Read Online The Billionaire's Payment (BBW Erotic Romance) by Alexis Moore - Free Book Online

for Eve.  He would do no less for Shakira.  She brought excitement to his life.  He had been living well, but not feeling real joy.  She made him feel younger, energized and perhaps ready to delegate some of his workload to trusted employees or sell off some of the hotels….
    He started out of his sleep two hours later and found himself still alone in bed.
    Even as he jumped to his feet and screamed for his valet, he knew that something was desperately amiss.
    “Yes, sir?”  Ambrose appeared at the door before Jared got to it.
    “Where is Shakira?”
    “I haven’t seen her, sir.”  A less-brave man would have cowered under Jared’s thunderous glare, but the ex-army soldier steadfastly stood his ground.  “I got here at six as instructed.”
    Jared cursed himself for not only giving Perkins the week off, but for drastically reducing his valet’s work hours.  He’d wanted total privacy with Shakira, but there were basic duties he’d still needed his valet to perform.  Otherwise he would have given the man the entire week off.  But now he regretted it—had the man been there Shakira would have never gotten past him.  Nor his ex-mercenary butler, had he been there.
    “Call Rigby.”  The ex-army intelligence officer had been the one to recommend Ambrose as a valet when the man had been made redundant by the British Army and couldn’t find employment.  “Tell him I may need his services.”
    “Very well, sir.”
    ***
    Less than half an hour later, dressed impeccably as usual, but with a betraying wildness in his eyes, Jared entered the already-open door of the plush office assigned to the hotel’s manager.
    David Phillips was sitting with his feet up on the large desk, sipping a mug of coffee and reading The Times . He didn’t officially start work for another twenty minutes yet, but Jared felt a sudden, intense dislike for the way the man acted as if he owned the place.
    The man turned, smiled when he caught sight of Jared and said breezily, “Good morning!”
    The man didn’t have the grace to show a trace of discomfort, facing by the man who had taken his daughter’s virginity as payment for her father’s sins.  In a similar situation, Jared would have ripped the man’s balls off!
    “Where is she?”  Jared tried to keep his barely controlled anger in check.
    Since meeting Shakira he had decided against keeping David on staff—the man would take early retirement, or be fired if he didn’t agree.  A man who would sacrifice his own child was not one Jared wanted in his employ.  One that would sacrifice a sweet, innocent daughter like Shakira should be drawn and quartered!  He’d often seen David strutting around the hotel as if he owned it.  He hadn’t minded the man’s pompous display—in fact it had pleased him that the man took such pride in his job.  It had obviously been more than simple pride; the man had delusions of grandeur—he would be a fool to keep him on staff now.
    “Where is who?”
    “Shakira!” Jared ground out.  Was the man so uncaring he didn’t remember his own child?
    “She’s with you…  Do you mean to say that she never turned up?”  The man’s face went taut with anger.  “Apologies, Jared, I will find her and bring her to you.  I can’t believe she would make a promise to me and then break it.  I thought better of her.”
    “Did you really?”  Jared asked him coolly.  The older man finally had the grace to flush.  “Shakira was with me.  She left this morning before I had a chance to discuss important matters with her.”
    “She’s probably out shopping,” her father dismissed, seeming unconcerned that his child, who had barely ventured out in the last five years, was suddenly at large in the capital.  “I’ll tell her you were asking after her.”
    “I’m concerned for her safety.  Do you have any idea who her friends are and what their addresses or telephone numbers are?”
    “I never paid much attention…”