Billionaire Bad Boy by C.J. Archer Read Free Book Online

the end. He went from city to city dodging
the law, dragging his family with him. Zack's parents' great love ended in
bitter divorce because of the financial and legal pressures.
    His father's creativity, sapped by the time he was
forty, went undiscovered until after his death. Too late.
    So much for dreams. So much for love.
    Zack would not make the same mistake.
    No, he couldn't let Annie know what she did to him or
he'd be trapped. In his experience, women latched on when they knew he was
interested, hoping to drag him to the altar. He supposed he was a good catch on
paper, but so far, he'd managed to extricate himself from any delicate
situations with his bachelorhood in tact.
    So far.
    But Annie was different to those other women. Already
he wanted her. If she knew, she'd use her entire arsenal to get him—and
her weaponry was more powerful than any other woman's because she wasn't aware
of her allure.
    Yep, she was so perfect, she was downright dangerous.
    ***
    Zack took her home and later that night he took Annie
to a bar where shmoozers shmoozed and gossip columnists listened in. Following
in his wake, she peered into the darkness and the motionless haze of smoke
which lent the place an aura of gothic moodiness. It was probably exactly the
atmosphere the trendy LA bar was trying to achieve.
    "What do you want to drink?" Zack asked, easing
himself onto a barstool.
    She shrugged. "Whatever you're having."
    He ordered two beers.
    "Can I have mine in a glass, please?" she
said to the barman.
    "No," countered Zack. "You'll drink
from the bottle." He grabbed his around the neck and swallowed half in one
gulp. She did the same but with considerably less success. She finished with a
splutter, spitting some of the beer across the polished surface of the bar.
    "Keep trying," he said. "Do you like
it?"
    "Not bad." She shrugged one shoulder. "But
I've had beer plenty of times before."
    He nodded but said nothing.
    Damn, he knew she was lying. Not a good
sign.
    She glanced around at the other patrons, trying to
appear as if she did this sort of thing all the time. Several scantily-clad
starlets sat in prominent spots in the middle of the room and a few
sophisticated drinkers hunkered down in dark corners doing deals or whatever it
was they did in bars.
    "You come here a lot?" she asked Zack.
    He shrugged. "More or less."
    "That's not an answer."
    "Nosy, aren't you?"
    "Just curious. I don't know much about you, but
I'm sure Bob's told you about me. That gives you an unfair advantage."
    "That's the way I like it."
    Okay, try a new tactic . "Yesterday you said you've lived in lots of
different places. Why? Was your father in the army or something?"
    Zack took another long gulp of his beer but he never
took his eyes off her. Even when he put the bottle down he studied her for a
long time. It was unnerving. She'd never felt so vulnerable in her life. It
didn't help that he was the man of her dreams either.
    "Okay, if I answer your question, you have to
answer one of mine."
    She hesitated only momentarily before nodding. She had
nothing to hide after all.
    "My parents were poor," he said
matter-of-factly. "Dirt poor. Dad had two jobs but Mom kept having
children. An itinerant laborer can only earn so much. He couldn't support
everyone and Mom couldn't work because someone had to look after us. So he
moonlighted as a thief."
    "Oh my God. I had no idea. Did he get
caught?"
    "We moved before the law caught up with him, then
my parents divorced and he died in his early forties. Shortly after, I headed
to LA. The story gets boring from there."
    She doubted that. "Oh," was all she said. Wow,
was her life so...normal. Next to him, she was dull, despite her father's
decadent lifestyle. A lifestyle he'd tried to share with her. A lifestyle she'd
tried to avoid. Annie's heart went out to the kid Zack had been. But studying
him now, all good looks and confidence and wealth, he hadn't grown up any worse
for his experiences.
    "So tell me how you