“Some of us come from places where hospitals don’t look like this room, where schools don’t get donations unless cameras are attached. Where talent dies because nobody important ever bothered to notice it.”
Silence.
“Tonight, I’m donating twenty million to the Valmont children’s initiative.”
That got the reaction I expected.
Gasps.
Applause.
Phones lifting.
Marcus had to stand there and clap for me like everybody else.
That part felt good.
I let the room eat it up, gave them the smile they wanted, shook the hands I was supposed to shake, let three different photographers catch my good side.
After, I left.
Quietly.
Out the side exit with my bodyguards.
Back into my black Rolls parked beneath the valet overhang.
The door shut, and the world got honest again.
I loosened my bow tie, lit the blunt that Darius had waiting for me, and leaned back into the leather.
The first inhale settled me.
Not enough.
But enough to keep me still.
I blew smoke toward the ceiling and looked out through the tinted glass at the line of luxury cars, the security, the movement, the fake importance of it all.
Then I said, “Go get her.”
My bodyguard, Ashton, in the front, didn’t ask who.
He already knew. All my men knew the women who were and weren’t in my world.
He stepped out.
I kept smoking.
A few minutes later, the back door opened, and Lyric slid in, furious before the door even shut.
“What the fuck is this?” she snapped. “You don’t get to summon me like I work for you.”
I took another slow drag before looking at her.
My gift was still around her neck.
She looked beautiful.
