Steven _BWWM Romance Read online

  Steven

  They are both successful and very busy but life takes a big turn for them both.

  A sexy over 40's romance by Katie Dowe of BWWM Club. Features another free bonus book.

  Alicia Barnett is driven by her career—and has put dating on the backburner.

  And her friends are practically begging her to go on a blind date!

  To her surprise, she gets hooked up with billionaire software tycoon Steven Hughes, who shares the same apathy towards dating!

  Despite their preconceptions about love, they fall hard for each other.

  Yet deep down, Alicia and Steven struggle with insecurities about finding romance so late in life.

  But an unexpected surprise makes them wonder…

  Is age really just a number?

  And will they find that their love has surpassed all of their expectations?

  Find out in this emotional yet sexy romance by Katie Dowe of BWWM Club.

  Suitable for over 18s only due to sizzling hot sex scenes!

  Tip: Search BWWM Club on Amazon to see more of our great books.

  Free: Get Jason from the Members From Money series where YOU'RE the star!!

  Hi there. As a special thank you for buying this ebook, for a limited time I want to send a copy of Jason free of charge directly to your email! It's a personalized story, meaning you'll add a few details about yourself (these won't be shared with anyone else) and you'll become the star of the story!! :D

  You'll be emailed a new chapter once a day for 7 days. You can get it by clicking the cover below or going here:

  Direct link: www.afroromancebooks.com/personalized-jason-members-from-money

  This book is so exclusive you can't even buy it. As well as sending daily emails with the story, I'll also send you updates when new books like this are available.

  Copyright © 2018 to Katie Dowe and AfroRomanceBooks.com. No part of this book can be copied or distributed without written permission from the above copyright holders.

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Bonus Book – The Billionaire's Fake Marriage

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Get Another BWWM Ebook Free

  BWWM Book Of The Week

  More Hot BWWM Books You'll Love

  Chapter 1

  The funeral was not bad as funerals go. Instead of the usual somber day with grey clouds hanging low from the sky, there was a brilliant blue sky with puffy white clouds dotting the incredible blue! The sun was still up causing everyone gathered around the box holding the departed Celia Whitlock to spring for their umbrellas to shade them from the glare of the brilliant afternoon sunshine. Alicia glanced discreetly at the elegant wristwatch to see the time. She had meetings backed up, important life changing meetings that she could not afford to miss. She quelled the thought that whoever had planned Celia’s service had not bear in mind that people who were still alive had things to do and people to see. She glanced sideways at her best friends and saw that their heads were bent in respect to the minister intoning the perils of not being prepared to go to the other ‘side.’ Alicia shifted from one foot to the other. It had been going on two hours now and she was going to have to take her leave if it went on for much longer. Celia had been a bad ass criminal lawyer who had been feared and respected by most. Not liked in the least but feared and certainly respected. She had been a shark, no doubt about that. The woman had been in the prime of her life. She had her power walk each morning, yoga when she had the time, the proper vacations to exotic places (she could well afford it!), money in several offshore accounts, and a luxury flat that had been envied by her peers. She had never been married nor had any children but that had not bothered her much. “Men are like leeches, darling, they suck the life out of you and children are too clingy and needy. Besides, I am not the nurturing type.” She had dropped dead while jogging in her exclusive neighborhood. She had been only forty-three years old, only two years older than Alicia and that had scared the crap out of her!

  “Guys, I have to go,” she whispered to her friends.

  “The minister is still praying,” Donna hissed back, as she opened her eyes.

  “He has been praying for the past ten minutes. No amount of holy words is never going to put Celia into heaven. She was the worst bitch on earth,” Alicia told her dryly.

  “Have some respect,” Elaine said sharply, trying to hide the grin.

  “I am not a hypocrite, darling, and I am not going to stand here and pretend that Celia had been a saint. I have a three o’clock meeting.” She glanced at her watch. “And it is now a quarter to. See you later.” Before they could respond she hurried away making sure she stepped carefully around the stones and dirt of the graveside. She had paid her respect by coming and being bored out of her skull listening to the minister droning on. She had paid enough attention and it was not like Celia ever went to church, she probably made some hefty donations to them at one point or the other or got a relative of someone there out of a spot.

  She nodded to her driver as he sprang to attention and opened the door for her. “Back to the office, Clive,” she murmured as she sat back and closed her eyes as the air conditioner kicked in. It had been as hot as the dickens out there. No one should die in the midst of summer, the heat was too brutal!

  *****

  “How was the meeting?” Elaine asked her as soon as she came back into the living room with the bottle of wine. She had wrapped up at the office at seven and had come back to her apartment to find her friends waiting for her. She had given them keys several years ago when she had laid in bed sick and unable to do anything for herself. She had realized the perils of living alone and had done the right thing. She had left them and gone straight into her bathroom to take a shower. It had been a very long day!

  “Productive,” Alicia said with a grin as she poured the wine. She padded over to the love seat and sat with her feet tucked beneath her. She had put on a loose lounge pants and a skimpy top and had pinned her thick dark hair on top of her head. She looked far from being the COO of a fortune five hundred company and appeared far younger than her forty one years. “I only just made my meeting. Allen was having as fit wondering if I was going to make it. ColaCo is a fairly newcomer on the fortune five hundred list and we need to keep it that way. I-”

  “We are not talking about work tonight, Allie!” Elaine, the more pragmatic one in their circle, said as she held up one hand. “We are sitting her and reflecting on the brevity of life. Celia was in her prime and she just dropped dead! She was healthy and rich and very attractive and yet whatever wealth she accumulated will be going to some cousins of hers and her favorite charity which by the way was an animal foundation! Don’t get me wrong! I am all for the saving the animals and all that but there are people out there dying for hunger and struggling to send their children to school. She gave millions to an animal shelter!”

  “She had a right to do whatever she pleased with her money,” Donna said carelessly as she shook back her reddish blonde hair. “I saw her in a killer jacket in December. I almost asked at the house if I could have it. I know it cost a fortune and was a Romano’s original.”

  Alicia laughed in spite of herself. “It was auburn, it would not go well with your coloring, honey.”

  “I don�
�t care! Just to feel it against my skin would be enough.” Donna had a wicked glint in her green eyes.

  “Are you listening to yourselves?” Elaine looked at the two women in shock. “A woman who was in our age group just died! Life is short and uncertain and we need to take stock of it.”

  “And do what exactly?” Alicia asked wryly as she sipped her wine. Tomorrow was Friday which meant she had a report to compile as soon as her friends were on their way home. “We are fairly well off, we live our lives well, and we have good jobs. Donna, you are a high school teacher although, honey, I have no idea how you put up with those wretches who go to school these days. I was at the mall the other day and you should hear the words coming out of the young girl’s mouth. I wanted to bitch slap her and get myself in trouble! And you, Elaine, you have those two wonderful children and a husband who loves you to pieces. We are good. We give to charity, we are nice people, and we pay our taxes.”

  “And you are as alone as Celia,” Donna pointed out.

  Alicia stopped and looked at the girl for a moment. “I am not. I have you guys.”

  “We have our families, Allie, and when we leave here you go into your office to work on some report or the other until you go to bed. You live, breathe, and sleep work.”

  “I love what I do!” Alicia protested.

  “And we are not saying you should not do that. You are smart, beautiful, and damned sexy. Trust me if I was into women I would be so into you! But you need more than work. You need a man, honey!” Elaine told her bluntly.

  “I don’t need a man!” she said firmly as she reached for the wine bottle to pour herself some more wine. “I am completely on my own and besides men are intimidated by a successful woman.”

  “Not all men,” Elaine insisted. “When was the last time you had sex?”

  “What?” Alicia gulped down the wine quickly, almost choking in the process. “We are not doing this.”

  “It was two years ago with Brandon and you dumped him the minute he started showing signs of getting too close. Honey, you need a relationship and a meaningful one.”

  “I don’t have time for a relationship. I am way too busy and when I need to blow off steam I call you guys!”

  “Not good enough,” Donna told her. “We are going to help you find someone.”|

  ********

  Steven nodded to the doorman as he made his way towards his vehicle. His driver sprang to attention as soon as he made his way into the parking lot, opening the door for him to get in.

  “To the club, sir?” he asked respectfully as he turned to look at him.

  “I am going straight home, Thomas,” he told the man quietly as he leaned back against the plush cushions and closed his eyes. It had been a particularly trying day. The meetings had run over and the board had been adamant about not expanding their hardware division. “We are a software company, Steven, and we provide technical support to companies all over the world. Our stocks are rising steadily and we should keep it that way,” Donald Manning had said in his quiet monotonous voice. The company had been in the Hughes family for two generations and when he had taken it over five years ago the profits had gone through the roof with his visions. He knew what the public needed and he had put it out there with good result. He was supposed to fly to Japan in the coming week and he was thinking about sending his assistant instead. In the last few months, he had been steadily thinking about his future. He had been so busy with the company that he had missed out on having a family. He was approaching his forty-third birthday in September and he was not even in a relationship.

  “Darling, you are my only child and I am the only woman in my club who does not have a grandchild to boast about,” his mother had chided him a few days ago. “That nice woman Clarice was showing some interest at the dinner the other night and you did not give her the time of day.”

  “That’s because I was not interested, Mother,” he had told her gently. But he was beginning to think that he was going to die alone!

  “You are here, sir.”

  He opened his eyes as the gate swung open to admit them into the lush and breathtakingly beautiful Lakeside Manor so named because of the lake which ran alongside the hilly terrain that housed the Hughes. It had been a hotel decades ago until his grandfather had bought it and turned into a palatial mansion. Gardeners were cleaning the area and making sure that the famous roses were well tended to. Giant ferns towered over the fences and water gurgled from the fountain adjacent to the front doors. The pool which was built into a cluster of craggy rocks glinted blue from the sunlight which was still high in the sky at seven in the night. The lawns were green and sweeping and a barn housing horses stood to one side. At the left there were tennis and basketball courts that were rarely used.

  A uniformed butler opened the doors the minute he approached the front doors and took his coat. “Your mother is waiting for you in the rose room, sir,” he said with a bow.

  “Darling, here you are,” Grace Hughes waved an elegant hand as her son came into the room. Her white blond hair was elegantly coiffed and her attire neat and elegant. Her dark blue eyes which reminded one of the velvety sky in the summer nights twinkled with fondness as she looked at her tall, handsome son. Steven had inherited her coloring: ash blonde hair and dark blue eyes but had gotten his height from his dad. “I was just enjoying an aperitif. I am afraid Miller could not wait for supper for you.”

  “That’s okay, Mother, I am not hungry.” Steven bent to kiss her soft lined cheek. Grace Hughes was seventy-five but looked ten years younger with her lily white skin and her penchant for healthy lifestyle.

  “You are a little too thin, darling,” she murmured as he took a seat opposite her. A maid materialized out of nowhere and handed him a glass of white wine.

  “Thank you, Martha,” he said with a smile. “I am perfectly good at the weight I am, Mother. Now tell me about the charity.”

  “It’s going to be one of the biggest events of the year. We are targeting abused children and of course Leesa came up with this idea of placing some more equipment in children’s hospital.”

  “What do you need the company to do?”

  “We need special software, darling. We need to have the computers up and running at the hospital and we need to know that Hughes Software is on board.”

  “Aren’t we always?” Steven asked with a smile as he sipped his wine. Ever since he had the sense enough to be aware of his surroundings, he knew that his mother was a force and a pioneer when it came to doing something for the needy. Grace Hughes had married Seymour Hughes when she was only nineteen and he was twenty-six. She had gone straight from her parents’ magnificent property in Connecticut to Seymour’s manor and had stood behind him with every step. She had wished for more than just Steven, but it was not to be and when she realized that it was only going to be him she had lavished her attention on him. “When is it again?”

  “The last Saturday in August. A kind of end the summer with a bag event,” she said with a smile. “I invited Clarice along with her parents,” she added casually.

  “Mother, I already told you that I am not interested,” he protested.

  “Darling, you are not getting any younger and I am sorry but I need grandchildren before it is too late.”

  “I am not marrying just to provide you with grandchildren, Mother, and you know how much I love you.”

  “If you really love me you would provide me with one or two,” she told him wryly. “Darling, more than I need grandchildren, I need you to be happy and see you with a woman who loves you.”

  “It will happen one day.”

  *****

  “We have the largest selling market in the Caribbean and our numbers are climbing in Europe.” Sherry’s dark brown eyes glowed as she made the report. “We have doubled up sales with our diet drinks and not only do they taste fantastic but people have reported that they have lost weight in drinking them.”

  “That’s good to know, Sherry.” Alicia wished the
woman would not sound so preppy so early in the morning. She had been up since two a.m. after going to bed at eleven. Maybe her friends were right, this could not be it for her. She loved her job but she was starting to envy people who could leave work and go home to a family. “We need the reports on the distributions to schools. We do not want another incident like the allergic reaction to that middle school kid a year ago.”

  “That was an isolated incident and we made sure it would not be repeated,” Sherry hastened to say.

  “Good. Meeting dismissed. Allen, could you give me a moment before you make those calls?” she asked her assistant.

  The tall attractive man looked at her in surprise. “You okay?”

  “I am. I just need a moment.”

  “I am sending down for you cup of latte.” He got to his feet and passed his hands over his well-pressed suit. Allen Blagrove was gay and single just now having survived an awful break up only a year ago. He had told Alicia that it was this job that saved him from going over the edge. He was very loyal to Alicia and made sure her day ran smoothly. He was not afraid to tell anyone no where she was concerned, not even the managing directors. “You look tired, honey. Rough night?”

  “I was up preparing the reports for Peter and Simon this morning.”

  “Honey, you work too hard. You need to get laid or something.”

  “Not you too,” she groaned. “Have you been talking to Donna and Elaine?”

  “Not yet, but I plan to,” he said with a grin. “Take half hour and rest. I will make sure you are not disturbed.”

  Alicia leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. For the first time she had risen to the top she was starting to feel her age. She was constantly on the move. She had meetings in house and out and was always traveling to meet with investors and sponsors. ColaCo sponsored several events from parties and different functions to adding sections to schools, not only to get the tax write off but also to inject a humane feel to the company. They had adopted several derelict parks around the community and turned them into practical showpieces much to the delight of the town where they had their head office. They were people friendly and also environmentally friendly and their advertisements said as much. Alicia reported to the managing directors but they gave her carte blanche to run the place as she saw fit because whatever she put her mind to she succeeded. But now she was thinking about what her friends had told her and she was starting to feel empty. “Damn you, Donna and Elaine,” she whispered softly. She was an over forty woman with a very lucrative career and a luxurious apartment. She was a pride to the black community and her picture had graced the covers of magazines as a rising star and a woman to be reckoned with! It was something to be proud of considering her humble beginnings!