Page 61 of Broken Headboards

I’ve asked them when I’m trying to figure out how they changed so dramatically from being my wingmen jizzing all over New York—sometimes, literally—to fucking one woman and expecting a child. It’s mind-boggling.

But what they’ve said is beginning to make sense. A woman you can spar with. Your equal. A woman who keeps you on your toes.

For me that’s definitely Tess.

And I’ve thought about it. Maybe this competition is the only reason why I find her so attractive. She’s been able to beat me when no one has before, and she holds her own—in and out of the bedroom.

But even outside of the competition I’m captivated by her. I can’t stop thinking about her and I fucking hate it.

This is not me.

I like women for what they have to offer temporarily not multiple times over. The only thing I like doing again and again is furniture.

And now apparently Tess too.

Twenty.

Speaking of Tess, she’s grabbed my arm and held onto me like nothing else in the world mattered.

Fuck. I want her hands on me. I want her wild like she gets when we fuck. I want Tess to scratch me, dig her fingers nails into my back, press her heels against my ass…I like it when she’s rough. I fight back. God, our sex is fucking electric. If I’m not thinking about her ass bouncing away from me, then I’m thinking about it bobbing up and down on my cock.

It hasn’t been good for business but at least I’m keeping my eye on the competition. Even if it’s not in the way Ishouldbe eyeing it, but everyone’s diversion and tactics are different. I didn’t becometheAustin Randall of Oakmont by doing what I shoulddo. Listening to what other people did. I became the fucking King because I paved my own path.

And I think I’ve found someone else who’s done the same.

One.

There’s one thing that’s getting in my way though. And there’s also only one thing I need to focus on.

The Clarendon Tower Contract.

The fucking competition.

It’s the one thing that’s getting in between Tess and me. The one thing we both want and the one thing that’ll keep us apart. I want this, and I will do whatever it takes to win the competition. Which means I have to forget about Tess. To push all my thoughts, feelings, whatever the fuck aside and focus on the prize. I can’t let her distract me.

And when I win—which will happen—it’ll be the one thing that has the potential to end us forever.

Even if we’re in some alternate universe where she wins I will always remember it. She’ll represent a blow to my ego and I can’t say I’d be able to get over that regardless of how secure in my manhood I am.

I love her—Jesus Christ—but unfortunately for this book, love isn’t as powerful as we thought. It won’t get rid of the fact that there’ll always be one thing—a $2 billion wedge between us—that separates us.

It brought us together but it’ll always keep us apart.

Even after the competition ends.