Page 15 of Meet Jon, the Billionaire

I was about to ask him what he did for a living, but he had more questions.

“Breadcetera has been around for a long time, yes?”

“Over forty years.” We began meandering toward the courts. I had all but forgotten about the actual tennis match we would have to play. Then I remembered I was going to throw the match on purpose anyway and relaxed.

“I would imagine that your aunt does good business.”

“Oh yeah. A good day clears fifteen grand.”

“Fifteen grand?” His mouth fell open. “But the typical revenue for a bakery is five to seven thousand…”

I wondered how he knew that little tidbit, but I was too busy showing off to pay it much mind. “Well, we’re really good at what we do. Plus I’m counting the revenue from our cake decoration services, which is where about twenty-five percent of what we make comes from.”

“That’s amazing. To what do you attribute this great success?”

Again, I could detect the presence of ulterior motives from Jonathon, even if I couldn’t tell what said ulterior motives were. I wasn’t sure what to make of it, so I just answered truthfully.

“Okay, this is going to absolutelystampedeover cliche territory, but here goes. If you want to know our secret, it’s that all of the employees care about the bakery and each other. We really are a family.”

I couldn’t help but laugh and add “A dysfunctional family at times. Like last night, I wound up decorating a birthday cake with an anatomically correct naked Jason Momoa drawn on it with icing.”

Jonathon burst into laughter. “You’re kidding!”

“Oh, I wish I were.”

I dug my phone out of my purse and showed him a cropped photo of the cake, where the naughty bits had been removed.

“This is really good.”

I laughed, and he shook his head. “No, I’m serious. You have a lot of talent.”

“I cheat, actually. We have a machine that’s sort of like a 3D printer for icing that does the heavy lifting. I just come in and touch it up a little. In the case of this cake, I had to do some, um, freehand drawing.”

He looked at me with a new level of appreciation in his eyes. “Your aunt is lucky to have you, Amy. Any business would be lucky to have you.”

“Thanks.” My cheeks burned, and I couldn’t quite look him in the eyes. Again, I felt like I should ask Jonathon to tell me about himself but we were interrupted, this time by an irate tournament official who was incensed we were taking our slow, lazy ass time reaching the courts.

I was surprised at the number of spectators. Most were friends and family that showed up to cheer on their favored participants, but I noticed some news media in the crowd as well, including cameras.

That made me super nervous. I hadn’t given much thought to how the actual tournament would play out, and now I had been thrust into the thick of it. People gawking everywhere, and the Maddoxes staring at us with laser-eyed focus made my carefully laid plans unspool in my mind. It was like my thoughts were a toilet paper roll and reality was a cat high on nip batting away until they were all gone.

“Heads or tails?” Chad said, holding a silver dollar in his palm and looking between me and Jonathon.

“Tails,” Jonathon said, melting me with a smoldering gaze. Something about the way he said ‘tails’ just… I don’t know. For a split second we were both totally thinking about sex. With each other. And it was awkward but thrilling.

“Tails it is.” Chad flipped the coin and caught it on the palm of his hand, quickly slapping it onto the back. “Looks like you get to serve.”

“Do you want to switch sides of the court?” I asked.

“Nah, we’re happy where we are.”

Jonathon cocked an eyebrow at me. “Do you want to serve first?”

I decided it would be too obvious to blow the serve. “Not really.”

“All right, I’ll be your huckleberry.” He winked at me and took up his position. Jonathon tossed the yellow ball in the air and stretched out his long limbs like a lion in the sun. It was a pleasure to watch him move with such liquid grace.

He smacked the ball and it flew—actually, I wasn’t sure where it flew, because I was still watching Jonathon. He dropped into a low crouch, recovering his balance and prepared to answer their returning lob.

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