Page 3 of Beauty and the Billionaire

But Vivien focused on me. She was a tall, curvy drag queen with glamorous wigs, elegant dresses, and a deep love for makeup. She was the only drag queen I knew, and I had never seen her perform onstage as she did every weekend. She also happened to have experience with ruthless men who wanted to take something away from her. Just a few weeks ago, a Manhattan developer showed up with bulldozers to turn this place into a luxury hotel. Vivien made her stand with Roman and the developer’s son, Everett, winning against the injustice. She was precisely the person to talk to no matter what the problemwas. “What can I do for you, Zain?” Her hand touched my upper arm and gently nudged me away from Roman and Bradley.

We stood in the corner, and I rummaged through the mess inside my head. “Erm, this is going to sound strange, but I’m looking for a rich guy.”

“Aren’t we all, darling?” Vivien said and laughed. “I only joke.”

I chuckled, although heat rose into my face sooner than I could cool off. “I’m looking for a specific one. Blackthorne? I was hoping you would know where I could find him.”

“Dominic Blackthorne?” Vivien asked, bewildered.

“I don’t know his name,” I said. “Judging by the look on your face, I’d say that’s the one.”

“What on earth would you want to do with him?” Vivien asked, worry creeping into the very air between us. “That is a ruthless man if I ever knew one.”

“Ruthless? How so?” I asked, although I had a good idea already.

“They hardly call you the Baron of Manhattan for doing anything good, darling,” Vivien said in a hushed voice. “And I’m yet to meet a banker with a ticket to Heaven. But Dominic…” Vivien shook her head sadly. “He has pushed every competitor out of the business on a path of personal vendetta. Oh, I don’t know the details, darling, but I heard things. Some say that looking at him for too long is enough to put you on his list. He’s rich enough to have God in his pocket, let alone the various commissions whose job would be to keep him in check. And before I tell you anything more, I need to know if you offended him somehow.”

“I…don’t think so,” I said. “But my father…”

“I see,” Vivien said softly. “Well, if it’s a personal matter, it’s your right to decide what to do, but I would advise you to stay out of Dominic’s way.”

I couldn’t believe my ears. This was the same person who had crossed her arms before the bulldozers parked on the street and told a billionaire developer to get lost. She wasn’t afraid of powerful men.

“Dominic Blackthorne owns properties wherever your gaze goes, but he never spends time in any of them. I heard he lives alone in a mansion upstate. There’s his staff, of course, but you’ll never hear them speaking about Dominic or their work. Unusual for the industry and more than a little peculiar.” Vivien folded her hand with long, red acrylic nails on the counter. “It’s a big estate, darling. And he’s not the sort of man who would welcome uninvited visitors. The chances are you’ll never be near him again.”

I understood that. That was what I had expected to hear. However… “He said he would be in the city for a few days.”

Vivien nodded. “You are lucky. Or unlucky, depending on how you slice it. If he’s here, he’s likely to stay in that ugly, pretentious building on the corner of Hudson and Christopher. He owns the top three floors, of course.”

Hudson and Christopher. That was on the edge of Hudson Burrow. While most of the neighborhood was made up of lower redbrick buildings, some developers managed to get permits to build luxurious buildings around us. That was one of them. “Thank you,” I said.

“I wish I didn’t know how to help,” Vivien said gravely as I turned around and walked away.

Dominic

My camera was off while I swirled the whiskey and ice in my glass, moving my gaze from one angry, concerned face to the next. Julian, Nicholas, and Maxwell, the Harvard pricks I once knew, simmered in frustrated silence.

I looked at each in turn while they waited for me to join the meeting. Julian Hale Jr., the heir to the diminished Hale wealth, was the smart one of the three. Blond, blue-eyed, with three-day stubble and dark circles around his eyes, Julian exhibited all the wonderful traits of a man who hadn’t slept in a while.

Nicholas Voss was the stupid one. That didn’t stop him from forming HVB with the other two. They needed him for his money. He had always been the easiest one to rope into new projects, so when his close friends, Julian and Maxwell, endeavored to create the most ambitious investment firm in the city, they pampered him into funding the damned thing.

And Maxwell Blake, the B of it all, was the lucky devil. Where Julian’s brain stopped short, Maxwell’s daring bridged the gaps. It was like he had a private audience with God whenever the market was the most unpredictable, and his bets paid off nine times out of ten. Truly, Maxwell was the one who made the company what it was today.

I knew them from before, of course. To me, they were the college brats who couldn’t fathom the fact that a poor kid could study at Harvard with a full scholarship. “He gives that sweet ass to the president every Saturday,” Julian had claimed. “Why else do you think he’s around?”

“You like it up your butt, Blackthorne?” Nicholas demanded aloud as if he had never considered that such things existed.

“Careful, Nicky,” Maxwell whispered. “If you bend down without looking over your shoulder, he might slip it in before you know it.”

“Nah, you won’t feel a thing,” Julian assured their stupid, wealthy pet.

The three of them had set the tone for the rest of my time at Harvard. Things only got worse after that first encounter. They weren’t the only ones, but they were the first. They were the template for all the spoiled sons of wealthy fathers I came across throughout my life.

I fingered my glass and tilted it to splash some woody, smoky whiskey over my tongue. It tasted like victory. The work I had done over the last ten years had brought me here purely becausethiswas why I did anything. I would savor it. I had to savor it.

The sweat on Julian’s tanned forehead said he had a good idea of why we were here. He suspected it, at least. It was delicious.

My pulse sped up as I pictured the next ten minutes: their stupid, surprised faces and sheer disbelief. It was like the final crescendo to a very long, very overdue symphony.

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