Title: His Dirty Bargain
Series: Dirty Billionaires #3
Author: Fiona Murphy
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Release Date: October 22, 2019
Blurb
Three billionaire brothers:
Cesare, Enzo, and Dante Sabatini have everything except the one thing money
can’t buy. Three big beautiful, women Alicia, Bethany, and Chloe will teach
them the ABCs of love. Follow these couples as they negotiate the riskiest deal
of all, falling in love.
My biological clock has been pounding. Any minute now, I'm going to hit
buy on the sperm that's been sitting in my online cart for the last six
months.... any minute. I want to be a
single mom. The last five years without a man have been the best years of my
life. Except, I do want kids, six if I had my way. But if I’m doing it alone, I
can’t really afford more than one.
At least what I need I can get off a website. I had no idea men had
biological clocks too, but Enzo Sabatini proved otherwise. The control-freak
billionaire married a gold-digging womb to get the children he wanted, and not
surprisingly it blew up in his face. With the ink barely dry on his divorce
that lasted longer than his marriage, I'm tasked with finding him a new place
to live. I can't believe it's really heat I see in his eyes when he looks at
me. I'm nothing like his usual women, plus size compared to size zero.
Shock is an understatement when I see the ring. I can barely process his
insane proposal of me getting the dream house and the multifamily property I
want in exchange for at least ten years and two kids. Wait, what? What kind of
effing proposal is that? It's not a marriage proposal, it's a bargain—one with
limits and terms and signed off by lawyers. I don't care how hot he is; he's
lost his mind.
So why do I say not yet instead of no? Is this going to be
the biggest mistake of my life, or is there any way we can make a
happy-ever-after from this dirty bargain?
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Excerpt
A hand
wraps around my arm as he drags me after him. “What the hell is going on with
you?” he thunders once we’re out on the front lawn.
“Don’t yell
at me, damn it! Are you fucking serious? You tell my boss a personal plan in a
light meant to shame and embarrass me over brunch, you belittle me, you ignore
me, then you want to know what is going on with me?”
Shaking his
head, he takes a deep breath. “Don’t forget I let the tiny blonde close to me.”
Violence
erupts from me and I shove him, hard. “She fucking touched you like she had
every right to.” Oh god, I didn’t do that.
The bastard
laughs as he tugs me close. I’m so ashamed I can’t look at him even though I
want to push him away from me, pissed that he’s daring to laugh. “Fuck, woman,
you are driving me crazy. Why can’t you be normal?”
With a sigh
I give in to resting my head on his chest. All at once, the anger and pain
disappears as I inhale his scent, feel his body against mine. “I’m not going to
apologize. Normal is boring. If I were normal you wouldn’t look at me twice,
you would have already moved on to your next bimbo.”
“Hmm…” His
hand runs up and down my back soothingly. “I won’t lie, you’re right. Bimbos
are boring, you could never be called boring. So I’ve been thinking…” He pulls
out something shiny from his pocket. No, it can’t be. Holy fuck, it is. “I have
another deal to offer you. Marry me and we’ll fill this place with laughter and
memories. Help me turn it from a house into a home. I want at least two kids,
any more is up to you, and in return I’ll buy you the multifamily property you
want, and this place is yours free and clear as long as we hit ten years. We
give it at least ten years and you’ll think you’ve won the lottery. If you want
out any sooner, I’ll make you regret ever meeting me.”
I stumble
back from him on shaky legs, staring at the enormous ring in horror. “What kind
of marriage proposal was that? It was a marriage proposal, right?” How could he
say such awful things at the same time as asking me to marry him? “Have you
lost your mind?”
At least he
has the decency to blush. “What? It’s an honest deal between two people, a hell
of a lot more honest than ninety percent of the proposals happening any given
day. I get it, you have a hard time trusting men are going to stick around,
treat you well, and be faithful. The ring gives you the first one, and I don’t
have a problem with either the second or third thing. I bought this house for
you, you can make it anything you want. If we divorce you’ll get it in the
settlement on top of the multifamily and more than generous alimony, as long as
I get custody of the kids.”
This is a
dream, a nightmare, a crazy Klonopin-induced nightmare because who the hell
would believe this is real? I’m shaking my head, trying to clear it, trying to
figure out what is happening. The ring is thrust in my face again. It’s
enormous, an odd pinkish peach color. “What is it?”
“It’s a
padparadscha, a kind of sapphire. Normally, I wouldn’t have gotten something so
big at twenty-eight carats, but the only other one they had was only four
carats and that didn’t seem right at all. A diamond didn’t seem unique enough
for you. I’m also willing to admit I didn’t want any man thinking you were
available.” He shrugs.
And it’s
the sweetest thing I think he’s ever said. How could he say that while also
saying all the other crap? “We’ve known each other a week, less than a week. I
can’t marry you, it’s crazy.”
“How is it
crazy? We both know what we want, we both want the same thing, and we both want
each other. When something’s right it’s right. When you know you know. What
difference does it make from one week to one year?”
“Because, I
don’t know how you like your coffee. I don’t know your favorite food, color, or
book. I don’t know if you sleep naked or in pajamas. I don’t know anything
about you other than you have way too much money, an enormous ego, and okay,
yes, I want to have sex with you, but that doesn’t make a marriage, not even
one for just ten years.”
“We
couldn’t make a marriage without the sex.”
“I don’t
want to breastfeed. I’ll do everything I can to make sure I have a C-section up
to and including bribing my doctor. Even if I didn’t have to work, I want to
after my maternity leave is over. I want six kids, not two, not four, six. I
want private school but not religious schools. I don’t want to take my kids to
church on Sundays, I want them to choose what they believe in. I don’t want to
do the Santa myth thing or the tooth fairy. I want my kids to know they’re
important, but I refuse to let them believe the world revolves around them.
Those are important, those things could break up a marriage. Those are the
things you learn over the course of dating and having an actual relationship
instead of just jumping into a marriage.”
“So you’re
saying, no?”
Oh god, he
actually looks sad, then he blinks and it’s gone. Deep down I want to scream yes,
fuck caution, fuck that it’s too soon, he wants me, bought a house for me,
he bought a ring, except he’s saying
things like ten years and threatening me with horrors unknown if I dare to want
a divorce before ten years. Fear outweighs everything. “I’m saying not
yet.”
“I should
have known.” He flicks the ring at me. I can’t catch it, it falls at my feet.
“Keep it, I sure as fuck don’t want it. Use it to go toward your sperm donor.”
I can’t believe he’s just walking away.
I’m frozen
where I stand. It was real. Enzo Sabatini just asked me to marry him. No, he
offered me a deal, a bargain, one with a whole lot of strings he would use to
tie me up. The insane ring glints up at me. I bend down; it’s heavy. Don’t
do it, Chloe. A sick curiosity has me slipping it on my left ring finger.
My stomach flips a dozen times—it fits perfectly.
In the
moment I was positive I did the right thing, but now…I’m not sure anymore.
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Author Bio
Due to commitment
issues I have lived in many different cities and my favorite is Chicago but I
have managed to settle into Austin and perhaps my commitment issues are behind
me.
I have enjoyed
reading from a very young age and it wasn't long before the children books
bored me and I read the books my mother enjoyed Stephen King and Dean Koontz
and I didn't sleep without the light on until I was about ten.
I came across my
first Harlequin by accident and it was love at first read, no one died and
happy endings? It was a whole new world and I loved it.
I wrote my first
story at eight and everyone died, of course. Since then I would like to think
I've gotten better and now I'm writing the happily ever afters I first fell in
love with, with some hot sex thrown in along the way.
As a plus size woman
myself, I have started writing the stories I always wanted to see myself in but
never did. And now I’m ecstatic to give BBWs the happily ever afters with hot
Alphas I want to read.
