One Night With The Billionaire

‘Vultures …’

‘Okay, not vultures,’ she conceded. ‘Debt collectors. Asset sellers. Whatever you want to call them. Regardless, it’s a shock and we need time to come to terms with it.’

‘You’re foreclosing on the loan?’ Margot said faintly. ‘On my loan?’

‘It’s not your loan,’ Mathew told his aunt. ‘You asked Grandpa to make the loan to Henry and he did. The circus can’t keep bleeding money. With Henry in hospital, they don’t even have a ringmaster. How the …’

‘We do have a ringmaster,’ Allie said steadily and turned to Margot. She knew what she wanted. Why not lay it on the table? ‘This afternoon your nephew put on Henry’s suit and top hat and was brilliant as ringmaster. He’s here to take care of you. Could you spare him for two performances a day? Just for two weeks and then it’s over?’

‘Mathew was your ringmaster?’

There was a loaded silence in the hot little room. Margot had been huddled in an armchair by the fire, looking almost as if she was disappearing into its depths. Suddenly she was sitting bolt upright, staring at Mathew as if she’d never seen him before. ‘My Mathew was your ringmaster?’ she repeated, sounding dazed.

‘He made an awesome one,’ Allie said. ‘You should come and see.’

‘I did it once,’ Mathew snapped. ‘In an emergency.’

‘And I couldn’t come,’ Margot moaned. ‘I’m dying.’

‘You don’t look dead to me,’ Allie said, and she wasn’t sure why she said it, and it was probably wildly inappropriate, cruel even, but she’d said it and it was out there, like it or not. ‘If you’re not dead then you’re alive. You could come.’

To say the silence was explosive would be an understatement. She glanced at Mathew and saw him rigid with shock.

He’d throw her out, she thought. He’d pick her up bodily and throw.

‘I’m … I’m sorry,’ she said at last because someone had to say something. ‘I don’t know how sick you are. That was … I mean, if you can’t …’

‘If you ate some dinner, let me help you dress, let us rug you up and use your wheelchair …’ Mathew said in a voice that was really strange.

‘I can’t eat dinner,’ Margot retorted, but it wasn’t a feeble wail. It was an acerbic snap.

‘You could if you wanted to.’ He glared at Allie, and back at Margot, and he looked like a man backed against a wall by two forces.

He loved this woman, Allie thought—and with sudden acuity she thought he loves her against his will. He hates it that he loves her and she’s dying.

What was going on?

And he told her.

‘It’s Margot’s decision to die,’ he said, sounding goaded to the point of explosion. ‘Her dog’s died. Her knees don’t let her walk like they used to, so she’s given up. She’s stopped eating and she won’t see her friends. She’s lost twelve kilos in the last four weeks.’

‘You’re kidding,’ Allie said, awed. ‘Twelve kilos? Wow, Margot, what sort of diet are you on? Our Exotic Yan Yan—Jenny to the rest of us—has tried every diet I’ve ever heard of. She’s currently on some sort of grapefruit and porridge diet. Her husband keeps sneaking over to my caravan for bacon and eggs. Maybe I should send Jenny to you.’

There was another silence at that. A long one. She’d trivialised something life-threatening, Allie thought. Uh oh.

She glanced at Mathew and saw his face almost rigid with tension. How hard would it be, she thought, to watch someone you loved decide to die? And she’d made light of it. Joked.

But in for a penny, in for a pound. Why not go for it?

‘It’s Sunday,’ she said, to no one in particular. To both of them. ‘We don’t play tonight, which is just as well as I’m feeling shattered, but tomorrow’s another day. We’re in the middle of the summer holidays and the forecast is for perfect weather. We have performances at two and at seven-thirty. Choose one. Mathew could rug you up and we’d keep the best seat for you like we always do. You could watch Mathew being wonderful and afterwards you could talk to Jenny about your diet.’

‘You can’t want me being wonderful,’ Mathew exploded. ‘If you think I’m about to make a spectacle of myself again …’

‘You enjoyed it,’ she said flatly. ‘Tell me you didn’t. I won’t believe you.’ She turned back to Margot. ‘Mathew took to ringmaster to the manor born,’ she said. ‘He’s seriously awesome. He could spend the next two weeks playing ringmaster. You could put off dying for a couple of weeks. I could give the team time to figure where we go from here. It’s win-win for everyone.’

‘You think dying’s a whim?’ Margot said faintly and Allie took a deep breath and met her gaze head on. She’d been blunt and insensitive—why not just keep on going?

‘I guess dying’s something we all have to do,’ Allie admitted. ‘But if you could squeeze in a couple more weeks of living and lend us your nephew while you did, we’d be very grateful. More than grateful. You’d be saving the circus. You’d be giving us—all of us—one last summer.’

‘The loan’s already called in,’ Mathew snapped.

‘Then call it out again,’ Margot snapped back and suddenly the old lady was pushing herself to her feet, unsteady, clinging to the arms of her chair but standing and looking from Mathew to Allie and back again.

‘Mathew is your ringmaster?’ she demanded as if she was clarifying details.

‘He is,’ Allie said.

‘I’m not,’ Mathew said, revolted.

‘If I eat,’ Margot said. ‘If I manage to eat my dinner and eat my breakfast … if I decide not to die … would you extend the loan for the two weeks Allie’s asking? You know I’ve never touched Bond’s money. You know I fought with my family. Apart from that one loan to Sparkles, I’ve never asked anything of you or your father or your grandfather. I’ve asked nothing but this, but I’m asking it now.’

‘Margot …’

‘I know,’ she said, and amazingly she grinned and Allie caught the glimpse of the old Margot, the Margot who’d been a friend of the circus forever, who’d sat and cheered and eaten hot dogs and popcorn and looked totally incongruous in her dignified tweeds but who now held the fate of the circus in her elderly, frail hands. ‘It’s blackmail,’ she admitted. ‘It’s something we women are good at. Something this Allie of yours seems to exemplify.’

‘She’s not my Allie,’ Mathew snapped.

‘She’s your leading lady,’ Margot said serenely. ‘Mathew, I’m happy to live for another two weeks, just to enjoy the circus.’

‘This is business, Margot.’

‘It’s probably not fair,’ Allie ventured. To say she was feeling gobsmacked would be an understatement. She’d come to plead for a two-week extension, not to negotiate a life. ‘Margot, you don’t have to do this.’

‘Don’t you want me to live?’ Margot demanded, and Allie felt flummoxed and looked at Mathew and he was looking flummoxed, too.

‘I came down to spend time with you,’ he managed.

‘And now you can,’ Margot retorted. ‘Only instead of immersing yourself in your financial dealings while I die, you can be a ringmaster while I watch. You’ve been a banker since the day you were born. Why not try something else?’

What had she done? Allie thought faintly. She hadn’t just backed this man against the wall; she’d nailed him there. He was looking as if he had no choice at all.

Which was a good thing, surely? It was the fate of the whole circus team she was fighting for here. She had no space to feel sorry for him.

Besides, he was a big boy.

And he was an awesome ringmaster.

‘I brought the scripts for the clown jokes for the week,’ she ventured, sort of cautiously. The room still felt as if it could explode any minute. ‘We swap them around because lots of families come more than once. If you could read them … even memorise them like you did today …’

‘He memorised his lines?’ Margot demanded.

‘He helped with the water cannon joke,’ Allie told her. ‘He timed it to perfection.’

‘My Mathew … a ringmaster …’

‘Worth living for?’ Allie asked and chuckled and glanced at Mathew and thought chuckling was about as far from this guy’s mindset as it was possible to get.

‘Yes,’ Margot said. ‘Yes, it is. Mathew, do you agree?’

It felt as if the world held its breath. Allie had almost forgotten how to breathe. Breathing was unnecessary, she thought—unless the decision came down on her side.

‘Yes,’ Mathew said at last, seemingly goaded past endurance, and she couldn’t believe she’d heard right.

‘Yes?’

‘Give me the scripts.’

‘You mean it?’

‘I don’t,’ he said through gritted teeth, ‘say anything I don’t mean. Ever.’

‘Oh, my …’ Her breath came out in a huge rush. ‘Oh, Mathew …’

‘You have what you want,’ he said. ‘Now leave.’

‘But I’d like crumpets,’ Margot interjected, suddenly thoughtful. ‘With butter and honey. Mathew, could you pop across to the store to get me some?’

‘Of course.’ Mathew sounded totally confused. ‘But …’

‘And leave Allie with me while you go,’ she said. ‘If I’m not dying I need company.’

‘I’ll get them for you,’ Allie offered but Margot suddenly reached out and took her hand. Firmly.

‘I’d like to talk to you. Without Mathew.’

‘Margot …’ Mathew said.

‘Women’s business,’ Margot said blandly. ‘Fifteen minutes, Mathew, then I’ll eat my crumpets and have a nap and you can go back to your work. But I need fifteen minutes’ private time with Allie.’

‘There’s nothing you need to discuss with Allie. Two weeks. That’s it, Margot. No more.’

‘That’s fine,’ Margot said serenely. ‘But I will talk to Allie first. Go.’

He went. There didn’t seem a choice. He needed to buy what Margot required, leaving the women to … women’s business?

He had no idea what Margot wanted to talk to Allie about, but he suspected trouble. Margot was a schemer to rival Machiavelli. For the last few months she’d slumped. He’d seen how much weight she’d lost, he’d watched her sink into apathy and he really believed she was dying.

Did he need to fund a circus in perpetuity to keep her alive?

It wouldn’t work, though, he thought, even if it made financial sense—which it didn’t. For the next two weeks, Sparkles would play in Fort Neptune, Margot would see him as the ringmaster and maybe she’d improve. But even if the circus was fully funded, it’d move on and she’d slump again.

Meanwhile, two weeks with Allie …

Allie.

He gave himself a harsh mental shake, disturbed about where his thoughts were taking him. The last couple of days while he’d been here, watching Margot fade, he’d become … almost emotional.

What was it about a girl in a pink leotard with sparkling stripes that made him more so?

A man needed a beer, he thought, and glanced at his watch. Two minutes down, thirteen minutes to go. Women’s business. What were they talking about?

A man might even need two beers.

‘You need to excuse my nephew.’ With the door safely closed behind Mathew, Margot lost no time getting to the point. ‘He doesn’t cope with emotion.’

‘Um …’ Allie was disconcerted. ‘I don’t think I need to excuse Mathew for anything. He’s just saved our circus.’

‘For two weeks and he foreclosed in the first place.’

‘Grandpa borrowed the money,’ she admitted, trying to be fair. ‘With seemingly no hope of repaying the capital. Bond’s is a bank, not a charity. It’s business.’

‘And that’s all Mathew does,’ Margot said vehemently. ‘Business. His parents and sister died in a car crash when he was six. His grandfather raised him—sort of—but he raised him on his terms, as a banker. That boy’s been a banker since he was six and he knows nothing else. I brought him down here for two weeks every summer and I tried my best to make him a normal little boy, but for the rest of his life … His grandfather worked sixteen-hour days—he did from the moment his son died—and he took care of Mathew by taking him with him to the bank. He taught Mathew to read the stock market almost as soon as he could read anything. Before he was ten he could balance ledgers. His grandfather—my brother—closed up emotionally. The only way Mathew could get any affection was by pleasing him, and the only way to please him was to be clever with figures. And there was nothing I could do about it. Nothing.’

‘Oh, Margot …’ What business was this of hers, Allie thought, but she couldn’t stop her.

‘You’re the same, I suspect,’ Margot said. ‘The circus is in your blood; you’ve been raised to it. I’ve watched you as a little girl, without a mother, but I always thought having the run of the circus would be much more fun than having the run of the bank.’

‘I’ve never … not been loved,’ Allie said.

‘You think I can’t see that? And I bet you’re capable of loving back. But Mathew … He’s brought three women to visit me over the years, three women he thought he was serious about, and every one of them was as cool and calculating as he is. Romance? He wouldn’t know the first thing about it. It’s like … when his family was killed he put on emotional armour and he’s never taken it off.’

‘Why are you telling me this?’ Allie asked, feeling weird. ‘It’s none of my business.’

‘It is your business,’ Margot said. ‘You’ve thrown him off balance, and what my Mathew needs is to be thrown off balance and kept off balance. Knock him off his feet, girl. If you want to save your circus …’

‘Margot …’ She’d been sitting on a stool near Margot. Now she rose and backed away. ‘No. I’m not even thinking … I wouldn’t …’

‘If I thought you would, I wouldn’t suggest it.’

‘And that makes no sense at all,’ she said and managed a chuckle. ‘Margot, no. I mean … would a Bond want a kid from the circus?’

‘He might need a kid from the circus. A woman from the circus.’

Margot was matchmaking, Allie thought, aghast. One moment she’d been dying. The next, she was trying to organise a romance for her nephew.

‘I think,’ she said a trifle unsteadily, ‘that I’ve won a very good deal by coming tonight. You’ve helped me keep the circus going for two weeks and that’s all I came for. I’d also really like it if you kept on living,’ she added for good measure. ‘But that’s all I’m interested in. You’re about to eat crumpets. If you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll quit while I’m ahead.’

‘He needs a good woman,’ Margot said as she reached the door.

‘Maybe he does,’ Allie managed, and tugged the door open. ‘But I need a ringmaster and two weeks’ finance and nothing more, so you can stop your scheming this minute.’

The pub was closed. Sunday night in Fort Neptune, Matt thought morosely. Yee-ha.

He walked the beach instead.

The moon was rising over the water, the last tinge of sunset was still colouring the sky and the beauty of the little fort was breathtaking—yet he deliberately turned his mind to figures.

Figures were a refuge. Figures were where he was safe.

It had been that way for as long as he remembered.

When he was six years old his family had died. He had a vague memory of life with them, but only vague. He remembered the aftermath, though. The great Bond mausoleum. His grandfather being … stoic. His great-aunt Margot arriving and yelling, ‘Someone has to cuddle the child. I know you’re breaking your heart, but you’re burying yourself in your bank. You have a grandson. If you can’t look after him, let me have him.’

‘The boy stays with me.’

‘Then look after him. Take him to the bank with you. Teach him your world. Heaven knows, it’s not the perfect answer but it’s better than leaving him alone. Do it .’

Thinking back, it had been an extraordinary childhood, and it didn’t take brains to understand why he was now really only comfortable ensconced in his world of high finance.

Which was why this was so … bewildering. Walking on the beach in the moonlight, knowing tomorrow he’d be a ringmaster …

Figures. Business.

He needed guarantees, he thought, fighting to keep his mind businesslike. He needed an assurance that in two weeks the handover would be smooth and complete.

He’d draw up a contract. Make it official. That was the way to go.

It was a plan, and Mathew Bond was a man who worked according to plans.

Tonight he’d watch Margot eat crumpets, he’d help her to bed, and then he’d make Allie sign something watertight. He’d make sure it was clear this was a two-week deal. And then …

Okay, for two weeks he’d be ringmaster, and that was that. He hoped that it’d make a difference to Margot but if it didn’t there was only so much a man could do.

He’d do it, and then he’d get back to his world.

To banking.

To a world he understood.

CHAPTER FOUR

AFTER LEAVING MARGOT, Allie headed back to the hospital. She reassured herself Henry was okay, she told her grandparents about the two weeks, she brought an exhausted and emotional Bella back to her caravan and settled her and told her the world wasn’t about to end, and finally she retreated to the sanctuary of her own little van, her own little world.

Her dogs greeted her with joy. Tinkerbelle and Fairy were her own true loves. The two Jack Russell terriers were packed with loyalty and intelligence and fun.

There’d never been a time when Allie hadn’t had dogs. These two were part of her act, the circus crowd went wild with their funny, clever tricks, and she adored them as much as they adored her.

She greeted them in turn. She made herself soup and toast and then she tried to watch something on the television.

It normally worked. Cuddling dogs. Mindless television.

There was no way it was settling her now. There was too much happening in her head. The loan. Grandpa. Margot.

Mathew.

And it was Mathew himself who was unsettling her most.

She had so many complications in her life right now, she did not need another one, she told herself. What was she doing? She did not need to think of Mathew Bond … like she was thinking of Mathew Bond.

‘It’s Margot,’ she told her dogs. ‘An old, dying woman playing matchmaker. She’s put all sorts of nonsensical ideas into my head, and I need to get rid of them right now.’

But the ideas wouldn’t go. Mathew was there, big and beautiful, front and centre.

‘Maybe it’s hormones,’ she said and she thought maybe it was. As a circus performer, hormones didn’t have much of a chance to do their stuff.

Hormones … Romance … It wasn’t for the likes of Allie. She moved from town to town, never settling and, as Henry and Bella had become older, Allie’s duties had become more and more onerous.

It wasn’t that she wasn’t interested in a love life. It was that she simply couldn’t fit it in. She’d had all of three boyfriends in her life and none had lasted more than six months. Trailing after a circus performer was no one’s idea of hot romance, and within the circus … Well, no one there exactly cut it in the sexy and available stakes.

‘So now I’m thinking about Mathew and it’s nothing but fancy, but oh, if I could …’ she whispered, and for a moment, for just a fraction of a lonely evening after a hard and frightening day, she gave herself permission to fantasise.

Mathew holding her. Mathew smiling at her with that gentle, laughing smile she’d barely glimpsed but she knew was there.

Mathew taking her into his arms. Mathew …

No! If she went there, she might not be able to pull back. She had to work with the man for the next two weeks.

‘This is nonsense,’ she told the dogs. ‘Crazy stuff. We’ll concentrate on the telly like we do every night. Half an hour to settle, then bed, and we’ll leave the hormones where they belong—outside with my boots.’

It was sensible advice. It was what a girl had to do—and then someone knocked on the door of the van.

Mathew. She sensed it was him before she opened the door.

He was standing in front of her, looking slightly ruffled.

He was wearing that fabulous coat again.

Mathew.

What was he doing, standing in the grounds of the circus at nine at night, holding a contract in one hand, knocking on the door of a woman in pink sequins with the other?

This was business, he told himself fiercely—and she wouldn’t be in pink sequins.

She wasn’t. She was still in her jeans. Her windcheater was sky-blue, soft, warm and vaguely fuzzy.

She looked scrubbed clean and fresh, a little bit tousled—and very confused to see him.

The dogs were going nuts at her feet, which was just as well. It gave him an excuse to stoop to greet them and get his face in order, telling himself again—fiercely—that he was here on business.

She stooped to hush the dogs and their noses were suddenly inches apart. She looked … she looked …

Like he couldn’t be interested in her looking. He stood up fast and stepped back.

‘Good evening,’ he said, absurdly formal, and he saw a twinkle appear at the back of her eyes. She could see his discomfort? She was laughing?

‘Good evening,’ she said back, rising and becoming just as formal. ‘How can I help you?’

He held up his contract and she looked at it as she might look at a death adder. The twinkle died.

‘What is it?’

‘It’s an agreement by you that these two weeks are not in any way a concession or notice by the bank that we’ve waived our legal rights. Our control over the circus starts now; you’re here for the next two weeks on our terms.’

‘I can’t sign that,’ she whispered. ‘Grandpa …’

‘You can sign it. You agreed before the show that you wouldn’t interfere with foreclosure. Your grandfather has named you on the loan documents as having power of attorney but, even so, we don’t actually need you to have legal rights. We don’t need to disturb Henry. As the person nominally in charge right now, all we’re saying is that your presence here for the next two weeks doesn’t interfere with legal processes already in place.’

She pushed her fingers through her hair, brushing it back from her face. Wearily. ‘Isn’t that assumed?’ she asked. ‘That the next two weeks doesn’t stop you from turning into a vulture at the end of it?’

He didn’t reply, just stood and looked at her. She looked exhausted, he thought. She looked beat.

She looked a slip of a girl, too young to bear the brunt of responsibility her grandfather had placed on her.

‘Have you told everyone?’ he asked and she nodded.

‘I asked Grandpa whether I should tell the crew, and he said yes. He’s known this was coming. He should have told us and he’s feeling bad. He asked me to give everyone as much notice as possible.’

So she’d had to break the bad news herself.

‘I’m sorry.’

‘So am I,’ she said wearily. ‘Do I have to sign this now?’

It could have waited until morning, he thought. Why had it seemed so important to get this on a business footing right now? Was it to make it clear—to himself more than anyone—that he wasn’t being tugged into an emotional minefield?

‘We might as well,’ he said. ‘Seeing I’m here.’

‘I’ll need to read it first. Are we talking a thirty page document?’

‘Two.’

‘Fine.’ She sighed and pushed the door wide so he could enter. The dogs stood at each side of her, looking wary.

How well trained were they?

‘They’re not lions,’ she said, following his look. ‘They don’t go for the jugular. They’re very good at hoops, though.’

They were. He’d seen them at work today and they were amazing. They were two acrobatic canines, who now looked like two wary house pets, here to protect their mistress.

‘Basket,’ she said and they checked her face, as if to make sure she really meant it, then obligingly jumped into their basket.

It was tucked into a neat slot under the table where feet didn’t need to go—about the only space in the van a basket would fit. The van was a mastery of a home in miniature, he thought. Unlike Bella and Henry’s, it wasn’t cluttered. It looked feminine and workable, and very, very comfortable.