Tom Billionaire Ch. 03

"But he did!"

"I didn't KNOW!" Crystal whined, now clutching my arm. "I'm sorry! I'm so sorry!"

"Sorry doesn't change the fact that you came to my house under false pretenses. You seduced me to catch me off guard. And then you *stole* crucial financial documents that allowed Bob Sharpley to disappear with FOUR BILLION DOLLARS!"

"I never would have done it if I'd known!" Crystal pleaded. "I've watched the news. This could have bankrupted you! I couldn't have done that to JJ and Joey!"

I was ready to yell right back, but checked myself. Crystal looked so pitiful, her eyes red and tears flowing, that I bit down any further recriminations. I was a softie inside, and I couldn't bear to keep yelling at her. For the same reasons why I'd wanted to so personally sit down and talk to the young woman – because I'd slept with her – I now found that I couldn't well and truly hate her for what she'd done.

She seemed to sense the shift in my attitude, and quickly grabbed my knees while looking up at me imploringly. "Please, Mr. K. Please don't turn me in. My life is a mess as it is. I don't know where Bob went. I don't know anything more about this whole scandal. All I know is that I'm wanted by the police and the FBI, and my life as I knew it is over. I can't ever go back home. I'm hiding out here, scared of my own shadow. If the news reports are right, you've found most of the money already. I'll... I'll even pay back everything Bob gave me." She said that last part hesitantly, wincing over the idea of handing over the money. "I... I don't have it all. I had to spend about six grand just getting here and getting myself a new identity. But I still have almost 94 thousand that I think is yours. I'll give it back. Just please don't send me to jail."

The young girl seemed to shrink even further. Her eyes were downcast, and she wrung her hands together in obvious anxiety. Really, I didn't need her money. What was 94 thousand amongst four billion? As long as most of my money was coming back, I could weather the rest of the losses. And looking at her, I just didn't have the heart to ask Crystal to hand over what little she had left. Besides, I had no proof that the hundred thousand that Sharpley paid her with was my money. In fact, it was most likely that the cash was Sharpley's, put in Crystal's apartment before he could get out of country.

Crystal was just a pawn, caught in this tangled web that Sharpley had weaved to swindle me. With a background like hers, she was just a 23-year-old hoping for a better life. Not all of us had inherited billions from an unknown father. I KNEW her. I knew Crystal's... _Jada's_... heart. She wasn't a bad person. No truly bad person could love my children the way she had these past months. And I liked to think that being intimate with someone, the way I had been with her, had given me some insight into her soul.

"You don't have to give me that money, Jada," I said warmly. "Clearly, you need it more than I-"

"_Jonathan_," Cassandra cut me off, striding forward. "Don't believe her."

Jada quailed and looked up fearfully at my imposing Amazonian assistant. Cassandra towered over her, looking grim, and snapped, "She's lying to you."

"What?" I chirped in surprise.

Cassandra just folded her arms across her chest. "You tell a nice story, miss. Really tugs at the heartstrings," she drawled in that Aussie accent. "But I wonder how much of it is true."

"It's ALL true!" Crystal insisted.

"Your father did not abandon your mother, _Alice_. And I doubt your mother ever turned a trick in her life. They're still together, living a nice life in Poughkeepsie," Cassandra stated smugly. "Your father is an IBM manager. Your mother is President of the local Garden Club. And they disowned you at sixteen when you were busted for a *third* time on cocaine possession, Miss Wasikowska."

Crystal's jaw dropped. Mine did, too.

"When you asked what we knew about you, you only let me explain your _adult_ criminal record. You didn't give me time enough to explain that we *also* found your juvenile record."

Crystal bolted. No really. One second, I was sitting there with my lower teeth on the floor and Cassandra looming over the both of us. The next second, the young blonde was off the couch and racing out of the room. Cassandra turned and *almost* grabbed her, but not quite. And then the two of us were in hot pursuit.

It was a short chase. Crystal only ran into the kitchen, where she yanked open a drawer and pulled out a black handgun. Cassandra and I skidded to a stop just as Crystal swung around, the business end of the Beretta pointed right at my face. Well, I HAD sorta of been expecting to find a gun barrel aimed in my direction sometime on this trip.

"Back off!" Crystal barked loudly, handling the weapon with what looked like practiced ease.

"Crystal, wait a second," I began slowly. "We can talk about this."

But Cassandra wasn't about to talk. She'd come to a stop only a few feet from the gun-wielding woman. And without waiting even a second, her left hand shot out, gripping Crystal's wrist and pushing it back.

The gun went off. My left ear rang with the close range report of the weapon as I ducked to my right out of the way. But I needn't have bothered. Cassandra had easily shifted Crystal's aim, and the bullet itself went harmlessly into the ceiling about six feet to my side. I briefly looked at the chunk of drywall gouged out of the ceiling above my head and to my left, then immediately returned my gaze to the women before me.

Crystal was flat on her back, the gun having skidded several feet across the floor out of her reach. Cassandra was more or less on top of her, pinning the much smaller woman down. And as I looked over, I was just in time to see Cassandra's right fist fly straight down to bash into the side of Crystal's head.

"Unnk," Crystal grunted with the impact, her body momentarily going limp. A second later, she stiffened back up and appeared ready to fight back. But by then, I'd gotten to the gun myself.

"Stop," I ordered, raising the weapon unsteadily in my hand. Both women immediately ceased their struggling and looked over at me, specifically at the black hunk of metal in my hands. And then their eyes darted behind me as the sounds of squealing tires and police sirens were heard just outside the front door.

****

"I thought I told you two not to do anything stupid," Agent Farnsworth grumbled over the speaker of Cassandra's Blackberry. She and I were standing next to our car, having finally been able to pull ourselves away from the police. The cops still wanted us to go downtown to make our statements, but several threats from Cassandra and a call to Agent Farnsworth put the kibosh on that idea.

Jada, err, _Crystal_ (or even Alice if you want) was long gone. She'd surrendered without a fight once the cops bashed down the front door. And as they'd frog-marched her out with her hands cuffed behind her back, I couldn't muster up much sympathy. I'd felt for the girl, and allowed her some level of consideration because we'd been sexually intimate. But I felt played, not only by her posing as Jada Sharpley to become my babysitter, but also by the story she'd given me not a half-hour ago. Maybe some of it was true, and she was just a pawn in Bob Sharpley's deceit. Maybe not. Putting a gun in my face hadn't done much to get me to believe in her anymore. And from now on, I was going to let the law enforcement authorities deal with her. I was a finance geek, not James Bond.

I remained silent and let Cassandra do the talking with Barry Farnsworth. She was much better at handling the FBI Agent, and I suspected the man had something of a crush on my beautiful assistant. She got him to stop complaining and leave us alone, though he promised to visit us for more questioning once we got back to Montauk. He still wanted a debriefing on what information we'd gotten from Crystal about Sharpley.

When Cassandra hung up, she exhaled and leaned forward, bracing herself against the side of the car.

"That WAS pretty stupid," I said quietly. "Attacking someone holding a gun. But then, I didn't know you had jujitsu training."

That put a little smile on Cassandra's face. "Jujitsu? Hardly. Rebecca gave me a few pointers in self-defense, but that's it."

"Then why did you do it?"

Cassandra blinked and stared at me with open sky blue eyes. "I couldn't let her hurt you," she said softly.

Her voice went straight to my heart, and I quickly enveloped her in a bear hug. "Thank you," I replied in just as heartfelt a voice. "You're incredible, you know that?"

She sighed and sagged into my embrace. "Yeah..." she mumbled, just relishing the touch of our bodies pressed together.

"It's my fault. I never should have gone in there without some kind of backup. It was a stupid, stupid idea."

"Yeah..." Cassandra nodded, still holding onto me. "REALLY stupid. But very *you*. That's why I'm going to have to watch who you get involved with a little better. Short-term flings here and there with Taylor's model friends are no big deal. But I'm going to keep a better watch on any girls you can develop a relationship with. Once they're in, you let your emotions get the best of you."

"Is that so wrong?"

"Not wrong. Just dangerous. And this one is MY fault. *I'm* the one who told you Jada didn't have any ulterior motives when I first interviewed her. I HAVE to be better, so that this never happens again."

I nodded. But then I picked my head up and looked straight at my assistant. I held her face in my hands and then kissed her tenderly. "*I* have to be better. This was MY decision, and it's MY life, and therefore MY responsibility. In this case, my fuckup put YOU in danger. And only your quick actions got us out of it. Thank you, Cassandra."

She heard the sincerity in my voice, and beamed back at me. "You're welcome, Jonathan."

I felt my heart flutter at the sound of my name. There was something in the way Cassandra said it, a tone she used very rarely. It wasn't respectful, like an assistant to her employer. It wasn't lustful, like a young woman lost in her fantasy. It was... equal. For a few seconds, Cassandra was simply my partner, the person who had shared this scary and unique experience with me.

"You know, we didn't play around at *all* on the flight over here," I commented. "That's not common for a two-hour-plus flight."

"No, it isn't," she chuckled, a twinkle coming into her eye.

"Then let's go home. And on the trip back, I intend to thank you *very* much for everything you've done for me today."

Cassandra grinned at me, her eyes now sparkling. Again, we hadn't made love since Tahiti, and all of a sudden, my assistant was in a really big hurry. She quickly fished the car keys out of my pocket and head-nodded me to the passenger side. "Hurry, hurry up! Let's go!"

I hustled around and opened the door, dropping into my seat just as Cassandra put the key into the ignition. We grinned at each other, both of us feeling the hormone rush. Thirty minutes ago, a desperate woman had pointed a loaded gun at me. Thirty minutes ago, we both could possibly have died. And right now, neither of us wanted anything more than to get aboard the jet so we could rip our clothes off and embrace the passion of life.

But my phone rang. Cassandra froze before turning over the starter, her eyebrows furrowing as she looked at my pocket. All business calls went through Cassandra. There were only five numbers that my phone would even _accept_ for an incoming call: the house, Cassandra, Charlotte, Ashlyn, and Taylor.

This one was from Ashlyn. I quickly answered it and put the phone on speaker. "Hello?"

"Johnny!!!" Ashlyn screamed, clearly panicked.

"Honey? What's wrong?"

"Umm... Ohmigod, Johnny..." Ashlyn wailed, and then broke down into heaving sobs on the other end of the line.

"Ashlyn. _What's wrong?_" I repeated more insistently.

"There's been an accident. Taylor's badly hurt."

"Oh, SHIT."

"But Johnny... Johnny..." Ashlyn sobbed. "JJ's _dead_!"