‘Thanks, but I already have a boat ride booked,’ I say. ‘It’s at two o’clock. It’s not a private one though, obviously.’
‘Oh, right. Where does that go from?’
‘From Kameoka.’ I pause, wondering whether I should say what’s on the tip of my tongue. I decide just to go for it. There’s no point in pretending anything at this point.
‘You know, I have a spare ticket if you’d like to come with me,’ I say. ‘I booked for Adrian and me to do it together and they wouldn’t give me a refund for his ticket because it was outside the timeframe they allow for cancellations.’
‘Seriously? You wouldn’t mind me tagging along?’
‘Nah. It’d be a shame to waste the ticket. Come and be with the real people, billionaire. You might have a lot more fun that way, instead of pretending you’d rather be on your own, which I know is total bullshit.’
He lets out a bark of laughter. ‘You know me too well.’
‘Yeah, I do.’ I flip him a grin.
‘That’s the thing about being really wealthy,’ he says. ‘It’s kind of hard to spend the money sometimes.’
I roll my eyes in jest. ‘Yeah, that sounds really tough. Such a hard life you lead. I’m not sure how you cope, to be honest.’
‘No, hear me out before you judge me,’ he says with a sting of hurt in his voice. ‘Most of my friends, other than Elliot and Raffa, don’t have the same sort of liquid wealth that I do. So if I want to go on a five-star holiday I’m limited as to who I can ask to come with me.’
‘You could always come down to their level, you know, and do something cheaper.’
‘Yeah, I know, and I do. But sometimes I want to have a blowout and treat myself, but I have to do it alone.’
‘So you’re telling me that being a billionaire is lonely?’
‘It can be, yeah.’ He holds up a hand. ‘I know, I sound like a total dick right now. One per cent problems and all that. But I can’t even offer to treat anyone and pay for them because it can be a point of pride thing. People don’t want to be paid for, it dings their own sense of status and integrity.’
‘Poor little rich Kit.’ I jostle him with my elbow.
‘Yeah, yeah. Okay. Maybe I deserve that. I know this must sound like utter bullshit to you. But it’s one of the reasons I ended up with Katya I think. Because she was more than happy for me to pay for everything and come with me when I wanted to do something that was prohibitively expensive for everyone else.’
‘What is it aboutprohibitively expensivethat appeals to you?’ I ask.
‘The sense of winning at something maybe? I’m doing something most other people don’t have access to.’
‘So it’s like being a member of an exclusive club?’
‘I guess so.’ He winces. ‘God, that sounds so crass when I hear it out loud.’ He rubs his hand over his face. ‘I guess what I’m trying to say is that I’m starting to recognise that I probably made a bad choice in Katya because she encouraged that kind of thinking. Which for someone like me, who’s always felt like he’s chasing to keep up with everyone else, especially my siblings, was like feeding a monster.’
‘Well, as long as you learned something from it, it wasn’t a total bust.’
‘Yeah. Maybe.’
We’re quiet for a moment.
‘So what do you say?’ I ask, to break the silence. ‘Fancy coming on the boat ride with me?’
He gives me a nonchalant shrug, which I suspect he’s putting on. ‘Sure, why not.’
‘Okay, great. Well, we’ll need to get a train over there, so meet me in reception at one thirty?’
‘Will do, captain.’
I can’t hide my grin at that. ‘Great. See you then.’
* * *
