CHAPTER TWENTY
(Matthew)
The guest room was luxurious, but new places always made sleeping difficult for me. For a long time, I laid awake, staring at the ceiling, trying to ignore the persistent throbbing in all of my erogenous zones.
Much like the last time I’d let Neil Dom me.
Eventually, I gave up on sleep, dressed quietly so as not to disturb Charlotte—and I could tell I hadn’t disturbed her based on all the god-awful snoring—and slipped out of the room.
I made my way to the main sitting room and the patio beyond. Maybe the sound of the crashing surf would lull me into a more relaxed state.
Nothing about this visit should have made me tense.
In fact, after what we’d gotten up to hours ago, I shouldn’t have been able to feel my muscles, let alone tie them in knots with my thoughts.
But being in this huge house, with its lush grounds and luxurious furnishings…
something about it didn’t sit right with me.
Probably the fact that I knew I had so much more money than Neil Elwood, and… it didn’t matter.
I could buy a house like his. I could buy all the cars I knew he owned. I could even build a little sex house. Hell, I’d built a whole sex island. The numbers in my bank account were so much bigger, but we spent the same. There was no true gap in what the both of us could afford.
Maybe Charlotte was right. Maybe I didn’t need all the money I had.
I opened the door and thought belatedly about a potential alarm going off. But outside, I found the gas fire pit burning and Neil sitting in one of the armchairs. He stared into the flames, so lost in thought that he didn’t notice me until I spoke.
“Couldn’t sleep?” I asked. His head snapped up, and I used his startled moment to indicate the other chair. “Mind if I join you?”
He recovered smoothly. “Not at all.”
“You seemed pretty intent on something,” I said as I sat down.
“I suffer from insomnia, at times,” he explained. “Partially due to my husband’s nocturnal tooth grinding.”
“Charlotte snores,” I confided. “It’s like sleeping next to a construction site.”
A small smile touched Neil’s mouth, then quickly faded. “To tell you the truth, I had a bit of a nightmare. About my daughter.”
I took a breath. Neil’s daughter had died in a car accident several years ago, but we’d never been such good friends that we’d discussed it.
“It happens sometimes,” he went on. “I’ll dream that I’m at the funeral, or in the hospital room where we saw her last. Once I see her face, well… I can’t get back to sleep.”
“I’m sorry.” I wasn’t sure what else I could say.
He shrugged it off. “You. What was keeping you up, besides your snoring girlfriend?”
“I was thinking about how I have so much more money than you do,” I admitted with a laugh.
“Well, that certainly disturbs my sleep.” He reached down for the bottle of mineral water on the ground beside his chair.
“I was thinking about how much it doesn’t matter. And how I probably don’t need it all.”
He paused with the bottle frozen near his lips. “Charlotte?”
It was the only thing he needed to say. “Yeah. Sophie?”
He took a drink and swallowed it down. “She’s the reason I started my foundation. Well, that and personal experience.”
“My personal experience tells me that I should start some kind of bear-eradicating charity,” I said, tapping my leg.
Neil followed my hand. “Yes, I did notice your scars. You’re coming along, though. Your balance is much better than it was the last time I saw you.”
“Thanks.” It seemed like a weird thing for a sex-acquaintance to compliment me on, but at the same time, I liked that he’d noticed. It was difficult to tell, from day to day, if I was making any improvement.
“I’m not sure there’s much need for a reverse-conservation program,” he began dryly.
“But if you’re looking for a way to assuage Charlotte’s guilt over your fortune, why not something along the lines of a medical charity?
Lord knows this country is a disaster when it comes to accessible healthcare. ”
“It’s gotten slightly better,” I protested. “But that’s what Charlotte suggested, too. I tried to call up a hospital and pay off all the outstanding bills, but they didn’t take me seriously.”
“I should think not. You need someone who has experience with these types of things. I can recommend the firm I worked with to establish my foundation,” he offered.
Unfortunately, I already knew someone suited to the job, and if I didn’t offer it to her first, mother would have a fit. “My sister does that for a living. I’m sure she can help. But if I need it—”
“You can call me any time.” He put the bottle back down. The night was so still, I could hear the tink and scrape of the glass touching the stone.
This was a peaceful life. One I could have, and never work another day. Never worry about making more money, because I would always have enough. Never worry that I was failing the family name, because it was carrying on in my businesses already.
And I could make Charlotte happy.
“Personal experience,” I repeated from his earlier statement. He ran a foundation that got therapy and safe housing for victims of sexual violence, and he’d shared his story in the press numerous times. “Did making the foundation take some of the pain away?”
He nodded, eyebrows raising. “Yes. In a way that totally surprised me. Now, it was somewhat delayed by my grief over Emma and the troubles after, but now I believe I can say that I’m at peace with what happened to me.”
“Nothing anywhere near that serious happened to me.” I felt like a dick for saying it, but it was true. “But I do want to do that hospital thing. My injuries were serious, and I had major complications, but it still wasn’t as expensive as anything other people go through.”
“Then that’s where to start,” Neil agreed.
“You and I, we’re never going to run out of money.
We couldn’t if we tried. An important thing I learned from Sophie is that performing charity, showing up to dinners and writing million dollar checks simply isn’t effective enough.
This is something that touches you. Why not pursue it with the same zeal with which you built Ascend Red? ”
“I think that was a bit different. I built that because I wanted to make people’s fantasies come true.” It had been a totally selfish desire, aimed at making me feel like some kind of miracle worker.
“Sophie would tell you that paying off medical bills is a fantasy for most working-class people,” Neil said grimly. “We paid for her sister’s kidney transplant, and it astonished me how much everything cost. Truly, a fantastic amount of money to people who have very little.”
I nodded slowly. Some kind of foundation that could pay for medical bills and treatment, then. Something that was important to me.
That sparked an idea.
“They’re incredible, aren’t they?” Neil mused.
I didn’t follow.
“Sophie and Charlotte,” he clarified.
“Absolutely.” And not in terms of sex. They were both fascinating women on their own.
“Having Sophie’s perspective on things like this has changed me for the better. I’m sure it’s the same with you and Charlotte.”
“She’s changed everything about me.” In ways I could never have anticipated. “For example, I never thought I would get jealous sharing a partner before. And yet, today…”
He smiled a slow half-smile. “Oh, got under your skin, did I?”
I laughed. “A little. I assume that was on purpose?”
“Entirely. I love being jealous, and I love making other men jealous.” He sighed in contentment. “I hope I didn’t take it too far?”
I shook my head. “No. It was hot.”
“We’ll have to do it again sometime.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Are you switching from Black Orchid to Ascend Manhattan, then?”
“It may be the only time I ever switch,” he quipped.
A sudden yawn assailed me; I hid it behind my hand and forced it into silence. “I think I’ll try sleeping again. This… really put me at ease.”
“Glad to be of help.” He stayed where he was. The stuff keeping him awake wasn’t anything anyone could help him with, I imagined. “You know, you can call on me any time. After this, I assume I can be so bold as to consider you a friend? I have come inside your girlfriend, after all.”
I barked a shocked laugh. “Dick.”
Upstairs, I slipped into bed beside Charlotte.
I breathed in the scent of her hair, curved myself around her small, soft body.
But it wasn’t her physical presence that comforted me to sleep.
It was the purity and peace of her heart, which couldn’t be disturbed even by the godawful racket of her snoring.
* * * *
The next day, I tried to call my sister. The fact that she didn’t answer didn’t alarm me. Our relationship wasn’t exactly warm and fuzzy.
But the day after that, when she hadn’t even sent a terse text message back, I started to wonder what I did wrong. I’d have to check in with mother later and hear all about it.
I was in my office, spending work hours on extracurricular research about various charities and seeking out the numbers of hospital billing departments, when there was a knock on my door.
“Yes?” I called.
Charlotte burst in and hurried over to my desk in a weird, creepy walk on the balls of her feet. Her tongue was poised on her upper lip, and she wiggled her hands in front of her. “Guess what I have!”
“Several empty espresso cups on your desk, judging by how you came in,” I joked.
She immediately dropped out of enthusiasm mode and straight into being fed up with me in the most adorable way possible. “The plans, jackass.”
“The plans?” It clicked before the words were out of my mouth. “Oh! The plans. That’s great news!”
“They’re in conference room A,” she said, already moving to the door and waving her arm as if she were directing traffic. “Come on, come on.”