Read Online Billionaire With a Twist 2 by Lila Monroe - Free Book Online

me.”
    Paige’s forehead creased
slightly. “What’s the problem, then?”
    “Good…for me,” I
repeated. “Maybe not so good for you. Um…Hunter. Well.
He kissed me. I kissed him. We kissed. I’m so sorry—”
    Paige laughed.
    My head snapped up, indignation
fighting for space alongside the guilt and rapidly winning. “I’m
serious, Paige. It’s the truth! I wouldn’t lie about—”
    “Of course you wouldn’t!”
Paige said, taking my hand and squeezing it. “Oh, I’m not
laughing at you at all, Ally—well, not for that. Just for
thinking you could hide something from your big sister. I could tell
you liked him. We weren’t really dating.”
    I gaped, unable to contemplate a
reality in which people cheerfully decided not to date Hunter Knox.
“Seriously?”
    “Seriously,” Paige assured
me. “To tell the truth, I only went along with the whole thing
to keep Mom happy and off my back for awhile. I was never interested
in Hunter; he’s not even remotely my type.”
    I snorted in shocked disbelief. “How
is that man not anyone’s type?”
    “Well…” Paige smiled
a secretive, happy little smile. “…you remember Sergei?”
    “Vaguely?” I remembered
some Russian guy from Paige’s college art courses: tall,
skinny, androgynous; deep soulful brown eyes but couldn’t grow
a beard if his life depended on it, and a build that reminded me of
nothing so much as a collection of coat hangers strung together
tenuously. “Well, different strokes for different folks, I
guess.”
    “Oh, stroking has been happening,
all right,” Paige said in a low voice with a wicked grin that
seemed imported from an alternate universe, not native to the face of
my famously dependable and well-behaved older sister.
    “Uh, what?” I said, an
answering grin beginning to steal across my face.
    Paige lowered her voice. “Can I
tell you a secret?”
    “Of course!”
    That wicked grin widened, and she let
out a little giggle. “I’ve been seeing him again! Under
the Mom-radar, of course. He’s painting me,” she sighed.
    My mouth fell open wide enough to catch
every last fly in the universe. “No way!”
    Paige nodded, the cat that got the
cream. “Yep. Hunter was actually helping out.”
    “Seriously?” I asked again.
    “True story. That guy’s a
total romantic; I explained about Sergei, and he came right out and
offered to invite me on dates and then drop me off at Serge’s
apartment. He’d drive off to the library to do research and
come back a couple hours later.”
    My heart squeezed tight in my chest.
Damn, but I had fallen into bed with a nice guy that night at the
hotel.
    “It was pretty obvious he was
hung up on someone too,” Paige went on. “Then I saw you
two together, and—well. I can put a puzzle together when it’s
that easy.”
    I was so relieved I couldn’t
believe it; all the tension that had lived in my shoulders and back
for so long had fled, and I felt like without it I might collapse.
“Oh my God, Paige, I’m so happy I can’t even—and
I’m so happy for you!”
    “And Sergei’s been helping
me get back into the art scene,” Paige confided. “In
fact, some people want me to do a show at Blackbird, you know that
little gallery downtown?”
    “Do I know it? The place you’ve
been pining to do a show at since you were seventeen? Of course I
do!” I was so proud and happy I could burst. I wanted to grab
her hands and swing her around in a circle. “Oh man, you are a
superhero.” Then a thought occurred to me. “So wait, all
that party planning and socialite stuff—”
    “Oh, I’ve been having to do
all that too,” Paige said. “You know Mom would’ve
smelled a rat if I’d let any of it slide. And of course I’ll
keep helping out with the Knox stuff even after I tell Mom; it’s
the least I can do for you. Plus, I really love it. I do.”
    “See previous statement about
superheroics, times a billion,” I said.
    “Thanks, Ally. I don’t
always feel that