Total pages in book: 46
Estimated words: 45404 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 227(@200wpm)___ 182(@250wpm)___ 151(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 45404 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 227(@200wpm)___ 182(@250wpm)___ 151(@300wpm)
The man I’ve crushed on since I was a lonely kid, obsessed with programming, says he’s chosen me for a programming opportunity. Good things don’t happen to people like me. There’s no way this is real. Right?
Luke is a billionaire, a tech mogul, and a cybersecurity specialist. My idol. My dream man.
I’m nineteen, nearly homeless, with no one to turn to but my trusty laptop after my roommate’s boyfriend gets violent with me. When opportunity comes your way with shelter to boot, you take it.
I expect a hostel. A dormitory. Something like that. Not a penthouse with all the comforts imaginable.
Luke is my crush, but there’s no way he would feel the same, right? I’m no model with no experience in the dating scene. Why would he want me? But the way his eyes heat when he looks at me tells a different story.
Is Luke just using me for some fun, a pet project, or is there something real here?
* Crushing on the Billionaire is an insta-everything standalone romance with a HEA, no cheating, and no cliffhanger.
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
CHAPTER ONE
Jane
This is my happy place: headphones on, sitting at my computer, heavy metal music blasting in my ears as I tap the keys. The programming book is open to the side of my keyboard. The equations and processes are so much simpler than people.
Programming will never abandon me, leave me stranded for almost a week, shaking in the corner, wondering if anybody will ever come and get me. I’ll never let that happen again.
I wince when there’s a crashing sound from the next room. It’s so loud that it cuts through the screaming voices of the heavy metal. I listen to this kind of music specifically to block any sounds, not just from the outside but also from the inside of my mind. It’s difficult to focus when my roommate and her boyfriend are arguing next door.
Taking a moment, I rub my hands up and down my face. My eyes are sore from staring so long at the screen. My clock tells me I’ve been at it for two hours this evening, and I did three hours earlier, before my cleaning shift.
Another crash. I wince, taking off my headphones.
Axel’s voice penetrates the paper-thin walls. “You say you love me, Lily. How the fuck am I supposed to believe you?”
Standing, I pace a circuit of the room.
I hate living here since Axel moved in. This apartment is supposed to just be for Lily and me. They arranged it through the orphanage program, but Lily doesn’t care about my opinion when her boyfriend is concerned.
She can do better than an asshole hopped up on beer and who knows what else. He’s an animal who throws a tantrum every few days.
Bang, bang, bang. Oh, great. Now he’s knocking on my door.
“Leave her alone, Axel,” Lily says weakly, her voice just about audible.
“Jane,” Axel yells, banging on the door again. “You in there?”
“You know she’s in there. She’s working.”
“Working,” he laughs meanly. “I wouldn’t call listening to music and staring at a computer screen work.”
“It is to her.”
Another knock and something’s rattling inside of me. It’s like my resolve is shaking toward an explosion.
On the wall, Luke Hart stares at me from the cover of Forbes. He’s a billionaire who founded the most successful antivirus software in the world. Tall and muscled, he stares from the cover as if telling me everything will be okay. He’s wearing a shirt with the sleeves rolled up, arms folded in a conquer-the-world pose, his forearms showing his muscles.
His hair is dark with some silver dust, shaved short on the sides and longer on top. It makes him look younger than his thirty-nine years, but not by much, and I actually like that. Or maybe like is an understatement. He’s so mature and experienced.
I bet he’s nothing like Axel. Axel is a complete pig. I’ve never seen him behave kindly unless he’s on the phone with his little sister. Then he looks human. Otherwise, yep, total pig.
“Axel, stop!”
He pushes the door open, striding into my bedroom. Axel is tall and wide-shouldered, with a jock look and a brown buzz cut. He wears a wife beater that shows sleeves of mismatched tattoos of tribal and colorful figures clashing. Behind him, Lily lurks, anxiously chewing her fingernails.
“Didn’t you hear me knocking?” Axel says, walking right up to me.
He reeks of whiskey. He looks like a bully, every inch of him drenched in the need to assert himself and show his inner weakness. I refuse to let my fear show, though it keeps rattling in my chest, my heartbeat crashing as I take a small step back. Posture straight, head held high, I hope he can’t tell how badly I want to run.
“You eavesdropping on us?”
“I’d hardly call it eavesdropping,” I snap. “The whole building can hear you.”
He grins, but it’s more like he’s baring his teeth, a predator making a threat.
“You’ve got a bad habit of talking back, fatty.”
Lily gasps. “Axel!”
“I’m not ashamed of my body,” I tell him, though my feelings are honestly conflicted. There’s nothing wrong with being on the curvier side. There’s nothing wrong with not neatly fitting into the traditional notion of beauty. I just wish the rest of the world agreed with me. Then I wouldn’t have to get so much crap about how I look.
“You should be.” He looks around the room, his gaze settling on my laptop. “What are you working on? Always in here, typing away. A man can’t even watch a goddamn movie without being made to feel guilty about it.”
“I’ve never made you feel guilty.”
“So, you’re telling me how I feel now, eh?”
He wanders over to my laptop and trails his finger along the keys. With each click, I flinch, watching my programming window fill with random letters. I can delete them, but what if he takes it further? I saved for six months to afford that cruddy laptop.