The Billionaire's Treat: Secret Billionaire's Club, #3

By Tracey Pedersen

One cheeky billionaire next door equals trouble!

Danny Griffin appears to live a charmed life. Son of a multi-married rock god, he spends his days annoying his friends, wearing odd socks, and buying expensive trinkets no one ever gets to see. His goal for this year is to see each of his friends find love.

The secret billionaires don't know it, but he started this game to fix his own lonely heart.

When Easter rolls around and he doesn't have a date, urgent action is required. Instead of admitting defeat, he bribes his new next-door neighbour into accompanying him to a charity auction for the local hospital.

Tina Faucet (not her real name) is enjoying a quiet existence in an almost silent neighbourhood, where no one looks too closely at her. She's had enough attention to last her a lifetime. Until her cute neighbour convinces her to have one night of fun, and her skeletons come dancing out of the closet.

Will Tina's past jeopardise the secret billionaire's club? Can Danny find a way to keep her and keep his secret?

 

The Secret Billionaire's Club Books:

The Billionaire's Heart
The Billionaire's Luck
The Billionaire's Treat
The Billionaire's Duty
The Billionaire's Spark
The Billionaire's Club
The Billionaire's Scare
The Billionaire's Feast
The Billionaire's Gift
The Billionaire's Surprise

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tracey Pedersen
• Release date: Apr 20, 2019
• ISBN: 9780648342281

Tracey Pedersen

Tracey Pedersen is an Australian USA Today Bestselling author who has finally accepted that she is meant to write, write, write! In 2016 she released her first romance novel and hasn't looked back. Now writing full time, and fighting the urge to write every second of the day, she loves travel, crocheting, replying to reader emails and spending WAY too much time on Facebook!

Book preview

Chapter One - Danny

Acat stares at me from a second floor window of the house next door. It sits upright in that way cats have—ears pointed, tail curled around its legs. I swear it’s glaring at me.

I hate cats.

I examine this house at least once a day, imagining how the two blocks, which sit side by side, will someday become one and I’ll build a walkway, or something equally tacky between the two. This is the first time I’ve spotted a cat sitting in the window that I intend to build my walkway through. In fact, today is the first day in months that the curtain has been opened.

I hit the call button on my phone and a wary voice answers. Hi, Danny. What can I do for you?

There’s a cat next door.

A cat?

A big, fat, ginger cat. In the window.

Umm.

Why is there a cat?

Sylvia, my assistant, slash manager, slash realtor, slash babysitter, hesitates. I stare at the orange beast next door and it observes me without blinking as I wait for her answer. I’ll need to check and come back to you.

If you could. I haven’t seen it there before.

I’ll call you back.

I don’t miss the sigh before Sylvia disconnects. No doubt she’s relieved I only have a cat query today. She knows that I could just as easily have asked her to organise me a new yellow Monaro to drive on the weekend. Maybe a picnic for fifty of my closest friends. Or even a private audience with my father.

Or that private jet the guys and I have been talking about buying for a year.

Yeah. That jet is a sweet idea. Maybe we can make it a prize next year in a new kind of game. Once this year’s amusement is finished, of course.

I turn toward the staircase and my eyes flick to the ornate mirror leaning against the wall. It has a thick gold frame and is almost as tall as me. An auction house delivered it yesterday, and I’ve yet to decide where to hang it. My eyes track along the wall, looking for a suitable space. The wall is filled with art, a scribble painting that one of my step-siblings did for me last year, and a shiny silver mirror I rescued from an estate sale last month. The silver doesn’t really go with my decor, but it was my duty to rescue that item. A woman with a giant birds-nest hairdo bid against me, and I just know she was going to hang it in her tiny dog’s bedroom.

I snort to myself remembering the yappy dog that disrupted the sale. If I thought I wanted a pet, that event convinced me I didn’t. I like my quiet life, even if it is kind of lonely.

I take the stairs to the kitchen where Luciana, my favourite Italian mama, waits with my breakfast. She scowls when I sit at the counter—that’s her regular morning face, since I take so long to come downstairs every day.

Today it’s not my fault. That cat was staring right at me, piercing me with his green eyes. A cat that should not be there. A cat that ruined today’s daydream about joining the houses. What delights are you spoiling me with this morning?

Her scowl disappears. If there’s one way around Lucy’s disapproval, it’s to flatter her cooking. I do it every morning and it never gets old to watch her toothy smile appear, and her chest puff out as she presents whatever she’s created for me. Today you have oats, made with coconut water as you requested. There’s banana and fresh berries, and if you’re still hungry I can make you a waffle.

I try a mouthful then load up my spoon, again. This is plenty. Are you trying to fatten me up with waffles every day?

Lucy smiles as she starts on the dishes. Of course not. I like to see you eat good food, that’s all. It seems a shame you always eat on your own, though.

Eating alone isn’t so bad. Plus, you’re here.

She raises an eyebrow and changes the subject. You have a package. Lucy’s stilted accent is cute as she gives me her best disapproving look. You must not have any more room.

The scowl takes up residence again as soon as I slide off the stool, my mouth full of oats and fruit, a grin stretching from ear to ear. I love it when packages arrive. Don’t worry, Lucy. I’ll find somewhere to squeeze it in. What was in the parcel?

I don’t know. It was too big and heavy, so I left it at the front door.

It must be my new chair. Didn’t they offer to bring it in? I head for the door, not listening for an answer as she starts up a protest about soggy oats.

I’ve been looking forward to this delivery, even if I have zero use for the chair. Who am I kidding? I have no use for most of the stuff I buy, but it gives me something to do all day. I don’t have my own business. My closest friends all work, and with an inheritance the size of mine I haven’t found anything to capture my attention long enough to bother turning it into a venture.

Mostly I support other ventures by buying their stuff. Why else would I have a chest freezer full of Kangaroo meat I bought from Wyatt? Or more than a hundred copies of Cole’s first independent movie packed in boxes in the garage? Kent, my most entrepreneurial friend still laughs whenever he tells the story of how he made us all buy his newest women’s eyeliner so he could show great sales figures to potential investors. He never lets me tell the second part of the story: how I sold the boxes back to him for four times what they cost when he had a stock supply issue a year later.

Turns out I can successfully buy things that increase in value.

I yank the door open and stare at the giant box blocking my doorway. I test to see how heavy it is. All signs point to it being a fairly easy lift, so I brace my feet and dig my hands into the handles cut in the side of the packaging. My phone rings before I can lift, so I answer instead, leaning against the box and looking up the street. Three doors down one of the neighbours reverses their people mover onto the road. I can hear her kids arguing in the back seat as it moves slowly past my house.

Hey, Everett. What’s up?

I need your money.

Said every woman who met me, ever. What for? What are we buying? That jet? I grin at the idea. How great will it be when I finally talk everyone into that purchase?

Not quite. Jillian’s hospital is having a black-tie fundraiser and you need to buy two tickets.

Who am I sitting with? I’m not going if I have to sit with old ladies who want to feel me up.

I can imagine Everett’s eyes rolling as he replies. You’ve never been to a gym in your life, Danny. I don’t know why that woman at Merek’s building opening last year kept saying she wanted to see your abs, but I can assure you that won’t happen here. We have a table of ten. You will be two of those. 10K a ticket. You in?

Ten grand? That’s some fundraiser. Yeah, I’m in.

Everett pauses. Who are you bringing?

Probably Felicity.

"I dunno about that. Isn’t Easter your weekend to have a proper date? I can