The Billionaire's Baby & The Wrong Fiancé
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Niobia Bryant
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41
Chapter 1
Marisa Martinez had lost count of the laps she swam in the Olympic-size pool, but she was thankful for the coolness of the water against her bikini-clad body and the silence it created. Beneath the crystal clear depths, made all the more brilliant by an intricate pattern of the turquoise glass tile, she could almost forget the party going on around her. Launching off for another lap by pushing her feet against the wall, her toned arms slashed the water before she turned over into a backstroke, taking in air with her head above the water as she alternated her arms in circles and flutter kicked her feet.
She closed her eyes, enjoying the feel of the summer sun on her face as she reached over her head to grip the edge of the pool and float.
“Are you trying to pickle?”
Marisa hid her surprise well. His deep voice and English accent were easily recognizable.
I thought he wasn’t coming? I thought he was working in Milan?
He was Naim Ansah.
She opened her eyes and looked up at him looking down at her. He was dressed in a well-tailored business suit and handmade Italian shoes with his hands in his pockets, his silk tie loosened and a smile on his handsome face. “And are you trying to incinerate?” she asked with a little chuckle, showing she amused herself.
He removed a hand from his pocket and smoothed it over his low-cut ebony beard as he nodded. “You’re right. It’s a party. It’s hot as hell. And I want in on the pool,” he said, removing his suit jacket to toss onto the pavement surrounding the water.
Marisa didn’t miss the way his eyes—those intense, dark eyes with the most beautiful shape and long lashes—took in her body’s curves as she floated. In the years since her cousin Alessandra had met and married his brother, Alek, it had been impossible to miss the way his eyes were always on her—probably because she was just as busy eyeing his chocolate good looks from a distance, as well.
The watcher watching the watcher.
Naim was delicious looking. Good body. Great face. Gorgeous dark eyes.
In the past, she would have gladly allowed herself a taste of all of his fineness. But now? I am single and not ready to mingle.
Marisa released the edge of the pool and turned to pull herself up and out of the water beside him as he finished undressing.
“Naim, get some swim trunks!” his brother, Alek, yelled over to them from where a small group of family and friends were gathered about the manicured grounds of the Ansah-Dalmount estate enjoying the live band playing and the catered food being served by uniformed staff.
“My boxers are good!” he yelled back as he looked down at her.
“Enjoy the pool,” Marisa said, water dripping off her from head to toe.
“We will,” Naim said, quickly reaching out with one strong arm to wrap around her waist and pull her into the pool with him as he leaped.
As soon as he released her, Marisa brought her feet to press against his rigid abdomen to push off and swim away from him. She was surprised at the ease with which he caught her, wrapping a hand around her ankle. She kicked away his touch, adjusted her bottom upright and pushed up off the base to break through the water with a splash. He did the same, and she eyed him while she pushed her water-soaked shoulder-length curls back from her face.
Their eyes met.
There was an invisible line between them that neither dared to cross. In the years since they were in each other’s company, more time was spent ignoring each other and acting like they were strangers than anything else. But that awareness for each other would not fade, no matter how much they denied the pull.
“Dinner’s ready,” Alessandra called out, unknowingly breaking their moment.
Marisa and Naim moved away from each other and climbed from the pool. He gathered his clothing and she picked up her discarded towel to wrap low around her waist. She had to force herself not to look in his direction as she strode across the heated stone walkway to the large pergola adorned with strings of white lights above the table large enough to seat twenty.
And every seat was filled.
As she reached for her sheer floor-length cover-up and dried her wet hair with a towel, Marisa eyed each one of the people seated at the table as one of the staff turned on the lights as the evening sky began to darken, streaking it with dark blue, lavender and orange colors. They were a large unit brought together by the love of Alessandra Dalmount and Alek Ansah, who were forced to work together as co-CEOs of ADG, a multi-billion-dollar conglomerate, but had willingly fallen in love once they tired of the battle of wits and strong wills. With their union, two families were brought together for family events and vacations.
Marisa took a seat near the end of the table next to Alessandra, the de facto head of the Dalmount family ever since her father’s death years ago. She doled out allowances, advice and sometimes strict orders, trying her best to keep a very rambunctious bunch of kin in line while running a business and putting her own small family of Alek and their baby girl, Aliya, first.
God bless, Marisa thought, reaching for one of the many crystal pitchers of citrus punch lining the table, among beautiful floral arrangements and thick, lit candles, to pour herself a glass.
Over the rim of the glass, she eyed the younger brother of her uncle Frances, Victor Dalmount, and his wife, who was nearly half his age, as they shared a secret toast and a laugh together. Thankfully their boisterous twin sons were upstairs in the nursery being watched by a few nannies, along with all the other children in the families.
Aunt Leonora, her mother’s lively younger sister, who was dressed in one of her beloved silk caftans in vibrant colors that dimmed in comparison to her personality, enjoyed large sips of her signature Veuve Clicquot as she doled out funny anecdotes and quips, giving her opinion on any and everything. Her personality and age made it all forgivable.
And then there’s Momma.
She shifted her eyes to her mother, Brunela Dalmount-Martinez, sitting at the head of the table—a seat most would assume would be for the man of the house. The entire Dalmount clan was well aware that as the eldest Dalmount child, she felt her younger brother Frances had been given her birthright to run the family business simply because “he was born with a penis.” When she met and fell in love with Mario Martinez, a man of no wealth but lots of affection for Brunela, she married him despite the objections of her brother, Frances, who was the head of the family at that point. Mario’s death just a few years after their marriage had been the final blow, and Brunela had turned bitter and resentful as a result.
Marisa looked on as her mother, a tall and regal woman who rarely seemed to smile, watched everything with derision. She seemed to detest the same family money she enjoyed spending so lavishly—particularly on her. It was a bitter pill to swallow, to admit that her mother spoiled her with the family’s abundance of wealth, to her detriment.
Marisa had been denied nothing growing up. Designer clothes, lavish lifestyle, missed curfews, surly attitude and eventually an abundance of alcohol and partying. She took her sense of entitlement to the brink and pulled Alessandra down into the abyss with her, nearly destroying her cousin’s career as the co-CEO of ADG.
Marisa’s partying had eventually spiraled, and she even began experimenting with pills. Alessandra had worried about her safety and come to retrieve her from a house one night where she had been partying to take her home. She, Marisa and everyone else in the house were taken to jail when the police raided the home. The scandal that followed Alessandra when the news hit the press was profound, and the ADG had contemplated asking her to step down from her position.
Thankfully, Alessandra retained her position and offered Marisa a stay in rehab to help defeat what she thought was about to become a serious issue for her cousin. Marisa’s choice was rehab or no financial help going forward. Resistant at first, Marisa had resented the order, but with every day of clarity and change, she became thankful that Alessandra had the balls to put her foot down in a way no one else had with her.
At times, when she thought of her past behavior, she felt ashamed. But now, pushing aside thoughts and regrets over her wild past, Marisa eyed Alek’s side of the family. His beautiful mother, LuLu, who remained true to her Ghanaian heritage with the gold head wrap she wore like a crown. Marisa smiled when she reached over and closed the case on the iPad her daughter, Samira, had been swiping through, not paying much attention to the summer dinner party around her. Like her brothers, she had inherited the Ansah work ethic and their billions from their father, Kwame—cocreator of the Ansah-Dalmount Group, along with Alessandra’s father, Frances.
Alek and Alessandra’s chef, Cook, stepped out onto the patio and stood next to Alek’s chair. Everyone quieted down. “Good evening,” he said. “For starters tonight, you are being served an appetizer sampler of fried crab ball with a spicy aioli sauce, fried oyster topped with a blue cheese slaw and bacon-wrapped seared scallop with a drizzle of garlic sauce. Enjoy.” He offered everyone a smile before turning and walking back into the house.
“Thank you,” Marisa said as a long and slender plate with the delicacies was set before her.
“It’s good to see you, Marisa.”
She glanced up at Ngozi Johns-Castillo as she returned to her seat next to Marisa with a glass of sangria filled with sliced peaches, oranges and white grapes. “You, too,” she said, shifting her eyes away from the alcohol.
“Does this bother you?” Ngozi whispered in her ear.
Marisa gave her a smile. “No, thank God,” she admitted.
Ngozi was Alessandra’s personal attorney and good friend who had successfully had them cleared of any drug charges after the raid. It was she who had driven Marisa to the front door of the rehabilitation center for admittance, so she was well aware of her fall from sobriety. “Still working at La Boulangerie?” she asked as she cut into her scallop and dipped it into the sauce.
“I am...for now,” Marisa added, only hinting at her plans for her future at the local bakery specializing in French pastries and the best fresh brewed coffee on the planet. “And how’s married life?”
Ngozi’s dark eyes immediately sought out her husband of the last six months, Chance Castillo—best friend of Alek and self-made billionaire via his invention of two successful productivity apps that had Forbes calling him a tech king. “Damn good,” she said, her voice soft and her eyes dreamy even as she took a bite of her appetizer.
Chance was sitting across from her and looked up as if he felt her gaze on his. His smile came with ease.
Their love was clear.
Looking away from them, her eyes fell on Naim, Alek’s younger and equally handsome brother, as he walked out of the house now dressed in a V-neck T-shirt and cargo shorts. His eyes went straight to her. Her heart swelled and her pulse quickened its pace. He had the kind of dark and intense eyes that drew a woman and locked her in.
They both looked away as if caught.
Everyone enjoyed the rest of the meal of beef sashimi on radishes and sisho leaves followed by seared octopus in a red-wine mole sauce and brandied cherries with whipped vanilla cream on chocolate sorbet. Everything was delicious.
But for Marisa, it signaled to keep a promise to herself to finally talk to Alessandra. For weeks she had been putting it off and effectively stalling her plans for her future. Tonight, she was determined to get it over with.
The worst she can say is no.
Marisa rose from her chair and raked her fingers through her still-damp curls as she walked down the length of the table to reach Alessandra’s seat. She bent down beside her. “Hey, can I talk to you for a sec?” she asked.
Alessandra set her wineglass on the table as she looked down at her. “Yeah, sure,” she said. “What about? Everything okay?”
“Actually, it’s business,” she said, amazed that no one else could hear her hard, pounding heart.
Alessandra looked surprised and then cleared her throat as she rose to her feet. “Well, let’s go talk business,” she said, leading the way around the table and into the mansion via the open French doors.
Marisa licked her lips and wrung her hands as she followed her cousin. At that moment, her nerves made her feel more like a child than a woman the same age as Alessandra. Their lives were so very different. While Marisa was a party girl in recovery working at the local bakery, Alessandra was an educated, married mother who helped run a billion-dollar conglomerate.
“In your office?” Marisa asked, her steps on the tiled floor pausing.
Alessandra turned the knobs of the double doors and pushed them open wide, nodding. “Alek and I have a deal that we only discuss business in here to help keep it separate from home, which is our haven,” she said, looking out of place in her strapless bathing suit and sheer palazzo pants as she walked around the two large wooden executive desks that faced each other—one for her and one for Alek.
They were a power couple.
Marisa came inside the large space with its dozens of windows admitting warmth and light as she took one of the three club chairs lined up facing the sides of the desks.
“So, what’s up?” Alessandra asked, crossing her legs and leaning back in the chair as she eyed her.
“I hope I’ve shown you since I finished rehab that I am intent on accomplishing more in life than traveling, wearing the latest designer fashions and being present at every hot event in the city,” Marisa began.
“You have and I am proud of you,” her cousin said. “We all are.”
Knuckle up, Marisa.
“While I’ve been working at La Boulangerie this last six or seven months, Bill has actually been teaching me to be a chocolatier on my off-hours,” she said. “And I’ve been completing an online, part-time professional chocolatier program for the last two months.”
Alessandra looked surprised.
“In fact, the chocolate desserts and candies that he has been selling for the last few weeks are my creation,” Marisa said.
“Really?” Alessandra asked. “I love the toasted almond truffles.”
Marisa inclined her head. “Thank you,” she said, unable to hide her smile of pride.
Alessandra fell silent but gave her an encouraging smile.
“Bill, the owner of La Boulangerie, is not interested in taking on chocolate making, but he has offered me the opportunity to begin my own small business by subletting me space to sell my chocolate at the bakery,” she said. “So, I would like a loan to be able to purchase equipment and supplies...and to be able to move out of my mom’s guesthouse and into my own place.”
Marisa released a breath.
There, I said it.
“Marisa, you’re asking for a loan when you have not accepted your monthly allowance in close to a year—the money you are entitled to by the family trust set up by my father,” Alessandra explained.
Marisa looked out the window at the summer sun, searching for the right words to speak life into her truth. “I have been spoiled—ruined—by wealth. No, no. What I mean is I have been ruined by wealth I did not earn,” she continued, thinking of every misstep, fall and fumble she’d made. She shifted her eyes to her cousin and locked them on hers with steely determination. “I want a success story that is earned, not easy.”
“So how was the chocolate mousse tonight?” Alessandra asked.
Marisa was taken aback by the question, but ready to respond. “A touch of orange liqueur would have elevated it,” she said.
Alessandra chuckled. “Please don’t tell Cook that?” she asked.
“I won’t.”
“Cash or check, cuz, because you’ve got a deal,” Alessandra said, rising to extend her hand to her.
Marisa rose, as well, and shook her hand. “A loan,” she stressed.
“A loan,” Alessandra agreed.
Naim could not look away from the sight of Marisa Martinez as she followed his sister-in-law, Alessandra, inside the mansion. Just as he hadn’t been able to the first time he saw her at Alek and Alessandra’s estate on their private vacation island off East Hampton. He vividly recalled the sight of her, young and beautiful, as she went running off the end of the deck in her bright red swim shirt and boy-cut swim shorts to jump into the water without a care. She was so different from the women he knew who wore expensive bathing suits but never dared get in the pool.
Marisa was petite and curvy with a head full of shoulder-length wild ebony curls and doe-like hazel eyes that suited her unmarred medium-brown complexion. Kissable full lips. High cheekbones. So pretty.
He worked out of ADG’s Milan office in the marketing division, but he had flown home for any and every family event over the last year and he couldn’t take his eyes off of her whenever they were in the same room. When she spoke, her raspy voice intrigued him. When she laughed, he wanted to be in on the joke. But there was never anything between them except distance. They barely spoke or had a conversation. Stolen glances? Plenty. Anything more? Never.
It was clear they avoided each other.
Naim was single with a bevy of beauties he dated, depending on which state or time zone or foreign country he was in at the moment—and all were well aware that he was neither committed nor looking for a relationship. A dalliance with Marisa that didn’t end well would hit too close to home and possibly affect other relationships—his with his brother, his with Alessandra, Alek and Alessandra’s marriage. He was aware of her past struggles and was definitely not looking for the headache of a relationship with the former party girl. No, he had nothing more to offer the beautiful Marisa Martinez but proof that he could fully deliver on the chemistry simmering between them.
He picked up his frosty glass of imported Star beer from Ghana that his brother kept stocked and sat there with his family, enjoying good food and good music that was a blend of American R & B hits and Ghanaian mainstays.
A good time was just the distraction he needed from his thoughts on Alek’s call that morning requesting his presence in his office Monday morning first thing. Right after a business meeting that ran extremely late, he’d taken the company jet to fly back to the States overnight.
His mother, LuLu, reached across the table and grasped his hand with her own. He gave her the same charming smile that had saved him from discipline growing up as a mischievous teen. “I could use some Red-Red,” he said, his eyes twinkling at the thought of his favorite Ghanaian dish of the black-eyed peas and smoked fish stewed in red palm oil and tomatoes with fried plantains on the side.
LuLu’s devotion was her children, and cooking for them gave her as much joy as they received eating her delicious food. “Dinner at my apartment this Monday, then,” she said, giving his hand one pat before releasing it.
Naim frowned. “Not tomorrow?” he asked, more than surprised. “No Sunday dinner?”
“No, Naim, I have plans,” LuLu said, picking up her glass of sangria to sip.
“Doing what, Ma?” he asked.
“Things, son,” was her reply.
His frown deepened.
“My clothes look good on you, little brother,” Alek said as he walked up and gripped his brother’s shoulders. “Feel free to keep ’em. Especially the boxers.”
“The pants are a little snug around the seat but they’ll do,” Naim quipped.
“Gross,” his younger sister, Samira, said into her glass of sangria.
“Boys,” LuLu said, her tone calm but her order clear.
The playful insults ceased.
“Let’s dance, nephew,” Aunt Leonora said, walking up with a flute of champagne in one hand and grabbing Alek’s hand with the other. “My niece is not the only Dalmount with moves.”
Alek gave them a playfully frightened look as the older woman pulled him over to the band.
They all chuckled.
LuLu rose. “I am going to kiss the cheeks of my granddaughter,” she said, leaving them with a wink.
Naim looked at his sister pick up her tablet. “Make yourself happy with work,” he said.
She gave him a long side glance as she opened the cover. “As if you put in any less hours than me,” she said. “We both have a lot to prove at ADG, big brother.”
“True,” he agreed, raising his beer to her in a toast.
Both Naim and Samira had always wanted to follow in their father, Kwame’s, footsteps into the family business. Unfortunately, Kwame wanted nothing more than to continue the family tradition and pass the business on to his firstborn son, Alek, the same way his father had passed it on to him. It didn’t matter that it was Naim who had the passion and drive for the business, while Alek declined to go into the business after graduating with his MBA to work on charter boats in the hopes of one day being a captain.
Naim took a sip of his beer and eyed his brother dancing with Leonora but skillfully avoiding her getting too close. He harbored no ill will toward his brother being his father’s chosen one. He was proud of his older brother and looked up to him. After his father’s unexpected death, Naim had been surprised and hurt to find his father had still left the helm of his share of the billion-dollar conglomerate to Alek, but he also knew his brother would soar in the position he had been forced to take by the stipulation of the will to step up to the plate or see the business sold.
Although Naim never revealed it, the fact that his father would rather sell the business than give him his fair shot at co-CEO was deeply troubling—especially since he was very close to his father, unlike the strained relationship he’d had with Alek. It was that feeling of being overlooked that made him so close with Samira. Both held positions at ADG and were as thick as thieves.
“I’ve been summoned to Alek’s office Monday, little sister,” Naim said, stroking his low-cut beard. “Any word on the street what that is about?”
She looked up from her tablet. “I didn’t know you were flying back from Milan so I am completely out of the loop,” she said. “As always.”
He chuckled before taking another sip of beer. Nothing but his brother’s well-known rule of not discussing business at his home kept Naim from killing his curiosity by questioning his brother. “I’m exhausted,” he admitted, pressing his fingers against his eyes before he yawned.
“You going home or staying?” Samira asked.
Naim owned a lavish penthouse apartment in Brooklyn, but any thoughts of it and his bed faded as Alessandra and Marisa came out of the house and walked back into the party. His heart thundered. He didn’t think he’d seen anything sexier than Marisa’s bikini under her sheer cover-up. Nothing at all.
“You’re drooling you want her so bad.”
He looked away from her as his sister playfully swiped her thumb against the corner of his mouth. He lightly shoved her hand away.
“Alek would kill you,” she stressed.
Naim looked at her.
“Or that could make it even more fun,” Samira said, looking first at him and then at Marisa. “Sneaky-deaky freaky.”
“You’re annoying,” he said, rising from his seat.
“Especially when I’m right,” she called behind him.
And she was.
He wanted Marisa Martinez.
“Shit,” he swore when she raised her hands in the air and swayed her hips to the band’s music.
Just sexy as hell without even trying.
His body was on high alert and about to expose his desire. Pulling off the V-neck T-shirt, he went running across the yard and jumped into the pool, welcoming the coolness. He lost count of how many laps he did from one edge of the pool to the other before he came up above the surface for air. He did slow backstrokes across the distance before turning and leaving the pool and sitting on the side. The music blended in the air with the conversation and laughter of everyone.
Naim glanced over his shoulder and froze to find Marisa’s eyes on him from the dance floor. And he did not miss the way they dipped down to take in his back. He fought the urge to flex and deepen the definition of his muscles. She pursed her lips and let out a little breath, like she was releasing pressure, and her fingertips landed against her chest.
Marisa Martinez wanted him, too.
Uh-oh.
Needing space before the wrong head got him into trouble, Naim rose to his bare feet and crossed the spacious yard to the patio. “I’m gonna catch a nap, Alessandra. Cool?” he asked her when he reached where she sat with her feet in his brother’s lap as she sipped sangria.
“I’m sitting here, too, bro,” Alek said.
He grabbed one of the rolled beach towels on the teak stand to drag across his body. “Yeah but I’m asking the boss,” Naim teased.
Alessandra raised her glass in a toast to that.
Alek shrugged one shoulder. “Carry on, then.”
“Enjoy your nap, bro,” she said, nudging her foot against Alek’s hand to remind him to continue his massaging of her toes.
Naim avoided looking in Marisa’s direction as he walked inside the house and made his way up the rear stairs off the kitchen. He barely heard the noise of the staff cleaning up or the smell of Cook’s homemade pizza for late-night snacking once he was off duty. Fatigue defeated him and desire scared him. Sleep would solve both.
There were plenty of bedroom suites to choose from in the three-story, twenty-thousand-square-foot French Tudor, so Naim just opened the first door and entered, pulling off his clinging swim trucks and leaving them on the hardwood floor of the sitting room before dropping down onto the plush sofa before the unlit fireplace cloaked by darkness.
Naim closed his eyes, enjoying the quiet, and soon he was asleep.
Click.
He awakened with a start, raising his head from the arm of the sofa and looking around the darkened room. “What time is it?” he asked aloud, his voice still thick with sleep.
“Midnight.”
Naim looked to the door at the sound of the feminine voice as he sat up. A shadowed figure reached to turn on the lights, revealing Marisa leaning against the wall by the door. Her eyes dipped down to take in his nudity, his member dangling between his open thighs. She arched a brow when he reached for a throw pillow to cover his privates.
“This was my room when I lived here,” she explained. “I didn’t know you were in here.”
“My bad, Marisa. I just opened the first bedroom door and crashed,” he said, rising to his full height with the pillow still pressed to his groin. “I’ll find another bedroom.”
Marisa smiled in amusement. “Like that?” she asked, pointing to the pillow.
He shrugged. “It’s better than those wet swim trunks,” he said, walking across the room toward the door. “Or nothing at all.”
“I’m not sure about that,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper.
Their eyes locked. A current shimmied over his body. He knew she felt it, as well.
Uh-oh.
Naim felt breathless, and his heart pounded as her eyes dropped down to his chest and she pursed her lips to quickly pant again. It seemed she was relieving some pressure. Like steam built up from desire.
The inches between them intensified the attraction. “Excuse me, Marisa,” he said, feeling his resolve weakening with each moment she remained blocking his exit from the room.
She nodded but did not move as she looked up at him again. “You have to stop looking at me like that, Naim,” she said.
He liked how his name sounded on her lips. “Like what?” he asked, feeling his desire for her stir against the pillow.
“Like that. Like you always do,” she whispered. “Like you want me.”
“I do,” Naim admitted, his voice deep and warm.
She gasped and her eyes glazed over as she pursed her lips once more.
His will broke and he wrapped his free arm around her waist to pull her close as he lowered his head to taste her mouth with a grunt of pleasure.
It was Marisa who reached between them to fling away the pillow to press him closer with her hands to his back as they instantly got lost in the passion—and gave not a care for every reason it was supposed to be wrong.
