Illusion (Billionaire in Disguise Series, #2) Read online

  I allowed myself the chance to rest. To shut down my predatory and protective instincts and simply exist.

  The silence was comforting. Erotic. The air swirled with our smells, and the walls were still echoing our sounds. I didn’t want this to change. I wanted to stay in this moment forever with him when neither of us feared for our lives, our safety, or our futures.

  Nothing could get us in this moment, and I wasn’t ready to give it up.

  But we had to. We had to know our next moves.

  Derek’s safety still depended on it.

  “Where do we go from here?” I asked.

  “You mean after we get dressed?” Derek asked.

  “Don’t be a dick about it.”

  “We still have to deal with Jacob. He’s still out there, and who the hell knows what he’s trying to pursue now? But I want to try a relationship with you. I want to build that with you. I want the chance to try.”

  “I’d be lying if I said I was sure about this, because I’m not. There are still so many factors in play that could be altering your—”

  His hand grabbed my chin and brought my lips to his. The kiss was deep. Rough. Passionate and meant to silence. I sank into him, feeling his heart beating against my chest as I moaned into his lips. His hand slid up to cup my cheek, his thumb tracing the outline of my cheekbone as my lips swelled under his attack.

  When he pulled away from me, my body followed him. Almost like it was instinct.

  I wasn’t sure how I felt about that type of instinct.

  Derek helped me from his lap, and I searched for my clothes. I could feel him pouring out of me, so I used my underwear to wipe myself down. I stumbled to get my pants on, refusing Derek’s help when he tried to steady me on my feet. I got myself dressed this morning. There was no need for his help now.

  Then I shoved my dirty underwear deep into my pants pocket.

  I still wasn’t sure that Derek was genuinely interested in me. I still felt he was getting all spun around by this unusual situation for him. The adrenaline. The danger. The Florence Nightingale effect where someone being protected latches onto their protector. It was a phenomenon I had watched John be plagued with on more than one occasion, and I couldn’t shake the feeling it was happening now too.

  Only I was giving into it instead of refusing it like I’d coached John so many times before.

  But what I had to do was keep myself in check. Even if I was sleeping with him, it didn’t mean my heart had to run away from me. Even if I had to protect Derek, it didn’t mean I had to fall in love with him simply because he was a powerful man. I needed to protect myself. I needed to keep myself from being so vulnerable to this man, especially now that I knew the power he had to affect me.

  A power I hadn’t encountered in years.

  Derek’s wish for a relationship was no more than infatuation, an illusion built on a series of rare events that drew two people together. Two people with very specific skillsets that were very good in their respective industries. I was a powerful woman, and he was a powerful man.

  That didn’t mean we were built to be powerful together.

  “Coming?” Derek asked.

  He stood at the door, holding it open with a smug grin on his cheeks.

  No. This wasn’t real. None of this was real between Derek and me. It was a stressful job that required a stress relief two parties were willing to give one another. That wasn’t a recipe for love, and it wasn’t a recipe for a relationship.

  I was right, and he was wrong. He had misjudged Jacob, I knew he was still misjudging Emma, and I know he was misjudging me.

  That meant he would misjudge what we were doing. His emotional dispositions proved that.

  And if there was anything I had built my life on, it was proof.

  Chapter 5

  Derek

  IT TOOK ME A FUCKING week for my public relations section of the company to get shit under control with the media. Our stock was finally stabilizing, and I had quelled the investor’s worries for now. Some of the projects that had been stalled were back underway, and a couple companies that had dropped out completely were back at the table to talk. But I wasn’t going easy on them. Them dropping off the face of the planet had put a dent in the schedule goals I had set forth for them, so I was using this as a time to negotiate a bigger chunk of their company.

  That was what they got for putting us in the time crunch.

  I was at my office looking through all the reports. I wanted to make sure all the numbers on every single piece of paper were what they were supposed to be. I wasn’t taking any chances that Jacob was dipping his hands into things. I didn’t want to take a chance that another zero had been added somewhere, enabling someone to skim money off the backs of our investors.

  While Sam was protecting me, it was my job to protect them.

  Plus, one of these projects was Jacob’s baby. It was a company he had personally brought me, and I was on high alert with it. The investors still wanted to take it on after our stocks had stabilized in the marketplace, but I wasn’t taking any chances. I had Sam vet every single person at that company. The owner. The operator. All the workers and even their families. I didn’t want there to be anything that got by me on this one. I didn’t want this to be a way Jacob wiggled his way back into the company.

  Especially since his accounts had been frozen.

  It was only a matter of time before Jacob got caught. He had lived a life of luxury for years, making the kind of money he did. He wouldn’t be able to slum it for long. He’d make a desperate move to get cash, and we would all be there to apprehend them. To throw his ass down to the pavement and maybe bust his nose as the police handcuffed him. I continued flipping through pages, double-checking numbers and running calculations as Sam came out of the washroom.

  She was practically living in that thing now since I was pulling so many late nights at the office.

  “I reached out to some of my contacts,” she said. “To see if I could track down Jacob.”

  “You have contacts who might know where Jacob is?” I asked.

  “When I tell you I live in the darkness, I’m not kidding. Some unsavory characters owe me favors for things I did for them. I’m cashing parts of them in.”

  “Parts of them? You can cash in partial favors?”

  “Yes. Right now, I’m simply gathering information. I’ll cash the rest in if I need their help catching this son of a bitch.”

  “I thought you said Jacob would never survive in the criminal underworld.”

  “I get you think this is a game, but it isn’t to me,” I said.

  “Every time I see you in that sling, I understand it’s not a game. Just didn’t take you for the type to fraternize with criminal under lords.”

  An involuntary grin spread across my cheeks as I darted my eyes over toward Sam. She was tense. Her eyes were hot on me as I leaned back in my chair. I knew I was teasing her, but I was trying to lighten the mood. I had no idea the types of people she was in contact with or the kinds of people she was introducing into this scenario. Who was to say they wouldn’t use that information to come after me somehow?”

  “Don’t worry,” Sam said. “I’m being careful as to what I say. All I’ve told them is that I’m on the lookout for Jacob Carl. They all know who he is, thanks to the media.”

  “They don’t know why?” I asked.

  “Nope. Only told them I wanted him before the police got to him. They can draw their own conclusions.”

  “Mr. Steele,” Emma said with a knock. “I’ve got your reports.”

  “Come on in, Miss Emma.”

  “Hey there, Sam. How are you? How’s your arm?”

  “The pain medication helps with the worst of it,” Sam said.

  “Everything’s good to go on that real estate company you bought out. They signed off on the time frame, so now it’s only a matter of you getting in touch with the construction company. I’ve also got yearly progress reports for the merger project two
years ago as well as budgets confirmed and signed off by Finance.”

  Emma handed me a stack of folders, her eyes dancing between mine as I reached out for them. Ever since she’d found out Sam was my bodyguard, things had been less tense with her. She was friendlier toward Sam, and her hostility toward me had dissipated. It was ironic, given the fact that Sam and I had slept together on many occasions. But Emma didn’t seem to let on that she knew about any of that.

  So things were peaceful. For now.

  “You have a phone call with one of your investors at three,” Emma said. “Then there’s a conference call tonight at nine with some of our international investors. You know, a catch-up sort of meeting. And that’s it.”

  “Thank you, Emma. That’ll be all,” I said.

  She left the room, throwing Sam one more carefree smile before she shut my office door behind her. I stared down at the documents, sighing as I leaned further into my chair. This was the type of shit Jacob had been paid to take care of. And now it was falling into my lap, and people were looking to me to see who I would consider as my new COO.

  I wasn’t even ready to tackle that monster yet.

  “You ever sit back sometimes and wonder what the hell you’re supposed to be doing?” I asked.

  “Nope,” Sam said.

  “Could you lie to me and tell me you do?” I asked.

  “Lying to you doesn’t do any good. But if you wanna talk, I’m here.”

  “All of this ... this stuff,” I said as I slammed down the folders, “it was Jacob’s job. All this stuff routed through him, and I trusted that. But now, with all this, I’m paranoid. I’m going back through everything to see if something got screwed up, notated wrong or if money was embezzled or something. People are looking to me to cast someone else as my COO, and I don’t even trust Emma as far as I can toss her right now.”

  “In that defense, she’s pretty light. If I tossed her out the window, she’d fall pretty far.”

  I chuckled and shook my head as I closed my eyes.

  “I can’t even think about hiring someone else to be the fucking COO of this company, and yet I can’t handle the workload.”

  “You have been pulling a lot of late nights,” Sam said. “But once we catch Jacob, I think it’ll be easier for you to hire someone.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  “Part of this is because of trust issues, but the logical part of you also sees that seat as a threat. If you hire someone else to take it, there’s a chance Jacob could come after them out of anger. Or revenge. I think part of this is coming from the betrayal, but I think part of this is you protecting your company.”

  “It’s funny, really. When I made my first half a billion with this company, I knew I’d made it. I traveled the path I set for my life, and I achieved more than I ever thought possible. I didn’t think anything could knock me from my pedestal. Absolutely nothing. Then something like this happens, and I wonder how the hell I could’ve missed it. After putting so much care into my career and attentiveness into my education, how could I have missed something this drastic?”

  “It’s not your job to dwell on that. It’s mine,” Sam said.

  “But it’s not. You were right. My personal feelings toward Jacob influenced your outlook on him. It was your job to catch him. It’s not your job to beat yourself up over this.”

  “Then who’s is it?” she asked.

  “I don’t know,” I said with a sigh. “I just ... I don’t know anymore. I’m doubting myself, and I never fucking do that. I’ve always been confident. I’ve always known all the parts of the equation, but this shit with Jacob proved I didn’t.”

  “And that worries you.”

  “You’re damn right it does.”

  The silence in the air hung heavily between us. Sam was sitting on the couch in the corner, staring at me as I twisted around in my chair. I felt like I was floating aimlessly among the clouds. Untethered and ungrounded. I reached my hand out and put it on the stacks of folders Emma had delivered and heaved a heavy sigh into the room.

  What the hell was I going to do?

  “You know, my parents wanted me to be a dancer,” Sam said.

  “What?” I asked.

  “You mentioned something about life paths. That was what my parents wanted for me. To become a dancer.”

  “I didn’t know you danced.”

  “I do a lot of things. Helps me with my undercover work. I dance. I sing. I play a few instruments. Can mock a few accents. Things like that,” she said.

  “What do you sing?”

  “Jazz and opera, mostly.”

  “You sing opera,” I said as I swiveled toward her. “Like, belting high notes from a stage without a microphone.”

  “Yeah?” Her tone dared me to question her ability.

  I started laughing, my head shaking from side to side as I tried to conjure the idea of Sam in some poofy dress and a corset, belting high ass notes in foreign languages with pounds of makeup on.

  The image itself was enough to bring tears to my eyes.

  I thought she was going to throw something at me. Pick up a knife and chuck it at my skull. But instead, her laughter rose from the other side of the room. The sound was light and lilting, so unlike the voice she talked in on a daily basis. Our sounds intertwined and filled the room with a joyous sound. It warmed my chest and trickled good feelings throughout my body.

  Oh, how good it felt to smile.

  “That was unexpected,” I said.

  “It’s good to see you smile. Sue me,” she said with a shrug.

  I turned my gaze toward Sam, her smile fading as our eyes connected.

  “We’ll catch him and soon,” she said. “I’ve got everyone from the FBI to Interpol actively searching for him.”

  “And your criminal contacts,” I said with a grin.

  “Them, too. It’s only a matter of time. It’ll happen. And when it does, this entire nightmare will be over.”

  It was hard for me to believe that. I had gotten used to Sam following me around and to my life always being on the line with this threat looming over my head. I was learning to work under the pressure, and I was slowly beginning to forget what it felt like to work without the threat of my life being ripped from me at a moment’s notice.

  Was this how Sam felt every day? On edge and yet, somehow settled?

  I wasn’t sure if we were going to catch Jacob soon. According to Sam just after she was shot, Jacob should’ve never escaped the building. The mere fact that he could fly underneath the radar with me like he’d done told me he was capable of more than we thought.

  I didn’t know if I trusted her words.

  I didn’t know if I trusted her reassurance.

  Hell, I didn’t know if I trusted anything anymore.

  Chapter 6

  Sam

  THE MIDDLE OF JUNE had rolled around, and the heat of San Francisco was becoming apparent. My jeans were unbearable, and my leather jacket had been traded for nothing more than leather hand warmers. They cushioned my hands if I had to throw a punch, but if I had to continuously fight someone, they also delivered a stunning electrical force. I’d made them myself, taking apart the leather fabric and installing the wires necessary to make them into another concealed weapon. There was a switch in the palm of my hand that had to be flipped. Then it was only a matter of balling up my fist and throwing a punch.

  The wires, once connected to the skin, did the rest.

  If I wasn’t sleeping in Derek’s executive washroom suite, I was sleeping at his house. I had set myself up in a room with eyes on his property surveillance system. I spent very little time at my house, always poised and ready for action should someone attempt to breach his property again. It felt odd here at night when San Francisco went to sleep and the stars in the sky twinkled above. Derek would stare at me when he thought I wasn’t looking, raking his eyes up and down my form.

  It made me unsettled, but it also made me happy.

  I didn’t like t
hat. The fact that it made me happy.

  “Sam? Sam, you there?”

  “Huh? Yeah. Hey, John. What’s up?” I asked.

  “The shift change is occurring. You want an update?” he asked.

  “Let me guess. No perimeter breaches, no letters, no foul play.”

  “Sounds about right,” he said with a grin.

  “Who’s on this shift change? Still the same guys?” I asked.

  “Sam, can I talk to you about something?”

  “Sure. What’s up?”

  “Without sounding insubordinate, I think it would be good if we got Derek away for a while.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You know, like a vacation. He doesn’t have to stop working, but with the police and the FBI hot on Jacob’s tail, I figured he would let up a bit. But Mr. Steele is more wound up than ever. He’s gonna have a heart attack with all this stress.”

  “In his defense, his best friend did try to kill him.”

  “All I’m saying is there’s no change in the threat, but there is a change in him. And it’s not a good one. He’s not really eating. If he’s not working at his office, he’s working here. The man could use a break.”

  “I can talk to him, but I can’t force him to do anything like that,” I said.

  “If there’s anyone who can convince him, it’s you. Spending some time away from this place will be safer for him, but it’ll also be healthier. Just ... talk to him. See what he thinks.”

  “Will do. Thanks for the update.”

  I lifted my eyes up the stairs and sighed. I knew Derek had been working late, but I didn’t know how badly it was affecting him. The man needed to eat. And if he wasn’t eating, then he was probably having trouble sleeping as well. I sighed as I walked up the stairs, making my way to his office as new men came trekking into the house. The shift changes were always louder than I wanted, with tactical boots stomping around and guns being prepped for action.

  But it was necessary to keep this man feeling safe.