The Billionaire Playboy's Regret (Lark and Max) novel Chapter 36

Lark watched her father and Bobbie leave the office and stepped out of Max’s arms and sat back in her chair. He perched his bottom on the edge of the desk by her keyboard and smiled down at her.

“Are you okay?”

“I feel guilty,” she admitted quietly rearranging things on her desk, trying desperately to quell her racing heart after the way she’d been cuddled in his arms moments ago. Neither her father nor Bobbie seemed to even react to it, as if it was perfectly normal for her to be held by Max and she knew there was a time it would have been. However, knowing now all those times in the past when he’d consoled or cuddled her, he was crushing on her was putting everything in a new light. She was avoiding looking at him and his perfectly formed arse sitting in her peripheral vision.

“Because of Doug?”

“It’s causing so much calamity. If I dealt with the situation like a rational human being instead of getting us both fired and exposing him and then retaliating like I did none of this would have happened. Max, I f****d up his sports car.”

He chuckled a warm breath over her and reached a finger to touch her chin forcing her to look up at him, “chère, you did what needed to be done. You showed him nobody f***s with you. If he’s stupid enough to keep coming at you, we will show him what he’s going to get. I’ll be with you every step of the way.”

“Except in Houston.” He owned a billion-dollar business which he needed to run out of Dallas.

“I’m coming to Houston.” He protested her words. “This involves me, much more than it involves you at this point because he’s coming for my money. I’m the one who hit him.”

“Yes, but I’m the one who ignored him until he showed up at my parent’s house.”

“He’s coming for the Villeneuve name and bank balance. At this point, he’s not even thinking of you, Lark. It’s all about me. You’re an afterthought.”

“What else is new,” she rolled her eyes.

“Is he still reaching out?”

“Not since Saturday night when I told him I would testify he tried to hit me, and you defended me.”

“What was the attraction there? I mean, I only got a partial look, but his eyes are weird.”

“His eyes aren’t weird,” Lark snickered at Max’s insult. “They were panicked because you jumped over me and attacked him. He’s normal looking.”

“I’m better looking.”

She chuckled at his obvious fishing for compliments. “Yes, Max you are better looking. You finally grew into that forehead.

“Hey!” he pinched her chin joining in her on her laughing. “Seriously though, what attracted you to him?”

“We met in our last year of law school. I had broken up with the guy I was dating and so I was burying myself in the library and he was studying hard to pass the bar.”

“He was studying hard?”

She laughed at Max’s sneer, “yes. He was studying hard, but the subject matter was not sinking in. I found out during one very unpleasant Thanksgiving dinner at his grandfather’s house his grandfather actually made a significant contribution to the school for him to get accepted into the law program.”

“Really?”

“Yes. He has two other cousins who are brilliant like his grandfather. They are hotshots. One is a neurosurgeon, and one is a tech guru. Doug was always so desperate to get the old man’s attention, he wanted desperately to be a lawyer like him. Many paragraphs are missing. Read the complete book on Jo b ni b.c o m. The thing is, Max, his kin are the kind of people where studying and learning wasn’t hard for them. Intelligence comes easy to them. Doug wanted it so bad, but it was elusive.”

“And you helped him.”

“He got to his final year on his own.”

“Probably with a lot of donations from gramps.” Max snorted.

“Maybe but it didn’t help his family mocked him constantly.”

“What are his parents like?”

“His father is dead. His mom raised him from the time he was a small boy. They always lived with her parents, his grandfather.” At Max’s silence, “she is clingy and barely lets him wipe his own ass. She cried when we got our condo together because she thought I was stealing her son from her.”

“No.” Max cupped his hand over his mouth, “she cried because he was moving in with you?”

“He was so happy to get out from under her thumb. She was still laying his clothes out right up until the day he moved in with me.” She bit her lips together, “part of the reason I got rid of our condo was to force him back to live with her. I knew he wouldn’t have any of his friends who would have room for him. He hated living with her. She’s smothering like a wet blanket on a campfire.”

Max threw his head back and laughed and she felt her stomach flip and flop with the noise. Shaking his head at her admission he tapped her nose.

“You are devious.”

“I learned from the best.”

They stared at each other for long seconds before Lark looked away uncomfortably.

“I want to kiss you,” Max blurted out.