Married by Midnight (The BAD BOY BILLIONAIRES Series, #12) Read Free Page A

this thing go.  What girl was worth all this trouble?
    But as his mind went to the memory of her guileless face, the cascade of golden hair floating behind her, he knew he couldn’t.
    He couldn’t explain it but he knew he would not stop until he’d found her.

CHAPTER TWO
    G olden was almost halfway home before her heart stopped slamming against her ribs and slowed to its normal rhythm.  Finally, she was beginning to breathe easier.  She still couldn’t believe what had just happened to her.  She’d never been more humiliated in her life.
    How do you get from accepting the simple job of putting clothes on models to ending up on a catwalk in front of an audience of thousands?  She, who’d always been shy and reserved, suddenly pushed into the limelight – literally.  If she’d only known, she would never have even shown up.  But then how could she have anticipated this?  It could have happened to anybody.  She was just in the wrong place at the worst possible time, a time that made her the perfect target for a drive-by recruitment for the runway.
    But never again.  As desperate as she was for the money she was still not planning to go anywhere near that place, not even to collect the thirty-five pounds they’d said each temp would get.  And, as much as she hated it, she had to admit it – she was desperate...
    Since leaving sixth form and then doing a two-year diploma in business administration all she’d been able to find were odd jobs, none of which provided more than the minimum wage.  She knew she was at a disadvantage, twenty years old and fast approaching twenty-one, not having entered a bachelor’s degree program.  She needed to get moving on her plan but how could she leave for the university of her choice when it was almost a hundred miles away?  That would require her boarding on campus and that would never do.  How could she leave her mother behind?
    Golden gritted her teeth as she thought about it.  She would just have to hang in there a little longer, maybe just one more year.  She had to keep trying to convince her mother to make that big step toward independence.  It was the only thing that would save them both.
    By the time she drove along the gravelly road and parked in front of the country house where she lived with her mother and stepfather it was already almost ten o’clock at night.  Tired and hungry she climbed out of her twelve year old Vauxhall Corsa and closed the door gently behind her. She didn’t want to wake her mother and she definitely didn’t want to risk the wrath of the man who now fancied himself her guardian.
    As quietly as she could Golden turned the key in the lock and pushed the front door open.  Typical creepy old house, the heavy mahogany door groaned as she pushed it open.  Holding her breath she paused, listening for the sounds of approaching footsteps, but when all she could hear was silence she let out her breath and pushed the door all the way in.
    There was a single light glowing on the entrance table.  Her mother’s doing, of course.  It was little acts of love like these that strengthened Golden’s resolve to do everything in her power to get her mother out of this prison into which she’d unwittingly trapped herself but, as much as she knew it was the right thing to do, there was a major issue that first had to be resolved.  There was hardly anything she could do until her mother realized that she’d married a man who meant her no good.
    Golden was crossing the hallway on the way to her room when she heard a soft meow coming from the kitchen.  Immediately the crease in her brow disappeared and a smile softened her lips.  If there was one thing in the world guaranteed to lift her spirits it was a quick cuddle with Sir Winston Churchill.  She headed off in search of her beloved cat.
    She found him by the back door, his head down as he lapped the remaining drops of milk from his saucer.  “Hey there, my love.  How are you?”