For Richer, For Poorer: The Titan Billionaire Brothers (Duet Book 2) Read online

  “You got it, Mike.”

  “What kind of a deadline are you going to need with this?” he asked. I loved my boss. “I’m thinking near the end of the month, we can run the story in December.”

  “That long?”

  Sadie and I had discussed this. I needed time to find Chase, although Sadie was certain that he was in Windswan, provided he hadn’t fled to another buttfuck-middle-of-nowhere town, and I had to earn his trust and somehow lure him out of the forest. That could take some time.

  “Maybe longer,” I tilted my head and pursed my lips. “This could be a big one, Mike. You know it, and I know it.”

  “Alright, kid. Go for it.” He grinned at me. I raised my eyebrows and smiled at him.

  “Thanks, Mike. I won’t let you down.” I shoved my laptop into my messenger bag and pulled my hair up into a ponytail.

  “Keep me posted.” His phone rang and he picked it up, but before he barked hello, he added, “And, Emma. Be safe.”

  “Always,” I winked at him. I was reckless and we both knew it.

  With that, I hurried out of the building, a smile on my face, and hopped into my rental car. I glanced into the back seat at my already packed bags and headed north. I never doubted that Mike would send me on this assignment. The drive was going to take at least nine hours, but I had a whole lineup of podcasts ready to go, and a giant travel mug filled with hot coffee.

  As soon as I turned onto the interstate, I dialed Sadie.

  “Hook, line, and sinker,” I said as soon as she picked up the phone.

  “I can’t believe it.”

  “You can’t?”

  She laughed. “Poor Mike. We sure know how to play that man,”

  I missed working with Sadie. We had been rival reporters, but that hadn’t stopped us from becoming best friends. She retired from the industry over a year ago and had somehow managed to snag the most eligible bachelor in the state, Liam Titan. To outsiders, they seemed like an odd pair, but when I looked at them, I saw something rare. True love. I didn’t blame the woman for quitting her reporting gig to work with her hot husband, and now she was expecting a baby. It’s crazy what a year can do. But that didn’t mean that I couldn’t miss working with her. The newsroom wasn’t the same without her.

  “Like a fiddle,” I laughed back.

  “Do you think he’ll be mad?” Sadie asked.

  “Maybe for a hot minute, until he realizes that his paper has the biggest story of the year. Then I think he’ll get over it.”

  “Did you get the directions I sent?” Sadie asked.

  “Mmhmm.” I nodded. When Liam and Sadie were having some issues, she had spent some time at a vacation rental in Windswan. That’s when she spotted the elusive Titan brother.

  “Call me when you get there, okay?”

  “Will do, Mom,” I laughed. At forty-two Sadie was twelve years my senior, a fact I never hesitated to throw in her face.

  “Ha. Ha,” she quipped. “I’m serious though, you be careful up there.”

  “I won’t do anything you wouldn’t do,” I said quickly.

  “Good,” she replied and then yelled, “Wait!” It had taken a minute for her to register what I had just said.

  I laughed. Sadie and I were known as cowboys in the industry, we did whatever it took to get the story. She knew it and I knew it. “Bye!” I sing-songed and jabbed at the screen to disconnect the call.

  I stomped the gas pedal down and the rental sedan zipped down the highway, headed for the hills. I would do anything for a story. Anything.

  Chapter 3 – Chase

  THE POSTS WERE IN PLACE and I rubbed my work gloves together, blowing hot breath onto my tingling fingertips. I was replacing the existing fence with an electric one. It would help with the deer and rabbits, as much as Dumpster loved chasing them, the sneaky bastards had a way of finding their way into the garden. More importantly, I had bees on order and the last thing I needed was a bear parking its butt in my yard, doing its best Winnie the Poo impression. An electric fence was the only way to go, and I couldn’t believe that I had put it off until this late in the season.

  For someone who ventured into town once or twice a month, I was setting a new personal record with two days in one week. I was missing a few key components to the fence, so Dumpster and I headed back into Windswan. Flakes started to fall as we pulled onto Main Street, adding to the generous accumulation from earlier in the week.

  The town of Windswan is in serious decline, half the stores on Main Street are boarded up. There isn’t a big bad mega-corporation to blame though. When the mine closed, half the townspeople lost their jobs. As soon as the young people are old enough to leave, they do. There’s nothing for them here. I don’t know why I chose to hide here; perhaps its destitution and struggle spoke to me. Also, the land was dirt cheap and that helped. My family owns half the state, and I could’ve easily built my little homestead on our own land, but I was sure that was the first place they would’ve looked for me. This dying little town suited me just fine.

  The local hardware store had been around since the mining days, and like the general store, still had its original worn pine flooring, built-in creaky drawers filled with loose screws, and attachments lined the walls from floor to ceiling. “Afternoon, Jack,” Bob said as I stepped into the store.

  “Afternoon, Bob,” I replied and pulled out a piece of paper.

  “What can I do you for?” He climbed down from a wooden ladder and hobbled towards me.

  “I’m building an electric fence and I need these attachments,” I pointed to the serial number on the page.

  “Let me see,” Bob pulled his glasses from his pocket and set them on his nose. “I’m going to have to look that up.”

  I was glad that I wasn’t in a rush. Bob’s Hardware had recently stepped into the twentieth century and had started using a computer system for inventory. Bob tilted his head back to examine the screen through his bifocals and started to jab at the keyboard with one finger. I glanced around the store while the old man typed. The building was of timber frame construction, with wrought iron railings leading to the upstairs apartment, and an original tin ceiling high above.

  The bell above the door rang, snapping me out of my architectural reverie, and Bob and I both looked to the entrance.

  She had to be lost.

  It was plain to see that the woman who had just stepped into the dusty hardware store was a city girl. Her leather jacket, skinny jeans, and brand new very expensive winter boots could’ve been a dead giveaway, but I couldn’t describe it. She just had the air of someone going somewhere important. It had been years since I had seen a woman younger than fifty, and I wondered if they had somehow gotten better looking in the past ten years. This woman was easily the most gorgeous person I had ever seen. She had white-blonde hair, pulled back into a ponytail that bobbed up and down as she walked.

  “Can I help you, miss?” Bob asked.

  “I can wait,” she replied and gestured to me.

  “Ladies first,” Bob smiled at her and set down my piece of paper like it was a piece of trash. I was thoroughly entertained; Bob had never smiled at me like that before.

  “Go right ahead,” I gestured to the cash register and stepped back. I turned away from her out of respect. She was hot as hell and it was impossible not to check her out. I was like a man who hadn’t had a drink in years, and in front of me had just stepped the finest wine.

  “Do you have a shovel?” the girl asked. Her voice was deeper and huskier than I expected.

  “Now, what kind of shovel are you looking for, sweetheart?” I heard Bob ask as I studied the various styles of tarps on the other side of the room.

  “The kind that can get you unstuck from a snowbank, I guess?” she giggled lightly. “I thought I could just drive through it, but...” I turned as she pointed to the front of the store. A champagne-colored sedan was lodged into the snowbank out front.

  “Oh, dear,” Bob replied and pulled off his canvas a
pron. “Let me help you with that.”

  I sighed. I couldn’t let an eighty-year-old man push a car out of a snowbank. “It’s alright, Bob.” I’ve got a tow rope in my truck. I’ll get her out.”

  Bob wanted to be the woman’s knight in shining armor, but I couldn’t have an old man’s heart attack on my conscience today.

  “If you need a hand, let me know.” Bob had returned to the computer. “I’ll try to find the parts you’re looking for.” He put his glasses back on his nose and leaned in closer to the computer screen.

  “Thanks,” the blonde smiled at me. “For helping.”

  “No problem,” I muttered. As we walked into the parking lot I wondered if the woman was on drugs. “Did you just drive right into that snowbank?” I asked. The tire tracks led directly into the biggest pile of snow in the lot.

  “It was hard to see, with all the snow.” She held her hands out and quarter-sized flakes landed on her palms and quickly disappeared.

  I shook my head. City girls. I pulled out the heavy tow rope I kept on hand for emergencies but set it down on the tailgate and pointed to the sedan. “Mind if I try?” I asked. It looked like I could drive the damn thing out, and there was no sense putting all that extra pressure on my ancient truck.

  “Be my guest,” she replied and opened the door for me. I crouched and slid into the car, my knees knocking the steering wheel.

  “Did you try rocking it?” I asked.

  “No, does that work?” She was holding onto the door watching me struggle with the lever to push the seat back. I started the car and gently, I mean way too gently, put the engine in reverse and then forward, literally two times, and the car crawled forward out of the deep tracks. “So that’s how it’s done,” she smiled as I stepped out of the car.

  I handed her the keys. “There you go. You should get some winter tires.” I strode away. It was suicidal driving in these mountains with summer tires. If she didn’t kill herself, there was a strong likelihood she could kill someone else. It was irresponsible.

  “It’s a rental.” She followed along behind me back to the store.

  “It’s a death trap.” I didn’t have the patience for her but held the door open for her to enter the store. Blue-blood chivalry and etiquette training were deeply ingrained in me. Sure, the woman was drop-dead gorgeous, but the helpless act grated on my nerves. I headed back to the counter to discuss parts with Bob while the woman lingered in the aisles.

  I left the store and I bristled as I felt her presence behind me. “Excuse me? Sir,” she asked breathily like she had run to catch up with me. I rolled my eyes and turned slowly. She thrust out her bare hand. It was below freezing; where were the woman’s gloves? “Emma,” she said. I glanced down at her hand. This was the first person who had actively introduced themselves to me in years. Again, my upbringing wouldn’t let me turn and walk away. I reached out my hand and to shake hers and she responded with a surprisingly strong grip.

  “Jack,” I said.

  “Well, um, Jack. I’d like to thank you. For getting my car unstuck.”

  “That’s not necessary. It was nothing,” I replied. It literally was. I pulled my hand from her herculean grip and turned to walk away.

  “What about a drink?” she jogged along beside me. “A coffee?” she added as I kept walking across the parking lot.

  “Listen, lady.” Her mosquito-like presence was seriously starting to annoy me, only I couldn’t swat her away. “If you want to do me a favor, learn how do drive in the snow, and get a safer vehicle.” I had reached my truck and the door creaked as I pulled it open. To my surprise, she grabbed my arm. First the handshake, now an unsolicited touch. I can count on one hand, the number of times I’ve been touched since I moved here. Well, touched by a woman. That number was a solid zero until today.

  “You don’t have to be a dick about it,” she hissed. The flirtatious tone was gone from her voice and for the first time, I noticed just how green her eyes were, like the emerald bracelet my mom used to wear.

  She was right, but I didn’t care. I glanced down at her hand on my arm, “Are you going to let me get into my truck, lady?” She released my arm and I stepped up into the cab. I turned to her, “You don’t know when to leave well enough alone, do you?”

  “Nope.” She glared at me, but there was a glint in her eye and the sides of her lips turned up like the Cheshire cat.

  I shook my head. “I have to get going, but here.” I pulled off my gloves and thrust them at her, a black leather bouquet of fingers. “You’re going to need these.”

  She accepted the gloves and I slammed the door shut. My truck growled to life as she walked back to her car and waved at me, the fingers of my gloves flapping in the air before she hopped in.

  It wasn’t until I was down the street that I realized that she hadn’t bought anything in the hardware store.

  Chapter 4 – Emma

  Did I think that he was going to fall for the damsel in distress routine? Maybe, but boy, did that blow up in my face. When I saw him park his truck, I didn’t think that I could be that lucky. Lucky enough to run into the man I was hired to find within five minutes of arriving in Windswan. I hadn’t even checked into my vacation rental. With that beard and hat, I couldn’t be sure, but his stature and the way he was built like a hockey player, along with the self-assured way he walked, told me somewhere deep within my reporter’s instincts that the man driving that piece of shit pickup truck was Chase Titan.

  Was I really stuck? Hell no, but I had to think on my feet. What if I didn’t see him again for weeks? It wasn’t the greatest, on-the-fly plan I had ever concocted, but if he wasn’t such an asshole, it probably would’ve worked.

  I slipped my hands into his warm gloves which were hand-stitched, butter-soft leather. Not the type of gloves a backwoods man would wear. They were probably relics from the days when he would spend thousands of dollars at the drop of a hat on clothes, vacations, and parties. My hands swam in the gloves, but I was thankful for them. Mine were packed away in the trunk, I hadn’t needed them in the city, but the drive to the mountains had been sketchy.

  The plan was to approach Chase about a story of living off-the-grid – not as a subject, but as a resource. The story wasn’t going to be about him per se, since both Sadie and I realized that he would never agree to that. I didn’t think that it was going to be a hard sell. Although it’s a shitty thing to say, I’m an ace at manipulating men. It’s easy most of the time, but this guy was a flat-out asshole. There was no way that man was ever going to agree to ‘help me’ write a story.

  I put the car into gear and headed out of the parking lot following the directions from my GPS. I braked as I saw an oncoming car, but the car didn’t respond and I gripped the steering wheel, pumping the brakes like my dad had taught me, grimacing while anticipating the sound of crunching metal but instead, the oncoming SUV blared its horn and veered around me. I came to a stop in the middle of the road. Chase was right... this car is a death trap.

  I crept along the snow-covered roads, carefully navigating through the side streets and marveling at the charm this town must’ve once possessed. The faded mining houses would have once been colorful and full of life. Now half of them looked abandoned and assaulted by time, their paint peeling exposing the old wood beneath.

  The little house I was staying in was one of the better ones. It was pale yellow with cute gingerbread trim, complete with a white picket fence lining the front yard. I hauled my duffel bag into the house and before I could even sit down at the kitchen table, I had Sadie’s number dialed.

  When she answered, I didn’t mince words.

  “We’ve got a problem.”

  TWO HOURS LATER I WAS in the neighboring town, a quaint little place called Chance Rapids. Why couldn’t Chase have disappeared here? I wondered as I walked down the vibrant main street past a bustling coffee shop and outdoors stores. This town had two things that Windswan did not. Well, it probably had a lot more, but all I needed was
a good backcountry outfitter and a car rental place that carried vehicles suitable for the mountains.

  Armed with a Titan expenses credit card, I left the backcountry shop with two thousand dollars worth of jackets and mittens, a backpack, hiking boots, poles. You name it – I bought it. The cute clerk had raised his eyebrows so high I thought they were going to disappear into his shaggy hair when I told him what I needed: outdoor hiking gear.

  “For, like, now?” he had asked. “You do know that it’s November, and it’s been snowing in the mountains for a couple of months now.

  “Yep. Got it.” I had replied. I didn’t need a lecture from this kid, he couldn’t have been older than twenty. In retrospect, I hadn’t any idea what I was getting into. I had covered stories overseas and worked in active war zones. I could handle a little snow.

  As I left the shop the clerk, Ethan, walked me to the door and pulled a couple of pamphlets from a cardboard holder and thrust them into my hand. “Read these.”

  “Okay.” I shoved the booklets into my shopping bag.

  “No, please. Read them before you head out.” His eyes were round and earnest. It was sweet, this young stranger was clearly worried about me, but he didn’t know who he was dealing with.

  “I will, I promise,” I smiled and let him open the door for me. Other than Chase, every one of these small-town mountain people had been kind and polite. I could get used to this I thought as I remembered how, just last week, a man had butted in front of me as I stepped to get into a cab back in the city.

  My phone rang as I reached the car. It was Sadie. I tossed the bags in the back seat and answered as I slid into the driver’s seat. Sadie informed me that the car rental place was out of 4x4 vehicles.