Bartered Submission: The Billionaire's Wife, Part 5 (A BDSM Erotic Romance) by Ava Lore Page A

this very same tactic with me, and it was
incredibly effective. After a moment the voice burbled again, this
time sounding very contrite.
    "Yes, thank you," Anton told them, and hung up, then
dialed a new number. "Arthur, I need to speak to Don Schmidt as
soon as I get into the office. Yes, clear that appointment." The
whole time he spoke in a slow, calm manner, his voice almost
soothing, unless, I suppose, you had fucked up in some way. Then it
probably sounded like a bomb about to go off. Unpredictable. And
yet I'd never heard him yell, and he'd only become closed off and
angry once or twice with me in private.
    He had incredible control. I'd observed last night
that his need for control was consuming, and could be a weakness.
Say what you like about my father, but he tried to teach me—between
rounds at the golf course when he forced me to be his caddy—about
the business world. Some of it had sunk in, despite my best
efforts, and I found myself falling back on them now, trying to
decipher the enigma Anton presented. Before our ill-fated shopping
trip, I'd read up on him on the internet.
    Anton Waters. No known family, though he had said
that his parents died in a car crash when he was young in several
interviews. He got his start in real estate, flipping properties
like pancakes as the bubble swelled. Money flowed from his real
estate ventures into finance and manufacturing, and he was known
throughout the business world as a man who made no attachments. He
held no trust in others, and others held no trust in him. His only
hobby, apparently, was cooking.
    And crazy sex. Couldn't forget that part.
    Anton hung up and turned to me. “Where were we? Oh,
yes, living arrangements.”
    “Am I not coming to live with you?” I asked.
    “Do you want to?” His green eyes bored into mine,
intense in the dim light inside the car. Outside the sky was gray
with late-autumn clouds, and everything was gloomy. Strange how his
eyes burned so brightly, even in this light.
    “I don't know,” I said. “I don't even know where you
live.”
    “I have a mansion on Central Park West,” he said.
    “Of course you do.”
    He smiled faintly at that. “But if you would like to
live separately for a while, I have no problems with that, as long
as we are together for the agreed-upon number of nights as
stipulated in our prenup.”
    I put a hand to my forehead and began to rub little
circles over my nose. “How many was that again?” I asked. “Per
week?”
    “Three,” he said. “Or ten days in a row per month.
Open to negotiation, of course.”
    Of course. Anton was a very particular man, but for a guy who
was famed for no attachments, he had attached himself to me in a
very big way, without even knowing me.
    “I think I'll move in with you,” I said. “But I need
a place to sculpt.”
    His eyes widened a bit at my answer—perhaps our first
encounter, when I barged into his office and demanded to know who
the hell he thought he was, trying to arrange a marriage with me,
had left a more lasting impression on him than my current, slightly
softer feelings. Nevertheless, he recovered quickly. “Of course,”
he said. “Would you like to keep your apartment as your studio, or
something closer to... home?”
    Hmm. Studio in Manhattan, or studio anywhere else in the
world? Gee, what a
dilemma. I opened my mouth to tell him to move my shit to an
expensive little corner apartment in one of the arty districts, but
then I shut my mouth again. My apartment was mine. Did I really want to leave it behind just because
I was technically moving up in the world? “I'll keep my apartment,”
I said after a moment. “I like it there.”
    He nodded. “Very well. You can pack up your personal
effects if you wish, or I can arrange to have that done for
you.”
    “How fast can it be done?”
    “By tonight, if you like.”
    I like to keep it real, but not that real. If I didn't have to wrap
up my shitty mismatched glasses personally, then I'm not