Mr. Black's Proposal (Part Two: A Billionaire Erotic Romance) by Aubrey Dark Page B

elegant gowns holding glasses of wine and cupcakes. All of them were frozen in shock.
    And my mom was definitely surprised.

Chapter Nine
    Steph
    Lucas had already declared his love for me, but I was sure that he was going to rescind that statement once Otis puked up cake all over his living room.
    Lucas’s mom stared at the pile of red velvet vomit on the floor.
    “Oh my god,” I said. “I’m so sorry. I’ll clean it up. I’ll… I’ll call a vet.”
    Lucas stepped forward in front of the group of women.
    “Ladies, let’s move into the den for evening cocktails, shall we?”
    Lucas ushered the women into the other room. Some of them looked like they were about to be sick as well, and I didn’t want any more red velvet disasters on the white carpet. I stood in front of Otis’s mess, tugging down the hem of my stupid club dress. I couldn’t believe I’d pulled out the wrong little black dress from my closet.
    The ladies trickled out of the room, and I was left alone with Otis.
    “I bet you feel a lot better after ralphing up that sheet cake, don’t you?” I asked Otis. He yelped, then burped.
    “Well, serves you right for stealing my cake.” I patted him on the head and he looked up at me with an expression of guilt. I knew the feeling. Eating too much cake gives anyone a stomach ache and a guilty conscience.
    Then I raised my head.
    “Is that—”
    Otis barked.
    “Oh shit,” I said, as I watched the tendrils of smoke curl out from the kitchen door.
     
    “I thought I’d turned the oven off!” Andy said. “Oh Jesus, Steph, I’m sorry.” He was standing in front of the smoking oven, looking completely aghast. His hands were pressed against his temples like he could shut out the fire if he thought about it hard enough.
    “What is even burning?! Otis ate the sheet cake!”
    “I put in a spare pan of cupcakes,” Andy said. “Because the sheet cake went missing.”
    I pulled the tray out of the oven. Billows of smoke rose up from the oven. I kicked the door shut and dumped the tray of blackened lumps into the sink. The water hissed as it hit the burning pan.
    Otis ran in, wagging his tail and barking. He’d recovered quickly from the red velvet mishap, thank God.
    “This is a disaster.”
    “The oven had a weird timer dial,” Andy explained, his hands still raised to his head.
    “Let me guess, it was in Swedish.”
    “Oh, Steph, I’m so fucking stupid—”
    “You’re not stupid,” I said. “Get the dishtowels over there.”
    I opened the back door.
    “Let’s try and fan the smoke away from the party, okay?” I waved the dishtowel over my head. Otis jumped up and snagged the dishtowel in his jaws. I tried to pull it away from him, but he thought we were playing tug of war. I pulled and he pulled back, and I was the one wearing heels. I went down on the kitchen floor with a thud. I heard the hem of my dress split.
    “Fuck!”
    I let Otis have the dishtowel, but he didn’t want it anymore. He jumped on top of me, licking my cheek and slobbering all over me.
    “Ahhh! Get off! Otis! Off! Down!”
    Andy tugged Otis’s collar and he sat down happily, wagging his tail. Gone was the guilty dog who had ralphed up my sheet cake. I pulled out my ponytail and tried to wipe the drool out of my hair with a paper towel.
    “It’s fine,” Andy said. “Everything is fine.”
    “Fine!?” I said. “You think this is fine? !”
    “I turned off the smoke detectors before they could go off,” he said. “And the cupcakes were great, weren’t they?”
    What was I going to tell Lucas? My heart twisted in my chest. On the one hand, he’d told me that he loved me. On the other hand, I was singlehandedly destroying his apartment with smoke and dog vomit.
    While I was pondering the best way to throw myself off of a bridge, Lucas stuck his head in the door.
    “Hello?” He sniffed at the air. “Is everything alright in here?”
    “Fine!” Andy said, one octave too high. “Ahem. Everything is