Total pages in book: 74
Estimated words: 71165 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 356(@200wpm)___ 285(@250wpm)___ 237(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 71165 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 356(@200wpm)___ 285(@250wpm)___ 237(@300wpm)
“To a successful weekend,” I echoed, raising mine to his.
I regarded Rex from over the rim of my glass. That kiss had completely blown me. How desperately I wanted more, and yet after this weekend he would be gone forever from my life. Not once did he mention ever doing anything beyond this weekend. Part of me wanted to sleep with him anyway, but another part of me was terrified to.
Danger signals were going off everywhere. I knew nothing about him. He was deliberately secretive.
A man like him could definitely shatter my heart into a million pieces. The smart thing to do was to leave it alone. Why did I want to further complicate this weekend? It was already going to be hard enough as it was.
“Tell me about your stepmother?” he invited.
“What would you like to know?”
He smiled slowly. “Whatever you would tell your lover, I suppose.”
The thought of him as a lover made my skin tingle. Get a hold of yourself, Willow. I cleared my throat.
“Well, Nicole owns the biggest beauty salon in town and both my sisters work for her. She’s smart, she’s ambitious, she’s well liked in the community. But we don’t get along. We pretend to, of course. We did that for my father’s sake and now it’s an ingrained habit. It’s how we roll. We never argue or disagree about anything. We just pretend all the time to be part of a loving family. Even when there’s no one around, we pretend. But secretly, she is furious with me and always has been. She hated the fact that my father and I were a package. She wanted my father, but not me. And any love he showed me, irked her to no end. As a child she always made me feel like an unwanted annoyance. I think she would have loved it if I had contracted some childhood disease and died.”
Rex’s eyes widened. “Whoa!”
“No, I’m serious, but by the time this weekend is over you’ll think I am an evil drama queen portraying her in that way, for you will never see anything but her mask: a loving mother who is so kind and generous she can love a child that is not hers as much as her own. That mask never slips. No, that’s not true. It used to, a couple of times at the beginning when we were alone, but not anymore.”
Solomon came out of the room holding some folded clothes. “If there is nothing else, Sir, I’ll take these to the laundry room to get them done,” he said to Rex.
“Thanks, Solomon. By the way, I’ve hired a car which should already have arrived. Could you get someone to bring it out front for me, and leave the key with the doorman?”
“Most certainly, Sir,” Solomon replied with a courteous nod, before he withdrew quietly.
“I have a confession to make,” I said softly.
He smiled. “Yeah?”
“Yeah. I was actually very annoyed when you changed my booking from an ordinary deluxe to the Presidential deluxe, but I’m not anymore. This is wonderful. Just the view alone is worth it. It will be an experience I will cherish forever.”
He looked at me curiously. “Why didn’t you want the Presidential suite? It was necessary for your act and you can afford it.”
“Yes, I guess I can afford it, but maybe I thought it was too much for me.”
“Too much?” he queried.
“Too luxurious.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Too luxurious?”
I shrugged. “I mean, come on, a butler? There are better things I can do with my limited resources.”
“Hmmm… have you ever asked yourself why you were never taught about money in school?”
“To be honest the thought never crossed my mind.”
“Think about it though. Shouldn’t the creation of money, the care and the management of it be an integral and essential part of every child’s education?”
I nodded. “I guess so.”
“So why isn’t it?”
I frowned and shook my head. “I don’t know. Why isn’t it?”
“Maybe because you are not meant to understand it. If you did, maybe you would not be such a willing slave of the system. Money is not scarce, Willow. Nor is it a limited resource. It is created out of thin air everyday by central banks around the world. The real truth is nothing is scarce. Not money, not water, not oil…nothing. In fact, the opposite is true.
“The nature of this world is pure abundance. To know and understand that all you have to do is tend to a garden. Look how fast the weeds grow. You cut them. They grow back. You cut them again… and they grow again. You use pesticides, and a different weed adapts to it and grows there. The cycle never stops.”
“The plenty is all around you. Everywhere you look. Sheep never run out of fleece no matter how many times you shear them. Snow can fall without rest for days, weeks, or months if you go higher north. The desert is never-ending sand. The tropics hold a profusion of lifeforms. The abundance is even in us, humans. Our bodies are constantly changing, trillions of cells completely replacing themselves every few years. A woman can give birth every year for many years. But it is us, we, who stop the abundance.”