Page 33 of The Runaway Billionaire's Inconvenient Baby
“The caves? In the dark?”
“It’s not dark yet,” I scoff. “Besides, hardly anyone knows these caves exist. It’s a great place to watch the sunset from.”
I lead him toward the rocks, and he squints in confusion at them. “There aren’t any caves here,” he says, eyes narrowing like I’m walking him into a trap.
“They kind of dip underground a little. They’re really hidden. You have to know they’re here to find them. Come on.”
Against my promise, I start crawling over the rocks. I hear him groan behind me, but he follows anyway. For a beautiful moment, the only sounds in the world are the waves rushing over the sand and Jacob, completely out of breath as he scrambles over the rocks, struggling to keep up.
When he finally catches up to me and sits next to me, the deep breath of delight as he sees the sun reflecting over the ocean brings me immense satisfaction. “Beautiful, right?”
“Yes,” he says. “You are.”
“What?” I almost yell.
He blinks, panicking. “What?”
“That was a slip of the tongue, right?” I giggle, trying to diffuse some of the awkwardness with a joke.
He stares at me with wide eyes, then glances at the sunset before looking back at me, his mouth ever so slightly open, his lips pink and inviting.
“Jacob,” I ask quietly. “You were joking, right? That was a mistake?”
“A mistake in the sense that I didn’t mean to say it out loud, yes. But not a mistake in the sense that I said something that wasn’t true.” His voice is low, and I barely hear it over the thumping in my head.
I can’t believe what I’m hearing. “Have you hit your head?” I ask with a faint chuckle. “Aren’t we supposed to be mortal enemies?”
“Do mortal enemies watch the sunset together?” he asks, gesturing out at the vast sky before us.
“I don’t suppose they do,” I say.
“I’ve never met anyone like you before,” he says almost to himself, staring out at the sky as if he’s trying to pretend I’m not there so he can make his confession. “I’ve never met anyone who’s so honest with me.”
“What, nobody else has ever called you an asshole before?”
He smiles at that, and I smile back at him. We’re supposed to be looking at the sunset, but I can’t take my eyes off him or the way the last of the sun’s golden rays make his eyes sparkle, lengthen the shadow under his chin and bring out his cheekbones. He is an exceedingly handsome man. I’ve never met anyone like him before, either.
I’ve faced challenges before, dealt with difficult men, difficult problems. But usually, those problems go away. Usually, my service to the world is all anyone notices about me, and here’s Jacob calling me beautiful.
It’s beyond belief.
“If this is a joke,” I say softly, “tell me now. It’s not funny to lead me on like this.”
“Who said anything about leading you on?” He turns to look at me now, his eyes stern with a realization that’s dawning on him. “Has no one ever called you beautiful before?”
“Do you count my mother and teenage boyfriends?”
“No.”
“Well, then.” I bite my lip, my mind racing with the reality that’s unravelling before me. If this is reality. This is the kind of situation you wake up from, the kind of weird but pleasant dream you have in the throes of the flu.
“They should have,” he says, the intensity of his words growing. “You should have someone to tell you how special you are. You should have someone who means it.”
My lips tremble, and my breath shakes. How can this be happening? How can a billionaire have looked at me and thought I was beautiful?
“Billie,” he says, looking deep into my eyes, into my heart. “Let me kiss you?”
“Kiss you? Kiss me?” I stammer.
