My Fair Billionaire

Five


After addressing Peyton’s wardrobe and hair, ah, challenges, Ava turned his attention to the appreciation of life’s finer things—art, music, theater. At least, that was where she was planning to turn his attention the morning after their sartorial adventures. No sooner did she rap lightly on the door of his hotel suite, however, than did she discover her plans were about to go awry.

“Sorry,” he said by way of a greeting. “But we have to cancel this morning. I’m supposed to meet with the matchmaker. I forgot all about it yesterday when you and I made plans for this morning.”

Ava told herself the reason for the sudden knot her stomach was because she was peeved at his last-minute canceling of their date. Ah, she meant plans. And she was peeved because they were plans she’d given herself the day off from work for when she might have saved herself some money instead of paying Lucy overtime. It had nothing to do with the fact that Peyton would be spending the morning with another woman.

Not that the other woman was, you know, another woman, since for her to be that, Ava would have to be the primary woman in his life, and of course that wasn’t the case. Besides, the other woman he was seeing today was only a matchmaker. A matchmaker who would be setting him up with, well, other women. Women he would be seeing socially. Confidentially. Romantically.


The knot squeezed tighter. Because she was peeved, Ava reminded herself. Peeved that he was messing up their plans.

“Oh. Okay,” she said, sounding troubled and unhappy, and in no way peeved.

“I’m really sorry,” he apologized again. “When I checked my voice mail last night, there was a message from Caroline—she’s the matchmaker—reminding me. By then it was too late to call you, and you didn’t answer your phone this morning.”

He must have called while she was in the shower. “Well, you don’t want to miss a meeting with her. I’m sure you and she have a lot to go over before you can launch your quest for Ms. Right.”

“Actually, I’ve already met with her once. We’re meeting today because she’s rounded up some possible matches, and she wants me to look at their photos and go over their stats before she makes the actual introductions. Maybe we could just push things back to this afternoon?”

“Sure. No problem.”

So what if Peyton was meeting with his matchmaker? Ava asked herself. He was supposed to be doing that. Finding an appropriate woman was half the reason he was back in Chicago, and Ava didn’t even have to work with him on that part. She only had to make sure he was presentable to any woman he did meet.

She leaped on that realization. “But you know, Peyton, I’m not sure you’re ready to meet any prospective dates just yet. We still have a lot of work to do to get you ready for that.”

“How much more do we have to do?”

He’d actually come a long way in four days, Ava had to admit. And not just because of his stylish new wardrobe and excellent new haircut—which he had finally agreed to get at her salon, but not after much haggling. Haggling that, in hindsight, hadn’t been all that unpleasant, especially when he seemed to be enjoying it as much as she did.

At any rate, his faded jeans and bulky sweater of the day before had made way for expensive dark-wash denim and a more fitted sweater in what she knew was espresso, but which she’d conceded to Peyton—after more surprisingly enjoyable haggling—was actually brown. His shorter hair had showcased the few threads of silver amid the black, something that gave him a definite executive aura—not to mention an added bit of sexiness. Ava’s charcoal skirt and claret cashmere sweater set—both by Chanel—should have seemed dressy, but he made denim and cotton aristocratic to the point where she felt like the palace gardener. He was the kind of client that would make a matchmaker drool—never mind the effect he would have on his prospective matches. It was amazing what a little polish would do for a guy.

Then again, it wasn’t always the clothes that made the man. What made Peyton Peyton was what was beneath the clothes. And that was something even teaching him about the finer things in life wouldn’t change. Yes, he needed to learn to become a gentleman if he wanted to impress the sisters Montgomery and acquire their company. But there was too much roughneck in him to ever let the gentleman take over for very long.

It was a realization that should have made Ava even more peeved, since it suggested that everything she was doing to help him was pointless. Instead, it comforted her.

Remembering he’d asked her a question that needed a response, she said, “Well, I was kind of hoping to cover the arts this week. And we still need to fine-tune your restaurant etiquette. And we should—” She halted. There was no reason to make him think there was still tons more to do, since there really wasn’t. For some reason, though, she found herself wishing there was still tons more to do. “Not a lot,” she said. “There’s not a lot.”

Instead of looking pleased about that, he looked kind of, well, peeved.

“I should go,” she told him. “What time do you think you’ll be finished?”

“I don’t know. Maybe I could call you when we’re done?”

She nodded and started to turn away.

“Unless...”

She turned to face him. “Unless what?”

He looked a little uncomfortable. “Unless maybe...” He shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans, a restless gesture. “Unless maybe you want to come with me?”

It was an odd request. For one thing, Caroline the matchmaker would be curious—not to mention possibly peeved—if Peyton showed up with a woman. A woman who, by the way, Caroline had had no part in setting him up with, so she wouldn’t be collecting a finder’s fee. For another thing, why would Peyton want Ava with him when he considered a potentially life-changing decision?

As if he’d heard her unspoken question, he hurried on, “I mean, you might be able to give me some advice or something. I’ve never worked with a matchmaker before.”

Oh, and she had? Jeez, she hadn’t even had a date in more than a year. She was the last person who should be giving advice about matters of the heart. Not that Peyton needed to know any of that, but still.

“Please, Ava?” he asked, sounding as if he genuinely wanted her to come along. “You know what kind of woman I need to find. One who’s just like—”

You. That was what he had been about to say. That was the word his lips had been about to form, the one hanging in the air between them, the one exiting his head and entering her own. Ava knew it as surely as she knew her own name.

After an almost imperceptible pause, he finished, “—Jackie Kennedy. I need to find a woman like Jackie Kennedy.”

Oh, sure. As if there were any women in the world like Jackie Kennedy. How Peyton could have jumped from thinking about Ava to thinking about her was a mystery.

“Okay, I’ll come with you,” she said. She had no idea when she had made the decision to do so. And she was even more uncertain about why. What was really odd, though, was how, suddenly, somehow, she didn’t feel quite as peeved as she had before.

* * *

The office of Attachments, Inc. had surprised Peyton on his first visit. He’d thought a matchmaker’s office would be full of hearts and flowers, furnished with overblown Victorian furniture in a million different colors, with sappy chamber music playing over it all. Instead, the place was much like his own office in San Francisco, twenty stories above the city, with wide windows that offered panoramic views of Lake Michigan and Navy Pier, furnished in contemporary sleekness and soothing earth tones. The music was jazz, and the only plants were potted bamboo.

Caroline, too, had come as a surprise that first time. He’d expected a gingham-clad grandmother with a graying bun and glasses perched on her nose, but the woman who greeted him and Ava was a far cry from that. Yes, her hair was silver, but it hung loose and was stylishly cut, and her glasses were shoved atop her head. In place of gingham, she was wrapped in a snug, sapphire-colored dress and wearing mile-high heels that click-click-clicked on the tile floor as she approached them.

“Mr. Moss,” she gushed when she came to a stop in front of him and extended her hand the way any high-powered business CEO would. “It is so nice to see you again.” Her gushing ebbed considerably, however—in fact, the temperature seemed to drop fifty degrees—when she turned to Ava and said, “Now who are you?”

Before Ava had a chance to answer, Peyton replied, “She’s my, ah, my assistant. Ava Brenner.”

Caroline gave Ava a quick once-over and, evidently satisfied with his answer, immediately dismissed her. She turned to Peyton again. “Well, then. If you’d like to come back to my office, we can get down to business.”


Confident the two of them would follow, she spun on her mile-high heels and click-click-clicked in the direction from which she’d come. Peyton turned to Ava and started to shrug, but stopped when he saw her expression. She looked kind of...peeved. Although that wasn’t a word in his normal vocabulary, he couldn’t think of any other adjective to describe her. She was looking at him as if he’d just insulted her. He backtracked the last few seconds in his brain, then remembered he’d introduced her as his assistant. Okay, so maybe that suggested she was his subordinate, but he was paying her to help him out, so that sort of made her an employee, and that kind of made her a subordinate. And what was the big deal anyway? Some of his best friends were subordinates.

Anyway, they didn’t have time for another argument. So he only gestured after the hastily departing Caroline and asked, “Are you coming?”

“Do I have a choice?” she replied crisply.

He did shrug this time, hoping the gesture looked more sincere than it felt. “You could wait out here if you want.”

For a moment, he thought she would take him up on that, and a weird panic rose in his belly. She wouldn’t. He needed her to help him with this. He had no idea what kind of woman would be acceptable to his board of directors. Other than that she had to have all the qualities Ava had.

Caroline called back to them, and although Ava tensed even more, she turned in the direction of the matchmaker and began to march forward. Relief—and a strange kind of happiness—washed over Peyton as he followed. Because he needed her, he told himself. Or rather, he needed her help. That was why he was glad she hadn’t stayed in the waiting room. It had nothing to do with how he just felt better having her at his side. The reason he felt better having her at his side was because, you know, she was helping him. Which he needed. Her help, he meant. Not her at his side.

Ah, hell. He was just happy—he meant relieved—that she was with him.

Caroline’s office was a better reflection of her trade. The walls were painted the color of good red wine, and a wide Persian rug spanned a floor that had magically become hardwood. Her desk was actually kind of Victorian-looking, but it was tempered by the sleek city skyline in the windows behind her. On one wall hung certificates for various accomplishments, along with two degrees in psychology from Northwestern. Her bookshelf was populated less by books than by artifacts from world travels, but the books present were all about relationships and sexuality.

Instead of deploying her strategy from behind her desk, Caroline scooped up a small stack of manila folders atop it, invited Peyton and Ava to seat themselves on an overstuffed sofa on the opposite wall, then sat down in a matching chair beside it.

“May I call you Peyton?” she asked with a warm smile.

“Sure,” he told her.

He waited for her to smile warmly at Ava and ask if she could call her by her first name, too, but Caroline instead began to sift through the folders until she homed in on one in particular.

Still smiling her warm smile—which Peyton would have sworn was genuine until she dismissed Ava so readily—she said, “I inputted your vital statistics, your likes and dislikes, and what you’re looking for in a match into the computer, and I found four women I think you’ll like very much. This one in particular,” she added as she opened the top folder, “is quite a catch. Very old-money Chicago, born and raised here, Art Institute graduate, active volunteer in the local arts community, a curator for a small gallery on State Street, contributing reviewer for the Tribune, member of the Daughters of the American Revolution.... Oh, the list just goes on and on. She has every quality you’re looking for.”

Caroline handed the open folder to Peyton, who took it automatically. It contained a few sheets of printed information with a four-by-six head shot attached. It was to the latter that his gaze was naturally drawn. The woman was—well, there was no other word for it—breathtakingly beautiful. Okay, okay, that was two words, but that just went to show how amazingly gorgeous and incredibly dazzling she was. Women who looked like her just demanded adverbs to go along with the adjectives. Her hair was dark auburn and pooled around her bare shoulders; her eyes were huge, green and thickly lashed. He didn’t kid himself that the photo wasn’t retouched or that she would look the same had she not been so artfully made up with the kind of cosmetic wizardry that made a woman look as though she wasn’t wearing makeup at all. She was still... Wow. Breathtakingly beautiful, amazingly gorgeous and incredibly dazzling.

“Wow,” he said, speaking his thoughts aloud. Well, part of them, anyway. There were some that were best left in his head.

“Indeed,” said Caroline with a satisfied smile. “Her name is—”

“Vicki,” Ava finished, at the same time Caroline was saying, “Victoria.”

The women exchanged looks, then spoke as one again. But, again, they each said something different.

“Victoria Haverty,” said the matchmaker.

“Vicki Nielsson,” said Ava.

The two women continued to stare at each other, but it was Caroline alone who spoke this time. “Do you know Ms. Haverty?”

Ava nodded. “Oh, yes. We debuted together. But Haverty is her maiden name. She’s Vicki Nielsson now.”

Caroline’s eyes fairly bugged out of her head. “She’s married?”

“I’m afraid so,” Ava told her. “And living in Reykjavik with her husband, Dagbjart, last I heard. Which was about two weeks ago.”

“But she gave me an address here in Chicago,” Caroline objected, as if that would negate everything Ava had said.

“On Astor Street?” Ava asked.

Caroline went to her desk and tapped a few keys on a laptop sitting atop it. It was then that Peyton realized all the information on his pages was nonidentifying statistics such as age, education, occupation and interests. “Yes,” the matchmaker said without looking up.

“That’s her parents’ place,” Ava replied. “She does come home to visit fairly often.”

The matchmaker looked at Ava incredulously. “But why would she apply with a Chicago matchmaker if she’s happily married and living in...um, where is Reykjavik?”

“Iceland,” Peyton and Ava said in unison.

The matchmaker looked even more confused. “Why would she apply with Attachments if she’s married and living in Iceland?”

When Peyton looked at Ava, she seemed to be trying very hard not to grin. A smug grin, too, if he wasn’t mistaken. He knew that because she wasn’t doing a very good job fighting it.

“Well,” she began smugly, “maybe Vicki’s not as happily married as ol’ Dagbjart would like to think. And ol’ Dagbjart is, well, ol’,” she added. “He was seventy-six when Vicki married him. He must be pushing ninety by now. The Havertys have always been known for marrying into families even wealthier than they are, but clearly Vicki underestimated that Scandinavian life expectancy. Did you know men in Iceland live longer than men in any other country?”

The matchmaker said nothing in response to that. Neither did Peyton, for that matter. What could he say? Other than, Hey, Caroline, way to go on the background checks.

The matchmaker finally seemed to remember she was with a client who was paying her a crapload of money to find him a mate—a mate who wasn’t already married, by the way—and returned to the sofa to snatch the folder out of Peyton’s hands and replace it with another. “An honest mistake,” she said. “I’m sure you’ll like this one even better.”


He opened that folder to find another sheet of vital statistics affixed to another four-by-six glossy, this time of a woman who wasn’t quite as breathtaking, amazing or incredible as the first, but who was still beautiful, gorgeous and dazzling. She, too, had auburn hair, a few shades lighter than the first, and eyes so clear a blue, they could have only been enhanced with Photoshop. Still, even without retouching, the woman was stunning.

“This young woman,” Caroline said, “is the absolute cream of Chicago society. One of her ancestors helped found the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and her father is on the Chicago Board of Trade. Her mother’s family are the Lauderdales, who own the Lauderdale department store chain, among other things. She herself has two college degrees, one in business and one in fashion design. Her name is...”

The matchmaker hesitated, glancing over at Ava.

As if taking the cue, Ava looked at Peyton and said, “Roxy Mittendorf. Roxanne,” she corrected herself when Caroline looked as if she would take exception. “But she went by Roxy when we were kids.”

Now Ava was the one to hesitate, as if she were weighing whether or not to say more. Finally, the weight fell, and she added, “At least until after that college spring break trip, when she came home with the clap. Then people started calling her Doxy. I’m not sure if that’s because they thought she was, you know, a doxy, or because her doctor prescribed doxycycline to treat it.” She brightened. “But I guess that’s really neither here nor there, is it? I mean, it’s not like she still has the clap. At least, I don’t think that’s one that flares up again, is it?”

She traded glances with both Peyton and Caroline, and when neither of them commented, she evidently felt it necessary to add, “Well, I never called her Doxy. I didn’t even find out about the clap thing until after graduation.”

Peyton closed the file folder and handed it back to Caroline without comment. Caroline fished for the third in her lap and exchanged it for the second one. When he opened this one he found—taa-daa!—another redheaded beauty, this one with eyes a lighter blue that might actually occur in nature. Interesting that the matchmaker was three for three with regard to red hair.

When he glanced back at Caroline, she seemed to sense his thoughts, because she said, “Well, you did indicate you had a preference for redheads. And also green eyes, but except for that first, all my other candidates for you have blue eyes. Still, not so very different, right?”

For some reason—Peyton couldn’t imagine why—they both looked over at Ava. Ava with her dark red hair and green, green eyes.

“What?” she asked innocently.

“Nothing,” Peyton said, grateful she hadn’t made the connection.

Had he actually stated on his application that he had a preference for green-eyed redheads? He honestly couldn’t remember. Then again, he’d been on the jet heading to Chicago at the time, surrounded by a ton of work he’d wanted to finish before his arrival. He’d only been half paying attention to how he was answering the questions. He thought about several of the women he had dated in the past and was surprised to realize that most of them had been redheads. Odd. He liked all women. He didn’t care if their hair was blond, brown, red or purple, or what color eyes they had, or what their ethnic, educational or economic origins were. If they were smart, funny and beautiful, if they made him feel good when he was with them, that was all he cared about. So why had he dated so many redheads? Especially when redheads were such a minority?

Instead of looking where he wanted to look just then, he turned his attention to his third prospective date. Before Caroline had a chance to say a word, he held up the photo to show Ava. “Do you know her?”

Ava looked almost guilty. “I do, actually. But you know her, too. She went to Emerson with us. She was in my grade.”

Peyton looked at the photo again. The woman was in no way familiar. Which was weird, because a girl that pretty he would have remembered. “Are you sure? I don’t remember her at all.”

“Well, you should,” Ava said. “You two played hockey together for three years.”

He shook his head. “That’s not possible. There weren’t any girls on the Emerson hockey team.”

“No, there weren’t.”

Understanding dawned on him then. Dawned like a good, solid blow to the back of the head. He looked at the photo again, shortening the hair and blunting the features a bit. “Oh, my God,” he finally said. “Is that Nick Boorman?”

“Nicolette,” Ava corrected him. “She goes by Nicolette now.”

Peyton closed the folder and handed it back to Caroline. “Not that there’s anything wrong with that,” he said. “But it would just be kind of, um...”

“Awkward,” Ava whispered helpfully.

“Yeah.”

Caroline took the folder from him and tucked it under the other two candidates that were a no-go. But she was looking at Ava when she did it. “Who are you?” she asked.

Ava shrugged. “I’m just Mr. Moss’s assistant.”

Caroline didn’t look anywhere near convinced. She lifted the last of her folders defiantly. She spoke not to Peyton this time, but to Ava. “This candidate has only lived in Chicago for four years. She’s originally from Miami. Do you have any friends or family in Miami, Ms. Brenner? Any connection to that city at all?”

Ava shook her head. “No, I don’t.”

Caroline opened the folder and showed the photo to Ava before allowing Peyton to look at it. “Do you know this woman?”

Ava shook her head again. “I haven’t had the pleasure of meeting her. Yet,” she added, seemingly pointedly.

“Good,” Caroline said. She turned to Peyton and finally allowed him to view the file. “This is Francesca Stratton. She started off as a software developer but is now the CEO of her own company. Her father is a neurosurgeon in Coral Gables, and her mother is a circuit court judge for the state of Florida. Their lineage in that state goes back six generations. And she’s a distant cousin to King Juan Carlos of Spain.”

Now Caroline looked at Ava, as if daring her to come up with something that might challenge the woman’s pedigree. When Ava only smiled benignly, the matchmaker continued, “Peyton, I think you and she would be perfect for each other.”

He tried not to think about how Caroline had considered the three candidates ahead of Francesca more perfect, and instead took the file to look over the rest of the woman’s particulars. He liked that she had built her own company, the way he had, and her knowledge of computers and software design could definitely come in handy with regard to his own work. She was outdoorsy—she cited a love of scuba diving, rock climbing and horseback riding. She preferred nonfiction over fiction, rock and roll over any other music, eating out over eating in. And she was a fan of both the Florida Panthers and Chicago Blackhawks. There wasn’t a single thing in her vitals to dissuade him from agreeing with Caroline. She really did seem perfect for him.

So why wasn’t he more excited about the prospect of meeting her?

A movement to his left caught his eye, and he found Ava trying to read the file from where she sat. Instead of making her work for it, he handed it to her.

“What do you think?” he asked as she turned to the final page.


“Ivy League–educated, accomplished pianist, member of the United States Dressage Federation, one of Chicago’s One Hundred Women Making a Difference. What’s not to love?”

Funny, but she didn’t sound as though she loved Francesca.

“So on the Jackie Kennedy scale,” he said, “where do you think she’d fall?”

Ava closed the file and returned it to the matchmaker. “Well, if Jackie Kennedy were a young woman today, I think she’d be a lot like Francesca Stratton.”

“So...maybe eight?”

With what sounded like much resignation and little satisfaction, she said, “Ten.”

That was exactly what Peyton wanted to hear. So why was he disappointed hearing it?

In spite of his reaction, he turned to Caroline and said, “Sounds like we have a winner. When can you set something up?”

The matchmaker looked both relieved and happy. “Let me contact Francesca to see what works for her, and I’ll get back to you. What evenings work best for you?”

“Just about any evening is fi—” Peyton started to say. But the delicate clearing of a throat to his left him kept him from finishing.

He looked over at Ava, who was shaking her head.

“What?” he asked.

“You said you didn’t think you were ready to meet any of your prospective dates just yet,” she reminded him.

“No, you said that.”

“And you agreed. We still have several lessons we need to go over.”

He said nothing. He had agreed. And really, he didn’t mind that much putting off the meeting. Odd, since he really did want to get out of Chicago and back to San Francisco. Maybe he hadn’t felt as antsy over the past few days as he had when he’d first arrived, but he did need to get back to the West Coast soon. So he and Ava needed to wrap things up pronto.

“How long do you think we’ll need to get me through them?” he asked. And for some really bizarro reason, he found himself hoping she would tell him it would be weeks and weeks and weeks.

Instead, she told him, “Another week, at least.”

“So maybe by the weekend after this one?”

She looked as if she wanted to say, No, it will be weeks and weeks and weeks. Instead, she replied, “Um, sure. If we work hard, and if you follow the rules,” she added meaningfully, “then we can probably get you where you need to be by then.”

Following the rules. Not his favorite thing to do. Still, if it would get him a date with a modern-day Jackie Kennedy...

He turned to Caroline again. “How about next Friday or Saturday if she’s available?”

Caroline jotted the dates down on the top of the file folder. “I’m reasonably certain that one of those days will be fine. I’ll let you know which one after I’ve spoken to Francesca.”

Great, he thought without much enthusiasm. “Great!” he said with much enthusiasm.

He stood, with Ava quickly following suit, thanked Caroline for all her work, and they both started to make their way to the door. They halted, however, when the matchmaker called Ava’s name.

“Ms. Brenner,” she said tentatively, “you, ah...you wouldn’t happen to be looking for a job, would you? Something part-time that wouldn’t interfere with your work as Peyton’s assistant? You’d be an enormous asset to us here at Attachments, Inc.”

Looking a little startled, Ava replied, “Um, no. But thank you.”

Peyton told Caroline, “The reason Ava knew all those women is because she moves in the same social circles they do. Her family is loaded. She doesn’t have to work.” Unable to help himself, he added, “Never mind that she’s bleeding me dry for being my assistant at the moment.”

Caroline suddenly looked way more interested in Ava than she had when Ava was just a prospective part-timer. Funny, though, how Ava suddenly looked kind of panicky.

“I see,” the matchmaker said. “Well then, maybe I could help you. Introduce you to a nice man who has the same set of values you have?”

In other words, Peyton translated, a nice man who had the same value that Ava had. Cha-ching. For some reason, he suddenly felt kind of panicky, too.

“What do you say, Ava?” the matchmaker added. And it wasn’t lost on Peyton that she had switched to the first-name basis she evidently only used with her clients, not to mention the almost genuinely warm smile. “Would you like to fill out an application while you’re here?”

Ava smiled back, but somehow looked even more alarmed. “Thank you, Caroline, but I’m really not in the market right now.”

Her response made Peyton wonder again if she was seriously involved with someone, and if that was why she wasn’t currently in the market. During the week the two of them had spent together, she had never said anything that made him think there was a significant other in her life, and she seemed to have plenty of time on her hands if she was able to work with him every day. Call him crazy, but he didn’t think a guy who had a woman like Ava waiting for him at home—hell, who had Ava waiting for him at home—would be too happy about her spending so much time with another guy. If Peyton had Ava waiting at home for him, he’d sure as hell never—

But he didn’t have Ava waiting at home for him, he reminded himself. And he didn’t want her waiting at home for him. So what was the point of even thinking about it?

“Well, if you change your mind...” Caroline said, leaving the statement incomplete but her intention stated.

“You’ll be the first person I call,” Ava promised.

Peyton did his best not to wish he could be the first person she’d call. Even though he kind of did.

Dammit, what was wrong with him? He’d just been paired up with a modern-day Jackie Kennedy. He should be over the moon. He was just distracted, that was all—too much going on. The takeover of Montgomery and Sons, massive self-improvement, the hunt for the right woman, the ghost of high school past...it was no wonder his brain was scrambled.

“Are we finished here?” he asked, more irritably than he intended.

Both Caroline and Ava seemed to notice that, too. But it was Ava who replied, “You tell me.”

“Yes,” he snapped.

Without awaiting a reply, he made his way to the door. Let the women draw whatever conclusion they wanted from his behavior. As far as he was concerned, any lessons Ava might have in store for the rest of the day were canceled. He had work to do. Work that didn’t include anything or anyone with more than one X chromosome.