How to Trap a Tycoon, Elizabeth Bevarly [best smutty novels txt] 📗

"The same way Adam trusted you," Carlotta said.

"Yes," Dorsey replied softly.

"And now he feels that trust has been violated."

"I know. That's the problem. And he's not the kind of man who'll forgive something like that."

"Oh?" Carlotta asked. "What kind of man is he?"

Dorsey fidgeted, then laid her Barbie on the floor beside Ken. Folding her legs up before her, she hugged them to her chest and settled her chin atop one knee. And she tried not to think about how she'd just curled herself up into a fetal position. What was next? she wondered. Would she be trying to crawl back into the womb, too? Somehow, she didn't think Carlotta would stand for that. Literally or figuratively.

"Adam," she finally said, "is the kind of man who protects what's his. He'll see this as an opportunity to throw Lauren Grable-Monroe—to throw me—to the wolves."

"Will he?"

"Oh, Carlotta. You know how much he hates that book. He'll jump at the chance to see me squirm."

"He might have jumped at the chance to see Lauren Grable-Monroe squirm, Dorsey, but not you. You yourself just said he protects what's his."

"I'm not his," Dorsey countered.

"Aren't you?"

She shook her head slowly. "I'm not anybody's." She had meant for the proclamation to sound fierce and proud. Instead, it only sounded sad and lonely.

"Regardless of what you may think," Carlotta told her, "Adam won't throw you to the wolves."

"I can't be sure of that."

"I can."

"Why?"

"Because he's just like you, Dorsey. And you would never do that to him."

"He's not like me," Dorsey denied.

"He's exactly like you," her mother retorted. "That's why you're so attracted to him. That's why you respond to him so strongly. You recognize yourself in him."

"No, he's… I'm… We're…" She sighed restlessly and gave up trying to explain something she didn't even understand herself. "He's not like any man I've ever been attracted to," she told her mother. "So why does it hurt so much to lose him?"

Carlotta laughed. "Oh, Dorsey, don't you see? That's always been your problem. You've always opted for Ken when you should have gone for GI Joe."

She narrowed her eyes at her mother curiously. "What are you talking about?"

Carlotta pointed at the Ken doll that Dorsey had dressed after completing Barbie's wardrobe. "Ken is so … so passive. He's so agreeable. So bland. He's the kind of man that I have always tried to attract. One who's manageable. One who's not much work. One who will behave predictably. Docilely."

"And what, may I ask, is so terrible about that?" Dorsey asked.

Carlotta rolled her eyes. "Oh, please. For me, that kind of man is fine. But he's not for you. You're a strong woman. You need a strong man. You need someone who will be both a worthy adversary and an equal partner. You're not going to find that in Ken. Yet Kens were all you ever dated. Until Adam."

"Ken is not that bad," Dorsey defended.

Carlotta sighed. "Dorsey, you always dressed Barbie in career coordinates, yet you always dressed Ken in tennis togs. And you still do. Do you realize that?"

Dorsey looked down at the two dolls she had just dressed, and sure enough, Barbie looked ready to take on the stock market, while Ken was prepared for game, set, match.

"Yeah. So?" she asked her mother. "Ken looks good in shorts."

"So you've never taken Ken seriously, that's what," Carlotta told her. "He's always just been a plaything to your Barbie. GI Joe, on the other hand—" Her mother held up the other doll. "Now he's a force to be reckoned with."

She snatched grinning, tawny-haired, totally harmless Ken away and settled intense, stoic, facially wounded GI Joe in his place. "Now look at that," Carlotta said with a smile. "That's what I call a power couple. Barbie has to take GI Joe seriously. He'd never stand for being dismissed the way that lame Ken just was. Ken belongs with my Barbie," she added, setting him down beside her peignoir-wearing doll. Dorsey had to admit that the pairing seemed much more appropriate. "My Barbie will be gentle with him," Carlotta concluded. "She'll take good care of him.

"You, Dorsey, you wouldn't be gentle with Ken. And you shouldn't have to take care of anyone, if it's not in your nature. You're a strong woman," she reiterated. "You have power. You have focus. You have drive and ambition. You have complete self-knowledge and self-confidence. You deserve to find someone like that, too."

Dorsey smiled halfheartedly. "I deserve GI Joe, huh?"

Instead of answering, Carlotta studied each of the male dolls for a thoughtful moment. "Then again," she finally said, "Ken and GI Joe are both eunuchs, aren't they? Hmm…" She snatched GI Joe away from Dorsey's Barbie, too. "Oh, dear. Look at that. Now Barbie's all alone. She's still smiling, but you can tell she's not really happy. I suppose she couldn't be happy with some boring, emasculated piece of plastic." She paused until Dorsey glanced up to look at her again. "She deserves a man. You deserve a man," she said pointedly. "A real man. One's who's like you."

"Adam Darien," she guessed.

Carlotta nodded. "He's a worthy rival for you, Dorsey, and a worthy companion. Strong women, I think, need both." She sighed heavily. "You aren't like me, darling. You never have been. And I'm glad of that. The one lesson I wanted you to learn, growing up, was that you are your own person. We are entirely different beings, you and I. We want entirely different things. But that's not a bad thing, Dorsey. It doesn't mean we don't care about each other. It only means that we are different."

"I think we want a lot of the same things," Dorsey objected.

"Name one," Carlotta charged.

"Security," Dorsey said immediately. "That was the whole point to writing How to Trap a Tycoon."

Carlotta shook her head. "That wasn't for security. That was for a financial nest egg."

"What's the difference?"

Carlotta smiled a cryptic little smile. "You'd never understand," she said without a bit of malice. "And just for