The Billionaire's Pledge (4 page)

After a quick microwaved lunch, she locked the door and walked over to Cuppa for her afternoon latte. It was a blustery day, cooler than yesterday, and the wind blew bits of grit into her eyes. She decided to stop into the bookstore and see if her order had come in yet.

Ding-ling
went the bell over the door, and Savannah entered the comfortable little shop, immediately greeted by a
meow
from Sparky the black cat and a friendly “Hey there!” from Jennifer behind the counter.

“Hi,” Savannah said.

“It’s here,” Jennifer said, pulling a book from underneath and holding it out. 

“Oh, awesome,” Savannah said, striding up and taking it. She looked at the cover:
Google This: The Inside Story of the Most Admired Company of Our Time.

Of course she could have ordered it from Amazon or somewhere else, but she preferred to shop locally whenever she could. She pulled some cash from her wallet, feeling terribly guilty for spending any of her own money on something so frivolous after just telling her mom she had nothing.

Jennifer rang it up. “I hear you might have a new client,” she said.

Savannah’s mouth dropped open. “How do you…?”

“Elaine told me she sent him over to your place. He was in here earlier, looking around.”

“How do you know who he is?”

“He’s hard to miss. Come on. The suit. The hair.”

“Guess so. Did he buy anything?”

“Actually he did.”

Savannah raised her eyebrows and made a face that said, “And?”

“Bookseller-client privilege, Savannah. I can’t tell you what he bought. But it was a little bit of everything.”

“Huh?”

“Like, 25 books. I’m not kidding.”

“Wow. Holy crap. Okay. Well, talk to you later.”

She went across the street to the coffee shop and the first thing she noticed when she entered was that Zac was sitting in his same table from yesterday. He seemed to have laid claim to it. His back was to her, and she noticed two bags full of books sitting on the floor next to his chair, with at least half a dozen volumes spread out on the table around his cup of coffee. He seemed engrossed in at least three of them at the same time.

She stood in the entry for a moment, watching him from the back. Even from here, he was gorgeous. Her body responded by growing slightly warm, as if somebody had turned up the heat in the room. She felt her heart speed up a bit, and she took a deep breath to get enough oxygen. She hadn’t felt this attracted to a man in years. Even what she’d felt yesterday for John, the hunky windsurfer, was nothing compared with this. 

A rippling of fire swept through her core, and she shifted on her feet. 

She swallowed hard.

She wasn’t sure whether to say hello or go to the counter. She decided it might seem weird to walk past her new client without saying anything, so she stepped around into his line of view and said, “Hi. How are you?”

Zac looked up from his reading, and his face bloomed into a wide smile when he saw her. She smiled back. As before, he wore a striking white dress shirt, and his eyes caught hers and held them. There was such intelligence there, such depth.

“Savannah! Wondered if I’d see you here. Elaine says you’re a regular.”

“Sometimes. I’m kind of an irregular regular, I guess.”

He nodded. “How’s the site coming? No, wait, never mind. I shouldn’t ask that. It hasn’t even been 24 hours. You take your time.”

She shrugged. She would have had no problem talking about her work, but it sounded like he didn’t want to right now. “Got a couple of books?” she asked.

He looked down at the table and then at the bags on the floor, and chuckled. “Long story. Tell it to you sometime.”

“Okay. Well, good to see you,” she said, suddenly feeling uncomfortable standing above him and making small talk. “See you again tomorrow, I guess. I’ll have everything ready.”

He made a little nod and smile and Savannah turned and went to the counter. She found her heart was racing. Just being around Zac made her nervous, in a way she hadn’t felt with any other client. It was distressing, but she realized she’d never had a client who was simply drop-dead beautiful before. As she stood at the counter, she shifted from foot to foot, trying to rid her body of a jittery sense of electricity that had built up during the short conversation. She didn’t want to admit to herself how turned on she was by Zac, because he was going to be paying her a fair amount of money.

Elaine smiled knowingly and started making the latte. Savannah caught her eye. “Thanks,” she said in a loud whisper.

“For what? Telling a rich businessman about my friend’s business? Don’t worry about it.”

“Well, I appreciate it. He hired me. It’s a great project.”

“Wow! I didn’t know I had that much influence.”

Savannah got her drink and walked toward the door. As she passed Zac’s table, he looked up and said, “Excuse me, Savannah.”

“Yes?”

“Would you care to join me? I’m a bit lonely here with just my books. I could use a bit of company.”

“Uhh, sure.” She sat in the chair opposite, and Zac pushed several books aside and stacked others to make room for her to set her latte and book down.

“Hey,” he said. “The new Google book! I read it last night.”

She was confused. “Last night? Like, the whole thing?”

“Well, most of it. I read pretty fast.”

“And…what’d you think?”

“Good read. Wild ride. You’ll like it, if you like tech stuff.”

“I love tech stuff. It’s kind of what I’m into.”

He gave her a weird look, then it was gone and he gestured at his own books. “These are just—whatever looked good, I grabbed it. History of warfare, the latest Dan Brown, some cool-looking young adult paranormal romance novel, one by some guy who used to be homeless,
The Corrections
, something about weird sexual positions. A little bit of everything.”

She flicked up her eyebrows, curious that he wasn’t embarrassed to mention buying a book on sex. “And how many have you read so far?”

“Only seven,” he said, deadpan. 

Savannah’s mouth opened in surprise, then closed again. “Seven?”

“Sorry, just kidding. Couldn’t help it. I haven’t read any yet, aside from the Google one, but I’ve skimmed parts of a few. Not sure where to start.”

Savannah sipped her latte to fill the silence. She felt uncomfortable, like she was being pulled in every direction at once. First, this man looks familiar and she wonders who he is. Then he appears in her shop and immediately hires her for a project without even knowing anything about her. He’s her client, and she’s his vendor—a very specific business relationship. She still wonders who he is, but discovers she’s powerfully attracted to him, physically and emotionally. Now she finds herself sitting down with him and talking in a purely friendly, social way.

It was all very weird. Exciting, but weird. Not something she imagined happening in this little town in Oregon.

She didn’t know if she should keep chatting with him like a friend, or leave and go back to work. After a moment’s pondering, she decided to go back to work, but realized before she got up that she didn’t have a business card or anything with all his information on it. She still didn’t even know his last name. There was no way she was going to make the same mistake she’d made with the slimy gallery owners back in New York. This time she was going to have an iron-clad contract and check him out ahead of time, as much as she could.

“I’m sorry, but I should get back to work. Do you have a business card, by chance?”

“Oh, sure,” he replied, looking sheepish and reaching into his pants pocket to pull out his wallet. “Ought to be one in here somewhere.” He fished around and eventually pulled out a simple white business card, which he handed to her.

She took it and noticed that it had an exquisite feel, with real embossed lettering in a subtle font. As a designer, she appreciated the effort that had gone into it. But still—how could such a little piece of card stock ooze money? The card read:

Zachary Cushman

Investor

Followed by a phone number and email address. 

Savannah stared at the card. Her heart raced. She was afraid to look up, for fear that Zac might see her expression of shock. Zachary Cushman.
Zachary Cushman!
It must be him, it must be the same Zachary Cushman. Of course it was! No wonder he’d looked familiar: a few years ago he’d sold his photo-sharing company for billions. He’d been all over the tech news as the
wunderkind
of the moment, the next Zuckerberg, even the next Steve Jobs or Bill Gates. He was practically a celebrity.

Images flashed through her head of articles she’d seen, stories she’d read about this man.
Billionaire. Private jet. Huge yacht. Women. Life in the fast lane.
But that had been a couple of years ago, and she didn’t remember seeing much since. 

Her hand shook. She felt her heart thudding hard. To most women, meeting George Clooney or Brad Pitt would probably be exciting. For Savannah, it was meeting someone like Zachary Cushman. For a long time, she just stared at the card and said nothing.

“Is something wrong?” he asked.

She put the card down and brought her eyes back to his. Of course. His face looked so familiar now, from the pictures she’d seen. His hair was longer now, and he had a bit of stubble and looked a little thinner in the face, but it was definitely him. 

“I—uh, no. I’m fine. You’re, uh, Zachary Cushman.”

He looked surprised. “Zac, please. You know who I am?”

“Of course. Doesn’t everybody?”

“Ha! Not in Hood River. I haven’t been recognized once. And I prefer to keep it that way. The press doesn’t know where I am, thank God.”

“Sorry,” Savannah said, gulping her latte and almost gagging on it. “I’ve never met a celebrity before.”

At this, Zac laughed out loud. Savannah felt embarrassed, and glanced around the coffee shop. A woman looked over from her laptop, then went back to whatever she was doing.

“What?” Savannah asked.

“I’m not a celebrity. I’m just a guy who got lucky.”

“Lucky?”

“All right.
Really
lucky.”

She sat and just simply stared at him.

“You’re making me a bit uncomfortable,” he said. “You still want to do the project, right? Even though you know who I am?”

“Of course. Why wouldn’t I?”

“I thought maybe you’d read some of the articles about me. Me and…well, you know.”

She smiled. She
had
read the articles, actually. “The women, you mean?”

He nodded.

“It’s…uh… a little concerning, yes.” Oh, shit! Had she really said that? “
It’s a little concerning”
?
 

But his expression remained neutral. If he thought she was an idiot who put her foot in her mouth, he didn’t show it. “Which ones did you read? Don’t tell me you read RollingStone.com.”

She hesitated, then said, “Yep.”

“Okay, now, that was a bit exaggerated. Only some of that was true.” He smiled. “Well, most of it.”

Her courage was growing. He seemed so…normal. Open to talking. “What about the part about the Playboy Mansion?”

He lowered his voice. “Yes. That was all true.” He turned red. “Don’t worry, that’s all in the past. I’m a changed man.”

Savannah suddenly felt self-conscious. She realized she’d barely combed her hair that morning, and was wearing plain clothes, even schlumpy, truth be told. Was he looking at her chest? Was she just another conquest to him?

As if reading her mind, he leaned a bit closer across the table. “They reported I had
three
women up in that room, but that’s inaccurate. I told them to correct it, but they never did. Really—you can’t believe everything you read on the internet.”

“So it wasn’t three women all at once?”

“No, of course not.”

Savannah sighed. “That’s good. I was a bit worried about what kind of person had just hired me.”

“It was
four
,” he said, laughing.

She rolled her eyes. 

“No, seriously,” he went on. “Here’s the problem I had when people realized I was suddenly a billionaire. First, I started meeting more women. I was going to parties…flying people around on my jet…hosting huge blow-outs at my house. People recognized me, they would come up to me. People would introduce me to people. I guess it was like being a celebrity, but on a limited scale. But the women I met were shallow.”

Savannah found this word a bit offensive. Just because a woman wanted to be around an unfathomably wealthy, incredibly attractive, unbelievably successful, seriously powerful man—that didn’t make her a shallow person.

“How so?” she asked. “What do you mean, ‘shallow’?”

“I mean they were only after one thing. And it wasn’t my superior physique.”

“Come on. You can’t be seriously telling me that every woman you met only wanted your money? That’s a pretty sexist comment.”

“Not every woman, but every woman who was trying to get into bed with me. Every woman who really seemed interested in me, and not just my business. And it started getting impossible to tell. Does she like
me
? Or just my money? You have to realize, I came from nothing. I grew up in a trailer park in Idaho, for God’s sake. Nobody in my family had ever gone to college before me. Most of them hadn’t even graduated from high school.”

The longer Savannah sat and listened to Zachary Cushman talk, the more she realized why he’d been so successful in life. There was something about him, some elusive quality that she couldn’t put her finger on. Call it charisma. Call it animal magnetism. A reality distortion field. Machismo. Confidence. Whatever it was, he had it. She didn’t doubt that women had started coming out of the woodwork to try to get with him. Whether it was his money or his looks or just the way he paid attention when she was talking, Savannah was falling under his spell exactly the way they had.

But this, she knew, could be a trap. If Zac were fully aware that women came onto him for his money, then he’d likely be wary of any interest she, herself, showed in him. The word
shallow
kept popping into her head. And then there was the fact that he would be paying her for her work, which made everything awkward. And if he found out how badly she needed the money…