Baby For My Billionaire Rival (Billionaire Daddies)

2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Jake

I can’t help but laugh when Professor… Fig calls on blondie. It’s what she deserves after treating me like I had appeared out of the blue to fix the toilet she screwed up. I’m not usually a vengeful person but come on. She took one look at me, saw my clothes, and immediately decided I wasn’t like her.

“I’m Caroline Gladstone.”

Gladstone… I know the name, I think.

“I have my Bachelor of Finance from Brown. I’m going to be taking over my family business at Gladstone Manufacturing once I earn my degree and… that’s about it,” she says.

I glance back at her as she talks. She’s everything I hate about the world of business. Flawless manicure, perfect hair, wears her money with her designer clothes. I bet she’s never had a callus or a blister from hard work in her life.

“Thank you, Ms. Gladstone,” Fig says. “Although I’m surprised you weren’t nearly as chatty in your introduction as you have been with… your friend here. And I’d love to hear from her next.”

I tune out the next introduction except for the name, Amy Trilby, which makes my blood boil even more. All of these people and all of their names. Their legacies. I have one too, sure, but I don’t walk around flaunting my wealth, nor do I rely on a bunch of little people to scramble beneath me to make my fortune.

I realize Caroline Gladstone is right in a sense. I’m not one of them . Nor do I want to be.

The introductions take longer than I’d like. The girl beside me is taking notes upon notes on her MacBook while I make a few scrawls into the cheap notebook I bought from Walmart. Works the same, doesn’t it? I can tell this somehow incenses her as her eyes keep flicking in my direction.

So, this is how it’s going to be, huh? I’m going to have to deal with all these looks from the city people like I’m some monster with two heads.

I knew this program would be a bad idea, at least for my morale. I can get along with all kinds, learned that in the military. You’ve got all walks of life, all races, all economic backgrounds, all religions, all political beliefs. I became not just a tolerant human, but an accepting one. People think I’m a country bumpkin, with my accent and my apparel, but they probably don’t know half as much as I do. Not about business, no, but about the world. About people.

“Now, I know some of you are here for business know-how. Accounting. Economics. Administration. But I’m your cohort leader and what I say goes,” Fig says, sitting on the desk and crossing her legs under her like a pretzel. “We’re going to start with a bit of manifesting.”

I hear a few of the suits balk at this idea. Of course, they would. They deal with facts, figures, and cheap beer. They’ve never dared to take a step beyond their comfort zone.

“I want you to take two minutes to write down what you think about every day. What makes you tick.”

I turn a new page and title it, “What I Think About”. My stomach immediately sinks.

“Two minutes starts now.”

I put the pen to the paper and write the word, “Tomatoes,” and then stop.

It may sound a little funny, but that’s what I think about. Day in, day out. Tomatoes. I run my family’s tomato farm, which in turn produces one of the top-selling tomato sauce brands in the country. I have my hands in everything, from the growing and harvesting, to the product development and production. Although that’s where my know-how stops. I’ve never been involved in what happens beyond that.

That’s why I’m here. Because I don’t want to run my family business that my great-grandaddy started into the ground.

Some people have already stopped writing, others are scribbling nonstop. I tentatively look over my shoulder at Caroline Gladstone. I stifle a laugh at her sparkly, feathery pen. That’s got to be some sort of joke, right? I thought people only wrote with those in the movies.

She writes methodically, steadily, a tiny crinkle in the center of her forehead. Honestly, it’d be cute if she weren’t the spoiled princess type.

I look back on my page. I can’t just write “Tomatoes”.

I add “Goats” to the list. My goats are my pride and joy. Been my passion project for about five years, even though Daddy thought it was silly to get into the goat milk market.

“Alright, last thoughts,” Fig calls out.

Once more, I consider my page. And just before I run out of time, I write, “Dad,” in small letters as if it’s a secret. As if even writing his name on the page will make his death even more real.

By the end of our three-hour seminar, it’s clear that Fig is a powerhouse. She’s the type that takes no shit, but also manages to make you feel like her favorite. Well, unless you’re one of the buttoned-up guys with pastel-colored shorts and bowties. She clearly has a disdain for them just as they do for her from the get-go.

As soon as we’re dismissed, I grab my pack and hurry out the stairs before I start seeing them all make nice with each other while I’m stuck as an outsider.

The feeling doesn’t go away just because I’m grown. I can outwardly say, “Fuck it,” but internally, it still feels like I’m a kid on the edge of the playground.

About halfway up the stairs, I hear Caroline’s voice. It’s hard to miss since it’s been two rows behind me all of class and she tends to raise her hand a lot. “Wait!”

I keep going. She wouldn’t dare talk to me after her earlier embarrassment, would she?

“Simmons!”

Okay, never mind, she’s definitely calling out for me. I’m far enough away that I can pretend I didn’t hear her. I leave the lecture hall and start to hustle down the hallway.

“Jake! Jake Simmons!”

Shit, she’s fast even in those ridiculous spikey heels.

“Jake –” Her hand connects with my arm and I have no choice but to acknowledge her existence.

As soon as I turn around, her nervous smile fades, eyes growing wide. Good. I’m giving her the best stoneface I’ve got. Don’t want to give her any illusions that I’m some nice guy who can laugh off what happened in the bathroom. “Hi, I…” She gulps. “I owe you an apology for what happened earlier.”

I raise an eyebrow. I wasn’t expecting an apology, honestly. Still, though, I won’t allow my fa?ade to melt.

“I thought we could start fresh. Seeing as we’ll be classmates.” She holds out her hand. Long fingernails painted baby blue to match her dress. Bet she’s the type to complain about breaking a nail. “I’m Caroline.”

Daddy told me never to turn my nose up at a handshake no matter how much I hated a person. I take her hand and give it one firm shake. “Jake Simmons.”

“Jake Simmons,” she repeats. I hate that I like the way my name sounds in her accent. Her southern affectation could easily be put aside in favor of something more neutral sounding, whereas mine is so attached to my tongue I could never shake it even if I tried.

I give her a curt nod and start to walk off.

“W-where are you going?” she asks, catching up to walk beside me.

“I’m leaving.”

“But we just started talking.”

I shake my head. “And now we’re finished talking.” I push through the front door of Trilby, thankful to feel the sun on my face and breathe in the fresh air after being stifled in that lecture room.

“Listen, I’m – ah!” Caroline gets caught in the door. I didn’t hold it open for her and I almost regret that. Almost. “I’m really sorry,” she cries out, shoes clicking behind me. I hear her huff. “Jake, I’m talking to you!”

“I don’t think we have a lot to talk about, Caroline, seeing as you’re an heiress and I’m the campus handyman,” I say drolly.

She huffs again. I’m impressed how she’s keeping up with my strides. She’s really not willing to let this go, huh? “It was my mistake. An honest mistake. But I’m sorry.”

I stop. “Do your ‘honest mistakes’ usually involve judging a person based on the way they look right to their face?”

Caroline ducks her chin back, brown eyes dipping down. If I’d passed her on the street or seen her picture, I might say she’s beautiful. But when someone has ugliness inside, it’s hard to get past it. “That’s not usually a habit of mine, no.”

I stare at her, waiting for more.

“Look, you’ve got every reason to dislike me. I get it. I’m just trying to make amends, seeing as we’re going to be in this program for the next two years together and –”

“I didn’t come here to make friends, alright? I’ve got enough of those.”

Caroline stares at me and then laughs.

I frown in frustrated confusion. “What?”

“Sorry, that just makes you sound like a –” She covers her mouth so she’s no longer laughing directly in my face. “Like someone on Real Housewives.”

Caroline wheezes with laughter. Which would be cute. If I didn’t hate her. And her taste in television.

“I’m not here to make friends,” she repeats sassily.

I breathe in tightly. “Alright, well, I’m not. I’m here to learn. That’s all. Make my family’s business better. I don’t need you to pretend to be nice to me when it’s clear that you don’t think we’re on the same level.”

Caroline scoffs, “I never said that.”

“You didn’t have to. Not outright. You made it clear that you don’t see us as equals right when you came out of that bathroom.”

“You’re assuming I don’t see a handyman as my equal. And that’s not fair.”

I’m taken aback, but I don’t let my face betray that she’s thrown me off. Alright, Caroline Gladstone has at least a little self-awareness .

“I made an assumption, I did. But that had nothing to do with me not respecting you.”

It’s hard to believe that someone who looks like her has respect for tradesmen and people who work with their hands… I guess I’ll take her word for it, though. I don’t have anything else to go off of. However, this was never about how she sees other people. It’s about how she sees me. “All the same, Caroline, I don’t feel the need to try and be friends with you. If that’s what you’re looking for. You do your thing, I’ll do mine. And we’ll exist in the same place at the same time sometimes and… well, that’s good enough for me.”

The corners of Caroline’s mouth sink and her cheeks drop making her friendly eyes a bit more distant. “Well, fine, if that’s how you want it to be.”

“That’s how I want it to be, yes.”

Caroline pulls her bag higher on her shoulder before giving me a nod and turning back in the direction of Trilby. After only a few steps, she stops. Turns back toward me as slowly and gracefully as a dancer in a music box. And she smiles, though there’s no kindness in it. “Have you ever heard that you catch more flies with honey than vinegar, Simmons?”

I resist smiling at her calling me by last name, like it’s some sort of indication of familiarity. “Sure I have. I think it’s a bit of a catch-22. Because while the vinegar may keep the flies away, the honey will kill them eventually.”

We stare at each other. Though the hubbub of campus rattles on around us, I am stuck in a vacuum of her echoing words.

“We don’t have to be friends, Simmons. You can be the vinegar… and I can be the honey,” she says. Then, with a tick upward of her chin, she heads off toward Trilby.

I stand there far too long, trying to untangle her words. What’s she trying to say? That I’m vinegar, warding people off and she’s honey because she’s supposedly sweet? But honey traps the flies, so does that mean she’s really some insidious mastermind?

It might be harsh, to be vinegar, but that’s been my whole philosophy in coming here. I’ve got my friends and family back home. I don’t need more of them. I don’t need to make connections. Simmons speaks for itself.

I just need to learn the skills I don’t have. If anything, friends would get in the way of that.

Beautiful women would certainly get in the way of that.

When I settle into the cab of my truck, it finally dawns on me. What Caroline meant.

While I drive people away, she’s going to draw people in. And in life, that might be fine. But this isn’t real life. This is business.

Caroline thinks she’s a better businessperson than I am. Because she can suck people in with her honey words and good looks and trap them.

Maybe she thinks she can even trap me.

I chuckle to myself. That head of blonde hair has gotten one calculation terribly wrong.

I don’t give a rat’s ass about sucking people into my orbit. And if there’s one thing I know about me, pretty women can’t take my eyes off the prize.

Graduation’s in two years. And nothing, not even Caroline Gladstone’s cute crinkling forehead can get in the way of that.