Christmas With Cassandra: A Billionaire Holiday Tale Read online

  “Of course it’s me. Who else would it be at this number?” Sylvia had gone through numerous changes in the past year and a half, but switching her phone number was not one of them. “What is it? You’re not someone I ever thought would be calling me like this.”

  “You’re right. It would take something pretty crazy for me to want to call you.”

  At least they could agree on that. Not much else they could agree on, though. Judith and Sylvia were old co-workers back at the Château. Last Sylvia heard, Judith was now in some exclusive ménage relationship with two men who barely knew each other. God only knew what Judith had heard about her. (The most pivotal thing Judith had heard lately was that Sylvia was now shacked up with a Hispanic man who was almost hotter than her Hispanic man. Almost. Judith would never consent to calling any men hotter than the ones she already had.)

  “So let’s cut to the chase.” Sylvia was growing colder by the second, after all. “What can I do for you?”

  “I need to know what Cassandra Welsh told you the last time she came by the Château.”

  “Huh, what? Who?” That name sounded vaguely familiar. “Cassandra? Wel… oh. Her.”

  The memories came with the next blow of the wind. One moment Sylvia had blissfully forgotten that someone like Cassandra ever existed, and the next? Thinking of that night Cassandra came up to the Château for some “therapy.” Which meant she had sex with almost everyone there and threw extra money at Sylvia and another girl to act as her therapists for the rest of the night. Sylvia was used to playing that role with clients, even female ones, as few and far between as they had been in her previous life. When Cassandra said she needed some sympathetic ears to listen to her, nobody said no, even though nobody was friends with her outside of the Château. (Perhaps that made it better for the young, emotionally fragile heiress.) Sylvia had heard a lot of weird shit that night. Mostly about Cassandra’s previous lovers, names that Sylvia knew so well she was shocked to know that one woman had managed to sleep with them all. Some of them still ongoing!

  “Why do you need to know that after all this time?” Sylvia held her sweater closer to her body. “What’s going on?”

  Judith sighed. “Not that it’s really any of your business, but it’s possible one of my boyfriends is the father of her child.”

  “Really?” Sylvia could have guessed that easily enough. Judith would never fall for men below certain income levels, and Cassandra loved her heirs and first-generation moguls. Hell, if Cassandra had spread herself anywhere in the PNW, Sylvia wouldn’t be shocked to know that Joseph had fucked her too! The man was the son of a Latin king of investments. Cassandra would probably eat that right up – and Joseph too. “I’m not sure what you want me to divulge. She didn’t tell me who was impregnating her.” She hoped Judith could hear her rolling eyes.

  “So it’s true. She really was pregnant, huh?”

  How could Judith not know that for sure? “That’s what she told us. You know, after we were all finished with her.” How many times would that ever happen at the Château? Wasn’t every day a woman in her first trimester popped in for a lesbian orgy and then some “oh you poor dear!” therapy. It was the sort of story Sylvia hanged on to when people like Joseph asked her to tell them the craziest thing to happen in her hooking career.

  Speaking of… Sylvia glanced up and caught her boyfriend’s eyes looking back down at her from the second story window. He waved at her. She waved back.

  “She didn’t insinuate who she thought the father was?”

  “I don’t think she knew.” Or so Sylvia recalled. Most of what Cassandra spilled from her pretty lips was her sordid sexual history that contained some famous names. Names Sylvia had slept with before. Names she still often saw in the social papers, when she bothered to read them anymore. “Who’s your boyfriend? Maybe it will ring a bell.”

  Judith was hesitant, but finally said, “Seth Christens. He used to be a gyno.”

  “Huh. I don’t remember the name, but she did say something about seeing a gyno who was also her lover. Honestly, by then I was going along with everything.

  “I’m sure. As I always say, err on the side of the craziest fucking story, because it’s probably the true one.”

  “She didn’t say anything about him being the father though, sorry.”

  “No worries. It’s probably not him anyway if the rumors about her promiscuity are true.”

  “Based on what she was telling me that night, yeah. Either that or she’s got a big mouth on her. Er, not that kind of big mouth.” Or maybe she did! Who really knew? Not Sylvia. She only had sex with the woman once, and there were two other women there.

  “Anyway, that’s all I had to call about.” Typical Judith. She wouldn’t admit she was nosy about Sylvia’s life as well. “See you.”

  “Yup. See you next week, probably, if you’re going to the Christmas gala.”

  “What? You’re coming back to visit?”

  “Uh huh.”

  “Well! How about that? Suppose I will see you around, then. Have a nice trip over.” Judith hung up without any other words.

  Sylvia returned to the café to find her boyfriend still at their table. Joseph was too polite to straight up ask her what the phone call had been about.

  Like she could hold it in.

  “Looks like there’s going to be enough drama at the Christmas gala to impress us both.” The only reason Joseph agreed to go – so Sylvia could spy on old acquaintances and pretend to be fancy, of course – was because his father the investment banker agreed it would be good for him to get to know the upper echelon of higher new England society. He already had a friend in first generation billionaire Vincent Lane, who was also going to this big fancy gala neither of them had heard of until that year. Neither man was inclined to put himself into that awkward situation, but Vincent needed to expand his business network, and Joseph had to be useful to his father’s family if he hoped to get any personal inheritance from his father. (The business inheritance was never happening.)

  If going to this party made both his father and his girlfriend happy, then Joseph wouldn’t say no. They were going to be in the area anyway to see Sylvia’s family. Why not go?

  Oh. Because drama. One thing Joseph had never been a big fan of. Most of the women in his life couldn’t get enough of it. Hell, guys at work were prone to start it? Joseph? Too down to earth and more inclined to keep the peace than disrupt it. The only peace he liked to disrupt was a peacefully made bed when his girlfriend was around.

  “Drama, huh? Don’t mind me if I keep to myself, then. I’ll let the east coast drama be your department.”

  “Even if I told you it hard to do with a woman who once paid me to sleep with her?”

  Joseph’s tea mug thumped against the table. Another person in the café glanced over at them. A woman. Joseph couldn’t say he minded. “Now that’s something else. That’s the kind of info you divulge to the man you’re living with. In great detail.” Why had Sylvia kept this piece of wonderful news from her boyfriend? She had let slip that there were women of means who had paid for her services, but Sylvia had always been adamant that it was purely for the work and she didn’t consider herself anything but heterosexual. Hence, no details.

  Until now.

  Sylvia didn’t drop anything too scandalous, since they were technically in public, but she let slip a name Joseph was unfortunately familiar with.

  Cassandra Welsh.

  His eyes widened. Sylvia’s did too, but only because his did first.

  “Oh my God.” Why did his girlfriend have to be so observant? “You know her?”

  “Uh.” Now here was an incredible predicament. How much of the truth should he tell her? Well, knowing Sylvia, who could suss out her boyfriend’s dating bullshit within two seconds, he should tell her the whole truth. Right now. “Maybe… carnally?”

  Sylvia gaped at him in disbelief.

  It was not an easy explanation to give. When Cassandra moved to the P
NW not so long ago, one of her first stops after settling into her Seattle penthouse was Portland. Both sides of Joseph’s family had connections to the Welshes, granting him an invite to a small party Cassandra threw as an olive branch offering for intruding on others’ stomping grounds.

  Her arrival came right after Joseph broke up with his ex-girlfriend Angelica due to their inability to successfully carry a child to term. In his brash, lustful state, he slept with Cassandra – but only once, it should be minded – and then promptly never thought of her again. Until now.

  Sylvia sat on her side of the table with only mild amusement in her eyes. That was… not a good sign. Surely, she wasn’t jealous? Perhaps simply in a state of disbelief?

  “Wow.” Sylvia finished her tea. “Amazing. We screwed the same pregnant hussy.”

  “Pregnant?” Joseph sat back in his seat. The barista behind her counter looked on with little interest. Even so, Joseph kept his voice down. “She wasn’t pregnant when I met her.”

  “She might not have been showing yet. She was really early on last time I saw her. I mean, there were miscarriage rumors…” Sylvia bit her tongue. Not the thing to say in front of her boyfriend who had lost two children already to miscarriage.

  “No, I mean… we had sex, Sylv. I would’ve noticed if she was pregnant.” The look in his eye suggested he knew what it was like to have sex with pregnant women.

  She shook her head. “Not always. It’s different between women.” Either that or Cassandra wasn’t pregnant by the time she moved out to the PNW. Which would’ve only happened if… was the miscarriage the truth after all? Because Cassandra had explicitly said “I’m pregnant and I don’t know what to do,” to Sylvia.

  “It doesn’t matter.” Like hell it didn’t! “But that’s going to be the drama going on at the gala. Everyone’s going to wonder if she’s there to speak with the father.” That made more sense when Sylvia thought she knew that Cassandra was pregnant. Now…

  “Huh…”

  Sylvia looked back up at her boyfriend. Joseph looked poignantly out the window and toward the rain falling to the street. “What?”

  “Do you think our friend Nala knows about Cassandra? Because if you want to start baby rumors…”

  Sylvia sat in silence for a few bitter seconds. “Go on.”

  “Let’s just say I’m not the only man in this town she got her hands on. But, according to a very interesting drinking session I had with a certain friend of ours, the timing is good enough that someone may have planted some seeds on the other side of the country a while ago.”

  Sylvia poured herself the last of the tea from the pot and settled into her seat. “No, seriously. Go on.”

  She needed to know exactly how to address her call to Nala.

  Scene 10

  The Nazarov-Lanes

  Nala hopped into the private jet as if it were her personal playground. It certainly was warm enough to rip off her winter coat and prance around the spacious cabin in nothing but ripped denim shorts, a black tank top, and a blue plaid shirt that made her look so ridiculously “Portland” that it was a wonder her boyfriend Vincent could keep up in the style department.

  But men had it easy. When he walked on board wearing his most comfortable Levi’s and a baggy gray sweatshirt covered in quirky emoticons, there was no doubt that they were both from the land of covered heads and soggy shoes.

  “Told you that you’d like it,” he said, slumping across the big leather sofa along the right side of the plane. Nala was still nosing around, poking into overhead bins, counting the amount of fire extinguishers and first aid kits, loving the huge shower complete with detachable showerhead, and hooting at the sight of the king-sized bed that looked like it came straight out of a hotel room. “I thought of you the whole time I was checking planes out. When I realized this was the one you’d flip for the most, I knew it was the one.”

  Nala bounded back into the main cabin, boots mussing up the carpet. “I still can’t believe you finally bought a plane.” How long had she been waiting for her boyfriend the tech billionaire to cough up the dough for his own private plane? It didn’t have to be huge. In fact, Nala had been content to look through catalogs of plans that only had the nice bathroom and nicer cabin, no bedrooms or other private corners to entertain and rest. Maybe a big TV. Definitely in-air WiFi and TV reception. Nala was content with pretty simple things.

  So for her boyfriend to buy a plane as swank as this? Even if it was “small” in the private airplane world? Damn!

  “Finally, an airbus to call our own.” Nala flopped down next to him on the couch. Even though he dressed like a college student with decent hygiene habits, he smelled and felt so wonderfully older. (He better. He was thirty, for fuck’s sake.) But Nala had college boys on the brain because she had just finished her first winter term at Portland Community College and was ready to relax through Christmas. Relaxing, of course, meant plenty of video games and sex with the boyfriend. So far she had managed to completely own his incompetent ass at the former and be completely owned by him during the latter. But there was always room for further improvement. “Can’t believe it took you this damn long.”

  “I never traveled as much as before, let alone those kinds of distances.” Once Vincent was renting a plane once, twice a month to go to places like South Korea and Germany, he realized he was losing more money in the long run compared to outright owning his own plane. “What can I say? As fun as it was to fuck you in all those rental planes, there’s something to be said for having one’s own bed to do with as they please.”

  Nala wouldn’t argue with that. She really fancied the whole plane sex thing. She was one of the lucky few who got so aroused and so off that she and Vincent were the luckiest people flying through the atmosphere every time they traveled. (Except for that one time she drank too much beforehand and spent a three-hour flight vomiting. That was not fun.)

  “Mr. Lane,” said the male flight attendant from the doorway. “We will be taking off soon if it’s fine with you.” He nodded to Nala. “Ms. Nazarov.”

  “Yes, let’s get going.” Vincent squeezed his girlfriend’s naked knee. They both always joked about the plane rising through the pot-cloud haze and into the clear blue sky. People whined that Portland was so rainy? Well, where there was the scent of skunk…

  “In that case, I have to ask that all parties buckle up for takeoff.”

  Vincent nudged his girlfriend. “Hear that? Buckle up.”

  The man could make anything sound like innuendo. Nobody but him understood what he was trying to get at there, but bless him for putting the thoughts into Nala’s head.

  Twenty minutes later they were up in the air, Nala’s ears popping no matter how many times she opened her jaw, and Vincent’s inability to properly yawn almost making him phone the captain to ask what the fuck was going on up there. Neither of them wanted to spend their five hour flight to New England like this!

  The only reason Vincent accepted an invitation from some business friends to attend a huge Christmas gala back east was because he could pencil in two crucial meetings in the process. Plus, he wanted to take his girlfriend someplace nice for Christmas… that wasn’t his childhood home back in Fresno. Oh, they would be going there too, eventually, but Vincent’s mother was still having a hard time grasping her son’s relationship to some older college student when there were perfectly good well-bred girls lining up to take his money and suck his dick. Mrs. Lane would never speak in those terms, but she and Nala were such polar personality opposites that Vincent knew he needed to do something fun with his girlfriend before subjecting her to that on Christmas.

  He also wanted to get the fuck away from the west coast for a few days. No real reason. Cabin fever, we have to suppose.

  Nobody, however, had cabin fever in the plane. As soon as they were free to get up without any danger, Nala was sprucing up in front of the bathroom mirror and waiting for the Mile-High drug to needle into her brain. She had a hot boyfriend who kne
w how to please her, and she had made a big point to him that very morning that she had just finished her period . A very tough, nasty period that had almost made her miss two of her finals because she felt like such epic shit for almost three days straight.

  Now she felt much better! Funny how not having one’s uterus explode in all spherical directions helped a girl out like that.

  “Hey,” she said, stepping out of the bathroom and leaning against the wall. Vincent looked up from his cell phone and found his girlfriend already halfway to O-Town. (It didn’t take much.) “You know, skip, there’s this bed over here and…”

  She didn’t have to say anymore. Vincent was off the couch and hauling her into the bedroom with strict instructions for nobody to bother them outside of an emergency.

  We all know, dear readers, that it’s bad when we can’t even bother to take off our clothes – or if we have to consciously take off our clothes because it’s not as good with all of our clothing still on our bodies. That’s what happened to Vincent and Nala the moment that bedroom door locked. Nala was so voracious for her boyfriend that not even the engine blowing out in the plane could have knocked any sense back into her.

  In fact, so wired by the experience was she, that she always found it perplexing that her boyfriend wasn’t immediately hard the moment the Mile-High arousal fucked her up. What, wasn’t he as much of a victim as she was? (He was, as soon as he realized how ready to go his girlfriend was. Then it was only a matter of getting certain friends up for the challenge.)

  Thing about this sort of aerial affliction is that it’s ongoing. Certain body parts may tire after a while, but the body as a whole is convinced that there is no such thing as satisfaction. So no matter how many times (or how fast or hard) Vincent fucked her, or how many scratch marks she left on his back, or how many times turbulence made the (many, many) orgasms even better, poor Nala was never satisfied. By the time Vincent rolled off her with hands of mercy in her face, she was grumbling that even though her pussy was also begging for mercy, the rest of her body was demanding more sex to make the itch finally go away.