Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 74604 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 373(@200wpm)___ 298(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 74604 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 373(@200wpm)___ 298(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
“Lies?” I asked, smiling at her as she flexed her feet inside the shoes, but was too stubborn to slip them off.
“Totally. I mean, don’t get me wrong, shoes that cost eight-hundred dollars are definitely more comfortable than the ones I used to get on a BOGO deal on the shelf at Payless, but they still hurt after a while.”
“Why do you insist on wearing them even outside of work then?” I asked, even though some part of me was cataloging what she’d just said. What she’d just admitted to, even though I don’t think she’d meant to.
It was exactly what I’d been suspecting.
That she’d come from much more humble beginnings.
Buy One, Get One deals at Payless was not something anyone who’d grown up rich would ever cop to even knowing about. In fact, many of the wealthy women I’d known in my life would be deliberately dense about “commoner” stores. Even if they technically did know about them, they would never cop to that because they would think that even having that knowledge made them seem poorer themselves.
“I think it started off as a status symbol, honestly,” she told me, shrugging. “Then it was really clear that some men in business have a real issue with women in business still. Especially those of us who are more successful than they are. And they look down on you. Quite literally, in some circumstances. So I always want to be as tall, or taller, than them.”
“It’s why you go for the handshake first too,” I said, thinking back to her meeting Sawyer.
“Exactly. But it’s also just a preference now. With the shoes. They make me feel put together. I’d feel naked without them on if I were in a work situation. Or,” she went on, sensing my objection about to come, “when I am in a situation where I might be meeting people for the first time. Like Sawyer and Tig.”
“No one would say shit about a businessman wearing a suit and cufflinks and a Rolex, right?” I said, understanding the argument.
“Except that no one who is actually wealthy would wear a Rolex,” she said, shaking her head. “That is what moderately wealthy people wear to appear richer. When the truly rich people are wearing—“
“Patek Phillipe,” I supplied for her.
“Yes,” she said, a smile spreading across her lips. “You know your watches.”
“I’ve seen a few.”
I’d packed one for the off chance that I needed to dress up to go out with her somewhere. She would want to be seen with someone who exuded the kind of quiet, confident luxury that she herself did.
“I am not a watch person,” she admitted. “Aside from my smart one.”
“Which is more about being accessible every single moment of the day than actually telling you the time,” I qualified.
“Ah… I guess,” she admitted, able to see the parts of her that didn’t, objectively, paint her in the best light. “But we can’t complain too much about my watch when it was the only way I could get a message out to Cam.”
“That’s true,” I agreed, wincing a bit at how she went from light and comfortable to tense and dark at just the mention of that place and her time there. “You ready to talk about that yet?” I asked, moving forward, ignoring the alarm bells going off in my mind as I put down my mug and sat on the bed beside her.
I was almost painfully aware of the way the bed depressed at my weight, making hers shift until she was brushing up against me.
“I don’t know,” she admitted, shaking her head as her fingers danced over each other in her lap.
“I’m assuming you didn’t talk to Cam about it.”
“Why would you assume that? The man knows when to buy me tampons and chocolate,” she said, smirking.
“Yeah, but that’s job-related, in a way, isn’t it? I’m going to assume that Cam doesn’t know about Buy One, Get One deals at Payless either, does he?”
“He… doesn’t,” she admitted, her brows drawing down a bit.
“Does anyone?”
“Aside from you? No.”
“Hey,” I said, reaching over to put my hand on top of hers that wouldn’t stop fidgeting, making her back go ramrod straight at the contact. I went ahead and pretended to know how I swear to fuck I felt some sort of electrical shock at the touch. It wasn’t the fucking time for that. “I can’t spill your secrets,” I reminded her. “It’s in the contract and shit,” I added, ducking my head to catch her gaze, then giving her a smirk.
“That doesn’t mean you have to be my shrink,” she said.
“I want to listen if you want to talk. I don’t think it’s good to bottle up that shit. In fact, I know that,” I told her, folding forward to reach into my toiletry bag to find the little medicine bottle with my free hand, then showing the label to her.