Chapter 46

“What?” Natalie asked, her brow wrinkling cutely.

“I don’t want you to go with him,” I said.

She didn’t say anything, only stared at me, chewing on her bottom lip—hardly sexy in this circumstance. Dark eyes shone with questions and unexpressed emotion. Of course, she looked confused. I’d ambushed her the day before she left.

“Natalie, I might be in love with you,” I admitted before I could fully process what I was saying. “Maybe for a while, and I can’t just let you leave town with some guy without telling you.”

Her eyes had been bright before, but now they shone with unshed tears, and I could see the effort she was putting into keeping her lips compressed so they wouldn’t tremble.

“Why are you telling me this now?” she asked, quiet and subdued.

“Because—”

“Why now, Marcus!?” Natalie repeated, much less subdued this time.

“I—”

“You felt this way while with Jessica, didn’t you?”

I was reluctant to admit it. “Yeah.”

“Then why didn’t you break up with her and ask me out a month ago?”

If I was being honest, it was because I would have felt like an asshole for ending my relationship with Jessica to pursue another girl. However, if I was being really honest with myself, it was because I’d been too much of a coward to ruin a relationship born of comfort and convenience. With Jess, I got my dick wet and filled my intimacy meter regularly. Ending that in pursuit of someone I wanted only to have it not work out had been too much of a risk for old Marcus.

“I would have said yes,” Natalie said before I had a chance to decide how honest I wanted to be with her. “Fuck, I liked you, Marcus. Way before you had money!”

God, that felt good to hear. “Then why did you jump in bed with this other guy? We were just starting something—”

“Because I like him, too, Marcus,” Natalie yelled. “I like him, and he doesn’t come with all the confusing extra baggage you come with.”

“Extra baggage?” I asked.

“The other women,” Natalie said. She counted them off one finger at a time, “Helen. Your assistant. Danielle. That cute little brunette.”

Cute brunette? I wasn’t sure who she was talking about.

“And don’t even get me started on Bobbi and that fucked-up situation.”

“You were—”

“I’ve never considered myself a jealous woman, Marcus, but this is a whole other level. Tyler isn’t doing whatever you’re doing with all these women. He’s living a normal life. He has a normal job, and we go on normal dates. He doesn’t have a harem, and I don’t work for him.”

There wasn’t real heat in Natalie’s gaze despite her raised voice. There was more sadness than anything, and I realized that I’d really fucked up my chance by not going after Natalie sooner. She genuinely looked hurt.

“Natalie...” I said. I needed to navigate this minefield carefully if I had any chance of keeping this from blowing up in my face. “I would have given all that up for you. Why didn’t you say anything?”

Clearly, that was the wrong thing to say. If Natalie could shoot lasers from her eyes, I was sure I’d be a blackened corpse right about now.

“Why didn’t you say anything a month ago, Marcus!” she shouted. “Fuck! I gave you enough signs!”

“I—”

“Why now?” Natalie asked.

“What?”

“Why are you telling me this now? I’ve been dating this guy for a few weeks. You had plenty of chances. You could’ve told me not to date him the moment I said anything! Instead, you just rolled over and accepted it. You didn’t fight back at all! So what’s changed? Why now?”

I’d always been a straight shooter with Natalie, so I decided to keep it that way. “Danielle asked me to be in a relationship with her.”

Natalie huffed. “Congratulations.”

“I should take her up on it,” I confessed. “But ... you sent me that message about leaving, and I couldn’t stop thinking about you going away with someone else. I hated it.”

Natalie crossed her arms across her chest, pushing her impressive breasts together and giving me a lot of caramel-colored cleavage to look at. I wanted to take a chance to appreciate the view, but I did my best to stay focused.

“Danielle’s offered me an open relationship,” I admitted.

“Sounds like quite the gal,” Natalie said, her voice tinged with ice.

“She told me there was only one person who would be off limits,” I hurriedly continued so I could get to the point of the story. “It was you.”

That took her entirely by surprise. “Me? What the fuck? Why?”

“She could tell how much I liked you,” I said.

“We met once,” Natalie said.

I shrugged. “That was enough, I guess.”

Turning to pace around the room, Natalie sighed. “Marcus ... god. You haven’t done me any favors here.”

“I know,” I said, “But if this isn’t what you want, just say so.”

“Part of me does want it, you idiot!” Natalie snapped, stopping mid-step to glare at me.

A swell of hope blossomed in my chest. “Really?”

“Yes!”

“Then just stay here with me. I’m going out to my grandpa’s place this weekend.” I closed the distance between us and reached up to place my hands on either side of Natalie’s face. She let me.

God, she was gorgeous. Her high cheekbones and almond-shaped eyes suggested the influence of her Native American background. At the same time, her plush lips and coffee complexion were inherited from the African American side of her family. Besides being exotically stunning, she was level-headed and had a good heart. I wanted desperately to whisk her away to some distant location, fall asleep with her in my arms, and wake up every morning to see her wearing one of my shirts. I enjoyed the mental image of her sitting cross-legged on my bed in one of my button-downs, sipping from a coffee mug as she suffered from a severe case of bedhead.

“Come with me. It’ll be just the two of us for the entire weekend.”

Eyebrows canted in concern, she looked up at me with those big brown eyes of hers, and tears began to well up in her eyes. “Marcus...”

Her voice was filled with emotion, and before she could get out whatever she was about to say, I pressed my lips to hers. It wasn’t full of fire or passion; it wasn’t about sex. This kiss contained all the concentrated emotions of nearly a year of admiring and adoring her. I didn’t try to invade her mouth with my tongue, nor did she, but her lips worked back against mine after a moment’s hesitation, and I felt her hands tentatively grasp my hips, then slide up my sides to my chest. Her fingers pressed into my muscles, massaging them slightly. Then she gently pushed me away until our lips parted. I still held her face in my hands, stroking her cheeks with my thumbs as we stared into each other’s eyes.

“Marcus...” her tongue darted across her lips, wetting them. A tear slipped free and slid down her cheek. “God ... I want to say yes,” she breathed.

“Then say it,” I said.

“I’m going with Tyler.”

My heart dropped into my stomach. “Why?”

“Please just...”

“Why?”

“Because he asked, and he’s been so sweet to me. Because I like him, and he deserves a chance.”

I opened my mouth to protest ... to ask her to just give us a chance, but Natalie cut me off.

“Please don’t. This is already hard enough, but...” She pushed me away enough so that my hands slipped from her face and wrapped her arms around herself defensively as she looked at the floor. Her eyes studied the office’s carpet for the next few moments while I simply watched, trying to find the magic words that would change her mind.

Finally, her gaze returned to me, “This is what I want.”

No magic words came to mind. “You said I didn’t fight for you last time,” I said, trying my damnedest to keep from tearing up.

Shaking her head, Natalie looked away from me and said, “It’s too late for that.”

The tension in the air was suffocating as she stared into the middle distance while I waited for an answer to spring to life in my head. After nearly five minutes of silence, I nodded. “Okay.”

A few minutes later, I climbed into the back of the SUV and shut the door behind me with a dark cloud hanging over my head. Maybe I hadn’t gone into Marduke with complete confidence that Natalie would fall in my arms, but I’d thrown it all out there and felt like she’d nearly chosen me. Being so close to having her and letting her slip through my fingers hurt ... a lot.

The SUV lurched in motion toward my apartment, where my chopper was being prepped for the golf course. I had my ‘date’ with Astrid but was no longer in the mood for it; sliding my phone from my pocket, I considered texting her to cancel our plans. Deep down, part of me hated doing that. She seemed like a genuinely cool person that I’d like to get to know better.

“Hey, boss?”

I looked up to see Erin sitting on the bench seat opposite me, watching me with concern.

“Yeah?”

“Mind if I take off the assistant hat for a few minutes and wear the friend hat?”

I sighed and stared out the window as I watched pedestrians whiz by. “I guess.”

“I think you should tell Danni about this.”

Having expected some sort of platitude or other form of sympathy, her words took me by complete surprise. “What?”

Erin inhaled deeply, almost as if she were getting ready for a fight. “Danni’s an amazing woman.”

“I know that,” I said.

“She really likes you. I mean really likes you ... enough that she’s willing to share you if that’s what it takes to be in a relationship. That’s huge for any young woman as infatuated as she is.”

“Yeah,” I said, already aware of where she was going with this.

“She only had one stipulation—Natalie.”

Of course Erin knew all the details; she and Danni were friends. It’s how we met, so it made sense that Danielle would have filled her in on all the gory details of our conversation about a potential relationship.

“I haven’t agreed to a relationship,” I said more defensively than I probably needed to.

“No. I know, and I get it. You’ve had feelings for Natalie for a while, and you needed to shoot your shot.”

“How do you know what happened?” I asked.

Erin simply gave me a look that said, ‘Don’t insult me.’

I sighed and rested my head against the glass. “Okay. Yeah.”

“Danni’s a sweet girl, and I think you should be honest about trying to try for Natalie before making a decision. If you start a relationship with her, she should know she’s the consolation prize.”

I winced. That was a really harsh way of phrasing it, and I didn’t think it was entirely fair. “She’s not a consolation prize, Erin.”

Erin shrugged. “If you say so. I’d rather Danni decide that for herself.”

“I don’t want to talk about this anymore.”

“Just ... let me finish this?”

With my head still resting against the window, I rolled my eyes toward her expectantly.

“Danni’s one of the sweetest, kindest women I know. She deserves the best.”

“I know,” I said, annoyed. It was like Erin was her older sister or something.

“You’re the best,” Erin continued, “Believe me when I say I know rich people, and almost all of them suck. Even I suck—I can be a selfish bitch. I’m not saying you don’t have your faults, but you care ... sometimes a little too much. I’m just asking you to tap into that for Danni and be honest with her.”

We continued in silence for a full ten minutes as I considered her words. Finally, I asked, “Do you think I should pursue a relationship with Danni?”

“Do you love her?” Erin asked.

“I could easily fall in love with her,” I answered.

“I know what you mean,” Erin said with a bit of a smile, and I wondered for the first time just how Erin felt about her best friend. Danni had confessed to not being interested enough in women to be in a relationship with one. Was there some unrequited feelings going on with my assistant?

She continued, “Part of me thinks that it might be worth pursuing if you like her enough—especially if love is on the table. I think you’re getting mixed up in a lot of things that are gonna to be hard for a girl like Danni to handle, though. It might be better for her if you left her alone. She’s almost too good for the world you’re living in.”

“Thanks for the insight,” I said.

Erin gave me a sympathetic smile. “Sorry, boss. I can’t tell you what to do. Not in my job description. More of the other way around.”

That last thought was said with a gleam of mischief in her eyes, and my troublemaking Erin was back as if she’d never left.

“Are we okay?” I asked.

“Oh, we are definitely okay, sir.”

“Even if Danni’s heart gets broken?” I asked.

“Depending on how things go down, I might be disappointed in you,” Erin said, “But if you told me to, I’d drop on my knees and put your cock down my throat before her tears dried.”

My cock stirred at the suggestion, and Erin broke out in a grin as she noticed my pants beginning to tent.

“That doesn’t make you a bad friend, does it?”

“Nope,” she said, her eyes still fixed on my crotch. “Don’t worry about me and Danni. We’ve been friends for years, and whatever happens between you two won’t change that.”

I nodded, leaned back against the seat, and closed my eyes, thinking about the conversation with Natalie, savoring that last kiss we’d shared before I left her office. Then Danni came to mind, reminding me of the last night we shared together ... me licking champagne off her body, taking her ass, and making love to her multiple times during that night of celebration. I laid back, contemplating what I should tell her ... if I could pursue a relationship with her. If it was fair to even entertain starting something with her while still in mourning over what might have been with Natalie.

Fingers caressed my pants-covered crotch, grazing over the fabric stretched over my hardon. I glanced down to see Erin on her knees between my legs. I opened my mouth to say something, and she reached up and placed a finger on my lips.

“Shhh,” she said softly. “Just lay back and close your eyes.”

I did. My thoughts drifted back to Natalie as I tried to put my desire for her behind me. She was the one I wanted for so long, but I hadn’t acted when I should have, and I lost the girl. All I had to show for it was a lesson—if you want something, don’t hesitate. It was something I needed to take to heart; if I didn’t, losing Natalie wouldn’t have meant a damn thing.

Cool fingers wrapped delicately around my cock as it was freed from my pants, and I felt the warmth of a wet tongue paint the sensitive underside of my cock.

The only question now was ... what did I want?”

Wednesday, 3:20 pm

“Compared to the planet’s population, the number of people with more than a billion dollars is small.”

Astrid adjusted her stance as she held the putter in her hand and then tapped the ball. I watched it roll across the green roughly ten feet before sinking into the hole. The blonde Norwegian heiress was a professional compared to me, and it didn’t need to be pointed out that she was squarely in the lead. I’d never familiarized myself enough with the game to understand how the scoring worked, but if I had to guess, I’d say she probably had one stroke to my every two, but I couldn’t have told you what that meant in terms of an actual score. As far as I was concerned, it consisted of putting a ball into a hole with as few shots as possible. Things like handicap, birdie, and bogey meant absolutely nothing to me.

I was dreadful at the game, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t enjoying the date, especially since I’d made peace with the fact that I knew I’d suck. Of course, Astrid had been the personification of poise and tried to teach me everything she knew about stances, terrain, and which clubs were best for which situation. I would probably forget almost all of it within twenty-four hours, but her easy company made up for the impromptu lesson I hadn’t expected. On top of that, it was easy to forget about my woman troubles around her.

My two favorite aspects of this date were watching Astrid do literally anything and enjoying interesting topics of conversation. Like almost every other woman I’d come in contact with since inheriting the Gerrard fortune, Astrid was incredibly beautiful. Her blonde hair was ultra-fine, and even though she had it tied back, silk strands kept slipping free of her makeshift bun to frame her face in white-gold whisps.

She was waifish, with delicate bone structure, slight curves, and sharp, angular features. Combined with how relatively tall she was, she looked like she could have walked right off the set of a fantasy movie where she had a part as some elven or fairy noble.

Yet despite her ethereal looks and classy demeanor, there was something down-to-earth about Astrid. She spoke with an advanced vocabulary but managed to communicate her ideas without coming off as pretentious. She kept her fingernails short and wore very little jewelry, suggesting practicality. Almost every subject we touched on had a depth to it. She was well-read and up-to-date on her pop culture. She had a soft, easy smile and eyes as blue as Helen’s but much warmer than my lawyer’s usual icy gaze.

“Nice one,” I said, referring to the ball she’d just sunk.

She performed a slight curtsy despite wearing pants and primly said, “Thank you.”

I nodded a ‘you’re welcome’ to her and said, “So, all the rich people know each other?”

“It’s kind of like a large high school,” she said as I lined up my shot, “Everyone knows of everyone, but there are cliques and groups with common interests. There are feuds, rivalries, and friendships. A lot of people date within their own groups or cross over into others, creating alliances or contentions. Like everything else, it’s full of humans with different desires and designs.”

“Man, we really are all the same, aren’t we?” I said as I lined up my ball, tapped it, and was pleased to see it was heading in the right direction. I followed after it.

“In a lot of ways, yes,” Astrid said. “Except unlike the rest of the world, we’re allowed to be honest with our morals.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, finally sinking my ball with the second shot, unlike Astrid’s single stroke. I gave her an apologetic look, but she simply smiled like the graceful woman she was.

Astrid said as she handed her club to her caddy. “We aren’t obligated to pretend morality is objective.”

“You don’t believe morality is objective?”

“No one does, Marcus,” Astrid said, watching my caddy as he took the club I handed him and slid it into my golf bag. He slung it over his shoulder and started leading us to what I assumed was the next teeing ground. “Everyone pretends to, but no one believes it deep down.”

“That’s not true,” I said.

Astrid gave me a look. “Please. Do you think any parents hold their own children to the standards they set for others? If someone murders, many would suggest the death penalty, but if it was their own child who committed the crime? Never.”

As we trudged across the green, I thought about her point. Parents were often able to overlook moral atrocities that their kids are part of, but not all parents behaved that way. Anyway, that sort of behavior was an emotional response and often considered an inconsistent moral failing, even if it was understandable.

“That’s not really the same,” I said.

“It is,” Astrid said, arguing with me but keeping her tone conversational. “We’re a social species, Marcus. We’ve evolved to rely on each other. How much do you think we could accomplish if we all had to gather our own food daily? What if we all had to maintain the cleanliness of our homes by making our own supplies and soap? Do you think we would have time to make rockets if everyone had to worry about making our own clothing?”

She shook her head and looked at the clear blue sky, shading her fair eyes from the bright sun. “No. Some slightly less dumb animal realized that cooperation was the key to progress and passed that to its offspring.”

She looked back at me. “We can’t have cooperation without a social agreement to respect each other.”

“‘I won’t hurt you if you don’t hurt me,’” I suggested.

“And more,” Astrid said, “‘I have your back if you have mine.’ Those simple concepts eventually turned into morality. It’s the vehicle in which cooperation is allowed to thrive.”

“Okay,” I said cautiously, “Let’s say I buy that. Why does being rich allow you to realize or admit the truth?”

“Because I don’t have to cooperate with most of the world, Marcus. I have what they all want, and they’re willing to overlook my actions as long as I give them enough of it.”

“Money,” I said.

“Most of the time,” Astrid said. “Or influence ... opportunity ... comfort... sex.”

She was eyeing me as she threw out that last one, and we stared at each other in silence for several beats. Then she looked away and said, “I’m sure you’ve already compromised your morals now that you’re so rich.”

My thoughts immediately went to Bobbi, and there was a small throb of guilt somewhere in the back of my mind.

“For instance,” she said, “going behind Hiro’s back and using his wife against him. Surely, you wouldn’t have done something like that a year ago.”

“That’s not what happened,” I said, explaining the entire situation to Astrid from the moment I met Carla Tanaka to the moment she voted for Chandler in the boardroom. By the time I was done, Astrid had an amused smile on her face and shook her head.

“Carla ... she really is something.”

“No kidding,” I said. “If I had to go back and do it all again, I probably wouldn’t have had her go through with it. I don’t think what I got from the deal is worth having Tanaka mad at me.”