by Claire Adams
“Well,” Isla said, as we stepped out of the closet and pulled the door shut behind us, “that was a good way to kill some time.”
34.
Isla
When we got back to New York, we took a few days to just lie low. I called Sophie to tell her that I was back in New York, but I left out the part about everything with Alfie. That was the sort of story you had to tell in person.
“You’re with Levi, aren’t you?” she said. “That’s why you’re in New York.”
“I’ve got a whole lot to tell you when we come back to Bel Air,” I said. “That’ll be in a few days.”
She exhaled loudly. “Oh boy,” she said. “I can just imagine.”
Levi and I stayed in the penthouse, ordered takeout food, slept late, watched movies and bad daytime TV, had sex. It felt like we were safe in this bubble where it was just the two of us, immune to everything else that was going on in the rest of the world. I kept my phone off and didn’t turn it back on until three days later, while Levi was getting ready to go into BCM.
I was sitting at the kitchen table, eating a bagel, using Levi’s laptop. I went online, first to Instagram, which I used occasionally, then Facebook, which I used even less. But an acquaintance had posted a link to a fundraising page for a family that had just lost the father in a car accident. There were three kids, the mother was pregnant with the fourth child, due in three months. I barely knew the acquaintance, definitely didn’t know the family, but I clicked on the link and then the donate button. I started browsing the site, clicking the links, looking at the pictures, reading the stories. There were people looking for money to go back to school, to pay off loans, to cover funeral expenses, to fund humanitarian trips to foreign countries, to help pay for alternative treatments because their health was failing. It was easy to fall into a sort of rhythm, make the donation anonymously, and then click to the next page.
I liked imagining the surprise, the happiness, probably the relief, in many of these cases. They’d wonder who on earth the money could possibly be from.
“What are you up to?” Levi asked, coming out of the bathroom. He’d just taken a shower and had a towel wrapped around his waist. I could still smell whatever soap he’d used.
“Just disbursing some of this wealth,” I said. He came and looked over my shoulder.
“Who is that?”
I shrugged and clicked the donate button. “I’m not sure, but they’ll be able to pay for their daughter’s orthodontia treatment now.”
“You’re just giving money to random people?”
“Yeah. Why not?” I pointed at the screen. “See, they have a goal amount here, and I’m just contributing whatever’s needed in order for them to meet that goal.”
He watched for a minute as I went through and made some more donations.
“That’s really nice of you,” he said.
“You’ve never done something like that before? Never just gave some of your money to someone because they needed it?”
He frowned, pressing his lips together. “Not really,” he said. “It never really occurred to me to do so. Which sounds like such a fucking shitty thing to admit out loud, I realize that.” He rested his hands on my shoulders and then started gently massaging my neck. “You’re a good person,” he said. He leaned down and nibbled at my earlobe. “And that’s quite a turn on.”
I turned away from the computer and stood up, tilting my head back as we started to kiss. His fingertips moved lightly up and down my sides. I pulled my shirt off and he pulled out the end of the towel he’d tucked in and it fell to the floor. Damn, he looked good. He reached around and unhooked my bra, then pulled the straps down and let it fall to the floor. He brought his hands up and put them on my breasts, massaging lightly, making my nipples erect. I ran my fingertips down his torso, over his drum-tight abdomen, to his erect cock. I stroked him slowly and kissed his neck, moving my tongue in circles.
We pulled back and he pushed the laptop over to the end of the table and lay back. I climbed on top of him, easing my hips back until I felt his cock sliding into me. I rested one of my hands on his chest as I sat all the way down. We stayed like that, motionless for a few seconds, and then I started to move my hips back and forth. He reached up and started playing with my breasts, making my nipples harder. His cock felt huge inside of me. He brought one of his hands down and began rubbing my clit with his thumb as we fucked, overwhelming my whole body with this most intense warm tingling sensation. I felt my breath catch in my throat as my heartbeat started racing. We were both covered in a light film of sweat, which made the smooth skin on his torso glisten. His abdominal muscles flexed, showing off their perfect definition as I swiveled and rocked my hips on top of him.
My whole body felt like it was electrically charged, and that my energy was intermingling with Levi’s and we were becoming something bigger than just the two of us. I knew he was feeling this sensation just as strongly as I was. He had closed his eyes and his brow was furrowed and his jaw clenched. He was gripping my hips now, almost as though he were squeezing my awareness into that epicenter in the middle of my pelvis, the place where all the good feelings seemed to be emanating from. How was it even possible that one person could make you feel so good?
I let out an anguished sounding cry as I came, a sound that would’ve made you think I was in horrendous pain or something terrible had just happened, but the truth was, I couldn’t remember ever feeling better.
Levi let out a similar sounding cry. “You’re incredible,” he said.
I gently eased myself off of him, holding onto the edge of the table as I lowered my feet back to the floor. I could feel my inner thighs still trembling. “I think you’re going to be late for work now,” I said.
He put his hands behind his head and lay there, a satisfied grin on his face. “And you know what?” he said. “I couldn’t care less. That was worth it. And then some.”
35.
Levi
I was a little late when I finally made it down to BCM, but Cal was on a call with a client, so I was able to slip into the office without having to hear it from him. I’d be joining him for a meeting later today with the research team to go over new asset selection. For right now, though, I could enjoy my coffee and read over the Wall Street Journal, which I was still having trouble getting totally interested in.
So when my phone started ringing, I happily dug it out of my pocket, eager for the distraction. I hesitated, though, when I saw who was calling.
It was Ella. But I picked up the phone, because I didn’t like the way we’d left things in Ibiza, and part of me hoped she was calling to say she had calmed down and that everything was all good.
“Hi,” she said, in a tone much softer than I’d ever heard her use before. “Levi, it’s Ella.”
“I know who it is,” I said. “How are you?”
There was a long pause and then a sigh. “I’m terrible, actually. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you, and the way we left things in Ibiza. Are you back in New York?”
“Yes. Are you?”
“I am. Can we . . . can we meet up?”
“I don’t know if that’s such a good idea, Ella.”
“Okay, fine. I can say this over the phone, too. I just thought it might be better to do it in person. I’m sorry about everything I said to you. It was out of anger. And shock. I . . . I’m hoping that you’ve had some time to think things over and that maybe we can just put all of this behind us.”
I smiled and plucked a pen out of the container on the desk. I doodled on the corner of a yellow legal pad. “I’m so glad you called to say that,” I said. “There’s nothing I’d like more than to be able to do that.”
“I knew all that was just a big mistake,” she said, laughing a little. “I knew you didn’t mean it. The two of us—we’re meant to be together.”
“Wait—what? I thought you just said you wanted to put this behind us.”
“Right. Like, I want to forget
that whole conversation even took place. We can pretend it never happened. You just said yourself that you’d like nothing more than to be able to do that.”
Shit, she was persistent. I knew why, though: She wasn’t accustomed to hearing no. She wasn’t used to not getting exactly what she wanted.
“We definitely can put it behind us,” I said. “But I don’t mean pretend the whole thing never happened. I’d like to be able to continue to be friends with you, Ella, but so far as us being together like we used to be . . . I’m with Isla now. So things can’t be exactly how they were. You have to be okay with that, Ella. Otherwise, I don’t think that we’re going to be able to be friends.”
Silence.
She was quiet for so long, I thought she’d hung up. “Hello?” I said. “Are you still there?”
“I’m here.”
“Look, Ella, I’m sorry. I know this isn’t what you want to hear. But—”
“My father’s going to be coming down there to talk to you.”
I stopped doodling. “Really? Really, Ella? You’re sending your dad down here because you don’t like what I’m telling you? That’s a little unnecessary, don’t you think?”
“No,” she said icily. “It’s not.”
“It is, though. He’s just going to be wasting his time. It’s not like your dad is going to come down here and say something that’s going to make me change my mind.” Maybe I needed to tell her to fuck off. Maybe that’s the only thing she would understand.
“I beg to differ,” she said, and then she hung up.
I tried not to think about what she might actually mean, though I was having a hard time wrapping my head around the fact she was basically refusing to break up with me. And she had sounded so certain that her father would somehow be able to change my mind. Frank could be persuasive and charismatic when he wanted to be, of course, but what the hell did she think he was going to say that would suddenly make me decide that I wanted to be with her?
It looked as though I was about to find out, though. Frank showed up less than an hour after I got off the phone with Ella. He breezed right in, not bothering to stop at the front desk, all but ignoring Cal. “You,” he said, pointing at me. “We need to talk.”
“Sure,” I said. “Come on into the office. We can talk in there.”
He followed me in and I shut the door. “So, Frank,” I started, but he interrupted me.
“What I’d like to know,” he said, “is why I get back from California only to find my daughter at home, more upset than I think I ever remember seeing her. She didn’t want to tell us at first, but she finally did. What’s the matter with you, Levi? And she tells me that you left her to be with your stepsister? Are you out of your mind?”
I took a deep breath. “Frank, talking with you about this in the first place is a little weird.”
“I know. Trust me—it’s not like I want to be having this discussion with you right now. What the hell happened to your face, anyway?”
“Nothing,” I said. “It was an accident. It’s fine.”
“Some accident. Anyway. I want to be talking about Westport, and I want to be hearing from you that we’re going to move forward with it. But, as a father, I don’t feel as though that’s a conversation we can be having until we get this little bit of business sorted out. This was the plan, Levi. You don’t get to back out of the plan now.”
“What are you talking about?” I asked. “Just because things between Ella and me didn’t work out exactly how you hoped doesn’t mean that you get to come in here and tell me who I’m going to date. Come on, Frank. Don’t be ridiculous.”
“Your father never told you?” Frank said.
“Told me what?”
“That you and Ella are going to get married.”
I laughed. “I don’t think that’s up for my father to decide.”
Frank shook his head. “Alex wanted to just let things happen naturally. Which it seemed like they were. Don’t tell me before your stepsister came back into the picture that you weren’t thinking you’d eventually settle down with Ella. To the degree that someone like you is capable of settling down.”
“I hadn’t really thought about it.”
“That’s not surprising. Your father had a bit of a blind spot when it came to you. I told him that it would be better in the long run if he talked to you about it, but he thought that it would only make you more resistant. He thought that if he told you, you’d purposefully start seeing someone else. Which you have. Because you can be a jackass like that. That’s no secret to anyone; I knew it, your father knew it.”
I sat there, feeling my brain trying to assimilate everything that Frank was telling me. Was he just bullshitting me? Trying to shock me into dating his daughter again? “So if I’m to believe what you’re telling me, you and my father had arranged for Ella and me to get married?”
Frank’s gaze didn’t waver. “That’s exactly right.”
I nodded slowly. “And the reason my father didn’t tell me this is because he thought that I’d refuse.”
“Right again.”
“Not because you’re just making all this shit up on the spot because you don’t want your daughter to be upset. Which is commendable, Frank, really, but also sort of . . . I don’t know, creepy? And why would you want your daughter married to such a jackass, anyway?”
“You can say what you want, Levi, but it’s the truth. The only reason you don’t know that it’s the truth is because your father thought it would be better not to tell you. Clearly, he was wrong. Alex wasn’t right about everything. Most things, yes, but there were some things that he wasn’t right about. This was one of them.”
“I still don’t believe you,” I said, though I was starting to wonder if my father had made some sort of arrangement like that. “Why would he do that?”
“Because when you were too young to even remember, BCM was a struggling little financial company that was going under because your father took some risks that he shouldn’t have. I was the one to provide the money he needed for the purchase of Sowa Bank, which basically turned everything around. Despite everyone telling me that it wasn’t worth it and I should keep my money where it had been for generations—at Peterson-Wendig, which I’m sure you’re unaware of—I listened to what your father told me, and agreed that though it was a high-risk investment, if it worked out, the dividends would be unbelievable. And you know what? They were.”
“So in exchange for this, my father told you that I would marry Ella,” I said. “That sounds so ridiculous, Frank, I can’t even believe that you would be sitting here, asking me to believe it. This isn’t India. We don’t have arranged marriages here.”
“You can choose to believe it or not. Your father, unfortunately, is not here to corroborate the story.”
“Let’s say I was willing to believe this bullshit. If we were so young when this deal was made, how did you even know that we’d get along? That we’d like each other? I know Dad liked to take risks and everything, but that seems like a pretty big fucking agreement to make.”
Frank looked at me incredulously. “It wouldn’t matter if you two liked each other or not. That is beside the point. Completely beside the point. What’s more important is protecting the family’s wealth? Let’s not fool ourselves, Levi: You’re no businessman. You’re not going to follow in your father’s footsteps, not because you don’t have the ability to, but because you don’t have the inclination. You might be fooling everyone else, dressing up in a shirt and tie and coming in here and sitting behind your father’s desk—and maybe you’re even fooling yourself—but I can see right through it. This will last another couple months, at most—you coming in here and playing pretend—and then you’ll hand the reins over to Cal, which is exactly what he’s been waiting for.”
“Sounds like you have it all figured out.”
“So let’s just keep things the way they are. The way they should be.”
“You don’t care that we don’t want
to be together? It’s more important that some deal you and my father struck is upheld? This isn’t feudal England or some shit. We’re not fucking royalty.”
“Of course we are.” Frank shook his head. “It may not feel that way to you because you didn’t do anything to earn it, but we are. And when you’re as wealthy as we are, you have to do certain things to ensure that the wealth stays within the family.”
“I thought that’s what prenuptial agreements were for.”
“What’s the matter with you, Levi? Ella’s gorgeous, intelligent, and she comes from a great family. You guys have been dating for, what, over a decade now? Cut the shit. Give her a call, take her out to dinner, go stay at our place in the Hamptons for the week. You can fix it. Just stop being a moron. You’re better than this.”
He wasn’t going to take no for an answer. He was, after all, someone who was used to getting his way, one hundred percent of the time. Is this how I came across to people? Did Alfie see me like this? I could understand, all of a sudden, why he did what he did. If I had been in his shoes, I probably would’ve done the same thing.
“There is no deal,” I said. “If my father made a deal with you, then it died when he did. I’m not marrying Ella.”
Frank face contorted and turned several different shades of red. Was he about to have a heart attack right here?
“I’ll give you one last chance,” he said, “and that’s being far more generous than I should be.”
“You don’t need to give me anything. And if you want to take your money elsewhere, then go ahead. I’m not marrying Ella, and we’re not going through with this Westport deal. End of story. And guess what, Frank? I’m the one in charge here. So there’s no one for you to go complaining to because you don’t happen to like what I’m saying.”
“You’re a fool, son,” he said, shaking his head. “A fucking fool and you don’t even realize it. If your father could see what you’re doing right now . . .” He turned and stormed out.
“Yeah, well, he’s not here,” I said. I could hear Frank ranting and raving as he walked through the office, his voice getting quieter the further he got, until it finally ceased. Cal stuck his head in.
