Page 7 of The Rebel Billionaire

"Okay, Charlie. So what has you sitting alone out here drinking whiskey in the middle oftheday?"

Charlie took a healthy slug of the whiskey. "Do you really want to know? Or are you just asking to be polite? Because I'm not in the mood for politetoday."

The perfect opening to get the hell out of there. I opened my mouth to say something likeyou look like you need to be alone. Instead, I said, "Yeah, I do. I'm curious. I've seen you before. You've never struck me as the 'drunk in theafternoon'type."

"I'm not," she said, holding out the glass and offering me some of herwhiskey.

I took it from her and sipped. Holy Christ. I like whiskey. I've had some pretty good stuff, but nothing that tasted like this. I took a second sip before handing theglassback.

"I don't know what that is, but I don't think you're supposed to drink the whole bottle in onesitting."

I leaned against the porch railing and looked down at her, irrationally turned on by the spark of irritation in her aquablueeyes.

"You're not," she agreed. "At 15K a bottle, you're probably supposed to take a decade to drink the whole thing. But this isn't about getting drunk. This isrevenge."

"Only a Winters would get revenge by drinking a bottle of whiskey that costs more than most people's cars," I said, crossing my arms over mychest.

Charlotte flushed. Her eyes narrowed. She should have looked petulant and childish as she took an angry sip of the whiskey. Maybe it was her kiss-swollen lips or the faint pink of beard burn on her cheeks, but she didn't look petulant. She lookedfuckable.

Every time I'd seen her before, her hair had been tightly bound in a bun-like thing that looked elegant and restrained. It was still in a bun, kind of, but strands were falling out loosely aroundherface.

With her messy hair, bright eyes, and worn jeans, she looked yearsyounger.

It was a reminder that shewasyears younger, twenty-four to my thirty-two. Yeah, I'd already told her I knew who she was. I was way too nosy and too much a hacker at heart not to pull up every detail on myneighbors.

None of them were remotely interesting. Until this morning, I'd lumped Charlotte Winters into the not remotely interestingcategory.

Clearly, I'd beenwrong.

"I thought about murder," Charlotte said after taking another healthy gulp of the whiskey. "But my family has had enough of scandal, and I'd probably regret itlater."

Taking the glass from her before she could guzzle the rest of it, I asked, "Who were you planning tomurder?"

"My oldest brother, Aiden," she said, her eyes grimanddark.

"What did he do?" I asked. "Cut off yourallowance?"

At the furious look she threw me, I was suddenly grateful both the glass and the decanter were out of herreach.

"Fuck you," she said, all trace of the passionate, reckless woman who'd kissed me gone. Her eyes narrowed on my face, coldlyfurious.

I held my hands up in front of me, palms out, to appease her. "Whathappened?"

She studied my face for a long moment as if weighing her options before she said, "You investigated me?" I nodded. "So you know who I am, who myfamilyis?"

I nodded again. Everyone knew who her family was. The notorious Winters clan of Atlanta. They'd been a power in this country before my grandfather was born. Charlotte's father and her uncle had taken charge of the family company, Winters Inc., and made it even more of a force than it had beenbefore.

They had their fingers in everything—manufacturing, technology, healthcare. You name it and Winters Inc. had a subsidiary making cash handoverfist.

Her older brother Aiden ran the company. Surprisingly, given how many of them there were, Charlotte was the only other Winters activelyinvolved.

The company and their wealth would have been enough to put them on the map, but the murder/suicide of her aunt and uncle, when Charlotte had been an infant, followed by her parents’ almost identical murder/suicide when she was a kid, had made them ripe targets forgossip.

All of them had grown up under the poisonous microscope of the media, and while they worked hard to live quietly these days, it didn't take much to stir up a littlescandal.

Probably why Charlotte was drinking in her fenced-in backyard instead of atabar.

"What do you know about me?" she asked, reaching out her hand for theglass.