3

I snatched my iPad up off the floor from where he'd thrown it and walked out after that. There really wasn't a good reason to stick around. Sure, our parents probably still wanted us to go through with the arrangement so they could effectively merge the companies. I was pretty sure they could do it without our marriage, but there was some bullshit loophole that cut a lot of red tape… blah, blah, blah.

Someone had explained it to me, and I had immediately tuned out all the jargon that was being flounced around, because I honestly didn't care. Instead, I made it all the way out of the building and then decided that I was in desperate need of some stress relief. I dialed Carlos and when he picked up, he laughed.

"Let me guess, you have a new scene you need to work out? That one last night was epic, girl. If that doesn't make the reading world's panties wet, I don't know what will."

"Thanks for the confidence boost. Actually, I just really need some stress relief right about now. Are you free tonight?"

"I wish I was, babe, but I have that party tonight. I need the cash for tuition next semester."

"Damn it, why can't college be free?"

"Preach it loud, babe, then maybe someone important will hear you and make it so." Carlos was on year six of a four-year degree because he couldn't always scrape together enough for the next semester of school. We had met the previous spring when he was auditing a class I was taking, because it was one of those semesters where he hadn't managed to scrape enough cash together for tuition.

"I wish I could help you out. Do they need anyone else? I could come work and donate my wages to you." I would offer to pay the rest of his tuition outright, but thankfully, the only stipulation on my inheritance from my grandparents had been that I finish college before I was allowed to touch a dime of the money. One more semester and I would be able to tap into it for whatever I needed.

"You know I can't let you do that," he told me in a serious tone.

"I know, but you have to understand that I want to, so bad. You deserve to be able to finish school without having to stress so much."

"I appreciate that, but you know it doesn't work like that for everyone. Now, I have to get going before I'm late. Sorry I can't help you out tonight, but maybe this weekend?"

"Yeah, for sure," I told him. "Give me a call when you're free. We'll work on that paper of yours too," I promised.

"Perfect, catch you later, babe."

"Bye," I said into the phone even though he'd already hung up on his end.

"What's the matter? Boy toy can't come help you out? Or maybe he really just doesn't want to," he added just to be cruel. I turned to see Sam standing there watching me, a curious look on his face.

"Some people have to do adult things and put pleasure on the backburner to keep their world turning," I schooled him before spinning on my heel to walk away. My car was parked three blocks down, which was rather unfortunate, considering it made getting away a slow process. Too slow, in fact, since Sam caught up to me.

His sigh was the only indication I had that he was literally shadowing me as I walked. When I stopped and turned to glare at him, he nearly ran into me, obviously not prepared for my abrupt change in pace. "What are you doing?"

"Following you until you talk to me," he informed me.

"What could we possibly have to talk about? I literally said everything I needed to back in that office," I told him as I pointed at the building where I'd had to go with my lawyer to meet his. I shook my head in disbelief. It was them I was helping, and I'd still been summoned to go out of my way, into Atlanta, to deal with signing a prenup for him, when his father had to drag him in today looking like twice warmed-over shit.

"I'm sorry, okay?"

"No, it's not okay. What exactly are you sorry for?"

"For everything," he mumbled as he glanced around. "Look, can we go somewhere to talk, just the two of us?"

I wasn't sure that was the best idea, but I also didn't want to become gossip when someone inevitably started pointing a camera at us and clicking away. "My car is just up this way," I pointed. He shook his head and grabbed my hand.

"My apartment is here," he informed me as he pulled me toward the building we happened to be standing in front of. The doorman gave a curt nod as we approached. "Good day, Mr. Tucker. Do you need any assistance?"

"No thank you." I was actually shocked that he knew how to use manners, but still, I followed behind him as we power-walked to the bank of elevators at the back of the lobby. By the time we got there, I was ready to take my shoes off and beat him with them. I'd shown up in business casual apparel, but that meant I was wearing heels, and while they made me appear slightly taller, my short stature still meant I had to take like fifteen steps to his one. Okay, that might have been an exaggeration, but it was close enough.

I growled in frustration as we disembarked the elevator on the upper floor where there were only two doors in the hallway that split the building evenly down the middle. Of course, they weren't near the elevator. "Can you please stop," I called out as I snatched my hand away from the crazy man. "I don't know what kind of fire you're running from or toward, but I'm not exactly wearing running shoes here."

"Sorry, it's just up here on the left."

"Great," I huffed. Then I remembered I hated this guy and shot off a quick text to my sister that I was at his apartment with him to talk, just in case anything happened to me and they had to figure out where my body was. By the time I caught up, Sam already had the door open and stood there waiting for me to enter. When I did, I nearly doubled back just as quick. Not only was this obviously the place where the pictures had been taken the night before, but half of the party remained behind. There was a naked woman waiting on the couch with her legs spread and only a bottle of champagne stood between my eyeballs and seeing all the way to her uterus.

The grin – which was all she was wearing – slowly slipped from her face when she realized there was another woman in the apartment to see her like that. Although, she hadn't seemed to mind sharing with another woman the night before. Maybe she only shared with people she knew personally? It was something to keep in mind for a future plot point in one of my stories. I wish it wouldn't seem rude to jot that down because I'd probably forget later.

"Shit!" Sam huffed from somewhere behind me after closing the door. "Ariel, what are you still doing here?"

She rolled her eyes. "It's Aria, and you told me if I was still here when you got back from your little business deal that we'd continue the party."

I turned to look at Sam, because let's be honest, I didn't want the image in my head when the woman finally had to move that bottle. When I turned, my eyes met his, and I swore for an instant, there was an apology there. Then it flickered away just as fast. What did I care if he was sincere about anything though? I was literally only here to humor my own morbid curiosity, if I was being honest with myself. As far as I was concerned, this was already a blown deal, but something I might be able to pull from for a future story idea. Maybe that made me a horrible person, but let's face it, my life wasn't exactly filled with shining examples of humanity's finest.

"Who is she?" Aria managed to snip out at Sam, which I thought was an oddly territorial thing to do considering he didn't even remember her name.

"She is none of your business, now get dressed and get gone, I have things to do." He glanced back at me just in time to see the disgust written all over my face at how he treated this woman.

"Do you not know how to treat people with respect?"

He laughed. "She's just some chick I brought home to fuck last night, and she wasn't even the only one," he argued. It wasn't quiet, so I knew the woman could hear him.

"She's some chick who agreed to have sex with you, and then wait around for you to get home, so whether or not you intended it to go any further, the least you could do is be a decent human being to her when it's over."

"I don't need you to be womankind's hero for me," Aria huffed out from behind me as the swish and rustle of fabric indicated she was in the process of getting dressed. "I knew the score," she insisted, though without doing a good enough job of hiding her annoyance.

"That's not the point. Even if you were a paid hooker, you performed your services, and shouldn't be treated as less than from someone who was in need of what you offered. And truthfully, you should demand better for yourself too. You will continue to be treated the way you allow people to treat you. If all you want is to be used and discarded like trash, then so be it. If you want more out of life, you have to demand it."

I glared at the man before me as I shifted gears to speak to him. "One day, there's going to come a woman who won't tolerate your shit, who sees through your disguise, and who you wish like hell wouldn't find you lacking. Do you really want her to see this? Or maybe when you pull your head out of your ass and find her, you'll realize you already treated her like this, or her best friend, or sister, or …"

"I get the point," he growled before turning his attention back to Ariel or was it Aria? Shit. Now I couldn't keep the woman's name straight. "Thanks for the night of fun, but I really do have important matters to attend."

"So important you already replaced me with a tiny, bitchy version of another woman?" She asked snidely while giving me a rotten little side-eye.

"I didn't replace you with her. You were more like the placeholder until I was ready for my fiancé."

"Fiancé?" She hissed and I turned in time to see wide, panicked eyes move to meet my own. Her brave face crumbled, and tears overfilled her eyes. "I didn't know," she whispered. "I'm so sorry. Oh God, I would never! I've seen him in the news with so many other women, I thought he was single."

I shook my head and turned slightly, so I could see Sam's reaction. He was stunned by it. "See what I'm talking about? These women are human beings too."

"My fiancé cheated on me, with my best friend. That's why I was out last night. I was trying to forget," she murmured. "I never wanted to be a woman who did that to someone else." Her admission quickly degraded to sobs and that was something I couldn't ignore. I walked to the woman, who was thankfully dressed at that point, and wrapped her in a hug even though she smelled like cigarettes, liquor and incredibly bad decisions.

"We are not engaged. We were, but it's complicated. You did nothing wrong, I promise," I whispered in her ear. "I'm sorry about your lost relationships with your former friend and ex-fiancé. That sucks."

Ariel, Aria, whoever she was, slid out of my arms and swiped at the tears running down her face. "I don't know how you could be so nice to me but thank you." She turned to Sam then. "I hope for her sake that she doesn't take you back, if this is how you treat your fiancé." She grabbed her purse and left after that without saying another word.

"Was this what you wanted to show me?" I asked after watching the woman leave as Sam stood there and said nothing. "If so, I already knew what kind of a person you were, so there was no need." I moved to follow the woman out of the apartment when Sam stepped forward to stop me.

"I didn't know she'd be here."

"You told her to stay," I reminded him.

"I forgot, okay? Is that what you want to hear? Go ahead and put another nail in my coffin. I'm a piece of shit, I get it, but I would like the chance to explain."

The doubt was plain on my face. There really wasn't an explanation that could make up for his behavior of late.

"I was dating someone, seriously, and ready to settle down less than a year ago," he admitted. Color me intrigued, I moved to go sit on the sofa and listen to his story until I remembered that someone's naked ass had just been parked there and there was evidence that it wasn't the only thing that had happened on that couch considering a condom wrapper crunched under foot.

I glanced around for a safer place to sit, and upon seeing no good options, I moved over to the window instead and glanced down at the city around us. "Come on, we can go to my office. I keep it locked so nothing ever happens in there." I almost laughed because he knew exactly what my dilemma was. I wondered why he had bothered to bring me back to his apartment to convince me of whatever he was trying to. He had to know, even if he forgot that he left a whole woman here, there was still the mess.

"Okay, I'm in your office, now what?" I asked after he unlocked the door and opened it for me to go in first.

"Have a seat, and I'll explain everything. Maybe it will make sense to you, maybe you'll still think I'm an asshole, who knows? I am an asshole; I'll admit to that. Didn't used to be this bad though."

"So, what happened to you wanting to settle down?"

"I bought a ring to propose to my girlfriend." He didn't say anything else, just that, as he stared off into space for a moment. His amber eyes were almost hypnotizing as I stared at them while looking for answers to questions that up until that point, I hadn't thought to ask. Those eyes that started out as a darker, almost brown ring and became more golden the closer they got to his pupils, held me captivated, but they gave no answers. Instead, I waited for him to offer up exactly what happened to turn him into the asshole playboy he had been portraying to the rest of the world.

After staring at the wall in front of him for a few moments, Samuel turned his gaze back on me. "The day I planned to propose, I found her fucking my father in the boardroom at one of our satellite offices where I'd been working the previous year. Venla had been trying to get me to bring her on as my personal assistant, and when I said no, because I wanted business and home life to have some separation, she appealed to my father behind my back. He hired her while he was there, and well, they started having an affair. Neither of them would admit to how long it had been going on, but she had apparently been employed there for six weeks before I found out."

"It was your dad's idea to do this so you could keep the company though," I managed to grind out through my clenched teeth. Even though I didn't condone the way he had been acting out, I could completely understand the why of it. I wanted bad things to happen to his father for even daring to do something like that. Not only did he betray his wife, but his own son too.

He shook his head. "No, this deal was my grandfather's idea. He is the one who was pushing for me to be settled down with someone. Grandad was part of the reason I bought the ring for Venla."

"What about the affair, didn't he realize?"

"He found out about it, but not because I told him. Grandad is my mother's father, so I couldn't tell him because I wasn't sure I wanted to be the one to devastate my mother that way." He waved away his concerns for his mother and continued telling me how his grandfather found out. "There are security cameras in the boardroom and when I threw a chair and broke a window in a dividing wall, he reviewed the tape to see why."

"Oh shit!"

"Yeah, exactly. The business belongs to my mother's family, the Brightons, not my father's. The Tuckers have some old family money, but nothing like what the Brighton Conglomerate generates. My father was brought on and given a place to work, a relatively high position even, only because he was married to my mother."

"Okay, so what does that mean for you?"

"It means that Samuel Brighton, my Grandfather, is the real man behind the company and my father has only been the public face for the past few years. He cannot inherit the conglomerate, controlling shares in any of the companies, or anything else. It would all pass to me since I'm a Brighton by blood and name."

"You were named after your grandfather?"

"Obviously," he told me. "My grandfather had been about ready to hand things over to me, since I was settling down and seemed ready to take over."

"Then you caught your dad having an affair with your girlfriend?"

"Then I caught my dad having an affair with my girlfriend, but that wasn't all. It wasn't the first time I knew of my father cheating. It was however my first time finding out that my grandfather knew about my father's infidelity, and he never once told my mother about it because it was more important to him that the traditional family be kept intact. Appearances mattered more than his daughter's happiness. I didn't tell my mom the first time because it happened when I was ten years old. My father made me fear the consequences of telling her what I saw, even though I barely understood it then. I tried to convince Grandad to tell Mom, but he refused. They swore me to secrecy and have held it over my head this whole time," he admitted.

"So, you acted out like a child in retaliation?"

"I guess you could say that. I saw it more as my grandfather having to keep my father in charge longer, my refusal to settle down riled the board members up though. I wanted them to have to live with the board issuing an order of no confidence that would effectively take me out of the running. It was our stalemate. Either they told Mom about all of it, or I tanked the family's hold over the Brighton empire."

"I can understand everything you had going on, but it doesn't explain where I fall in the middle of all of this?"

"They told my mom, came clean, and she was the one who ordered me to fall in line after she told me I was an idiot if I thought she didn't already know."

"Ouch," I hissed. "So, wait, why didn't your mom just inherit the empire?"

Sam laughed. "It's not enough just to be a Brighton, you need to be one born with a penis too."

"Your family is kind of fucked up."

"Yep, but yours was ready to marry you off to me, so is it really any better?"

"Um, mine gave me a choice all along, so yes."

"Touché."

"So, if you were going to go along with this ruse to gain control of the empire after your mom was informed, then why all the constant partying and acting out in public?"

He ran his hands through his hair and tugged a bit, frustration evident. "I don't know," he groaned while dropping right into the leather chair on the opposite side of the giant mahogany desk. Would you believe me if I said I panicked when I thought about having a marriage like what my parents have? I grew up thinking they were happy together. It was the face they always showed. Come to find out, my father is a serial cheater, and as a result, my mother took on a long-term lover. Honestly, I'm not sure if my sister is my full-blooded sister or half. Not that it matters since she's been away at boarding school most of her life. I barely know her, but now I think I realize why she was sent away."

My eyes widened at that admission. "And before you ask, I'm strictly forbidden from revealing that information to her or I'll be completely cut off from the family and the empire. I'd appreciate it if you kept that to yourself."

"Mums the word," I told him before miming zipping my lips shut. This man's family was toxic from the bottom up. Maybe it was for the best that he had been acting out which forced me to come to my senses.

"So, all of your partying and debauchery have been what amounts to a temper tantrum," I summed up. "If you didn't want to marry me, you could have just said so."

"No, I couldn't, because if I didn't go through with it then I'm cut off. If you backed out of your own volition, then I was free to do things my way."

"So, you thought you'd convince me to back out by portraying yourself as some entitled slut-boy?"

He winced at my choice of descriptors, or maybe because they were true. "I wouldn't put it quite like that, but, basically, yeah."

"Well, good job. You got your wish already. Thanks for clearing all of that up for me after making me look like a fool in front of the rest of my family who didn't know I was just your business beard before."

"I'm sorry. It really wasn't about you. I just don't want to be stuck married to someone I don't want."

Well, that stung. "No problem then," I mentioned as I stood to go see my way out.

"Wait," he called out to me as he hurried around the desk to catch my arm before I could get too far. "That was all before," he admitted.

"Before you realized I wasn't a truly horrid troll-person?" I asked, and the way he crinkled his nose told me that wasn't it at all. I braced myself for what was about to come out of his mouth, because I wasn't sure I wanted to hear it.

"No. Look, you aren't a troll, but you're still not my type at all." He glanced at the door to the office and back at me. "You saw Aria, and all those other women. Let's be real here, none of them look anything like you." If someone could just kick me in the kidneys repeatedly, I'm sure it would feel better than having a man stand there and basically inform me of how unattractive he found me.

"The thing is, before we even showed up at the meeting today, I was late because I got a lecture from both of them. They knew what I was doing and why. I am supposed to make this right with you, and figure out how to make it work, because my grandfather has been trying to acquire your father's business for a long time now. It's not just about the inheritance, who is running the empire, or me settling down at this point. It's also about the merger."

"I see." It was all I could say as I glanced down at where his fingers were still wrapped around my bicep. I used my other hand to grip his fingers and pull. He let go immediately, and then stood there and watched as I walked out of his office. He didn't follow me as I also left his apartment, made my way to my car, and all the way back to my parent's house in the suburbs while on autopilot.

Okay, here's the part where I admit to my mistake in all of this. I talk a really good game. Love isn't real. Soulmates are an ideal used to sell relationships and monogamy to people who don't really want that. It's also used to sell greeting cards and the idea of the nuclear family, but whatever. The thing is, there was a part of me that believed my father when he told me that maybe down the road, my fake husband and I would grow to love one another.

I'm not completely delusional. I didn't think I'd make a true love match in what amounted to a modern day arranged marriage, but there had been this glimmering hope that we would become friends. That our common enemies and overbearing families would bring us together to form a bond. Us against the rest of the assholes in the world type thing. After talking to Sam, and hearing what he thought of me, I knew that would never, ever happen.

I called Carlos, because even though I knew he was busy, I still needed someone to validate the fact that I wasn't some heinous troll. "Hey babe, I'm working tonight, remember?"

"Yeah, I didn't think that was until a little later though. I was hoping to catch you before," I explained.

"Hey baby, who is on the phone?" I heard a woman ask and my heart immediately sank. His muffled response was something about work, and while my brain was yelling for me to abort this mission and hang up, for some reason I was paralyzed with the phone to my ear as Carlos took the time to get somewhere more private to finish his call.

"Mina," he whispered into the phone after a couple minutes.

"Explain," I demanded in a far too quiet tone for how I was feeling.

"I met Charlotte at one of my jobs over fall break." Over the fall break. Those words repeated in my brain because we were now halfway through spring semester.

"And you didn't break it off and tell me about it because?"

He sighed and I knew I wasn't going to like the answer. "I needed help with those classes, and you seemed so lonely. I didn't think-"

"No, you sure didn't," I told him as I cut off whatever excuse he'd been about to make. Finally, my fingers started to reengage with my brain, and I was able to hang up the phone.

I turned to look in the full-length antique mirror that stood on the opposite side of my room. My blond hair was shimmery gold, I'd always loved the way it hung down my back in a far too straight curtain of silky locks. My sister, Bea's, hair would sometimes get all frizzy, thanks to the natural wave and curl she had. Mine didn't have that problem. I'd always loved it. It was my best feature next to my big, blue-green eyes. Bea had brown hair and hazel eyes that were more amber and brown with spots of green. Mine looked like the Mediterranean Sea in those places where the color of the water became more vibrant near the shore. Despite my blond hair, I had long, dark lashes that made wearing eyeliner or mascara unnecessary unless I really wanted to make my eyes stand out in a dramatic way.

My mom had always told me I had a natural beauty that was different to my sister's. She was earthy and curvy, and full of warmth. I was angelic, precious, and whatever else equated to not truly being attractive in the eyes of men, apparently. Christ, I couldn't even have a fuck buddy situation like normal college girls. How the hell was it possible that I'd been just a pity fuck for months, or in a situation where a guy was secretly paying me with sex for the tutoring that I gave him, and I never realized it?

"Mina?" My dad's voice called through my bedroom door as he knocked. Thankfully, I had locked it when I got here because the tears and subsequent red eyes were just making me even uglier. Not wanting to risk him sticking around and demanding entry, I quietly moved to my ensuite and turned the shower on. Maybe he would think I had already been getting in and didn't hear him calling to me.