One Kiss, the Billionaire's Bride novel · Chapter 17 of 24

Chapter 17: The Bakery

The flatbed truck blocked the whole front of Ridley's.

Two men in gray coveralls stood on the sidewalk with a dolly, and Dwight Moody leaned on the truck bed in his camel coat, grinning at the crowd.

Bryony got out of the taxi and the crowd turned.

There were thirty people on the pavement, regulars and neighbors and strangers holding phones, because the story had been on every screen since Saturday.

Her mother stood by the lamppost, small in her cardigan, with her hands clasped in front of her.

"Right on time," Dwight said. "Nine sharp, honey, like I told you. Where's the billionaire?"

"Working."

"Then you didn't bring a checkbook."

"I brought something else."

She held up her phone.

She had made one call on the way from the lawyer's office, to the DA investigator who had taken Rosalind's loan paper at the press conference.

He had said, "Thirty minutes," and then, "Don't do anything dangerous."

She did not know yet whether this counted.

"Dwight," she said, loud enough for the whole street. "Tell them who is paying you to take my ovens."

"The bank sold me the note. It's legal."

"Tell them who paid for the note."

His grin slipped.

"I don't know what you mean."

She pressed play and turned the volume all the way up.

Lyle's voice rang down the street, smooth and clear.

I promised you the bakery, the ovens, and the girl's humiliation.

Dwight's face went the color of old dough.

Eleven million dollars of my thing, over two years. And now they'll find it paid for your note on the ovens.

"Turn it off," Dwight said.

She didn't.

I need the girl on every screen as a thief and a liar before the board meets Tuesday.

A woman at the front of the crowd lowered her phone and stared at him.

Your Monday money, Lyle said. Count it.

Then the sound of paper, and Dwight's breathing, and the rustle of a very thick envelope.

The street was silent.

"That's not me," Dwight said.

"That's your voice," said a man in the crowd.

It was the man in the ragged coat.

He had come to the bakery every morning for two years, and Bryony had never heard him speak above a mutter.

"That's you, mister," he said. "She feeds me. I read what they said about her."

"Get that old drunk away from me."

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