Page 3 of Auctioned to the Billionaire Stalker

The elevator doors opened again, and I glanced out, surprised. I didn’t see anyone, but even if I had, I would have pressed the ‘close doors’ button. Then I looked around the elevator some more while I waited for the doors to close.

That’s how I missed the sight of the delivery girl from Dinardo’s Deli hurrying towards me.

How did she not see me? I’m not sure. But she didn’t.

The next thing I knew, I was knocked backwards by something hitting me squarely in the chest. Then I was covered in something piping hot and wet.

“Ow!” I looked down and saw red liquid everywhere. It looked almost like blood. But no one’s blood was that hot. “What the actual fuck is happening?”

“Oh my God… I’m so, so sorry.”

I looked down. Right into the greenest eyes I’d ever seen. I stared into them, momentarily hypnotized by both their beauty and the kindness I saw in them. I blinked. Then I looked further down and saw that the large container of tomato soup she’d been carrying was crushed, its contents allover me, the tiled elevator floor and… oh my God, her shirt. Her thin T-shirt was saturated with tomato soup, making it virtually see-through. I swallowed hard and stared. Her shirt clung to her, making the fact that she had the most perfect breasts I’d ever seenveryobvious.

I reached out to steady her. At least, that’s what I told myself. I really just wanted to touch her.

Because something strange had happened to me when I looked at her.

It was like something clicked.

I wanted to get to know her better. In fact, I wanted to know everything about her.

Everything.

CHAPTER TWO

An Hour Earlier

Daisy

I tried to stand patiently in the long line stretching out of the Bursar’s Office and down the sidewalk. I couldn’t help tapping my hand against my thigh and checking my watch off and on, though. I didn’t want to be late for my deli delivery job. I knew Old Man Dinardo wouldn’t fire me or anything, but the majority of the money I earned came from tips. If I wasn’t there to wait tables, I didn’t earn any of that money. I sighed and rubbed my temples. It was so damn hot.

Usually, the ocean breeze would somehow find its way to campus, but that wasn’t the case today. Resigned to the fact that I was just going to have to wait, I found myself looking around. The campus was beautiful, as usual. Spanish moss hung from the branches of the huge old water oaks that lined the sidewalks. Groups of friends and couples holding hands were out in droves. So were the frat boys playing frisbee on the huge open lawn in front of the massive, almost gothic styled library building. I caught myself looking for a familiar handsome face with dimples. A mess of dark hair hanging over his forehead. I pictured him pushing it back as he laughed over something one of his friends said. Then I winced as another memory of him came to mind.

I turned away from the sight of the guys and banished the thought of walking in on Myers, my boyfriend, fucking one of my former friends. I wouldn’t go there. Never again. He still tried to talk to me at least two or three times a week, but Iignored him. I’d blocked his number last year. But he’d used the numbers of our mutual friends to get to me, until I’d realized that all the friends we’d shared had chosen him instead of me when we’d split up.

They blamed me for dumping him. Saying it was normal to cheat in college. That he loved me, he really did, and I should consider myself lucky to be with him.

I might have been blinded once by how handsome he was, how charismatic, funny, rich, and smooth. But I wasn’t anymore. I knew that if I’d stayed with him, I’d be finding some new girl in his bed every few months for our entire married lives.

No thank you. If I ever got married and had a family, I wanted my children to have a stable, loving upbringing with two parents. Not like what I’d had. I wouldn’t be repeating my mother’s mistakes.

West Bay University had been… interesting for me. It had started off so well. I’d gotten a full academic scholarship. Then I’d made the dance team. I’d been good enough my sponsor even gave me a scholarship that covered some of the smaller things that weren’t covered by my main award. I’d pledged the best sorority on campus. Myers had picked me out of all the girls who’d wanted to date him, which was pretty much all of them. And the first year of college had passed like a beautiful dream. It had been perfect, like a movie.

But that had all fallen apart spectacularly. After I’d lost my scholarships, I’d had to drop down to one semester of school a year so I could work more hours. And that money hadn’t even gone to school. I closed my eyes, starting to panic at the amount I’d had to take out in student loans just to get my business degree. Now I wasn’t even sure I’d earn enough to pay it back. I had always pictured myself wearing a designer dress and heels, leading a presentation for an ad campaign in the sleek conference room of one of the tall, skyscraper-style buildings that dotted West Bay’s growing skyline.

Now? It was a foregone conclusion that I’d be working andmanaging my mom’s flower shop back home in Crosston.

Nothing was going as planned. Not one thing.

Now I was finally about to graduate. Just one semester left. It was August now, and I’d be done in December. Because of everything that happened, I was a couple of years older than the average senior. I didn’t care a bit about that anymore. Life had beat it out of me.

They say bad things happen in threes. For me? It had been more like twenty-threes. I tried not to feel sorry for myself, but it had been… a lot.

“Next,” a woman’s voice called.

I looked up, surprised when I realized the line had passed by quicker than I’d expected. I stepped forward. “Hello,” I started.

“Name.” She glanced at me, blinked a little, her eyes growing wide, before looking back at her computer and poising her fingers to type. Her bubblegum pink manicure looked off when compared with the rest of her. She had a short, old lady perm and wore a beige cardigan sweater over a plain white shirt. Those pink nails looked to be her one rebellion, her one pop of color, in a bland world.