Bad Boyfriend: Billionaire’s Club #7 Read online

  Bad Boyfriend

  Billionaire’s Club #7

  Elise Faber

  BAD BOYFRIEND

  BY ELISE FABER

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  This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters, and events are fictitious in every regard. Any similarities to actual events and persons, living or dead, are purely coincidental. Any trademarks, service marks, product names, or named features are assumed to be the property of their respective owners, and are used only for reference. There is no implied endorsement if any of these terms are used. Except for review purposes, the reproduction of this book in whole or part, electronically or mechanically, constitutes a copyright violation.

  * * *

  BAD BOYFRIEND

  Copyright © 2020 Elise Faber

  Print ISBN-13: 978-1-946140-42-5

  Ebook ISBN-13: 978-1-946140-41-8

  Cover Art by Jena Brignola

  Billionaire’s Club

  Bad Night Stand

  * * *

  Bad Breakup

  * * *

  Bad Husband

  * * *

  Bad Hookup

  * * *

  Bad Divorce

  * * *

  Bad Fiancé

  * * *

  Bad Boyfriend

  * * *

  Bad Blind Date

  Contents

  Billionaire’s Club

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Epilogue

  Bad Blind Date

  Billionaire’s Club

  Also by Elise Faber

  About the Author

  Prologue

  Kelsey, Nine Years Prior

  College had been an utter waste of time.

  Though part of that was probably due to the fact that she was graduating with her Master’s when her peers were snagging their high school diplomas.

  She wasn’t bragging. She was just really smart.

  College courses at twelve. Bachelor’s (with a double major in Mathematics and Computer Science) at sixteen. M.S. in Engineering by eighteen.

  And . . . she’d never been kissed.

  Never gone on a date.

  Which was great news, according to her overprotective father, who wanted to pretend she would be his little girl forever. Not so great when she had the social life of a leaf. A fallen leaf, dried out and crunched underfoot in the middle of winter when all the other leaves had gone to the movies and prom and lost their virginity in the back of Tommy Peddlenton’s car.

  She digressed, but that was Kelsey. Her mind going in a million different directions at once, even as she did something completely different with her hands.

  Brilliant had been a description of her more than once, and again that wasn’t bragging, that was merely how her teachers had always described her. It was why she’d been offered an outrageous sum of money to work for the government beginning in a few weeks, and also why she’d turned down a dozen other offers from the private sector. But her big ole juicy brain—she had her older brother Devon to thank for that lovely description—was also a big reason she was lonely.

  She’d been untouchable, undateable. Yes, as complete and utter jailbait until her eighteenth birthday just the month before, she understood exactly why that was. She was glad for it, glad the men she’d gone to school with had treated her with respect and consideration and . . . fine, also like she was asexual.

  So that part she wasn’t exactly grateful for. The rest of it, for sure she was.

  Sighing, she fixed her gown, adjusted the colored stole that signified her exit from graduate school, and strode out of her room. Most of her family was downstairs, all wearing proud smiles, even her brother Sebastian, who tended toward quiet and closed down and definitely not verbose with his praise pulled her into a hug and murmured, “Proud of you, Kels.”

  “Thanks,” she murmured back.

  “Devon is going to try to make it for the party, sweetheart,” her mother said in her softly musical voice. “His plane was delayed, but he’s going to get here as soon as he can.”

  “Okay,” she said and meant it. Dev was a professional hockey player, and his team was knee-deep in the playoffs. The fact that he had left, that his coach had allowed it, meant more to her than him seeing her walk across a stage. “Warn him, he owes me extra hugs when he gets here.”

  Her mom’s lips twitched. “I’ll do that.”

  Dev gave the best hugs ever. Probably because he was a giant, and so being hugged by him felt like being enfolded against the chest of a very large teddy bear, but his hugs were also good because he didn’t let go. Didn’t treat hugging like cursory contact—a wrap and release. He held on like he meant it, and . . . it was impossible not to feel like the most precious object in the universe when she was in his arms.

  More digression.

  “You know,” her dad said, holding out his arms. “I taught him to hug.”

  Her mom’s eyes sparkled. “I’d like to think I had something to do with his hugging ability.”

  “Nope,” her dad said. “He got his slapshot from you. His hugs are all mine.”

  Kels laughed.

  Sebastian grinned.

  Her mom made an affronted noise and reached for her, but no sooner had her mom’s arms closed tight than Kelsey found herself tugged out of the embrace and against her dad’s chest. She giggled, then she was tugged away again, but this time into Sebastian’s arms. He rivaled Dev in the hugging department, and she was enjoying the contact, the attention, when she was tugged away once more.

  She let herself slide free, went willingly, assumed it was her dad claiming her again.

  If she’d known who was reaching for her, she never would have allowed the contact. But she’d had her eyes closed, was soaking up her brother laughing and joking and being so fun and loose, a rarity compared with Sebastian’s normal demeanor, and so she wasn’t paying attention to who’d snagged her.

  Wasn’t paying attention until she found herself smack nose-first into a chest that was hard and broad, but definitely not comforting. Spice and male assaulted her nostrils, and she went from laughing to quiet, every cell in her body standing at attention.

  She knew that scent.

  Oh shit, she knew that scent.

  She’d stolen his sweatshirt because of it and wore it to bed every night, no matter how hot it was outside. The smell, the feel, the image of it covering all of Tanner’s hard muscles never failed to have heat coiling through her limbs, soaking deep into her abdomen.

  Quite simply, that scent made her want.

  And the object of her want was currently holding her tightly against his chest, hands running up and down her spine.

  He glanced down at her, one half of his mouth curved up. “What do you think, Kels?” Was it her imagination or was there a trace of heat in his expression?

  “About what?” she whispered.

  “Do I give good hugs?” He tugged her a little closer.

  She rubbed her nose across the half-circle of skin exposed above the collar of his sweater, inhaled deeply, trying to absorb his scent into her pores. His breath caught and she leaned back, definitely not missing the heat in his eyes this time.

  “Yes,�
�� she murmured. “You give good hugs.”

  His lips curved, his smile hitting her in the gut like a punch.

  But it was a good punch.

  Because that was the moment Kelsey Scott fell in love.

  She’d been crushing hard on Sebastian’s friend for years, though he’d never shown her the least bit of interest—other than acting like another brother who was there to tease and annoy and steal her Pringles.

  That hug had changed her. Changed them.

  She’d catapulted over the edge from mere infatuation to offering her heart on a platter when Tanner’s arms wrapped around her.

  Love. Heady, intoxicating first love.

  But feelings aside, that was also the moment she promised herself she was going to get Tanner to hug her again, only the next time, neither of them would be wearing any clothes.

  She grinned and stepped away, knowing this was just the beginning.

  In some ways, she was right.

  She got another hug that night—in fact, many more hugs in the weeks and months that followed—and some of them were of the naked variety.

  Unfortunately, she was also very wrong. That moment wasn’t a beginning.

  It was an end.

  And it wasn’t first love, heady or intoxicating or otherwise.

  It was first hate.

  She hated Tanner Pearson with a passion.

  One

  Kelsey, Present Day

  She opened the door of Bobby’s, the local bar she and her friends liked to frequent, and paused for a moment, enjoying the crispness surrounding her.

  It was one of those perfect end of summer evenings, warm during the day, but with the promise of fall in the air. She snuggled into her hoodie and smiled, thinking about how happy her brother, Sebastian, and his fiancée, Rachel, had been that evening at dinner.

  Of course, a lot of that had to do with the fact that Rachel was sporting a diamond large enough to blind Kelsey . . . and the rest of the Earth’s populace.

  But, seriously, she was happy for them both.

  Sebastian and Rachel were perfect for each other, and they deserved all the happiness in the world.

  She slipped out of the opening and let the door start to close behind her, but before she got too far, Sebastian caught it. He slid through, dropped an arm around her shoulders. “Let me walk you to your car.”

  “I’m fine,” she said, shrugging him off. “Go enjoy your fiancée. It’s not your guys’ fault that my flight is ridiculously early in the morning.”

  He rolled his eyes. “You know you’re not going to win this argument, so just accept my chivalry. It’s my brotherly duty, after all.”

  “You sell it so effectively.”

  “Shut up.”

  “You shut up.”

  “No, you shut up.”

  “No—“

  They broke off with grins, and Kels let Bas sling his arm around her neck, tugging her into a hug. “I love you, brat,” he told her.

  “Well, I don’t love you.”

  “Rude.”

  “You know it.” But she hugged him back before leading him to her car. “I am really so happy for you both, you know that, right?”

  “Of course, I do,” he said.

  They spent the next few minutes discussing the wedding—the date and location were set, as was the food—and the whole crew of females, including Kelsey, were going honeymoon shopping—because apparently that was a thing—the following week.

  “It sounds like you’ve got it pretty much sorted.”

  Bas smiled. “Rachel’s a force of nature,” he joked. “Seriously, though, she wanted to ask you this, but I preferred to do it myself.”

  Kels frowned. “Ask me what?”

  “To be a bridesmaid. We were hoping you’d be in the bridal party.” He lifted his hands, palms up. “No pressure, of course, but we’d love to have you in the wedding.”

  No pressure? This was her brother. But her brother was a reformed anti-social and so she understood the gesture—him asking her himself—for what it was. He wanted her there and it meant something. See? That M.S. in Neuroscience she had done in her spare time over the last few years had paid off—or at least the psychology classes that had been required for it had. She put her mental detour to the side and let her lips curve up. “I’m happy to play whatever role you want, Bas.”

  “How about flower girl?” he teased.

  She shot him a glare. “Seriously?”

  “So bridesmaid it is then?”

  Since they’d reached her car, she unlocked the passenger’s side door, and tossed her purse on the seat. “Yes,” she murmured. “I’d be honored.” Then added, a little firmer, so he’d know she was serious. “As long as you’re sure that’s what you guys want.”

  “I know this is all last minute,” he said. “But it is what we want. We’re ready to start our future together and want our family to be part of it.”

  Aw. Rachel was so good for him, bringing Bas out of his shell, making it so her brother could say something like that when he never would have managed it before.

  “Thank you.” She pressed a kiss to his cheek. “And count me in. Thank Rachel for me?” She’d call her future sis-in-law later to sort out dress details, but based on what she knew about Rach, Kels figured the dress was already purchased.

  “Done.”

  Kels rounded her car, paused with her hand on the driver’s door handle. “Oh, besides Devon”—their brother—“who are the other groomsmen?”

  “We’re keeping it small.” He shrugged. “Heather is going to be the maid of honor, you a bridesmaid, and Devon is going to be my best man.”

  She smiled. “And Clay is going to be the other groomsman.”

  Bas shook his head.

  Kelsey had opened her mouth, ready to tease Bas about choosing to include Rachel’s boss over his when her gut sank.

  Small bridal party.

  Two on each side.

  One of which was not Clay.

  Her quiet, often taciturn brother only had a few close friends growing up. None of whom she could see in the bridal party.

  Except one.

  Fuck.

  But she was worrying for nothing. Bas hadn’t talked to Tanner in years as far as she knew. They hadn’t talked in years. They couldn’t have—

  “Who is it then?” she asked through stiff lips.

  Because it couldn’t be Tanner. Her brother didn’t know about them. She’d made sure of it. They’d kept things on the down-low and then when the short thing between them had gone bad . . . she’d nursed her broken heart two thousand miles away.

  “Tanner.”

  Her gut twisted.

  Double fuck.

  And a shit for good measure.

  “That’s fine, right?” Bas asked. “You guys always seemed to get along great.” Concern rippled across his face. “Is there something wrong? Did—?”

  “No,” she said quickly, fingers clenching on the roof of her car as she attempted to clear her expression of old pain while still keeping her tone light. “That’s great. I’m sorry. I’m just preoccupied with my new project.”

  He grinned. “Always work with you.”

  “That’s me,” she said weakly. “Always working.”

  Of course, work was safer than risking another broken heart. Not that she wasn’t fully over Tanner, because she was.

  Definitely.

  Liar, her big, juicy brain declared, never one to let anyone—including herself—hide from the truth.

  Whatever.

  “Great,” Bas said. “Since you’ll be paired up with him. And I know it’s been a while, but he’s coming into town next week to catch up.” He tapped the roof of her car, took a step back. “You want to grab dinner with us?”

  “I’d love to,” she lied before getting into the car, and with a wave that hopefully didn’t show her dismay, Kelsey drove away.

  Paired up with Tanner.

  Been there, done that.

  Got
the souvenir broken heart.

  Triple fuck.

  Two

  Tanner

  He shouldered his carry-on, smiled at the flight attendant who’d been flirting with him since the plane had crossed the Rockies, and strode off the plane. It had just been one in the latest of many flights, his job as a photojournalist having taken him all over the world.

  But it was also the last of many in a way.

  Because his career was over.

  He was almost thirty, at the top of his field, and . . . he didn’t want to do it anymore.

  Bypassing the baggage claim carousel, Tanner exited the airport. Bas was waiting at the curb, huge grin on his face as he lowered the passenger’s side window and gestured for him to get in.

  “You look great, bro,” he told his friend, and it was the truth. Bas was happier than Tanner had ever seen him.

  “Rachel does a man good,” Bas quipped.

  “I can see that.” Tanner shoved his bag into the backseat and buckled in. “How is the fiancée?”

  “Working like a crazy person.” But Bas grinned and his tone made it clear that Rachel’s working habits didn’t upset him. “She’s allocated me exactly an hour tonight.”

  Tanner raised a brow.

  Another flash of teeth. “She’s clearing the decks for our honeymoon.”

  “Where are you guys going?”