She already ran two successful businesses—Radiant and her sex toy company—and she had mentioned to me when I was just starting that she would be interested in collaborating with me in some way.
If this didn’t work out, screw the investors.
Athie had said she didn’t care about the money, and while I knew it to be true, I wanted to give her a really, really great life. I wanted to spoil her and make it so she didn’t have to work, if she didn’t want to work.
The elevator whizzed up to the eighteenth floor, and suddenly, the doors opened. When I stepped out, the elevator doors to my left opened, too, and out walked Derek fucking Easton with a black eye and a busted lip.
His lips curled into a smirk when he saw me. “Funny seeing you here.”
“What the fuck are you doing here?” I asked between gritted teeth.
“Oh, I didn’t tell you,” Derek said. “I picked up investing in the past few years. I’ve partnered with Harold to make sure I could get my hands into every last investment that could make me wealthier than you could ever be.”
I balled my hands into fists. He had to be lying.
“Fuck you,” I snarled under my breath.
“Did you bring Athie along?” he asked. “Bet she’s working in a café somewhere.”
Restrain yourself, Charlie. Don’t fucking hit him.
If he was lying and I hit him here, then coming all the way out here really wasn’t worth it. I had convinced Athie to come here with me when she could be back at home with her friends, studying for the bar.
I needed to get something out of this that was not being thrown in jail.
“Hey, Derek,” a secretary said when we stepped into the lobby.
Derek smirked. “What’s up, Sammie?”
“What happened to your face?”
“Ah, don’t worry about it,” he murmured, glancing at me. “You should see the other guy.”
The other guy was about to pummel another fist into his face if he didn’t shut the fuck up and stop trying to inject himself into every fucking facet of my life. Didn’t he have anything better to do? Of course not.
He didn’t have a real job and never applied himself to anything other than my life.
“Right this way,” Derek said, guiding me toward the third room on the left, as if it was his first time ever meeting me and he wanted to show the girls up front that he was sweet, caring, and didn’t deserve his swollen face.
“What do you want with Athena?” I growled quietly.
“To fuck her.” A low chuckle escaped his throat as he grabbed the door handle. “Until she’s bloody.”
Just as I was about to say something, he pushed the door open, and I plastered a fake smile on my face because I knew this afternoon was about to be shit. I wanted to walk right out of here, but I had come all this way.
All this fucking way just to be shit on by him.
“You must be Charlie,” Harold said, firmly shaking my hand. “It’s nice to meet you.”
“You as well,” I said, shaking his hand, then the two other venture capital investors’ hands. “Let’s get started.”
Most importantly, let’s get this fucking over with.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-EIGHT
ATHENA
