The Billionaire’s Ultimatum: His Absolute Need(27)
Author: Cerys du Lys

I sat up front this time, as opposed to the backseat when Jeremy first drove Asher and I to the Landseer estate. I rolled my eyes at Jeremy as he rolled his eyes at me.

"You don’t get it," I said. "It’s a different experience looking through a bookstore. It’s not the same if you already own the book. Buying a new book is exciting."

"Technically you don’t own the books in Asher’s library," Jeremy said as a point of fact.

"Ugh! That’s not even it," I said.

"Fine. We can stop here, but don’t take forever. I know your type, you book people. Wandering through aisles of shelves for hours and then you forget what you were even doing beforehand. We have stuff to do today. You have ten minutes."

"Yes, sir," I said, offering him a disingenuous salute. "Whatever you say."

"Don’t you sass me, girl."

I laughed. "This is fun. Are you going to come in? I’ll introduce you to the owner. He’s very nice."

"You have a cracked idea of fun," Jeremy said. Then he softened. "Yeah, let me park the car and then I’ll be right in. Have to make sure you don’t take forever, right?"

"Right," I said.

Jeremy let me out in front of the independent bookshop we’d been idling in front of forever. I waltzed towards the entryway, feeling light and springy, then swung open the door and walked inside. Robert, the owner, wasn’t behind the counter, but that wasn’t too strange. Sometimes he did things in the back, or went around re-organizing the shelves. I’d see him soon, no doubt.

I headed directly to my favorite section. It wasn’t exactly my section, but it might as well be. Robert had it set up with books he thought I’d like, and he said that since he’d done it he’d seen an increase in sales. I didn’t know if he was just being nice, or if his other customers really enjoyed my choice in books, but it was neat to have a section somewhat of my own.

Literary fiction, with some romance. I liked historical and contemporary, and sometimes fantasy ones. I really enjoyed Elizabeth Haydon, but she hadn’t written a new book in forever. The occasional science fiction book was good, too, like Dune, but I wasn’t too into the genre as a whole.

Unfortunately the shelves that usually contained the books in my section were empty. Some books lay in stacks nearby, presumably left there from some planned redesign of the shelves. This was both exciting and upsetting. I looked forward to seeing what Robert might change, and had a few suggestions for him, but that didn’t help me right now. I sifted through one of the nearby stacks just in case I found something new and interesting.

I didn’t, but it was nice to catch up on old books I’d read. I remembered the ideas in them, and the thoughts I had while reading them, like a memory within a memory. Yes, this one, a Glen Cook book I didn’t actually think I’d like, but enjoyed very much. I’d taken it with me in the bath and read amidst bubbles. When the fantasy army started fighting off their magical enemies, I turned the hot water on to fix the temperature of my lukewarm bathwater.

It was fun to remember things like that.

I moved to a table with more stacks, planning to check through them, too. I stopped before I started, though, feeling odd. Something… oh, yes. Nearby was the curtained off doorway to the local book club’s meeting room. And people were talking behind the curtain.

Nothing too strange, except it was a bit early for a book club meeting. Sometimes they did lunchtime ones for people who had long lunches, but still, it was barely past ten. When I listened further, it didn’t sound like any book discussion I’d ever heard, either.

"You have to understand," a man said, "we need to tread carefully here. It’s not something we can enter into lightly."

He sounded familiar somehow, but I couldn’t quite place it.

"Why?" a woman asked. "Just do it. Figure out some plan. I’m tired of this. It’s always the same. Always. Do you know what he did last night? He brought home some woman. He plans to have her act as a mother where I can’t. I keep having to lie to him, and I’m tired of it. Do you know how much of a nuisance it was to pay off the doctor to say I was…"

"Shh," the man said. "Not so loud."

"There’s no one here. It doesn’t matter."

"The owner of the store is here."

"He’s out back. And, if not, what of it? Do you think anyone will believe someone like him? He is beneath me."

Beatrice Landseer and… Solomon Royce?

I stood perfectly still, caught up in the moment. Panic and awareness blazed through me. I wasn’t supposed to be here, I wasn’t supposed to hear this. And, why were they here, too? I didn’t understand.

"It’s just so boring," Beatrice said. "Do you know how annoying it is? I make excuses to Asher, time after time, and yet he won’t do anything about it."

"He’s not going to divorce you, obviously. Even he knows that won’t go in his favor. What grounds does he have for it, anyways?"

"If he knew, then he’d have plenty of grounds," Beatrice said. I imagined her grinning, some sly, sleek look like a wicked Siamese cat.

"Yes, and then you’d receive next to nothing afterwards. Just relax and be patient. I have everything under control. Asher’s not an idiot, but he’s too trusting by far, and he’ll play into my plan exactly."

"Our plan," Beatrice said, sweet and seductive. She sounded so much different now; still the same voice, but with more emotion. "You won’t leave me out of it, will you?"

"Of course not," Solomon said. "For now, just continue as you have been and we’ll go from there. I won’t have another ‘business trip’ planned for awhile, so I’ll be able to set things up. You should do the same. Keep tabs on this new girl, too. Maybe see if you hear any rumors? If Asher’s done anything with her, even something remotely incriminating, it’ll work out in our favor later on."

"Yes, but I doubt he will. She seems dull. Though that type does seem to be his sort most times. His pet projects annoy me to no end."

"I know. I know. Soon. Don’t worry."

I needed to leave. Beatrice and Solomon sounded like they were finishing up in the book club meeting room, and if they realized I’d heard everything, well, I didn’t really know what they’d do. Something bad, obviously, but the scope of it was beyond me. I didn’t even fully understand most of what they’d said, except for the obvious parts. Insinuations and assumptions and piecing together parts of their conversation only went so far.

I rushed to the bookshop door and tried to hurry outside, but a man blocked my way. Shit, oh God!

"You’re sure in a hurry," Jeremy said as I crashed into him.

Oh. Oh! This wasn’t terrible. Just Jeremy. "We need to go," I said. "Now. Hurry."

"What?" He gave me a funny look.

I pulled him out of the store, dragging him along. He seemed reluctant to come, but went nonetheless.

"Jessika," he said. "Seriously, what’s wrong with you? You wanted to get a book and now you’re pulling me away from the book store. You were only in there for like three minutes."

"I’ll tell you in the car. Where is it? We need to hurry. We can’t…" I looked over my shoulder just in time to see two people exiting the book store: Solomon and Beatrice.

A corner, somewhere, we needed to hide. I rushed to the right and pulled Jeremy into an alleyway. The greasy, stale air in the side street smothered me and I wanted to choke, but I carried on.

"I really don’t understand," Jeremy said. He refused to move any further, holding his ground.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw Beatrice and Solomon walking past the end of the alleyway. Beatrice tilted her head slightly, looking just barely at me and Jeremy.

Fuck! An excuse, we needed an excuse to be in the middle of an alley, to evade her scrutiny. I jumped into action and grabbed Jeremy’s face in my hands, twisting us both to hide the majority of our features. I pulled him into an awkward kiss, shoving him against the wall.

Beatrice scoffed, sounding repulsed. Then the telltale sign of her departure, her heels tapping past the alleyway entrance.

Jeremy gasped, astounded. When I was sure Beatrice and Solomon were gone, I let him go, which worked out well because he pushed me away at about the same time.

"I’m flattered and all," he said.

"Don’t be," I said. "It was a ruse."

"Right. Like some spy stuff, huh? Detective movies? You on the run from the law or something?"

"No. I’ll explain it in the car. Where did you park? Can we get there this way?" I peered down the alleyway, reluctant to go back to the main street.

"Yeah," he said. "I guess."

"Alright. Let’s go."

A million thoughts flipped through my mind as Jeremy led me back to the car. At first I was elated, overjoyed at the fact that Beatrice didn’t like Asher in the least. That feeling soon faded, though. I was happy, but did I have a right to be? Asher remained—or tried to remain—loyal to Beatrice, and so it didn’t matter what exactly she did to him, but how he felt towards her. Which I assumed would change if her plans were… if they were what? I wasn’t quite sure, since I didn’t know anything about her plans in the first place.

Though it sounded like her and Solomon were doing something more, too. An affair? Definitely a possibility, but even that seemed difficult to prove.

And then it dawned on me, as sure as that. I couldn’t actually prove anything. I didn’t have a recording of anything they said, and I didn’t have any real credibility as far as anyone taking my word for it, either. If I came right out and accused Solomon and Beatrice of some kind of treachery, they could deny it. And then what? Well, if they had actual plans, they’d delay them, I imagined. Possibly doing something about me, too. I briefly imagined a mafia style murder situation, but I doubted that would actually happen.

Still, no matter what, I needed to figure out how I should approach this.

"We’re almost there," Jeremy said.

I decided I needed to tell Jeremy, at the very least. He might know what to do, or he might think I was insane. I really hoped it was the first one.

His Absolute Impulse

"So, this is your apartment?" Jeremy asked me.

I tossed my keys on the kitchen counter and looked around. Sure, it was nothing compared to the Landseer estate, but I liked it. The living room, kitchen, and dining area were actually all one combined room, separated by a countertop. I sectioned off the living room and my circle dining table with a couch to elude to the existence of separate rooms, but it wasn’t that great. It worked, and sometimes I had people over for dinner, but I kind of wished I had an actual dining room.

Still, the place looked nice enough. I kept it clean and my furniture was only a few years old. I never watched TV, but I had an older CRT TV in a rustic looking entertainment center against the wall for when guests came over. Granted, I didn’t have cable(since I never used it), but Redbox or my DVD collection solved most problems there.

I used to think all of this was good up until Jeremy peered around my apartment with a funny look on his face.

"What?" I asked. "Yes, this is my apartment."

"It’s kind of small," he said.

"I live by myself. I don’t need a big place."

"Is there another room? Is this it?" He stepped past the "dining area" and into the "living room."