Except this time, Dylan was the feature of a video clip, dressed in—my, my!
Shirtless Dylan, with an oiled chest and red bow tie, wearing the bottom half of a fireman’s uniform and carrying an ax? While strolling down a runway at a charity bachelor auction. She laughed; she’d seen the same clip on YouTube. But why was he being featured on a morning news show?
“Laura, that’s him, right? The guy who delivered flowers to you a few weeks ago.” Debbie nudged a woman standing next to her. “I could never forget that, uh...face. Yeah,” she said with a low whistle. “That face.”
“With a chest and abs like that, who needs to look at his face?” someone said, her voice older and smoky. The women in the group laughed. The video ended and the scene cut to the co-hosts on comfy couches, two women and a man doing that chat thing that was designed to keep people watching.
“Records show that Dylan Stanwyck, firefighter extraordinaire, former model, and one of Boston’s hottest bachelors, is the heir to shipping tycoon Richard Matthews’ daughter’s estate. Matthews’ daughter, Jillian, died in 2010 and left Stanwyck, her longtime lover, a trust fund of $1.1 billion, with an annual income of more than $50 million.”
Laura’s stomach turned to acid. Debbie’s eyes were as wide as saucers as her head bounced between gawking at Laura and staring at the television. One of the men in the room walked away quietly.
“Holy shit,” someone muttered. “A billionaire?”
“What’s he doing delivering flowers?” Debbie squeaked.
“Sources confirm that her $2.2 billion estate was split between Stanwyck and Mike Pine, a local ski instructor who recently used his inheritance to purchase the struggling Cedar Mountain Ski Resort. Here’s to the lucky lady who finds her way to either man as the billionaire bachelors become the hottest dates in town and Stanwyck can buy himself many times over now in whatever charity auction he pleases.”
Ohmigod ohmigod ohmigod, her mind screamed. Rooted in place, she couldn’t move. Couldn’t inhale. Couldn’t feel her fingertips or her lips or her eyelids. Dylan and Mike? Jill? Billions? Money? Why hadn’t they—? What were they doing—? Wha?
Her phone buzzed in her pocket. Like a robot, she reached in and mechanically looked. Five texts.
Dylan: “Laura, please call me now.”
Mike: “Laura? Call me.”
Dylan: “I’m coming to see you at work.”
Mike: “On my way to see you.”
and Josie: “Those assholes. I am so sorry. Come to my apartment to hide.”
“Laura!” Debbie squealed, pulling on her arm. “He wasn’t just a delivery guy, was he?” Her expression showed she was very proud of herself to connecting the (obvious) dots. “Oh, my God, you were dating him! Are you still dating him? Holy shit, you landed the most eligible billionaire bachelor in Boston? You’re, like, Anastasia Steele!” The room broke out into a mixture of nervous laughter and derisive murmurs. Debbie’s long, perfect, chocolate-brown hair shimmered down her shoulders and her creamy skin made Laura want to claw her.
“If I had a billionaire boyfriend I sure would quit in a heartbeat!” Debbie couldn’t—wouldn’t— shut up, and Laura was quickly growing faint, her heart rate through the roof and brain spinning out of control. Air. She needed air.
“Do you know the Mike guy? Does he have a girlfriend?” Shut up, Debbie! Her mind screamed. She opened her mouth to say the words when her boss touched Debbie’s elbow lightly and pointed to the phone, which was lit up like a Christmas tree with waiting callers. Mercifully, Debbie sat down and plucked her way through call after call as her boss mouthed the words “go home” and made a shooing gesture.
She needed to escape the Red Lobby of Pain right.this.minute and a flood of gratitude overwhelmed her. “Thank you,” she mouthed back. Shaking Debbie off, she fast-walked back to her office, grabbed her purse, and fled down the back staircase. Thirty-two flights of stairs in a spiral pattern of nausea would take her mind off whatever was coming, right?
Those bastards. Step, click. Step, click. She’d forgotten how hard navigating stairs could be in heels. Tears pooling in her eyes didn’t help, the grey, institution cinderblock walls floating as she descended carefully. Step, click. Step, click.
Billionaires? Billionaires? Really? Seriously? Could they have kept something bigger from her? It had been bad enough that they’d never told her they knew each other, that they were in a committed threesome before meeting her, that they wanted her—and had set up that night in the cabin as some sort of test. She was still raw from that—and had just started to heal from it, allowing herself to trust them slowly, giving herself permission to believe deeply that this was going to work, and that they could overcome convention and find their own, unique path to happiness.