Net Worth by Amelia Wilde

13

Charlotte

Mason leadsme through the glittering, glowing heart of the gala. Humid summer air brushes over the skin exposed by my gown, soft and light in comparison to the strength of the arm underneath my hand and the hard-pounding heart in my chest. With all those people and all those tables and all those lights, I had the impression that the gala went on forever. We pass through one archway bursting with roses in blush and cream, more tiny bulbs alight in the blooms like they might lift off and float away at any moment. Another archway. Another.

His movement is different. Whatever is wrong with Mason’s leg is affecting him now. A subtle hitch whenever he lifts his right foot off the ground. I can feel it through the palm of my hand. If I turned my head to look, I bet I’d barely see it. But I would see it. It would have to be bad for a man like Mason to let anything show. His expression tells me nothing.

Is it considered new money or old money if you lost it and then regained it?

A foolish, drunken question from a foolish, drunken man. I heard the words come out of Mr. Peters’s mouth, and I saw them reach Mason. He didn’t flinch. The change was entirely in his eyes. He hadn’t looked happy to be standing in that crowd to begin with. Danger in his smile and the set of his jaw. I saw that danger zero in on Mr. Peters.

And I saw something else, too. The fallout. I’ve seen how that bristling anger plays out at galas like this one. At best, the insult is smoothed over with more alcohol or a change of topic. At worst…

We avoided all the worst possible outcomes, and for a single moment, I thought I saw a relief in Mason’s eyes. Relief, as if I’d rescued him, as if he’d been all alone and out of his depth and not one of the most powerful men in the city.

I might have been wrong about that.

He leads us through a garden glade decorated for the gala with shimmering falls of tulle and lights, then makes a turn. I’m touching him, trying to move with him, so I feel how his balance shifts to one side and rights itself.

The illusion of the forever-gala falls away into shadow.

The illusion of the polite couple bursts like a broken lightbulb.

Mason pushes me up against a pillar, my back to cool concrete, and then his hand is skimming along the side of my neck and up to my jaw so he can tip my face up to his. It’s so fast, so fast, and I only have a second to try to catch my breath, a second to register darkness and heat in his green eyes.

“Fuck,” he says, and then he kisses me.

My whole body tumbles into the kiss. There’s nowhere else to go. A concrete pillar at my back, a man who might as well be made from marble holding me in place. My pulse becomes a racing, dancing thing, completely out of control. I find the lapels of his jacket in my hands, pulling him closer. I didn’t make any decision to do that. My hands turn to fists. My nerves turn to sparks, then fire. His tongue is in my mouth, his teeth are on my lip. The chatter and music from the party is no louder than a whisper. It’s miles away if it’s a hundred feet.

Mason is the only one here, and he’s the most dangerous one of all.

Who was I trying to save, going to him like that?

Not me, not me, not me.

I saw the threat of him and then I let him take me away.

He wraps his hand around the back of my neck, testing my lip with his teeth. Again. Again. Like he wants to bite hard but won’t let himself. Like he wants to draw blood. I haven’t had a sip of champagne at the party but I feel tipsy from the taste of him. A hand on the small of my back hauls me closer in to solid muscle under expensive fabric and the hard ridge of his cock.

His belt buckle.

Ridges of metal and man. Steel digging into softness. It’s one thing to see his hands near the buckle. It’s another thing to feel it through the insubstantial fabric of my dress.

I’ve never done this before, I’ve never submitted to a kiss like this before, never even been offered one, but it’s good. It’s good. It hurts. It’s good.

It’s heat on my skin, so much that I part my thighs under my dress so I don’t combust. Mason feels me do it and both his hands tighten. Mistake, mistake. The fabric of my thong makes more contact with the air. Cool against hot, wet—

I moan into his mouth. Can’t help it. Can’t stop it. Don’t want to. He licks the remains of the sound off my tongue and laughs. Mason shifts, moves his hands to grip my face, and stares down into my eyes like he’s deciding whether or not to kiss me again. Whether or not he’s going to do worse. “You sweet little thing. I can’t fucking believe it.”

“I didn’t know you would be here.” I can’t for the life of me let go of his jacket. He doesn’t brush my hands away. “I didn’t know.”

“Why wouldn’t I be here? These events are for people with money.”

Moneyis bitter in his mouth. A dirty word. But it can’t be, because he has so much of it that he can buy anything. He bought me. He’s gone to my head. My fear of him—of his strength, of his beauty—is like a drug. His hands on me make my blood run fast and my brain run faster. I know better than to bring up what Mr. Peters said about his money. About losing it. About getting it back. But it’s the thundercloud hanging over us right now. It won’t go away until the lightning cracks.

“My mother—”

“Your mother isn’t convincing anyone.”

“She told me about your parents.”

Mason digs his fingertips into my face. He doesn’t mean it. It happens so fast it’s over before I can blink. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

“I’m sorry my dad didn’t help you.”

A laugh like a knife bursts out of him, followed by another one, the sound so cruel I flinch. “You think our little meetings are about that? No, it’s much worse.” He backs me up against the pillar again. Nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide. No way to let go of his jacket. I can’t do it. “He didn’t just decline to help. He stole our money. He used my father’s death to make a profit.”

His smile is the scariest thing I’ve ever seen. A painful delight in telling me something I didn’t know, telling me something terrible about my father. “That’s—how would he have done that?”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Ms. Van Kempt.” I never thought my own name could sound like such a taunt. Such an insult.

“Charlotte,” I whisper.

A shake to my face that makes heat sprint across my cheeks. “You’ve been running that worthless excuse for a company for long enough to know the basics. How did he take the money?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know.”

“Think.”

“It’s hard.” I can hardly breathe, and when I do manage to inhale, the scent of him is on the breeze and I want more of it. “It’s hard when you’re—”

He angles my face up, absolute control in his two steady hands, and being forced to stand still sends electricity running through every one of my nerves. “This isn’t hard,” he snaps. “This is nothing. What’s hard is when both your parents die before your eyes. What’s hard is when your family fortune is stripped from you overnight. What’s hard is having to look into your seven-year-old sister’s eyes and explain to her that no, she can’t go back to second grade with her friends because your parents are dead and there is no money.”

“I’m sorry.” Anything to soothe the storm I’ve brought down, but I’m not calm myself. I’m caught in a million cross breezes and breathing is difficult when I look at him. He’s so close. He’s so angry. “I’m sorry that happened. It sounds awful. But it didn’t happen because of my father.”

“Right.” There’s such a dry bite to the word that I feel it on my own tongue. “He had nothing to do with it.”

“My father’s a lot of things. He’s—he’s not always nice. He drinks. He makes mistakes.” I don’t want to think badly of my own father. I don’t. “He always cared about money and work and he missed every one of my ballet recitals, but he’s ultimately a good man. He’s honest.” Don’t ask it, Charlotte. “Isn’t he?”

Mason laughs again. I close my eyes, then think better of it. When I open them again, he’s watching me. Waiting. We’re close enough to be kissing. We’re so close that if anyone came upon us in the dark, they’d think we were lovers. That we wanted to be this close. And maybe I do, because I’m trying to pull him toward me. Mason stands tall, solid, unmoving. He’ll only come closer when he wants to be closer, and right now he wants to laugh at me like I’m the most foolish person he’s ever met.

I probably am.

He bends his head. Leans in. I don’t know why I inch my legs apart. Hope, maybe. That this will go somewhere hot and unthinking.

But Mason doesn’t kiss me.

One of his hands drops and the other locks around the back of my neck to turn my head. This way I can’t see his face, only feel the heat of him near the shell of my ear. “I don’t give a fuck if you believe me about your daddy. If you want to know how he stole my money, it’s quite simple. The next time you’re snooping in his office, take a look at the family financials.” The low, mean suggestion of a laugh. “And, Charlotte?”

Hard to speak. “Yes?”

“Close your legs.” His hand tightens again—half a breath, and then he’s detaching my fingers from his lapels. My hold on him was nothing. “Unless you want me to take Thursdays too.”

Mason turns and stalks away, his dark suit blending with the shadows. The heat of his hand lingers like a slap, and I put my own hand there in its place. There’s no one to hide my embarrassment from. No one to hide my humiliation. I squeeze my thighs tight together. My fingers ache from how I tried to hold him here. Why would I do that? I have no idea what I look like, but a few tentative touches at my hair says it’s fine. Mason could have undone the knot at my nape. He could have left me out here a disheveled wreck and made it difficult to walk back into the party.

I’m a bit of a wreck, with swollen lips and a slick, aching pussy and a nervous pressure in my lungs. But I’m okay to go back to the party.

It isn’t far. Closer than I thought. Mason’s words ring in my ears all the way back to the fairy lights and the tulle and the champagne glasses.

My mother was vague about the details. A fire, she’d said. They didn’t help.

She didn’t say they lost everything. Not a word about that. And she wouldn’t have. I would have asked questions, and there’s only so much uncomfortable conversation she can handle. My stomach turns. They knew, then. They both knew what had happened to Mason and his siblings.

It feels like being torn in half. I change my mind with every step I take in my Target heels. Left. There’s no way my father would have been so callous. Right. Mason’s correct. Left. My father is a decent man, and if he couldn’t help them, it was for a good reason. Right. There’s proof in our own financial records. Mason wouldn’t have dared me to find it if it wasn’t there.

But then.

The pain in his voice.

Anger, but a wounded anger. He’d expected better from my father. His parents and mine were friends, and Mason must have thought—

I turn a corner and there it is. The gala. The women in gorgeous jewel tones. Summer silhouettes that let the hems play in the breeze. Men in tuxedos, standing tall and proud and laughing. From here, it looks lovely. Perfect even. Good, beautiful people having a nice time. I recognize more than a few of them. There’s Leo Morelli and his wife, crossing through. He says something into her ear and she grins. Yes, her nod says. Yes, please. The instant she approves, he straightens up and guides her in another direction.

My pulse races under my fingertips. It’s so strong because I’ve put them up to the hollow of my throat.

Mason’s the only one who dresses me in jewelry.

The crowd shifts, and my parents come into view. Around another standing table this time, surrounded by people my father scoffs at when we’re at home. He’s wearing his tux. Its age is starting to show around the cuffs and buttons, but it’s Armani. He wouldn’t sell it, even when I started pawning my own clothes. Making sales on eBay and Etsy to cover the bills. He kept the suit. Refused to give it up.

He couldn’t have done what Mason said.

He couldn’t have.