Black Ties & White Lies (black Tie Billionaires, #1)

The first installment in the Black Tie Billionaires series, this contemporary romance follows a fake-engagement scheme between a billionaire CEO and his younger brother's ex-girlfriend that evolves into a genuine love story.

Margo Moretti, a graphic designer at 8-bit Security in Los Angeles, is called into a conference room to meet her new boss. The man waiting is Beckham "Beck" Sinclair, the older brother of her ex-boyfriend Carter Sinclair. Beck reveals he purchased the company because Margo ignored his calls for months, assuming he was reaching out on Carter's behalf. He explains his real motive: A gossip site ran photos of him with numerous women, and the board at Sintech Cyber Security, the company he founded and sold while retaining his role as CEO, warned him to maintain a stable relationship for at least a year or risk losing investors. He proposes that Margo become his assistant and, after a month, they announce a fake engagement so the relationship appears natural. In exchange, he offers a pay raise and promises to arrange an interview with Camden Hunter, his friend and owner of an elite Manhattan art gallery. Margo, who dreams of displaying her art professionally, agrees, insisting on exclusivity and nothing physical. Beck accepts but warns she will eventually want to cross that line.

Two days later, Beck demands Margo leave with him. She signs a nondisclosure agreement and learns they fly to New York the next day. At her apartment, Beck finds her sketchbook and references a night at his family's Hamptons vacation home when she let him look through her drawings, asking if she still sketches him. Margo denies it. After an emotional goodbye with her best friends, Emma and Winnie, she flies with Beck to Manhattan on his private jet.

At Beck's lavish penthouse, their proximity in the kitchen nearly leads to a kiss, but Beck deflects, and Margo retreats to a guest bedroom, humiliated. He takes her to Bergdorf Goodman, a luxury department store on Fifth Avenue, for a private shopping session. When a zipper gets stuck in the dressing room and Margo calls Beck for help, the tension snaps: He kisses her passionately, and she responds before the stylist's return interrupts them. At the Sintech office afterward, they argue about whether the kiss was genuine. Beck insists it was and grows angry when Margo downplays it.

Beck apologizes by cooking dinner and physically carrying Margo to the kitchen when she refuses to come downstairs. Over the meal, he delivers a blunt monologue about his desire, promising he will not act until she asks. On her first day as his assistant, Beck gives Margo his corner office because he knows she loves the Manhattan skyline. Over the following weeks, they exchange increasingly flirtatious emails and grow closer. Meanwhile, Carter calls Beck, claiming he still loves Margo and intends to win her back. Beck resolves to keep Carter away.

A month in, Beck announces a business trip to Colorado. After a meeting, he insists on driving to the airport despite an approaching snowstorm. They argue, both grab the steering wheel near an exit ramp, and the SUV skids off the road. With no cell service, they walk through the blizzard to a small inn, where the only room available is a honeymoon suite with one bed.

Beck forces Margo into a hot shower to warm her, following her in fully clothed when she refuses. The sight of her in lingerie pushes him to the edge, and he storms out. When Margo demands an explanation, Beck confesses that the only thing on his mind is how badly he wants her and that she is too afraid to act because of what Carter did. Margo drops her towel and asks if this is where she begs. Their first sexual encounter follows, intense and drawn out. Afterward, in the bathtub, Beck reveals he has wanted Margo since the moment she walked into a bar during college, before Carter ever spoke to her. He left the Hamptons vacation early because he could not bear watching her with Carter after discovering Carter was cheating. Margo confides that she touched herself thinking about Beck that night, a secret she has never shared.

On the jet home, Beck slips his grandmother's engagement ring onto Margo's finger while she sleeps, later explaining he chose not to propose formally because the arrangement has an expiration date. Back at the penthouse, Beck declares Margo will sleep in his bed. When she heads to her guest room instead, he follows, and they reconcile there. They share the engagement news with Emma and Winnie via video call. At the office, Carter shows up unannounced, escalating the brothers' rivalry.

Beck and Margo announce the engagement at dinner with Beck's parents but find Carter already at the table. Carter insults Margo. Beck pins Carter's face to the tablecloth, forces an apology, and leaves with Margo. Outside, she confesses she is developing real feelings. Beck asks her to be his girlfriend genuinely. She says yes.

At a lavish engagement party, Ruby Robinson, the reporter behind the original gossip article, warns Beck she has damaging information. She arrived with Carter. While Beck steps away, Carter corners Margo on the terrace and reveals that Beck noticed Margo first at a college bar and Carter pursued her to spite his brother, that Beck paid Ruby to publish the article so his board would pressure him to settle down, and that the entire arrangement was engineered to reach Margo. Carter forcibly kisses her. She bites his lip to free herself and runs to Beck.

At home, Beck admits he paid Ruby and fabricated the board's ultimatum but insists the scheme was never revenge. He explains that he saw Margo in college but never approached her, that Carter pursued her out of sibling rivalry, and that Beck spent over a year engineering the fake engagement as his only path to her. Overwhelmed, Margo removes the ring and returns it, telling him she cannot trust someone who built their relationship on lies. The next morning, Beck leaves for San Jose, giving her three days of space. He asks her to be waiting when he returns. She agrees to stay but makes no promises.

While Beck is away, Margo disguises herself and visits Camden's gallery, earning an impromptu meeting by impressing him with her knowledge of architecture. She shows him a mixed-media piece: One half is a pencil sketch of an elderly man she once observed sitting alone on a memorial bench; the other is a painted scene reimagining his life with his late wife and grandchildren. Camden agrees to display the piece and discusses an eventual exhibition built around Margo's concept of reimagining strangers' lives. Meanwhile, Beck confronts Carter in San Jose and threatens to expose his gambling debts if Carter ever contacts Margo again.

Alone in the penthouse, Margo discovers a door left ajar revealing a fully outfitted art studio Beck secretly built for her after the Colorado trip. On the wall hangs a framed sketch she drew of Beck on the Hamptons beach, one she believed she had lost. The studio convinces her his love is genuine, and she begins working on a large canvas.

Beck returns early after receiving her text. She shows him a split canvas: on one side, a pencil sketch of them in the LA conference room where the arrangement began; on the other, a painting of Beck pulling her onto a dance floor at their wedding. Margo declares her love and says her future looks like him. Beck confesses he has loved her since college. They reconcile passionately.

Three months later, Margo's exhibition, titled What If, opens at Camden's gallery, and every piece sells. Beck secretly purchases the wedding painting and pays Ruby to suppress the article exposing their scheme, commissioning a feature celebrating Margo instead. After the show, Beck walks Margo to a row of brownstones near Central Park, kneels, and proposes for real with a diamond wedding band to pair with his grandmother's ring. Margo says yes. An epilogue set years later shows the couple married with three daughters, preparing to attend a Metropolitan Museum of Art exhibition honoring Margo as one of the most prominent artists of the last decade.