Chapter 4: Black Ties and White Lies: Chapter 4

So many words fly through my head, none of them managing to leave my mouth. It doesn’t happen often, but he’s rendered me speechless.

Beck’s smile is almost predatory. He knows his answer has taken me by surprise. I’m backed into a corner, unsure how to get myself out of it. I hadn’t expected him to remember my favorite creative outlet. Especially since Carter always told people I painted, even though he’d never seen me with a paintbrush the entire duration of our relationship. I’d just assumed that’s what Beck would’ve thought I did, too.

“Tell me what it means to be your assistant.” I try to fold my arms across my midsection in a defensive position, but all it does is make the wire of my bra dig into my rib cage even further. My hands slide into my lap instead, my eyes still watching Beck carefully.

“Does it matter? You start Monday.”

“I haven’t even agreed to it yet.”

“It’d be silly for you not to say yes. It’s a significant pay bump, and you’ll be out of this place.” His finger loops in the air, bringing attention to the lackluster conference room we’re in.

“I’m terrible at making coffee,” I argue. “Ask Darla.”

“There’s more to it than that…” For a fraction of a second, Beck looks nervous. The look is erased almost as quickly as it first showed up. But as fast as it was, I still saw it.

“What is it?”

His cheeks hollow out, making his sharp cheekbones even more prominent. “I need you to not only become my assistant but also my fiancée.”

The chair underneath me groans loudly as I lean forward, looking at him in shock. “What did you just say?”

“I’m in a bit of a”—he picks at a non-existent piece of lint on his sleeve—“predicament,” he finally finishes. “One I need your help with.”

“You need me?”

“I’ve made a mistake.” He keeps his voice level, but there’s the smallest bit of vulnerability in his eyes when he looks at me. “Recently, a gossip site ran an article on me that features numerous photos with me and multiple different women in the last month. Like, a good number of them…”

My eyebrows raise. Carter had mentioned Beck never did relationships. He’d meant it as a dig at his brother. Looking back, it seems Beck doesn’t make any fake promises. At least he’s up front about not wanting to commit to women, very unlike his brother. Carter will make the promise and just fuck it to shreds behind your back.

“And that involves me how?”

“My board is upset. They say it reflects poorly on the company.”

“Why? You’re allowed to have a personal life.”

He blinks, a slight grin on his lips. “It doesn’t quite work like that, Violet.”

I cross one leg over the other. “I’m still trying to figure out how I play into this.”

His fingers tap against the table, catching my attention. They’re long, slightly thicker around the knuckles. I wonder how they’d feel inside me. Blinking quickly, I shake my head. Where the fuck did that come from?

He’s completely unaware that my mind is only half listening, the other half wondering how many he could fit inside me and still feel pleasurable. Beck continues to talk as I try to rid my brain of the dirty thoughts of my new boss, AKA him. “I was told I need to maintain a stable relationship for at least a year, or they feared investors would become uneasy. No one wants to invest in a company whose face is plastered all over magazines being penned a playboy billionaire.”

I bite back a smile. “It’s kind of catchy.”

He does nothing to hide his grunt of disapproval. “I’ve never tried to hide the fact that I can’t stand most people. The thought of tolerating someone for a year makes my skin crawl. That is, a year with anyone except…you.”

My ass almost flies out of the chair. Surely I heard him wrong. I want to make some kind of witty remark, but the unreadable look on his face has me snapping my mouth shut. I hold back the comment, stunned by how he brazenly stares back at me.

“People wouldn’t believe it if we told them we all of a sudden started dating. But…they’d believe it if we went from working closely together with you as my assistant and it developed into more.”

“Now it’s starting to make sense…”

“I bought this company because I needed a reason you and I were brought back together—hence the reason I now own 8-bit Security. You work closely with me as my assistant and in a month or so we’ll tell people we’ve fallen in love.”

“That seems quick.”

When he smiles at me, I understand why so many women fall at his feet. It’s magnetic, bright but predatory. Enough to make my core clench because never did I expect it aimed at me. “When you know, you know.”

And then Beck Fucking Sinclair winks at me, and I swear to god in the moment, I’d do anything he asked me to. His hotness is a shock to my system, something I’m nowhere near equipped to deal with.

“The whole idea seems highly unnecessary. Don’t you own the company your board sits on or whatever? Tell them to go fuck themselves.”

He actually laughs at my comment. A loud, throaty laugh that for some reason, feeds my soul. I’d do anything to hear it again.

I made broody Beck Sinclair laugh. I want to do it over and over until his stomach hurts from laughter.

Beck shakes his head at me, his eyes lingering on my returned smile. His attention to my lips has me absent-mindedly licking them. “While I’ve thought about doing that a million times, it’s not something I can quite commit to. You see, I don’t hold all the power when it comes to my company. No matter how much I want to. I’ve got to clean it up or I’ll lose important investors. It’s not a risk I’m willing to take.”

“What if I’m not willing to agree?”

His teeth dig into his lip as he bites back a smile. He attempts to wipe the smile from his face by running his hand over his mouth, but it doesn’t do much. When his hand falls back to his armrest, he still grins at me. “I can be very persuasive, Margo Moretti.”

Is Beckham Sinclair flirting with me?

Am I into it?

No. I can’t be into it. I dated—loved—his brother for years.

Bad, Margo.

But god, with that grin on his face, it might feel so good to be so bad.

I’m silent, still wondering in the back of my mind if this is some sort of joke. Am I on some sort of reality TV show where they play an epic prank? That’s totally something Emma would sign me up for as a cruel joke.

My eyes scan the office for any hints of hidden cameras.

“So, I become your assistant, then your fiancée, and then have to go back to normal with my tail between my legs when you end our engagement after the year is over? Have everyone think you grew tired of me? No thank you, Beck. It’s a no from me.”

“We could tell people you ended it. Whatever you want to say to them, I’ll do it.” The hurried way he gets out his words has me stopping to wonder why he seems so invested in getting me to agree to his ludicrous plan.

I’m quiet long enough, my foot tapping against the carpet as I think through his words, when he feels the need to fill the silence with more of an explanation. “I’ll get you an interview with Camden Hunter.”

My foot stops immediately. “How?”

“We went to boarding school together. He’s one of my best friends.”

I snort. “I’m shocked you have friends. You don’t seem like the kind of person to form attachments.”

His eyebrows pinch together on his perfectly wrinkle free forehead. “I form attachments just fine. I’m just picky about who I choose to form them with. Am I to assume your answer is that you don’t want an interview with him?”

“You assume correctly. I don’t want to be hired by Camden—owner of one of the most elite art galleries in New York—just because you know him. I don’t want my dream job handed to me.”

There he goes, making my heart flutter just from the sound of his laugh. It’s deep and rumbly, a sound that is felt from my head to my toes. “It’s cute you think I have that kind of power with Camden. He’s charming but ruthless. It wouldn’t matter if I begged him on my knees to hire you. While he’d find it hilarious, he’d never feature someone’s art he didn’t love. I’ll get you the interview to show him your work, your ideas, but it’d be up to you and your talent to solidify the partnership.”

Why is the thought of Beck on his knees making me feel hot and bothered? Do we have AC in here? It’s got to be the lack of airflow and not the mental picture.

My eyes narrow to pinpricks as I mull over his offer. The picture he paints doesn’t seem so bad. I’d pretty much sell my soul or any non-vital organ to even be in the same room as Camden Hunter. The son of two of the most world-renowned artists, it was only natural that the moment he opened his own gallery, it’d be the talk of the city. While Camden isn’t known to be an artist himself, he’s got the best eye there is. If he even looked at any of my drawings, I could die happy.

“I can’t believe you know Camden Hunter,” I comment, my voice full of wonder.

He runs his thumb over his lip, a gesture I’m learning he does often. “I can’t believe you hero worship him. I knew him when he had acne and braces.”

My mind tries to picture the not only brilliantly talented at spotting art, but a work of art himself Camden, with braces and acne. “I refuse to picture him like that.”

Beck shrugs dismissively. “I’ll deny I said this, but he could still get any girl he wanted back then—braces and all.”

My nose scrunches. “That’s more like it.”

Beck’s large hand rests on the table. For some reason, I keep focusing on his fingers. I’d never wanted to draw the veins on the back of a hand so bad. They’re so freaking sexy, and I don’t understand why. I itch to run my finger over them, to trace them all the way up his arm, even getting the luxury of feeling the skin that’s hidden underneath his suit.

“So, what do you think?” His dark, strikingly blue eyes focus on me. “Are you open to hearing more about my offer?”