Page 29 of The Billionaire’s Paradise (My Billionaire #4)

The flight back to Maui was quiet.

Not tense, just quiet, the way good books and long walks are quiet. The kind of quiet that lets you sit with something big before life comes rushing in again.

I sat by the window, Cal beside me, and Leilani across the aisle.

The sun was setting beyond the wing, streaking the sky with warm golds and soft pinks, as if Hawaii was trying to soothe us, to tell us everything was going to be okay.

I looked at my husband who had managed to doze off.

I couldn’t help but think how handsome he looked—even in coach.

Yes… coach.

It was the first time I’d ever seen Cal like this. No leg room. No champagne. Just a little foil packet of pretzels and a surprisingly well-behaved toddler trying to form the occasional nonsensical sentence for his mother in the row behind us.

And yet Cal looked perfectly comfortable.

He had been the one who’d insisted on keeping things low key.

“We’re not taking the jet,” he’d decided long before we made the trip to Honolulu.

“I don’t want to freak Leilani out.” She still didn’t know the full extent of his wealth, and while it wasn’t exactly a state secret, it also wasn’t a conversation we needed to rush.

The longer she thought our lives were relatively normal, the better.

There’d be plenty of time for sticker shock later.

So, there we were.

I watched him for a long moment and tried to imagine a world where none of the money existed. No penthouses. No private staff. No empire.

And I realized—he’d still be him.

The guy who smiles more with his eyes than his mouth.

The guy who eats cereal straight from the box while wearing nothing but boxer shorts and mismatching socks.

The guy who talks to the plants when he thinks I’m not listening.

The guy who just kissed me in a beige-walled clinic like we were the only people on earth.

He would’ve been happy in any life.

And I would’ve loved him in all of them.

Across the aisle, Leilani had her earbuds in for most of the flight, one hand on her belly, the other sketching invisible patterns on the tray table with her finger.

I don’t know what she was thinking, but she looked peaceful.

Focused. Like she was already beginning to build the kind of world a baby might be lucky to land in.

As we taxied toward the terminal in Maui, Matt woke up, while Leilani leaned across the aisle and said quietly, “The doctors seemed really pleased. They said my readings looked great. We should have the full report in a few days.”

Cal smiled. “You’re amazing.”

“I know,” she said with a wink.

We dropped her off at her family’s house—Tutu and Kimo were already waiting out front, hooting and waving like they were greeting a local celebrity. Her father Nakoa was nowhere in sight .

Leilani blew us a kiss and shouted, “Give my love to the gang! Tell them we did something amazing today!”

I smiled and sighed. “We will. We did.”

It was dusk by the time we pulled into our driveway, but the house was glowing from the inside—light spilling from the windows, music faintly audible, chaotic chatter in full swing before we even opened the front door.

I took a breath.

And braced myself.

Because there they were. Our chosen family.

Angus was the first to spot us as we stepped inside the door. “They’re home! Hide the evidence!” he yelled, hurling a throw pillow over a bowl of cheese puffs for reasons unknown.

Mrs. Mulroney stood at the kitchen island, tumbler of whiskey in one hand, a suspiciously burned oven mitt in the other.

“Don’t mind us,” she called. “We’ve just been having a respectful and deeply civil discussion about the miracle of conception.

Also, I tried to cook dinner before deciding the job was better left to someone who can actually cook. Which would be you two.”

“Welcome back!” Rashida called from the armchair, where she was casually holding a small whiteboard labeled Womb Watch 2025 with a very unhelpful doodle on it. “So? How did it go? Did you pass the test?”

“You can answer that while cooking,” Mrs. Mulroney butted in, steering me straight over to the kitchen counter. “I got as far as boiling the water before setting fire to an entire roll of parchment paper. Fortunately, Rashida knows how to use a fire blanket. Here’s an onion. Now start chopping.”

“I’m not chopping anything until you tell me why there’s a slipper in the microwave.”

“Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answer to. ”

From the couch, Angus came rushing over. “Did everything go okay?” he asked excitedly, peeking at us like we might spontaneously produce a baby from Cal’s pocket.

“It went great,” Cal said, starting toward the kitchen. “We’ll know more in a few days.”

“Bravo, gentlemen,” said Mr. Banks, slapping me and Cal on the back with surprising force.

“You’ve done Mother Nature a great service.

Although I’ve always said the birds and the bees was a misleading metaphor.

Bees die after sex, and birds are notoriously bad at follow-through.

Durham bulls on the other hand—they really know how to fill the tank.

Talk about beasts of burden. Massive amounts of semen.

So tell me, did they need to fetch an extra bucket and a mop for Cal here? ”

I choked on my own saliva.

Mr. Banks pointed directly at Cal and turned to the room. “Trust me, I’ve seen this one’s tackle. And here I was thinking I was lucky the day I spotted the Loch Ness monster. Let me tell you, Nessie’s got nothing on our Cal.”

Cal blushed bright red.

Mrs. Mulroney raised her glass. “To Cal’s mighty tackle—may it stay baited, weighted, and never snap the line!”

“To babies!” Angus shouted.

“To buckets!” added Mr. Banks, completely delighted with himself.

“To whatever the hell just happened!” said Rashida, lifting a glass of wine.

Cal groaned and leaned on the counter. “Why are we talking about me ejaculating?”

“Oh, don’t be shy,” Mrs. Mulroney said. “It’s a beautiful thing. Life-affirming. Sticky as a date pudding, although unfortunately not as tasty.”

“Let’s change the subject,” I said, beginning to chop carrots and tomatoes with the speed of someone who knew the quickest way to stop anarchy in its tracks was to feed the masses. “ Angus… Mr. Banks… how was your trip to the volcano the other day?”

There was a pause.

An actual pause.

Angus blinked. “Fine.”

“Very scenic,” said Mr. Banks, staring up at the ceiling fan.

“Did you guys talk things out?” Cal asked gently, sensing the energy shift.

“We looked at lava rocks,” Angus replied.

“In Hawaii it’s called pāhoehoe,” Mr. Banks corrected.

“And you’re called a know-it-all!” Angus said, hands on hips.

“If you must know,” Rashida said, sitting back with her wine and narrowing her eyes on both Angus and Mr. Banks like a therapist who’s about to get real. “I didn’t resort to a sacrificial offering to the volcano gods, but there’s tension there.”

“I don’t know what you mean,” Angus said too fast, shoveling cheese puffs into his mouth.

“Nor do I,” Mr. Banks added, his fingers trying to anxiously straighten a bow tie that wasn’t even there.

“She means exactly what she said,” Mrs. Mulroney said. “You two are acting like a pair of Dublin schoolgirls fighting over who gets to sit next to Paddy O’Rourke at lunch.”

“Who’s Paddy O’Rourke?” Cal asked.

“He was a boy who also needed a bucket and mop, but that’s not the point. The point is Angus and Mr. Banks need to grow up, talk it out, and stop sulking.”

“I think you’re all imagining things,” Angus said, straightening his back like he was trying to become furniture.

“Nobody’s imagining anything,” Rashida said. “I’ve been watching you both for days, and I know the difference between mutual avoidance and heartbreak over a friendship that’s fraying at the seams.”

Mr. Banks snorted. “I wouldn’t call it heartbreak. More like indigestion. ”

Rashida raised an eyebrow in Angus’s direction. “With a side of abandonment issues.”

“I’m fine,” Angus said. “Completely fine. Happy, in fact. Kimo and I have a wonderful time together. We sing. We meditate. Our auras connect. He understands me.”

Mr. Banks scoffed. “He understands how to keep his shirt off and oil his chest in public. What a spiritual connection.”

“Oh, here we go,” Angus snapped, shoving cheese puffs into his mouth like they were a defense mechanism. “I knew it. You can flirt with Makani until the cows come home—literally, there were cows—but the minute I hang out with someone new, suddenly I’m the problem.”

Mrs. Mulroney raised her glass. “Oooh. There it is.”

“Don’t you dare drag Princess Makani into this,” Mr. Banks said. “She and I have a long history—”

“I saw you together in a rowboat on a lagoon full of swamp ducks. I’ve watched The Notebook —I know what that means!”

“We were birdwatching!”

“Oh, please,” Angus scowled. “You two are doing the hoochie-coochie and you know it. You’ve left me for woman you haven’t seen in a hundred years.”

“You left me for a man who keeps crystals in his fanny pack!”

“Kimo understands me.”

“Kimo wears toe rings!”

“You let her braid your hair.”

“She’s very persuasive!”

“You never let me braid your hair.”

“You never offered! ”

Rashida raised a hand. “And there it is again… two grown men throwing emotional darts because neither of them knows how to say, ‘I miss you.’”

Angus crossed his arms. “He ignored me for a week.”

Mr. Banks blinked. “He ran off with a shirtless Hawaiian oracle with abs. ”

“He was busy getting his hair braided by a royal temptress with hips like a lullaby.”

“I was rediscovering my past!”

“You were ignoring your present! ” Angus shouted. “Me!”

There was a long pause.

Rashida held her wine like a judge with no time for appeals.

Cal stirred melting butter in a pot in total silence.

I kept chopping like the fate of the evening depended on it.

Mr. Banks took a long, deep breath. “I didn’t know what I did mattered that much to you. Nothing I’ve ever done has meant much to anyone.”

“Everything you do matters to me,” Angus muttered. “I’ve been your best friend since the minute we met, and then suddenly—boom—Princess Makani floats in on a breeze and everything changes.”

“It didn’t change,” Mr. Banks said quietly. “The world has just… shifted. Ever so slightly. It always does. It always will.” He paused, then added, “I’ve missed you, Angus.”

Angus sniffed. “I missed you too.”

Suddenly he leapt up from the couch and threw his arms around Mr. Banks.

It wasn’t graceful.

It wasn’t cinematic.

But it was real.

They hugged hard and for slightly too long.

“I was worried I’d lost you,” Angus mumbled.

“You couldn’t lose me if you tried, my dear friend,” Mr. Banks replied. “Unlike my passport in Marrakesh. One minute I was buying figs, the next I was impersonating a Bulgarian folk dancer named Yuri just to get through customs.”

And just like that, things were whole again.

We sat down to dinner… not perfect—we would never be perfect—but intact. Like people who’d gotten something off their chests and were better for it .

And as the smell of pasta and the sound of laughter filled the room, I caught myself smiling. This was ours.

And that made it enough.

Even if the slipper in the microwave would remain a mystery forever.