Page 13 of Unwrapping the Billionaire

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Grace

Present

“Here, drink these... Line ‘em up. One at a time.Bam bam bam.Don't even think about, just do it.”

My best friend, Trina, neatly arranges six shot glasses on the bar counter in front of us, and pushes the first one toward me.

“Is this really the best way to handle the death of my pride?” I say doubtfully.

“Yes!” she exclaims, filling the word with so much certainty it’s bursting at the seams. “This is the best kind of funeral wake for you. You won’t feel a thing afterward, except the mother of all hangovers. Jonas Farley could make you crawl around his office like a dog, and you won’t give a shit.”

“Is that a thing?” I make a face at her.Think of the end game, Grace... You can't let this company go under.

“There’s a kink for every occasion in Manhattan,” she says with a grin, swiping her messy, brown bangs out of her eyes. “Now, drink up. You don't have time to reach total obliteration, but this lot will give you a pretty good head start.”

I pick up the shot glass and sniff the contents. Tequila. I’ll be yapping like a dog for him no problem after a couple of these. “He still hates me,” I muse suddenly. “Even after all this time. I could hear it in his voice…”

“I have a theory about that.” Trina picks up a shot glass from the opposite end of the line and clinks it with mine. “Down it, and I’ll share it.”

“Okay, fine.”

We wince on cue as the alcohol hits the back of our throats in glorious, messy tandem.

“What’s the time?” I croak, banging the empty shot glass down, and grabbing my cell. I glance at the screen and visibly deflate into my barstool. “Oh God… Only thirty minutes until execution time.”

“Then drink another, and fast.” Trina pushes a second shot glass toward me.

“What about your theory?”

“Alpha and beta,” she says knowingly. “You were never a pushover for him. You were a Christmas novelty, like one of those seasonal gifts in the stores that people crowd around in fascinated wonder.”

“Like the massage chair,” I say.

“Like the massage chair,” she agrees. “Or the jumping dog.”

“Are we back to the canine thing again?”

“Problem is, that alpha gene is a default setting. It never really goes away. Jonas decided to test you by sending you that email. When you didn't come running and begging, he got all puffed-out-chest-and-grudgy about it.”

“Enough to not talk to me for two years?”

Trina laughs. “You sound surprised! You know, you're just as bad as him.”

That’s what made us so good together, and that man was so damn good at being bad.I can feel the heat blossoming between my legs at the memories.

There’s a moment of silence between us, filled with a few bars of the old Wham song coming from the jukebox in the corner.

“You think I should have called him, don't you?”

Trina sighs. “I think you should have called each other, but who the hell was I to intervene?”

“It’s too late now,” I say with a sigh. “After tonight, I’ll have even more reason to hate him. Big stuff, this time… The kind of stuff that no amount of tequila is going to numb.”

“Stop right there, lady. I’m not having any of that misery around here, not when it’s Christmas Eve,” says Trina firmly, before she’s bursting into the first line of Rudolph The Red Nose Reindeer to cheer me up—jazz-hands waving like crazy as she shoots me another grin. “It’s Happy Time Central, accordingly to my TV guide. Maybe it’ll affect even him.”

“Infect, not affect,” I correct, glumly. “He hates Christmas. It makes him even more of an asshole.”

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