Total pages in book: 60
Estimated words: 59044 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 295(@200wpm)___ 236(@250wpm)___ 197(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 59044 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 295(@200wpm)___ 236(@250wpm)___ 197(@300wpm)
“And you get nothing?” I asked.
“I get a buyout, most likely.”
“Have you tried to explain this to him?”
Scarlet’s eyes rolled as she exhaled hard.
“I have tried to explain to him, in detail, how Stephen himself is trying to undermine him. He doesn’t believe me. Tells me I’m naive. That I just don’t like Stephen. To be fair, I don’t. He’s a condescending prick and he acts like he didn’t grope me when I was sixteen, when he absolutely did.”
“He what?” I asked, surprised with how quickly rage could bubble up in my system. I found my fingers digging into her flesh, and had to focus to force them to relax.
“On this very ship, in fact,” she said, body tensing again. “Tried to corner me in the hall right outside my bedroom, and reached up to grab my tit. The only reason it didn’t go further than that was because Drea was coming down to my room for us to get pretty.”
“Did you tell your father this?” I asked, feeling any respect I’d used to have toward Marcus slipping away.
“I did.”
“And?”
“He said that he probably just accidentally brushed me. When he had a whole handful of my boob. Whatever. I did make it a rule that he’s never allowed to have a room near me again. Which is why we haven’t seen him over here. He’s closer to Dad’s room.”
“That shouldn’t have happened to you. And your father should have believed you.”
“When you grow up in this world, you learn really young that money and power can excuse all sorts of bad behavior among men. I think to the outside, people assume that they only use that power against people who are so much more powerless. House or office staff, for example. Women in the poorer cities they visit. But being wealthy and privileged didn’t protect any of us,” she said, eyes far away.
“Any of you. Meaning your friends,” I said.
“Drea, especially. I’m not betraying a confidence there. She and her mom tried to bring it to trial, but her father forced them to drop it. Spouting off that shit about one bad act shouldn’t bring down a ‘great’ man.”
“Great men don’t abuse women and girls.”
“In this world, apparently, they do. And get away with it. While Drea…” she said, exhaling hard after trailing off.
While Drea got fall-down drunk and acted out sexually, wanting to be the one in control, but somehow only managing to get further victimized.
“Is this why you don’t date? Or don’t date much,” I clarified, since I was sure she’d dated, but it definitely didn’t hit any gossip sites, and not her socials at all.
“Men in these circles are raised by those so-called ‘great men’ who passed on even worse ideas to their sons.”
“What about in college?”
“Do you know what they teach business majors?” she asked.
“What?”
“To get what you want by all means necessary,” she said. “The way the guys I went to college with talked about women was disgusting. Like they were property to be bought and discarded when they lost their value.
“And before you ask… guys not in the general vicinity of the way I was raised… they tend to be really insecure about it. You learn that it’s just easier to be alone. Or have friends who know what it’s like.”
Or, I added silently, to find a man who didn’t base his worth on his income, and wasn’t intimidated by a woman who was never going to need him financially. Because he knew his worth was in what he provided emotionally.
I would show her that.
In time.
For now, it seemed, I had to help keep her regulated while we were all trapped on this yacht together.
“We can avoid them as much as possible,” I suggested.
“My father likes to spend a lot of time in his cigar lounge. Where he knows I won’t step foot. I hate cigars,” she added, wrinkling her nose.
Given her words a moment ago, I figured that was because the smell reminded her of these men who treated her and her friends poorly.
“But would he want me there, is the question,” I said.
“Well, I was thinking…”
“Always dangerous,” I said, getting a smile out of her.
“You could sort of… play the part of an influencer boyfriend. I mean… not that you’re my boyfriend. It’s just what the saying is.”
“Don’t care what title you want to give me, pet. I know what I am to you,” I said, running my fingers over her thigh. “What does an influencer boyfriend do?”
“Take pictures, mostly,” she said, smirking. “Lots and lots of pictures. And if my father asks, I can say it’s an agreement we have. So I don’t try to run you off like all the others.”
Taking pictures of Scarlet wouldn’t be a hardship.
“I’m in.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Scarlet
The trip would be no issue if my father hadn’t brought Stephen. My father would still have found occasions to make his little jabs, but without someone else to feed into it, he would have let it go.