One Kiss, the Billionaire's Bride novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: A Kiss at the Coffee Lounge
Dwight orders Bryony to quit and bear him a son, so she kisses a stranger and calls him her fiance, and the stranger offers marriage.
Dwight Moody had ordered Bryony Ridley the lemon tart before she sat down, and he told her so with a wink.
He said he had eaten her family's rolls every Sunday for ten years.
He pulled out her chair, and he laughed easily, and for ten minutes she almost liked him.
Then he told her, in a hotel coffee lounge full of strangers, that she would quit her job the day they married.
"Your whole job will be my house," he said, still smiling. "And a son before the year is out."
He stirred his coffee while he said it.
"Not a girl. I know what girls cost. Weddings, college, all of it."
Bryony set her cup down.
Her phone lay face up beside the saucer, and her mother's text was still lit on the screen.
Table nine, by the window. Dwight is lovely, sweetheart. Just let him talk. Don't leave before four.
It was ten to four.
Bryony was twenty-four. She had been baking since five that morning at her family's bakery, and there was still flour under her nails.
Dwight Moody was thirty-nine. His face was on forty billboards around town, grinning above the words MOODY MOTORS, WE TAKE YOUR OLD CAR.
"I like my job," Bryony said.
"You like a hobby that loses money."
He said it loudly enough that the couple at the next table stopped talking.
"Your mother and I have an understanding," he went on. "I carry the loan on that bakery building. You move into my house in March. Everybody wins."
"Nobody asked me."
"You're being asked now."
He leaned back and looked her over from her face to her hips.
"Good. Wide enough. You'll carry a boy fine."
A woman across the room put her hand over her mouth.
Nobody said a word.
At the table beside theirs sat a man in a gray suit with a laptop open and an untouched espresso. He had checked his watch twice since Bryony sat down.
He did not look at them.
His jaw was tight, and his hand had gone still on the keys.
Bryony thought about the loan.
She thought about her mother, who had never once in her life said a plain thing to her face.
She thought about March.
Then she picked up her phone and put it in her pocket.
So Bryony stood up.
"Excuse me," she said, to the man in the gray suit.
He looked up.
He had dark eyes and a face that did not give anything away.
"I'm sorry," she said. "I'll make it up to you."
Then she bent down, took his face in both hands, and kissed him.
For one second he did not move at all.
Then his hand came up to her jaw, and he kissed her back.
It was not a polite kiss.
His mouth was warm and sure, and when she pulled away, his thumb stayed on her cheek.
The whole lounge had gone quiet.
"Sorry, darling," Bryony said, loud and clear. "I lost track of the time."
She turned to Dwight with her hand still on the stranger's shoulder.
"This is my fiancé. Dwight, I'm so sorry you had to hear about it this way."
Dwight's mouth fell open.
"Your what?"
The man in the gray suit shut his laptop.
He stood, and he was a head taller than Dwight.
"Holbrook Draper," he said, and held out his hand.
Dwight did not take it.
Something went across his face then, quick and ugly, and the color left it.
"Draper," he said. "Draper Hotels? That Draper?"
"That Draper," Holbrook said. "This is my hotel."
He rested his hand on the small of Bryony's back.
"Mr. Moody, you've been insulting my fiancée since she sat down. I'd like you to stop."
"She's not your fiancée. Her mother signed with me."
"Then her mother can explain it to me," Holbrook said. "Not you. Not here."
Bryony felt his fingers press once against her spine.
It was a signal to keep going.
"I'm not anyone's to sign for," she said. "Please leave, Dwight."
For a moment nobody breathed.
Then Dwight picked up his coat.
His hands were shaking, and the whole room was watching them shake.
"You think a rich man wants a baker?" he said. "He'll use you up, and you'll come crawling back to my door."
He pointed at Bryony.
"That loan is due Thursday, girl. Your mother put her name on that building. Thursday I take it, and everything in it."
He walked out past the staring tables.
Bryony's knees finally gave.
Holbrook caught her elbow and held her up without a word, and walked her through the lobby to a quiet corner by the elevators.
Then he let go.
"I'm Bryony Ridley," she whispered. "I don't know you. I'm sorry. I'll tell the staff it was a joke. I'll pay for the espresso."
"Don't apologize."
He was looking at her mouth for a moment, and then he was not.
"How much is the loan?"
"Three hundred and eighty thousand dollars."
"Due Thursday."
"Yes."
He nodded slowly.
"My grandmother's will says I lose my company unless I'm married by my thirty-fifth birthday," he said. "That's twenty-six days from now."
Bryony stared at him.
"I came here to sit alone and decide who I'd have to pay to pretend," Holbrook said. "Then you kissed me."
He held out his hand again.
"Marry me, Bryony."
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