Trusting the Billionaire

Chapter Nine: Condition I

Audrey had spent the last ten days working days waiting for this meeting, and every one of them had worn on her differently. Some mornings she woke up certain it would work out, replaying the strength of her numbers, the soundness of her plan, the way Marshall had actually read her proposal instead of skimming it. Other nights she lay awake running worst case scenarios, mentally drafting the speech she would give her board if Bellamy Trust had no choice but to shut its doors. She had prayed more in those ten days than she had in the past year. She had also, quietly and without telling anyone, started making calls to other potential investors, just in case Marshall's answer was no. She hated that she'd had to hedge her hope like that, but she couldn't afford to be naive twice.

Her secretary's call that morning, confirming the meeting, had sent her stomach into a knot she still hadn't shaken. She had stood in front of her closet this morning longer than she cared to admit before choosing the navy power suit, the one that made her shoulders look squarer, her spine straighter. She needed every inch of that armor today. Whatever Marshall King was about to say, she wanted to be someone who could take it standing up.

Now she was here, walking into his office, folder pressed against her side like a shield.

He looked up when the door cracked open. For a few seconds he only stared, and something in that stare made her pulse trip, though she couldn't have guessed whether it was nerves or something else entirely. Then he stood and gestured toward the chair across from his desk.

"Miss Bellamy."

"Mr. King."

She sat, back straight, ankles crossed, folder now resting on her knees like she might need to hide behind it. He looked like he was calculating something, his eyes dimming the way they had in their first meeting, that same unreadable stillness that had left her guessing for ten days straight. She could not help but notice the features of his face, he is one handsome man she thought, and at that same moment she remembered the gorgeous stranger who sent her a drink at the bar. But then she quickly brought herself back to the meeting. 'no time for fantasies' she said

"My team has reviewed all the documents and conducted its own research." He paused.

She held her breath and made herself let it out slowly. She knew that pause. She'd been bracing for it since the moment she woke up. That kind of pause was never good news, it always came with a but trailing behind it, and her mind had already started composing contingency plans before he even finished his sentence.

He continued. "We've found your reports to be consistent and true." Another pause, longer this time, like he was weighing whether to say the rest at all. Audrey's grip on the folder tightened. Whatever came next, she told herself, she would hear it with her chin up. "And we've decided to partner with Bellamy Trust, on one condition."

There it is, she thought, her heart lifting and dropping in the same breath. Relief and dread arriving together, tangled up so tightly she couldn't separate one from the other.

Kings Capital is one of the financial agencies competing for the state's infrastructural financial initiative for small industries." He said it slowly and plainly, like he was reciting a fact from a briefing rather than opening a negotiation, but Audrey had learned enough about him in their two meetings to know that plainness was its own kind of performance. "As you know, the initiative is meant to support families in the long run. Small businesses, local banks, the people who actually keep neighborhoods running. As CEO of this organization, I need to present a family front to the committee reviewing our bid."

Audrey blinked, the words settling somewhere just out of reach. A family front. She turned the phrase over in her mind, waiting for it to make sense, waiting for the part where it connected to her, to Bellamy Trust, to anything she had actually walked in here for.

"I'm not sure I follow, Mr. King. What does that have to do with Bellamy Trust?"

He didn't answer right away. He studied her instead, the same calculating stillness from a moment ago, except now it felt less like he was reading her numbers and more like he was reading her. His eyes moved from her eyes, to her lips, then hovered over her general frame before flicking back to the folder on the table, She resisted the urge to shift in her seat.

"The committee wants to see stability," he said finally. "Not just in the balance sheet, but in the leader behind each company applying. A CEO with roots, with something to lose outside the boardroom, reads as a safer bet than one who has nothing tying him down." He paused again, and this time she caught his gaze and realized he is checking her out, for some kind of role.

then he said "I need a Fiancée. For the length of time it takes to close this deal and secure the initiative."

For a moment Audrey simply stared at him, certain the words hadn't landed the way she thought they had. Her mind scrambled to catch up, replaying his sentence twice, three times, searching for another interpretation that made more sense than the one sitting in front of her. Surely he meant something else. Surely a man like Marshall King, with his spotless reputation and his army of lawyers, wasn't sitting across from her asking what she thought he was asking.

"I'm sorry," she said slowly, "could you repeat that?"

"You heard me correctly. I need you to play the role of my Fiancée for the next six months"

She had. That was the problem. Ten days of hoping, of praying, of quietly lining up backup plans in case the answer was no, and not once, not for a single second, had she imagined the answer might be worse than no. She felt something twist low in her stomach, somewhere between insult and disbelief, and beneath it, buried deeper than she wanted to admit, a flicker of something she refused to name.

She sat back, arms folding over her chest, using the motion to buy herself a breath. Whatever this was, she would not let him see her rattled.

"Mr. King, I came here for an investment. Not a role in a play."