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“I want you to be poor like me,” I groan, stunning him with my absurd insecurity. But the beauty of being ridiculous is that IknowI’m being ridiculous. “I don’t want you to be poor,” I amend on a sigh, “but I don’t want to be the only poor person in our relationship. I want us to be equals, because now I’m embarrassed. I can’t help us, Archer. I can’t equally contribute when it’s time for us to buy a house with grass.”
“Well—”
“I go to work, I earn my pay, then I spend most of it on medication. What I don’t spend on that, typically goes toward street food for me and Aubree while we’re working. I’ll probably rent that crappy apartment, which I love, by the way, for the restof my life. Because it’s convenient and affordable and it has a Steve.”
“A Steve?”
“A Steve! I’m not leaving him. He’s too old and cute and rumpled for me to break his heart, especially since his wife died of a hotdog and his whole world is about making sure his tenants get home safe at night. You’re over here with a boat and a chopper and maybe a jet, too. Meanwhile, I’ll never save more than a few dollars from each paycheck because if I stop buying Factor, I’ll die.”
“I’m not asking you to do anything we’re not already doing! I’m not complaining about who we are and what we’ve got.”
“No!I’mcomplai?—”
“You’re mad because my criminal father, who stole and lied and killed and cheated, left me money in his estate?!”
“No, I’m mad because you’ll forever be able to hop on over to Jamaica for a little vacation whenever you want, as often as you want, and I can’t afford to do the same.”
“Fuck you can?—”
“I can’t live the same lifestyle you do, and I can’t feel good about you paying my way.”
“Oh, well…” He releases me, stunning me with how quickly I stumble back and bump into the railing. He was holding me up, and I had no clue quite how much. Kind of like our life, I suppose. Our financial disparity. “We should probably break up, then.” He stalks away, crossing the H and shrugging like his words don’t set fire to my brain. “You’re broke, and I’m rich from blood money.” Spinning back, his eyes flare with ire. “Your medical expenses are a bother, and I workedsooooohard for the money I have.”
“Archer—”
“I’m bored with us now anyway.” He reaches down and spins the ring on his finger. “I got my jollies. Used you up. Fucked youthe way dogs fuck. Now I’m done.” He lifts his chin. “Give me my diamond ring back. It cost a bunch and I wanna give it to the next love of my life.”
I bring my hand up, but I press my palm to my chest and cover my rings—both of them—with my other hand. “You’re being ridiculous.”
“Yeah.” Chuckling, he charges back my way and doesn’t stop until our chests slam together and his lips crash down over mine. He swallows every last bit of oxygen in my lungs and squeezes me tight enough to make it impossible for me to breathe more in. “I’m not breaking up with you, Mayet, and you’re not leaving me. And just so we’re on the same page, I currently have about ninety-seven million dollars in the bank.”
My heart stops.
Dead in my chest.
Unresponsive.
Won’t come back again.
“My father’s net wealth sat somewhere around four hundred million when he shit the bed. Split that five ways, then expand on it again because Micah is good with investments. Felix cut out a bunch of the family’s income streams, all to makeyouhappy, by the way.”
“Me?” Dead. Dead. I’m totally and completely dead. “What?”
“You and Solomon, anyway. Our father sold women like they were candy, and he didn’t mind snatching them off the streets.”
No longer dead.
Enraged.
“He made a fortune selling women, but Felix…” He shakes his head. “Me, Tim? Micah and Cato? We don’t get off on hurting women. We especially don’t wanna make money kidnapping kids and selling them to the highest bidder. That stream of income alone made the family upwards of three hundred milliona year. Now it’s gone. But the residuals are still here. They’restill in the bank, and when Tim died, that wealth was split between his sons.”
“Archer—”
“So if I wanna give my brother a million dollars of blood money I didn’t ask for in the first place to buy a helicopter, then yeah, that’s what I’m gonna do. If I wanna own a boat with him and turn down an offer of one hundred thirty million dollars from some other guy who wants to buy it, then yeah, that’s cool too. If I want to take my wife to Jamaica and ask her to try on a pretty dress, then that’s what I’m gonna do! The interest alone on ninety-seven million dollars is half a million. We could live on the interest for the rest of our lives, and that would be fine by me.”
“Oh god.” My heart palpitates. My hands sweat. My entire life flashes like a cliché in my mind. “Half a million dollars a year… f-for nothing.”
“You don’t have to work. And I don’t have to work. But we turn up every day, anyway, because that’s what we were born to do. We help the dead. But that salary you make and spend on medication? The salaryImake? It doesn’t matter. Because in interest alone, we make half a million a year to live on. And Micah spends his down time making more for us.”
