Billion dollar baby bargain.txt Read online

  TESSA RADLEY

  BILLION-DOLLAR BABY BARGAIN

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Epilogue

  Prologue

  W ho would have thought that a baby—cute and gurgly when his mother held him—could be such a

  demanding little devil? Victoria Sutton sank down onto the couch in the living room of her Auckland

  town house and gazed at the sleeping baby in the traveling cot with weary disbelief.

  Dylan looked utterly angelic as stubby eyelashes rested in dusky crescents against chubby baby cheeks

  and his mouth moved gently up and down.

  Oh, for a shot of caffeine.

  Strong, hot Starbucks coffee. Hard to believe the whole weekend had passed without finding time to

  pick one up. Mandy, her secretary, would laugh herself silly tomorrow when Victoria recounted the

  events of the past two days.

  Had it only been two days?

  Propping her elbows on her knees, Victoria rested her chin in her palms, and groaned. Two days, but

  also two pretty much sleepless nights during which Dylan had turned her normally organized life upside

  down. Heavens, it seemed like she hadn’t drawn a breath since her best friend Suzy had gabbled her last

  bits of advice on Friday evening as Michael had tugged his wife out the front door, eager to get away for

  a brief romantic break to celebrate their second wedding anniversary.

  Never again would she imagine that babies slept all the time!

  Lifting her head from her cupped palms, Victoria scanned the normally immaculate living room and

  took in the chaotic disarray of toys, diapers and other baby paraphernalia. Another groan escaped. She

  knew her bedroom looked worse. She needed to get the mess packed up before Dylan’s parents arrived

  to collect him.

  Victoria glanced ruefully at the apple puree smears on the winter-white fabric of the couch. And that

  stain on the carpet hadn’t been there before Friday, either. What had possessed her to feed Dylan in the

  all-white living room this morning? Had she learned nothing over the past two days?

  Tomorrow first thing she’d organize to get the marks cleaned.

  Tomorrow. Oh, heavens. Victoria’s hands shot to her mouth in dismay.

  The weekly Monday-morning partners’ meeting…

  Good grief, she hadn’t done any preparation. She thought wildly of how she’d delusionally planned to

  work while Dylan napped over the weekend.

  A glance at the wall clock showed her it was still early. Michael and Suzy would be here within the next

  two hours to pick up Dylan. The whole evening lay ahead.

  If she worked quickly to tidy the apartment, she might even get some work in before the Masons arrived.

  Grabbing a nappy bag, Victoria started to toss in toys, wet-wipes and unused diapers.

  But nothing could take away from the fun she’d had with her godson. They’d played peekaboo and

  she’d tickled Dylan’s tummy. They’d been to the beach, where she’d dipped Dylan’s toes in the

  shallows while he squealed in ecstasy. They’d even shared an ice-cream cone—granted, most of it had

  ended up over Dylan’s face, plus a few smears down Victoria’s favorite Kate Sylvester T-shirt.

  So she’d willingly offer to do it again. Her godson was adorable. A memory of his loud, growling

  screams in the middle of the night made her amend that statement. Mostly he was adorable.

  The throaty roar of a powerful motor pulling up outside her town house unit made her pause in the act of

  retrieving a miniature sock from under the coffee table.

  She checked the slim gold watch on her wrist. Too early for Michael and Suzy.

  The doorbell rang in a long, insistent buzz. Victoria leaped to her feet, a quick glance showing that

  Dylan hadn’t stirred. The bell buzzed again. She shot across the room and, without pausing to look

  through the peephole, yanked the door open before whoever it was could lean on the doorbell again.

  “Connor!”

  Connor North, Michael’s best man, stood on her doorstep.

  To Victoria’s annoyance her pulse kicked up, but with practiced ease she avoided Connor’s gaze. He

  wore a white T-shirt that stretched across a broad chest, and a pair of jeans that molded the lean hips.

  “I probably should have called.”

  His voice was gravelly, all male, full of edges with no smooth sweetness. Victoria knew she should

  reply, should agree that it would have been better for him to have called first—and then hope like blazes

  that he would go.

  Instead, unable to answer him or steel herself to meet his unsettling pale gray eyes, Victoria fixed her

  gaze on the hard line of his mouth. Mistake. It had been two years since he had kissed her at Michael and

  Suzy’s wedding. By rights she should’ve forgotten all about the texture of his lips against hers, the

  desire that had spun dizzily within her.

  She hadn’t.

  Victoria swallowed.

  The memory of the taste of him, the hardness of his body against hers, was so immediate it could’ve

  happened yesterday. Despite her every effort to pretend it had never happened at all.

  “Connor…” she croaked, wishing he was a million miles away.

  Why had he come? They didn’t have the kind of relationship that allowed for casual drop-ins. To be

  honest they didn’t have any kind of relationship at all.

  Since the wedding the two of them had developed an unspoken pact of practicing avoidance: when one

  arrived at the Masons’ home, the other departed within minutes. The passage of time had not dulled the

  hostility that crackled between them. A dislike that they both colluded to conceal from Michael and Suzy

  —and Dylan.

  She tried again. “Connor, what are you doing here?”

  Carefully, with immense composure, she raised her gaze from that hard, tight mouth and met his gaze.

  To her astonishment he didn’t look anything like his usual arrogant, assured self. He looked…

  She took in his pallor, the dull flatness in his gray eyes. He looked shattered. “Hey, are you okay?”

  “Victoria—” He broke off and shoved his hands in his pockets.

  At least he seemed to have no difficulty remembering her name these days, Victoria thought wryly. But

  it wasn’t like Connor to be at a loss for words. Usually the sarcastic quips rolled off his tongue. She

  frowned. “What is it?”

  “Can I come in?”

  Victoria hesitated. She didn’t particularly want him in her home. But he was…he wasn’t himself. “Sure.”

  Leading him into the living room, she felt a flare of embarrassment at what he must see. Toys. Baby

  blankets. Dirty plates. She would’ve preferred Connor to see her home as it normally looked. Elegant.

  Immaculate. “Excuse the mess.”

  He didn’t even glance sideways. “Victoria…” That soulless gaze was focused on her face with an

  inte
nsity that was awfully disconcerting.

  The need to fill the awkward silence made her blurt out, “Can I fix you a cup of coffee? Not that it’s

  anything like Starbucks, but I was about to make myself—” she stopped before she could reveal that one

  small human had reduced her to a caffeine-craving wreck “—a hot drink.”

  “No.”

  “Tea?”

  He shook his head.

  She moved toward the kitchen, which opened off the living room, flipped the kettle’s switch and opened

  the fridge.

  “I don’t have beer. Would you like a cola?” she offered with reluctance as his footfalls sounded on the

  tiles behind her. She wished he’d waited for her in the living room. There wasn’t enough space in the

  kitchen for the two of them.

  “Please.” He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck and shut his eyes. An instant later they flicked

  open and she glimpsed…pain?

  Victoria swung away and yanked the fridge door open. She stared blindly at the contents before reaching

  for two cans of cola. Shutting the door, she said more curtly than she’d intended, “So what do you want,

  Connor?”

  His mouth twisted. “Certainly not sympathy.”

  She flicked him a rapid once-over as she set the cans down on the counter. He made no move toward the

  drinks. A ring of white that she hadn’t noticed before surrounded his lips.

  What was wrong with him? “Why on earth would I offer you sympathy?”

  It couldn’t possibly be about his former girlfriend. That had been over two years ago and no one ever

  spoke about Dana or Paul Harper, Connor’s former business partner who had pinched his live-in lover

  while Connor had been out of the country on a business trip.

  What Victoria had gleaned of the affair had come from a soft-focus women’s magazine feature on Dana

  and Paul not long after Suzy’s wedding. Connor’s ex had been nominated for a business award, and was

  quoted gushing about how happy she was, how she’d “come into herself.” There’d been an

  accompanying spread of photos showing the couple at home in a modern Italianate mansion, all glass

  and marble.

  Yet according to stories in business publications, Harper-North Architecture hadn’t thrived well under

  Paul’s leadership after Connor had walked out. In fact, Suzy had once told Victoria that Paul Harper still

  owed Connor money. Victoria had surmised that the only thing keeping Connor from placing Harper-

  North—and Paul Harper—into receivership must be his intent to squeeze every cent he could out of Paul

  Harper.

  By contrast, there’d been quite a splash in the media about The Phoenix Corporation, the waterfront

  development company that Connor had floated. Reading between the lines, Victoria had gathered that

  he’d turned what for a lesser man might have spelled disaster into a multimillion-dollar success story.

  Yet a sense that something was not quite right closed in on her, as he rubbed his hands over his face in a

  manner she could only describe as helpless.

  “I shouldn’t have made that crack about sympathy,” he said. “Oh, hell, let me start over.” He dropped

  his hands to his sides and the eyes that met hers were as expressionless as ever. “I’m sorry, Victoria, I’ve

  got bad news.”

  “Bad news?” Bewilderment set in. “What bad news?”

  “Michael—”

  “No,” she interrupted, as if that might stop her absorbing the reality of the despair that clung to him.

  “Not Michael!”

  Her index finger tapped her watch face with insistent, staccato force. “He’ll be here soon. I know it.”

  Connor was shaking his head and his face was gray, his eyes drained of all vitality. “He won’t. He’s

  never coming back.”

  He had to be.

  A sickening fear hollowed out her stomach. She found herself standing right in front of him—closer than

  she’d ever been, except for that brief disastrous time when they’d danced together at Michael and Suzy’s

  wedding. And when he’d kissed her. “You’re wrong.”

  Because if Michael wasn’t coming back that meant…

  Seized by desperation, she choked out, “Suzy. Where’s Suzy?”

  “Victoria…”

  This time he didn’t have to say anything more. It was all in the way he looked at her with deep sorrow

  and regret.

  “No!” she howled, her throat thickening with grief.

  He moved swiftly forward. “Suzy’s gone, too.”

  Victoria fell forward against the broad chest, uncaring of how unyielding Connor’s solid frame had

  become. After a moment of blubbering her arms crept up about his neck.

  He grew more rigid still for just a moment until his arms came around her and squeezed. Then he shook

  off her clinging arms and stepped back, his eyes remote.

  “There are arrangements to make. I need to get on to them but I thought you should know…” His voice

  trailed away.

  “That Michael and Suzy are—” she couldn’t bring herself to say it “—are not coming home.”

  A muscle moved high in his cheek. “That’s right.”

  “No, it isn’t right. It’s wrong!”

  The eyes that met hers were full of torment. “Victoria—”

  She shook her head. “They’re supposed to knock on the door…Suzy will be laughing, she’ll call out,

  ‘I’m baaack.’”

  He hunched his shoulders.

  The lump in her throat finally got too big and her voice broke. Tears welled up from deep within her

  aching heart. “It’s not fair. They should be here.”

  Backing out of the kitchen, Connor spread his hands, then dropped them to his sides. “Look, there’s a lot

  to be done.”

  “And you don’t have time for good, old-fashioned grief,” Victoria said bitterly, as she followed him.

  “You’re overreacting.” He looked hunted. “I’ll talk to you later.”

  “I’m coming with you.”

  “No, you’re not. I work faster alone. And you need to take care of Dylan.”

  Dylan!

  She gaped at Connor in horror. Oh, dear Lord, how could she have forgotten about Dylan?

  Dylan had lost his parents.

  Connor couldn’t leave now. “Connor!”

  But Connor was already halfway across the living room. He threw an unreadable glance over his

  shoulder but didn’t slow down. “When I come back we’ll talk about Dylan.”

  One

  August, two years ago

  T he taxi pulled up outside the quaint white church where Suzy and Michael would be getting married

  tomorrow. Victoria paid the driver and leapt out, tugging her rollaway suitcase behind her.

  “Hey, Victoria, over here.” Suzy stood in the churchyard, waving madly from behind a white-painted

  wooden gate, her curly blond hair bubbling about her face. “I’m so glad you made it.”

  “Me, too.”

  Opening the gate, Victoria abandoned her suitcase and stretched her arms out wide to give Suzy a fierce

  hug.

  “When my plane was delayed I thought I was going to miss the wedding rehearsal.” She’d been away

  doing an audit for one of her largest clients. The text message from Suzy that she was getting married in

  five days’ time had shaken Victoria—although in hindsight it shouldn’t have. Over the past month,

  everything Suzy said had been prefaced by “Michael says.” But Victoria hadn’t expected the romance to

  escalate so quickly. “You certainly decided to ge
t married in a hurry, didn’t you?”

  Stepping away, Suzy grabbed Victoria’s hand. “Come see what the church committee is doing with the

  flowers.”

  “You’re changing the subject,” Victoria said with fond frustration.

  Suzy cast her a grin. “Tory, it’s too late to try and talk me out of marrying Michael tomorrow.”

  Victoria smiled at the woman she’d pulled from more scrapes than she cared to remember. “Well, I hope

  Michael knows what he’s letting himself in for. Is he here yet?”

  “He and Connor—his best man—” Suzy tacked on at Victoria’s questioning glance, “are on their way.

  We’re taking you both out to dinner tonight to celebrate. I booked a table at Bentley’s.” She did a little

  jig. “I can’t believe it’s the last night we’ll spend apart. Michael can’t wait for tomorrow, either. Come

  on.”

  “Wait, let me grab my bag.” With a laugh, Victoria reached for the bag and let Suzy lead her through a

  courtyard overflowing with ivy and rambling roses, rolling her bag behind her.

  The late afternoon sun filtered through the branches of a lofty Norfolk pine, casting shadows across the

  sundial in the centre of the courtyard.

  Victoria came to a halt. Suzy slowed. “What now?”

  “Suz, don’t you think it might’ve been better to wait? You’ve only—”

  “Known Michael for a month,” interrupted Suzy, finishing the sentence with the familiar ease that came

  from twenty-four years of friendship, “but I knew after an hour that he was The One.”

  “But Suz—”

  Suzy stamped her foot, managing to look sweet and determined at the same time. “No, don’t say

  anything more. Just be happy for us. Please.”

  Now, how on earth was she supposed to withstand Suzy’s puppy-dog eyes? Truth was she’d never been

  able to say no to Suzy, despite the fact that Victoria was supposed to be the sensible one.

  The sound of footsteps prevented Victoria from responding. She glanced around and her eyes widened.

  It wasn’t Michael—much as she liked him—who snagged her attention, but rather the dark-haired man

  who strode into the churchyard beside him. Tall and powerfully built with features that could’ve been

  carved from granite—angled cheekbones, a blade of a nose and a hard mouth—he made the hair on the