Page 1 of The Stranger

Chapter 1

Spencer

Fuck.The loud incessant shrill of my phone jolts me out of a deep sleep. Begrudgingly cracking one eye open, I groan into my pillow when I glance at the clock on the bedside table and see it’s only 5:15 am. It’s a Sunday, and the only day I get to sleep in. Who the fuck would be ringing me at this time of morning?

I blindly reach for my phone, unsure whether to answer it or throw it across the goddamn room. If this is one of my employees, someone is about to lose their job.

Without even bothering to look at who it is, I bring it to my ear and answer the call with an abrupt, “What!”

I hear an audible gasp through the line, which is followed by, “Don’t you darewhatme, young man.”

My mother.

I am thirty-two years old, but that knowledge never stops her from occasionally berating me like a small child.

I blow out a long breath. “Someone better be dead, Mother. It’s five o’clock in the morning.”

This time she huffs. “What I just saw online has my poor heart racing and my chest feeling tight. I’m sodistraught I’m going to need to take a Valium once this conversation has ended.”

“Mother,” I growl, narrowing my eyes. Eloise Prescott has always been a touch on the dramatic side. “Enough with the theatrics. I can guarantee you are not having a heart attack. Why are you calling me at this ungodly hour? You know this is my only day off.”

“After the relationship status you were tagged in on Facebook, no less, I very well could be,” she replies.

I abruptly sit up. Has something happened I’m not aware of? Or have I fallen victim to the gossip mill once again? It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve made the headlines of some trashy tabloid for my philandering—as my mother refers to it—ways.

“What relationship status?”

“That my firstborn son—my only child—is in a committed relationship. She’s beautiful and I’m very happy for you both … thrilled actually, but imagine my surprise at finding out this way. I’m your mother, Spencer. I should’ve been told before the rest of the world.”

I was right.Fuck my life.

“Mother, you know as well as I do never to believe what is printed in the media. They’ll say anything to sell a story.”

“What about when it comes directly from the woman you’re seeing?”

“What?”

I sharply pull the phone away from my ear and stab my finger against the screen to open the Facebook app, and my irritation morphs into anger the moment I see it. It was posted by a woman by the name of Delilah St. James. It clearly states,“In a Relationship with Spencer Prescott”.

Who the fuck is Delilah St. James, and why is she spreading such vicious lies?

“Mother, I’ll call you back,” I bark, then hang up without waiting for a reply.

I click on Delilah St. James’s profile picture and use my forefinger and thumb to expand her image so I can get a closer look. She doesn’t look familiar at all, but has that rare kind of beauty … one that’s hard to forget. She’s gorgeous, and just my type, with her thick, long blonde hair, a radiant smile, and the prettiest blue eyes I’ve ever seen.

The problem is I’ve been so busy running my empire that I haven’t dated in months.

I exit out of the picture and scroll down her page to see she regularly posts and gets likes and comments, so I doubt it’s a fake profile, but you can never tell these days. Scammers are ripe on social media and getting more brazen by the day. It’s why I hate these platforms. That, and the fact I’m a private person.

The ones who post every facet of their lives online, including what they ate for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, annoy the hell out of me. Who wants to see that?

What I do in my own time—and who I do it with—is nobody else’s business but my own. I only have this account because my PR team said it would make me more personable.

It’s a load of bullshit if you ask me. I can be very personable when I want to be. I only went along with their suggestion because there is nothing I wouldn’t do to protect my company.

I move back to the top of Delilah’s page, and my finger hovers over the message tab.Do I really want to go there?I should let my assistant, Simone, or my PR team sort thisout … it’s what I pay them for, after all. Alternatively, I could call my lawyer and have him do it for me, but against my better judgement, I press the button and open Messenger.

My fingers are flying over the screen before I even realise what I’m doing.