Page 40 of The Renegade Billionaire

“Are you in trouble with the law, boy?”

His question has me tumbling back on my ass with a laugh. “I’ve never been and hopefully never will be in trouble with the law. You have my word.”

“Yeah,” he mutters. “I believe you.”

“What the heck is happening in here?” Madison’s voice sets off a bundle of nerves I knew were coming but I’m still not prepared for.

“We rented two more rooms,” Pops says proudly.

“To whom? For how long? And won’t they need a bed?” She drops her oversized bag on the floor and enters the room.

At first, I think she’s going to take the screwdriver from my hands, but instead, she holds the longboard that connects the headboard to the footboard, and suddenly it’s a hell of a lot easier to unscrew the damn thing.

“Nope. They’re using this one as a home office with a twin bed for when his nephew visits.” Pops is as carefree as ever. If anything, he’s looking a little too smug for my liking—Madison’s going to be pissed.

“They? This isn’t a home or an office building, Pops. This is an inn.” She turns those dangerous blue eyes on me. “This is you, isn’t it?”

Swallowing hard, I duck my head, pretending the screw is more difficult than it is.

“My acting CEO, Grey?—”

“Your best friend.”

I look up and nod. “Glad to see you were listening. Yes, my acting CEO and best friend is coming to stay, and since I’m on sabbatical, he’ll need a private office to take virtual meetings in.”

“This…none of this makes sense. For how long? How long is he going to be here?”

Once again, I look away, and Pops answers before I can.

“They booked two more rooms for five months.” He flashes a wide, toothy grin.

“F—five months? Why wouldn’t you rent a house or an Airbnb?”

This time, I look her square in the eye. “Because I like it here, and I don’t have a lot of places where I can just be…me. So I wanted to stay here.”

Her face scrunches up in the cutest way. “You feel like you fit here? With us?”

I nod.

“And you can afford to…holy crap. Ninety thousand dollars, Braxton? Did you pay ninety thousand more dollars?” She swats at my arms with both of her little hands. “I don’t even know if I could get that much selling the place. What the heck is wrong with you?”

“With Grey here, it’ll be a business expense. I’m not paying for it, the company is.”

“Your company, Braxton. Your. Company. But.” She’s searching the room as though it’ll give her some answers. When her gaze finally meets mine, hers is watery and fragile. “There’s that much money in marketing?”

She shakes her head and holds up a hand. “Sorry, don’t answer that. It was an incredibly rude thing to ask. But this with the amount you’ve already paid, it’s just too much. Take it back.”

My shoulders shake with laughter I hold in. If I outright laugh in her face, she might try to kill me.

“I’m at a point in my life where I need to make some changes. I’m comfortable in this town, Madison, and that doesn’t happen often.”

“That’s not true. You’ve liked everything and everyone since the day you showed up here.”

My cheek twitches with the beginnings of a smile. “Here, yes. But with the way I’m making changes to my company, I’m not sure I’m very well-liked at home. I’m…different here, I guess.”

“Different.” The cute little line between her brows deepens. “What makes you behave differently here?”

You, I almost say. Instead, I remove the final screw in the bed before answering her. “I’m not sure. Maybe it’s the sense of community, or that there’s no city traffic clogging up the streets. I like that everyone cares about you and Pops. I could do without the constant interrogation, but I get that people do it because they’re protecting their community. I don’t know where I’ll end up, so while I’m on sabbatical, I want to be where I’m happy, and what better place for that than Happiness?”