Cruel Money

by K. A. Linde

  These were not good circumstances.

  I struggled with the dress and the layers of material, desperate to find the opening for me to slip my head through. As if it wasn’t bad enough that I was seeing Penn again for the first time in six years, I had to do it completely naked.

  Seemed fitting. That was the last way he’d seen me then, too.

  “Yes, but you are the one who is out of place, skinny-dipping on this beach. Don’t you know these are private residences?”

  “I’m well aware.”

  I finally found the bottom to the dress and yanked it over my soaking wet head. My long silvery-white hair was such a nuisance sometimes. If only I’d let my best friend, Amy, convince me to chop off my ass-length hair, but no. I had to have another weapon to make getting my dress on more difficult.

  “And you’re only supposed to have bonfires in preapproved metal containers.” He glanced down at my makeshift fire. It had almost completely died out by now. “Not to mention, have at least a two-gallon bucket of water to douse the flames.”

  I rolled my eyes. Was he actually serious right now?

  My euphoria from the ritual began to evaporate. Well, that hadn’t lasted long.

  With a huff, I ruffled the bottom layers, pulled my sopping wet hair out of the back of the dress, and then grabbed the shovel off of the ground. With a mighty heave, I covered up the dying flames with a heap of sand.

  “There!” I spat. “Now, can we get back to what is important? Like what you’re doing here after all this time.”

  He frowned, as if confused by my statement. And that was when it hit me.

  He didn’t remember me.

  Penn had no clue who the hell I was.

  Oh god.

  I hadn’t thought that this could get worse or more humiliating. Sure, I looked like a crazy person, burning soul-crushing rejection letters and then stripping nude into the Atlantic. But, now the guy I’d cursed for years was standing before me … and he was staring at me as if I were a stranger.

  Six years was a long time.

  It was.

  Most people might not remember someone that they’d had a one-night stand with from that long ago. I knew it was maybe a little irrational to be upset about it all. But, fuck it, I was upset.

  You didn’t have the most amazing night of your life with a total stranger and then completely forget that person! I didn’t care who the hell you were. I didn’t care how many times you’d had a one-night stand.

  And it had been pretty clear that it wasn’t Penn’s first time—though it had been mine—but still, how could he have forgotten me?

  “After all this time?” he asked.

  “Never mind,” I grumbled. “The real question is, what are you doing here? Do you live nearby? I thought this was the wrong time of year for the rich and entitled to be in the Hamptons. Memorial Day to Labor Day, right?”

  I couldn’t keep the snark out of my voice. No point in filling the bastard in on how I knew him. If he lived nearby, this was going to be one hellacious house-watching.

  “Most people are gone. But this is my home, which is why I was wondering what you were doing here.”

  “This is your home?” I whispered, pointing at the house off the beach. “No, this belongs to Mayor Kensington. She hired me to watch it this fall. You can’t possibly own that house.”

  He shrugged and then sighed. “I didn’t think anyone would be here,” he said, clearly frustrated at my appearance.

  “But…but…why would you…”

  Then, it dawned on me. My heart stopped. My jaw dropped. I released a sharp breath in disbelief.

  “You’re a Kensington.”

  He gave me a sheepish grin. “I suppose it’s my family home.”

  “You have got to be fucking kidding me.” I shook my head in disbelief.

  I thought this ritual was supposed to cleanse shit from my life. Not bring in another issue. Fuck.

  I could not deal with this right now. Not with my anxiety high from the rejection letters. I’d only been here three days. I’d thought this was a dream come true. Everything was pointing me to get the fuck out of Dodge. Because, man, what else was life going to throw at me? Everything always came in threes. That was what my mom had said.

  “I can’t,” I said. I held up my hand to keep him from saying anything. Then, I grabbed the remaining matches and the bourbon, which he eyed curiously, and then stomped off with the shovel over my shoulder.

  “Um…where are you going?”

  “I don’t want to talk to you,” I told him.

  I didn’t care that I was being incredibly unprofessional. Or that I was probably ruining my chance at staying at this house. Not that I wanted to work for the woman who had birthed this asshole. But I just needed to get away. I needed to get away and decompress and figure out how to proceed. If I saw his gorgeous face and that come-hither smile anymore, I was likely to stab him with the shovel.

  Penn didn’t seem to listen though. He barged right up the beach after me. Heedless of the sand in his loafers or messing up his probably bajillion-dollar suit.

  “Uh, you left this,” he said, holding out my bra.

  I squeaked, juggled my full load, and snatched it out of his hand. Just fucking great. It wasn’t the first time he’d held my bra or anything, but, god, at some point, I had to catch a break. I had to.

  “You’re welcome,” he muttered under his breath.

  I had no intention of thanking him for anything. So, I kept my mouth shut.

  “Are you going to tell me why you seem like you’re ready to set me on fire?” he asked. He was calm—curious but calm.

  I was a puzzle he needed to solve. He needed to be able to put me in a box so that he could figure out how to manipulate my emotions to his whim.

  “No.”

  “All right,” he said. But it only made him inspect me harder. “I really don’t understand why you’re mad. This is my house. I thought you were the one trespassing.”

  “Well, I’m not,” I growled. “I got this job a month ago. And I had no idea that you were going to be here. In fact, I had no idea you were even a Kensington.”

  He peered at me inquisitively, as if he were memorizing the span of my face and the curve of my figure. As if he were about to take a test and was having a last-minute cram session to remember all the little things he already knew about me but promptly forgot. “Have we met before?”

  I snorted. “Observant.”

  “And it was a bad meeting?”

  I snapped my narrowed eyes to him.

  He held his hands up. “Okay. Very bad meeting.”

  “The fact that you don’t even remember is…” I trailed off.

  “Bad?”

  “Reprehensible.”

  “You know, you do look familiar. I thought you did this whole time.”

  I rolled my eyes skyward and then deposited the shovel back where I’d found it. Better to keep it out of arm’s reach for the rest of this conversation. “Don’t bullshit me.”

  “I wasn’t.”

  “Sure,” I said sarcastically.

  I wasn’t sure he knew how to do anything else.

  “No, really, how do I know you?”

  I shook my head. Hurt broke through the anger. Hurt that I hadn’t let myself feel in so long. “If you can’t remember, then I don’t really see any reason to enlighten you.”

  Then, I reached for the door, but he stopped me in my tracks.

  “Paris.”

  I whipped around in shock. He did remember. That bastard did remember something. But hurt was then immediately replaced with that boiling anger. That righteous, vindictive flame that shot through me every time I remembered my first time.

  I yanked the door open and glared back at him. “That’s right. We had one night in Paris. You wooed me, you fucked me, and then you ghosted!”

  Pushing the door the rest of the way open, I stepped into the Kensington summer cottage. And I froze in place as four people tur
ned to face me. Four people who had clearly heard me screaming at Penn and airing our dirty laundry.

  Just…wonderful.

  Natalie

  3

  My face turned the color of a tomato.

  “I…um…” I stammered, at a loss for words.

  I looked like a hot mess, standing soaking wet in my sand-covered dress with a bottle of bourbon and my bra. They probably thought I was a lunatic. A madwoman that Penn had picked up outside when he went to check on the fire.

  It was even worse that, whoever these four people were, they looked fabulous. Two men and two women clothed in tailored suits and cocktail dresses. Glamorous, confident, wealthy. It was evident in their dress and mannerisms and the way they let me stand there and gape like a fish out of water.

  “I’m so sorry,” I finally managed to get out. “I wasn’t expecting anyone to be at the house tonight. I was hired by Mayor Kensington, but Penn informed me that he wasn’t aware of that fact. Just as I was not aware that he had…friends with him.”

  Penn stepped over the threshold and inside. He kicked at the sand on his shoes. Our eyes met, and my breath caught. He was even more stunning in the light. No wonder I’d noticed him in Paris, writing furiously in his notebook in the park by my flat. Or why I’d approached him at that party. Or why…I’d had that one-night stand.

  “Why don’t you introduce us to your friend, Penn?” the brunette girl asked coyly. She was tan, as if she had spent the summer on the beach, and wore a glittering emerald-green dress.

  Strangely, she gave me Anne Boleyn vibes. I wasn’t sure yet if that was good or bad.

  “He doesn’t have to, Katherine. I should be giving the introductions,” the other girl spoke up. She was pale with a splattering of freckles and wavy dark red hair to her shoulders. Her black dress fit her like a dream, but she didn’t seem as relaxed as the others. She was jittery, as if she’d had too much coffee. “This is Natalie Bishop. She’s watching the house for the next two months.”

  “I…yes, I am,” I said in confusion.

  “Sorry,” the woman said, stepping forward with an extended hand. “I’m Lark. Larkin St. Vincent.”

  My throat bobbed. And I’d thought the night couldn’t get any worse. Here was the woman who had hired me.

  I hastily put down the bourbon bottle and hid my bra before taking her hand. “Lark, it’s so nice to meet you.”

  “It completely slipped my mind that you were going to be here this weekend. For some reason, I thought that you started next week. Since I handed this off to my assistant, I never saw you come into the office.”

  “So, you knew someone would be here and suggested it anyway?” one of the men asked. He was incredibly tall with smooth medium-brown skin and short-cropped hair. One look from his depthless dark brown eyes said he was as much trouble as Penn standing next to me. He knew the effect of his good looks.

  I swallowed and glanced away.

  Lark just rolled her eyes at him. “I didn’t remember, Lewis. You can blame the fact that I haven’t had a vacation in three years.”

  “That’s your own fault,” Katherine said.

  The last guy just bobbed his head and said, “Yep.”

  “Stay out of this, Rowe,” Lark said.

  I saw this as my opportunity to get out of there. I looked horrible. This wasn’t how I’d thought I’d meet anyone. “I’m just going to…” I pointed past them, down the hallway to the bedroom I’d been staying in the last two nights.

  “That’s probably for the better,” Katherine said. “Did you fall in the ocean?” Her eyes cut to Penn’s, and a smile grew on her pretty red-painted lips. “Did you push her in?”

  Penn, who hadn’t said a word up until that moment, finally spoke up, “I think we should allow Natalie a moment of privacy. On a good day, we’re overwhelming. She shouldn’t have to meet the crew like this.”

  My head whipped to the side. I was caught between anger and relief. Anger that he’d spoken for me. And relief that, dear god, I really needed to get the fuck out of there. It was way too much all at once. I didn’t people all that well to begin with. I was better one-on-one. But standing where I was and facing down his incredibly attractive and put-together friends when I wanted to yell at him didn’t help anything.

  “Uh…yes. Privacy.” I nodded and then stepped around his friends. “Nice to meet you all.”

  I raised my hand to awkwardly wave good-bye and realized a minute too late that it was the one that had been hiding my bra. My eyes widened in horror, and then I snapped it down to my side.

  I opened my mouth to try to apologize for my behavior, but then I stopped and just fled down the hallway. I didn’t owe anyone in there an apology, except Lark. And, really, what good would it do at this point? There was no way that I was keeping this job after she saw me like that. She would most definitely tell the mayor that I wasn’t fit for the position. That whatever recommendation I’d gotten from my previous house-sitting job must have been fabricated. Because no one could have this many missteps and not be utterly incompetent.

  * * *

  The room I’d been assigned was a soft and luxurious guest bedroom with a white four-poster bed draped in a blue-and-pink-flowered duvet. It had an actual canopy on top. Everything was plush and inviting with a million and a half throw pillows of every variety imaginable and a rug so lush that my feet sank right into it. I was going to miss this room the most.

  Only two nights in the down-feather bed, and it had already been the best nights of sleep of my life. I’d really been looking forward to another night in that bed. But, alas, it would not be.

  I tossed my bra onto the bed with a huff, threw on a pair of shorts and an oversized T-shirt, and tied my hair in a messy bun on the top of my head. I kicked the sandy dress into a corner and then dragged the two suitcases out of the closet. I was a fast packer. Product of growing up as a military brat and traveling year after year after year to various locales the Air Force had sent us. As a vacation home watcher, I carried the entirety of my life in these two suitcases so that it was easy to move in. And, now, more importantly, out.

  All signs had pointed that this was the perfect opportunity for me. Now, all signs pointed to run and run fast. I couldn’t have been more awkward if I’d tried. I wasn’t even that awkward when I tried. But something had just come over me. A cataclysmic reaction to being in Penn’s presence again. My brain had shut off, and my mouth had opened. Ready to unleash on a relative stranger.

  A stranger who was the son of my boss.

  Who apparently was friends with the woman who had hired me.

  I shook my head in exasperation as I unzipped the suitcase and pulled out the packing cubes. What had I even been thinking?

  Of course, I hadn’t been thinking. I’d just acted on impulse. Six years of pent-up anger had just unleashed.

  I yanked open the first drawer and removed my clothes. This was such a fucking disaster.

  Now, I had no idea what I was going to do for the rest of the year. This was a cushy job. Sit around and watch someone’s house? Get paid to do that? Um…yeah, a no-brainer. But, without that, I’d probably have to go home. Back to Charleston. A month at home had been plenty to begin with. Between my parents constant arguing about my job and nagging about the lack of boyfriend situation and my perfect little sister, Melanie, starting her senior year of high school with the same guy that she’d dated since we moved to the town. I couldn’t handle it.

  I’d have to find another way. Maybe have Amy get me a job at the gallery even though she really didn’t need the help. And maybe I could move in temporarily. Current boyfriend—Steve or Chuck or Tom or whatever his name was—probably wouldn’t like that. They always thought they were the one until a few months later when Amy would kick them out because a new artist had come into town for her gallery. It was a recurring cycle. She loved artists. She somehow continued to settle for losers back home in the interim.

  I needed to call her.

 
She’d freak out about Penn.

  She was the one who had warned me about him to begin with.

  Of course, I hadn’t listened.

  But I realized I didn’t even know where my phone was. Where had I left it after getting that awful email from my agent? Probably the living room.

  I grumbled under my breath as I stuffed a bunch of underwear into a small cube. I was fucked because no way in hell was I going back out there to make a fool of myself.

  It was bad enough that Penn was here. Let alone that he had seen me naked and watched me humiliate myself. I didn’t have to make it worse.

  Plus, what the hell did I have in common with those people? I threw the cube into the suitcase. They all looked famous with their fabulous clothes and perfect hair and manicures and stylish makeup and easy confidence. They’d had their life given to them on a silver spoon. And I had grown up with nothing. Amy had money, but even she wasn’t rich like this.

  There was rich, and then there was wealthy.

  And I didn’t even follow the lives of the rich and famous, but I knew the name Kensington carried its weight in gold.

  I was an idiot. I’d known in Paris that he had money. He’d opened doors that I couldn’t fathom even now. But it had never occurred to me that he was the heir to the Kensington fortune. That he was that wealthy.

  A knock on the bedroom door broke me from my silent rant.

  “Natalie?” Penn called from the other side.

  What the hell? What was he doing, trying to talk to me?

  I’d basically run away from him and his friends on his suggestion. It hadn’t been long enough for him to consider his offer of privacy expired.

  “Yes?” I took a half-step toward the door and then stopped.

  “May I come in?”

  Come in? What the fuck? No!

  I checked my clothes. Still in shorts and an oversized Grimke University T-shirt. It was one of the best damn private schools in the South and had the added benefit of being in Charleston. But still…it wasn’t much better than my dress.