Page 23 of Rival to the Billionaire

And wondering why the hell I suddenly care so much.

ChapterSeven

RYDER

The main bar in the lobby of the Fountain Springs hotel is the best place to relax as the sun sets in Vegas, with its panoramic views of the city.

It's also the best place to watch women.

There are a ton of them here, in skin-tight dresses. Flirting with the bartenders. Laughing with their girlfriends.

I don't laugh with them. I don't give them a second glance.

All because of Jenny.

The woman's infuriating way of making me feel like a cad has me sulking in my drink. My hand wrapped around a Black Manhattan that's as dark as my mood, I let one or two flirtatious come-ons from the bartender slide.

This used to be my modus operandi—my lifestyle of choice when it came to women.

I'd show interest. I'd flirt. I'd have fun. And then I'd walk away. Without a second thought.

Tapping the edge of my half-empty glass, I contemplate the way I lived my life until quite a few months ago…when my days of ‘work hard, play harder' ended because of the app. I'd spent my days and nights helping to develop it, then testing it.

And I found myself consumed by it. Hooked.

I'd started spending my free time working on it…dedicating more hours to it than the many flings I'd juggled at the same time.

In the beginning, I'd done it to defy Derek, my big brother teasing that I was too much of a playboy to focus so much of my time on one thing.

Getting into the work of developing a reading app was my way of proving to him I was tough enough to work as hard as he did.

I never thought I would actually love it. Love dedicating myself to building something that would change millions of lives in a good way…

Then, one by one, my friends-with-benefits started to disappear. I'd found myself drifting away from sleeping around, because I no longer had the time or energy. I was in a techno-sexual love affair with the app.

And yet, it was Jenny who haunted me. Left me spinning with my lack of forward progress.

Jenny and her always-secured, silky, red-cinnamon hair. Her golden-green eyes. The way she frowned beneath those red glasses when she was thinking. The way she sighed when she was mad…or…or the way she laughed when she was happy.

Not that she was happy much these days, but she had been happy, actually laughing, at the charity event with Julian Sabado.

And I wanted that smile to be mine.

Was I wrong for not thinking things through? For letting her come on this trip after we'd come to verbal blows on that dance floor?

I can still remember how she felt as we swayed to the music. How her body shuddered against mine.

How she leaned into me, how she made me forget—for a moment—that I'd been hurt by her.

I didn't look at her because I was afraid to. Afraid I'd like her. Afraid she'd be my undoing when she was the last thing I needed.

Jenny had always been the one thing holding me together when we were young enough to find ourselves in trouble. No one else knew—or could know—what it felt like to be abandoned by parents who were still alive.

Except Jenny.

She'd made me feel like the most important person to her in the world. Until one day, she just stopped.

And even when we were falling apart, in that moment on the dance floor, I knew she felt how I did.

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