The Billionaire's Bet: A Seductive Deal by Clarissa Wild

Chapter 1
     
    “He took her hand and gave it a small peck,
before asking her if she wanted to be his girl,” I muttered, typing
the letters. The string of words just flowed out of my brain and
into the laptop, but it wasn’t anything to be even remotely happy
with.
    I sighed and rolled my eyes. “Delete!” I
firmly pressed the button on my keyboard and erased about a couple
of hundred words. I just stared at the letters, wondering how on
earth I could make this interesting again. My writings had sucked
the last couple of days.
    No scrap that, the last couple of months was
more like it.
    Ever since I broke up with my boyfriend a
few months ago, things had gone downhill, and I didn’t mean with me. I just couldn’t put
out anything worth reading. My entire entrepreneurship of writing,
publishing and selling my own books had come to an abrupt halt and
hadn’t picked up since. It wasn’t because I was sad or depressed; I
just lacked the inspiration to come up with something that was
worthwhile.
    Some idiotic voice in my head told me it
was because of the sex, or lack of thereof. I hadn’t had any good
sex since a long time, and even my ex couldn’t satisfy my needs. It
was like my smutty side had completely dried up and all that
remained was a sappy, laughable version of me, which of course, was
reflected in my erotic novels.
    I heaved a sigh again and took the last
sip of wine from my now empty glass, before saving the small bit of
work I’d written. It was a waste of time. I just couldn’t do it
right now.
    I got up and put on some high heels, and
then grabbed the keys and went out. It was quiet in the hallway.
Most guests were probably already downstairs, blowing away their
money on cheap slot machines that would never yield them anything
but regret, which was exactly what I was planning to do as
well.
    Shame, I know, but what else am I supposed
to do?
    My life was not something I was thinking
about right now. I was
only twenty three, but I was living it, that was all I knew and
cared for. Trying out the cards at the poker table, enjoying the
music and liquor, while writing away in my little hotel room above
the casino. It wasn’t much, but it beat the heck out of staying in
some lousy, one-shop town where everybody knew my name, even though
I was anything but famous. I enjoyed my privacy and needed a shot
of the wild life, so that’s why I came here.
    I walked to the elevator and pressed the
button to go down, but when the doors started closing, a man held
his hand in between.
    “ Wait,” he said, and wriggled his way in
until the doors opened again and he passed through. Eyeing him, I
noticed he was wearing a
fancy suit. He had a strong physique, I could tell that much from
his broad appearance and the nicely fitted fabric. He was probably
somewhere around twenty six. His square, stubbly jaw moved up and
down as he chewed on a toothpick.
    “ Excuse me,” he muttered. He briefly looked
at me with his big, blue eyes. He stepped beside me and our arms
grazed each other, sending tiny shocks through my body. We were
both facing the door, waiting for it to close again, but time felt
like it had stopped. This stranger, whoever it was, had a weird
effect on me I couldn’t ignore.
    While the elevator went down, I glanced
sideways at him. He had short, wavy hair, a bit honey colored, and
I couldn’t help but think about running my fingers through it. My
eyes drifted down toward his big hands, imagining they were all
over me. Of course my lusty brain told me to look at his package,
which was abundant, to say the least.
    Julie, what in the world are you thinking?
Stop it!
    My eyes shot back up to his face again and
only then did I notice he was staring right back at me.
    My cheeks flushed, my body shivering from the
heat. I cleared my throat and turned my head quickly.
    Dear God, I hope he didn’t see that. I know
he did though.
    I heard a muffling sound and from the corner
of my eyes I saw him flash a smile.
    The