Give Me More--A Sexy Billionaire Romance A.C. Arthur (the giving tree read aloud .TXT) 📖

His temples throbbed and his heart raced. She was standing there with a towel wrapped around her looking as if she’d just been caught with her hand in the cookie jar.

“Wait a minute, just calm down and let me explain.”

“There’s nothing to explain, Grace! I told you what I expected and you lied to me. I specifically said what would be allowed and what wouldn’t, and you went against our agreement and wrote this crap! What the hell is wrong with you?”

He was yelling, his hands were clenched into fists, and for the life of him he couldn’t find the strength to calm down. How could she do this? How could she lie to him every day of this trip, every night that they’d lain together, when he’d held her in his arms and told her he loved her, how had she been able to do all that knowing she’d planned to betray him with this story all along?

“I think you should calm down,” she said, and took a step toward him.

“I’m not gonna calm down while you destroy my family. How dare you create this lie about my mother! She had nothing to do with this feud. You promised me you wouldn’t do this and I trusted you, Grace.” He huffed and ran a hand down the back of his head. “After everything we’ve been through I trusted you to write a story that focused more on the companies, not the personal trials of my family. And you did it all just to get a promotion!”

She jerked back as if he’d made a move toward her, and RJ felt like crap. He’d never put his hands on a woman, had never even yelled at one the way he was yelling at Grace now.

“It’s not what you think,” she said before clearing her throat. “If you would just sit down and let me explain.”

He didn’t sit, nor did his anger abate, but he did lower his voice. “Explain what? That you’re not telling lies to glorify a feud that I told you was quashed months ago? I read it right there on your computer, Grace. That’s the story you’re planning to send to your editor. It’ll end up on the fashion page of some newspaper.”

“Lies? RJ, everything I write is factual. I’m meticulous about fact-checking everything. I’ve conducted lengthy interviews and transcribed my notes myself.”

“You never shared this with me during any of our meetings!” He pointed to the laptop. “I never heard about any of this, and I never would’ve approved of it if I had. So you have to delete it. You shut this whole story down, Grace, or I swear you’ll never work on another article for any paper again.”

Grace walked away. She went back into the bathroom and shut the door. Leaning against it, she closed her eyes and counted to ten. When she opened her eyes again, she dared a single tear to fall. She could feel that they’d welled up in her eyes but she wouldn’t let any fall. She couldn’t. Instead she picked up her robe from the duffel bag she kept in the bathroom and pushed her arms through it. She removed the towel wrapped around her, belted the robe and took a deep breath before reaching for the doorknob.

RJ was upset. Given what he thought the circumstances were, he had a right to be upset. He didn’t, however, have a right to read her unpublished story without her permission, and, in turn, threaten her job. And that’s exactly what she would’ve said if he were anyone else.

She opened the door and went back into the room where he was still standing near the table. He had both arms up, hands on the back of his head, and when he saw her return the look on his face said he was still angry. But he was still there, which meant he either wanted her to explain or he wanted her to tell him she was pulling the story. He wasn’t going to like what she had to say.

“Everything you read on that screen is the absolute truth. Your mother told me how the feud started. She dated Tobias first, then she met your father and fell in love with him. Tobias was pissed and that’s why he left RGF and refused to speak to your father or mother again.” RJ took a couple steps back, until the back of his legs bumped against a chair. “The design that it was said Tobias stole back then, that sketch belonged to Tobias. He’d worked on it while he was at RGF, but it was all his work. So there was some question as to whether the sketch was RGF’s work product or if Tobias as the creator owned the IP rights. But the real issue was that love triangle.” She paused, took a breath and folded her arms over her chest. “Your father and Tobias corroborated the story.”

RJ sat down with a thump and dropped his head. “All this time,” he said softly.

“Yes,” she replied. “All this time your parents and Tobias let the world believe the reason for the feud was the stolen dress. That’s how they protected their privacy. Despite her breaking his heart, Tobias loved your mother and he didn’t want her name dragged through the mud for dating best friends.”

“And that’s why my father never spoke of the details of the feud. But he harbored it. He told us that King Designs was the enemy.” RJ was visibly shaken, his voice rough as he tried to come to terms with what she was saying.

“Because Tobias left. He broke the pact that he and your father made to run RGF together. Tobias couldn’t work with the man who he felt had stolen his girl. And your mother, she swore she never had romantic feelings for Tobias and they’d only gone out on three dates. She admits she should’ve handled the situation better, especially since Tobias and Ron were friends, but