High Paying Bounty for My Secret Husband’s One Night Stand? I Queted Chapter 01

High Paying Bounty for My Secret Husband’s One Night Stand? I Queted Chapter 01

I’d been married to Eastbrook’s most powerful man, Alexander Harrington, for three years, and we were still practically strangers.

The world knew Mr. Harrington as cold and restrained, but they didn’t know he’d been married in secret for years.

Then, late one night while I was working overtime, someone accidentally added me to a group chat called “Eastbrook Elite Socialites.”

A pinned message instantly blew up the chat:

[URGENT! Alexander Harrington is landing in Palmetto Key tonight. Whoever gets me his hotel room number gets a ten-thousand-dollar bounty!]

I stared at my phone and let out a dry, humorless laugh.

Wasn’t that my husband who hadn’t come home in three months?

In the group, the so-called socialites were feverishly studying a file called The Harrington Playbook.

One mocked the “invisible Mrs. Harrington” as a “neglected frump,” while another vowed to become the “new mistress of the Harrington estate.”

So I fired off his private location and pocketed twenty grand.

I figured I’d just watch the drama unfold. But instead, that cold, detached man flew back overnight, pinned me against the door, and rasped in a low voice, “So, Ms. Blackwood, I hear you sold me off for a pretty good price?”

***

“Ms. Blackwood, here’s next quarter’s financial report for your review.”

My assistant, Morgan Chase, placed the folder gently on my marble desk.

I rubbed my throbbing temples. Outside the window, Eastbrook’s neon lights stretched on endlessly. I had been in the office for fourteen hours straight.

“Just leave it. You can head out.”

I had just picked up my cold coffee when my phone buzzed violently in my pocket.

A red “99+” appeared over the message icon.

Frowning, I opened it and found I’d been added by a “Jessica Whitmore” to a group called “Eastbrook Elite Socialites.”

I was about to leave when a pinned post froze me in place.

[URGENT! Alexander Harrington is landing in Palmetto Key tonight. Whoever gets me his hotel room number gets a ten-thousand-dollar bounty. Waiting, and it’s urgent!]

I froze, my coffee cup still raised halfway to my lips.

Alexander Harrington.

I knew that name all too well.

It was a regular in financial news, the undisputed king of Eastbrook real estate, and the name on the marriage certificate next to mine.

The chat was already on fire.

[Jessica, you’re offering ten thousand just for a room number?]

Jessica, who had posted the bounty, shot back instantly: [Too high? Just getting into his bed puts the position of Mrs. Harrington right in front of you. Can ten thousand compare to that?]

I stared at the screen, a sarcastic smile curving my lips.

If Alexander were that easy to get into bed, I wouldn’t have lived like a single woman for the past three years.

[I heard his secret wife is just some business merger sacrifice. Ugly and frumpy. Mr. Harrington never goes home.]

[For real. I have inside info. That “Mrs. Harrington” can’t even set foot in his villa in Meadowridge Hills. Just sits there neglected every day.]

[Oh my god, that’s so sad. All dressed up with nowhere to go. If it were me, I’d step aside and let someone else have the spot.]

My fingers tightened slightly around the phone.

So that was how the world saw me? A neglected, frumpy housewife?

I was the CEO of Blackwood Technologies, worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

My marriage to Alexander was an alliance of equals, each getting what they needed. He wasn’t home because I was just as busy.

[Jessica, I heard Mr. Harrington hates women who throw themselves at him. We have to be smart about this.]

Jessica sent a smug text: [Relax. I have The Harrington Playbook. Paid a fortune for it from his former secretary. It even lists his boxer color of the day.]

I almost laughed out loud.

Alexander’s former secretary? That poor fool he personally sent to prison for embezzlement?

“Ms. Blackwood? You okay?”

Morgan, who hadn’t left yet, looked at me with concern.

I waved a hand, staring at the rapidly climbing bounty on the screen. A sense of mischief stirred inside me.

“Nothing. Just spotted an interesting investment opportunity.”