him and he shouldn’t care, but damn it, he still wanted her. But the feelings would go away. He’d stay away from the café and dump this box of cookies in the trash. Done.

But when the got back to the shop, he couldn’t do it. Instead he brought them inside and plopped them on the break room table.

“Cookie time!” one of the guys yelled and Colin thought a stampede of elephants was rushing toward him. Within minutes, the box was half empty. He grabbed one of the cookies and against his better judgment, bit into it. He’d never again taste lemon and not think of the lavender-hued beauty who’d created these cookies.

“Cookies as employee motivation. I’ll have to look into that.”

Colin turned toward his father’s voice as he swallowed, even though his throat had gone completely dry. “Dad.” He coughed and tossed the half-eaten cookie in the trash. “What are you doing here?”

“Thought I’d check up on you. I haven’t heard from you all week. No one has.”

“I’ve been busy. Here. Working with my team.”

“I can tell.” The man eyed his son’s grungy attire. “I will never understand why you’re drawn to this.”

“And you don’t need to.” Colin brushed past him and into the garage.

“That’s fine. Get it out of your system now. In a few years, when I’m ready to retire, you’ll take over for me at Rutherford Enterprises and leave this behind.”

Over the last week, Colin had spent every waking moment at the shop with his guys, learning from them, helping them. He was exhausted, but it felt good to build something from nothing. To be a part of the team, not just the guy whose name was on the paychecks. And he wasn’t sure anymore if he wanted to be the one in charge at Rutherford, spending his days in board meetings and wooing investors.

He turned toward his father. “I’m needed here.”

“You’re doing well. I’ve seen the financial reports. You can afford to hire someone to manage the place.”

“I don’t want to hire someone. I enjoy being here.”

His father shook his head. “You’ve always been like this. But you’re not a kid anymore. You need to get your head out of the clouds and prepare for your future. The future I worked hard for. And your grandfather and great-grandfather before me. This is your legacy. This silly car shop was a fun distraction, but you need to get serious.”

Colin didn’t bother arguing any further. He wouldn’t win.

“The Rutherford Gala is Saturday. You’re bringing a date, correct?”

“Probably not.”

“You need to. It looks bad to investors if you don’t.”

“I don’t care about investors. I’m not dating anyone right now and I’m not going to just grab any woman off the street.”

“You don’t need to do that. I’m sure there’s a plethora of available women your mother can set you up with.”

Been there. Done that. He wasn’t interested in high-society debutantes who only wanted him for his money and social status. “No thanks.” Colin stepped to the counter, picked up a rag, and began wiping grease off of a crankshaft.

“Oh! I have the perfect girl for you. Richard Hinskin, one of the Board of Directors, has a daughter. Sophia, I believe?”

He knew who she was. He’d seen her at several Rutherford events over the last couple years. “Dad, she’s what, twenty-two at the most? I’m thirty-four.”

He shrugged. “So. I’m ten years older than your mother.” He checked his watch. “I need to go. But think about it.”

Colin Rutherford III didn’t give him a chance to protest further.
Typical.
Which was fine with him. His father was gone and he could get back to what actually made him happy.

*   *   *

“So did the asshole ever show today?” Charlene asked as she and Jilly lounged on their couch with bad reality TV and frozen treats: regular ice cream for Charlene, the non-dairy stuff for Jilly.

“Yeah. Two minutes before I was locking the door.”

“And?”

“He was his normal asshole self.”

“You seem surprised.”

Jilly took another scoop of chocolate and caramel brownie goodness. “A little, I guess. I felt bad because I thought I misjudged him. And maybe I did, to some degree, but he’s still an asshole. I apologized and everything and he didn’t even care.”

“Poor little rich boy got a bruise on his ego so now he needs to pout.”

“Exactly.”

The girls continued to dig into their ice cream, but Jilly couldn’t get the look on Colin’s face out of her head. He said he was tired and he looked it. Tired in general, or tired of her? Was there more to it?

“You like him,” Charlene declared.

Jilly met her stare. “What? No. I mean, yeah…he’s hot, but no.”

Charlene rolled her eyes. “Okay. Whatever.”

“No
whatever
. Maybe for a millisecond I thought he was cute and charming, but we know what cute and charming does to girls. It lures us in and makes us stupid. You, of all people, should know that.”

“I do. But do you really think all guys are jerks who will screw us over? Are we doomed to spend our lives alone? Do we have to choose between being a spinster old maid and settling for an asshole husband who will walk all over us and do whatever the hell he wants?”

Jilly took another bite as she contemplated her friend’s questions. “First of all, we should never settle for anything less than we deserve. And I have yet to witness it myself, but I have to believe there are good men. There might be a happily ever after out there for us.”

“Aww. Is my Jilly turning into a romantic?”

She snorted. “Nope. I’m far too skeptical for that. I never said it would be easy, and I definitely don’t want any kind of white knight situation, but I think it can happen.”

“So I shouldn’t give up hope?”

“Definitely not.”

“Then you shouldn’t give up either. Actually, have you ever even tried? I’ve known you for eight years and you’ve never had a boyfriend.”

“I’ve had boyfriends!”

“Not really. You’ve kinda sorta dated a few guys on a semi-regular basis. Dinner with someone every other week doesn’t make him your boyfriend. And did you even have sex with any of the recent guys?”

“Sex makes it an official relationship?”

“No, but it’s fun.” Charlene’s mischievous grin blossomed across her lips. “Eddie was a piece of shit, but man, he knew how to go down on a girl.”

Unfortunately, Jilly knew just how great Eddie was in bed. Not from experience, of course. She’d heard Charlene’s euphoric screams through their thin bedroom walls on far too many occasions. “We’re done with this conversation.”

“Why? Cause you don’t have anything to contribute?”

“I do, I’m just not in the mood.” Total lie. She had stories, but none worth reliving. She’d had sex a few times with some of the recent guys, but nothing that was core shattering.

“Party pooper.” Charlene scraped the bottom of her bowl for one last bite of meltiness. “I think we should go out this weekend. We both need to get laid.”

“I will consider the possibility of going out, but the getting laid part? You’re on your own.”

“Come on! When was the last time a guy really screwed your brains out? Where you were so satisfied and exhausted you couldn’t even move afterward?”

Uh..
. Most of Jilly’s sexual encounters were simple: do the deed, then get back to normal life.

“You took too long to answer, so I’m guessing that’s never happened. We so need to get you laid.” Charlene stood and headed for the kitchen. “I have the perfect slutty outfit you can wear.”

“Not happening.”

“It is, so you better make sure you shave.”

“Nope.”

Charlene was halfway down the hall when she yelled,” I’ll bust into your shower and do it myself if I have to.”

The scary part was that she knew Charlene well enough to know that she actually would.