Gabe
Poppy followed me as I charged up the stairs, dropping house stats on the way. The six-bedroom home’s design was more traditional than I preferred, but I planned to eventually tear it down and build exactly what I wanted. The lot itself smacked with perfection. Set back from the ocean with enough distance to be safe during storms, at least during my lifetime, the location boasted sweeping panoramic views. The oversized front door opened onto the main level on the second floor. The wide foyer offered a direct view out the back of the house showcasing expansive blue.
Poppy’s mouth gaped as she stepped into the entranceway. Pride swelled. The kid in me wanted to snatch her hand and pull her around, showing her every room. But I played it lowkey. Slipped my eager hand into my pocket and tilted back on my heels, giving her time to take it in and admire all I bought.
“Holy shit, Gabe. This place is fantastic.”
“Can I give you a tour?”
“Absolutely.”
As we went along, I pointed out the home’s flaws that bugged me. “The floors have this reddish color to them. God only knows why folks down here like this red pine look.”
“It’s not that red. It’s a blonder hue. I’ve seen red pine. Trust me, this isn’t it. It’s gorgeous.”
“I’m going to have them redone when I go away sometime. They’ll do for now.” I shrugged and waited for her to finish gaping at one of the two inconsequential front rooms that bordered each side of the foyer.
“This would be a great place for an office.” She pointed to a room off to the side that had a partial view of the ocean. I hadn’t decided how I’d use the room, but technically it could be a guest room. The other small room opened into the kitchen. “I thought a lot of these homes came furnished. I’d heard the owners found it easier, as opposed to having to get all the furniture off the island.” She circled the empty, unfurnished room.
“Yeah, it was furnished. I had them remove most of it. Felt like stuff my grandmother would’ve picked out. Shelley hooked me up with a designer, and she’s got great ideas. The living area is all new furniture, as are a couple of the bedrooms.”
“Did you sell it?”
It took me a minute. “The furniture? Nah, Goodwill.” Her eyes bugged out. “It was junk.”
She glanced around the place. “I doubt that.”
“Would you’ve wanted it?” It really wasn’t what I thought of as Poppy’s style.
“I don’t have room. My rental comes furnished, but…” Her voice trailed off, and I let it drop and continued the tour.
I’d laid out my priorities and furnished the main living area and the master bedroom in less than a week’s time. We were in the process of converting the in-law suite over the separate guest house into my office, but Poppy’s idea to convert this area into an office space appealed to me too.
For furniture, I’d mostly thumbed through the Beach RH catalog and selected muted, clean colors. Once we fixed these floors, it would be a suitable space. The expansive deck out front with multiple seating areas and outdoor fireplace ranked as my favorite.
Poppy toured the house with slack-jawed amazement, like she’d never seen anything so nice in her life. The place was nice, but it wasn’t spectacular. If she’d ever been to some of the places in the Hamptons, or Martha’s Vineyard, or any upscale northeast beach locale, she wouldn’t be nearly so impressed. Still, her reaction to my home-in-progress had me puffing out my chest like I’d made a damn good real estate decision.
I opened the refrigerator door, searching to see what Shelley had purchased, and set about putting some grapes in a bowl and finding some crackers and cheese.
“What can I get you to drink?”
“Water’s fine. What’s on the bottom floor?”
“A couple of bedrooms. Originally bunkrooms, but I had the bunks removed and furnished them as proper bedrooms.”
“Can I check them out?”
“Go right ahead. The master suite is upstairs. That’s probably more impressive than downstairs, if you want to check that out.” She paused for a split second, and I thought maybe I’d crossed the line by suggesting she tour my bedroom first, but she simply headed to the stairs and descended to the first floor.
“It’s gorgeous here. You must be so thrilled. It’s like a dream.” Her voice echoed through the foyer.
At my request, Shelley fully stocked the wine refrigerator, and I combed through the options and selected a crisp chardonnay.
I filled the second glass as Poppy called up from the stairwell, “Those bedrooms are absolutely gorgeous. Like, magazine worthy. Straight from a catalog. Stunning.”
I slid the cork back down into the bottle and raised a glass to her. “Move in, then.”
“What?” She half-laughed and rolled her eyes, dismissing me.
“No. Seriously. You mentioned you might need to move. I’ll never go downstairs, at least other than for the outside components. If I wasn’t converting the in-law suite in the guest house, I’d tell you to take that.”
“What are you doing with it?”
“My office.”
“Nice. I bet you have stunning views out there.” She stepped over to the kitchen window that overlooked the street side of the house and checked out the building in question.
“I do.” I popped a grape in my mouth. “And I’m serious. Why should you be paying rent? I’ve got plenty of space here. I’d be upstairs. You’d be downstairs. We’ve got a common area here.” I swept my arm around the kitchen and living area. “Or you could pick one of the bedrooms on this level, but the noise from the den might be distracting. And you’d have your own floor downstairs.”
Her golden waves glimmered in the sunlight as she shook her head, continuing to dismiss the idea with a tight smile.
“Why not?”
“Gabe.” She sipped her wine and then licked her lower lip in a way that made my dick twitch. Her dress draped over the svelte curves of her breast. The dress in its entirety didn’t do her any favors. It hung like a muumuu from the seventies. But when she sat down, it shifted and exposed enticing cleavage.
“Gabe,” she reprimanded.
“Yes.” I lifted my gaze from her breasts. Her cheeks held a pink hue, and I smirked, pleased to see a positive reaction to my blatant perusal.
“If I moved in, we couldn’t date.” She emphasized the word date in a way that I believed we both understood meant to have sex.
“And why not?”
“Live in the same house and date? No.”
“Would you not date someone who lived in the same apartment building? Besides, this is all temporary for me. If all goes well, in a couple of months, I’ll be back in New York, and you’d be doing me a favor by being my on-site property manager. I offered for Shelley to live on-site, but she refused. Something about her husband wouldn’t like it.” I waved my hand and grinned to let Poppy know for certain I joked. “Hey, I could pay you what I’m paying her. Extra income for very little work. You wouldn’t even need that OnlyFans account.”
“How much do you pay Shelley?”
I popped another grape and recalled my agreement with Ms. Shelley Brownlee. Given I had her doing so much extra, we weren’t on any kind of standard package she offered. But once I got settled, she’d be charging me less. As I mentally scrolled through the numbers, I realized Poppy might make more per month from her little website side gig. “How much do you make from OnlyFans?”
“The amount varies by month.”
“On average?”
“Between five to ten thousand. But lately it’s been more consistently closer to five.”
“And that’s revenue, right? Not profit, so it doesn’t account for any of your expenses. How’s this for a deal? I pay you five thousand monthly for property management, and you agree to allow me to be your only OnlyFans client, and I pay you an additional five thousand. Then you live in a place rent free, plus you’re making the top range, and less time intensive too.”
Her face contorted, and the sinking sensation in my stomach informed me I’d said something insulting. I braced myself for angry words to exit her mouth as I ran through my offer to identify exactly which portion I needed to retract.
“Do you see me as a prostitute?” She drew her words out slowly. A good thing because it helped with my slow processing speed.
“Nooo.” My brain kicked in. “Okay. Never mind about the OnlyFans account. Forget I mentioned that.” Although, damnit, I wanted her dropping that bullshit. Maybe it was a conservative notion, but I’d never been fond of her showing her wares to every Tom, Dick, and Harry. But that was just me being possessive. I’d never been a great sharer. For the negotiation at hand, I dropped that point.
“You live here rent-free. If, once I’m back in New York, you want to take over Shelley’s responsibilities, it’ll be another income source. If not, that’s up to you. Forget I mentioned OnlyFans.” I leaned closer to her, forearms resting on my knees, and paid careful attention to those wide, blue, doll-like eyes.
“Why do you want me to live here so badly?” Those stunning eyes squinted as if reading small font on her phone.
I inhaled and stared out the window at the ocean and asked myself the same question. The whitecaps had grown more plentiful, a sign the winds had picked up.
“Because. I’m bored out of my mind. It’s too quiet. I’d love to have a housemate. Seriously. I came here on a total whim because Tate’s here, and I liked coming to visit as a kid, and I wanted to get away, but there are only so many things to do. And the house is quiet. So fucking quiet. It hadn’t even occurred to me how much it’s all getting to me until right now.” My index finger jabbed in her direction to emphasize my point. “You’d be doing me a favor if you moved in.”
“But we can’t date.”
No, I would not cave on that point. One, I found the whole friend zone thing to be oxymoronic. And two, I’d jacked off far too many times fantasizing about her to even pretend to build a sophomoric fence around us.
“No.” Her shoulders pulled back, and she sat erect on the stool. I rushed my counteroffer. “We can date, but with agreed on parameters. I’ll ask you out to dinner, and it will be a date night. You know, the way parents do it. You’ll live downstairs, and I’ll live upstairs.”
“Until you go back to New York.”
“Yes.” I snapped my fingers, the excitement of closing a deal surfacing. “And once I’m back in New York, you can take the upstairs suite. The place will be yours except for random weekends I come back to visit.”
She crossed her legs and swirled her wine ever so slightly as she held the stem between two fingers. “OnlyFans doesn’t work like that. You can’t set it to one client.”
“Okay.” I said the words softly, mindful she hadn’t agreed to anything yet. Her words sank in, and it became crystal clear that portion of my proposal didn’t make sense.
“Why did you say you’re here, again?” Her wine sloshed up against the slide of the glass as she swirled it and hung a thin veil as it sank back down.
“It’s a lot to explain.” And I hated explaining it to anyone, mainly because it was all such bullshit.
“Try me.” She put it out there like her own counterpunch. Or dare.
“A few years ago, well, several years ago, this one guy, Cyr Martin, gathered a significant number of investors around the world. Some big investment banks funded his effort. The guy raised in the neighborhood of three hundred billion.”
“Did you say B? As in boy?” I nodded. “In U.S. dollars?”
“It doesn’t matter what currency you use. He raised a ton of money. Governments put in money. The company supposedly bought up land in Malaysia, doing good things in developing areas and…making a lot of money. It was a hot investment tip in the Asia market for a while.”
“Okay. Then something went wrong?”
“You could say that.” I popped another grape. “It was a shell company. Didn’t even really exist.”
“Wow. That’s a scam and a half.”
“Yeah. There are all kinds of precautions that are supposed to prevent a scam of that size from coming to fruition. So, there’s an investigation now.”
“To figure out how he did it? So, why are you in hiding?”
“I’m not in hiding. It’s…okay. Obviously, a lot of money was lost. Right?”
She nodded.
“The Justice Department filed a civil lawsuit against Cyr Martin attempting to recoup some of those funds.”
“The US government lost money, too?”
“Yes. And they’re also trying to recoup on behalf of the investment firms. But,” I waved my hand dismissively, because the civil suit didn’t have any bearing on my situation, “as our lawyers predicted, they hit pause on the civil suit and are now pursuing a criminal case.”
“Against Cyr Martin? How does that relate to you?”
“Against Cyr Martin and any individuals they deem to be a party to the various crimes.”
“Were you involved?”
“No.” I shook my head emphatically. “But my firm was the initial underwriter in his shell company. Our firm should have caught it. My managing director is currently camped out in Singapore. We’re expecting charges against him any day now.”
“And how does that involve you?” She pointed a well-manicured finger to my chest.
“I’m a hedge fund manager.” I paused to see if she understood or had questions. Her facial expression silently communicated Duh. “Okay. So, I invested in his fund. I also sold a day before the scandal erupted. But I swear I didn’t know. I went to a lot of Martin’s parties. The guy had enormous parties. Like, million-dollar mega parties all over the world. I liked the guy. We hung out. But I swear I had no inside information. Maybe at the beginning, but not when I sold.”
“Why’d you sell?”
And that right there was why I appeared culpable. I’d made tons of money off that investment. But I’d heard from a guy that one of their hotels had sat incomplete for almost a year. A friend told me one of the government leaders sold stock, and that guy was beyond close to Cyr. And I had another great investment opportunity. An inside source tipped me off that Google Alphabet might acquire them. I jumped on rumors. Which didn’t look good to the SEC, but having an ear to the ground was the hidden sauce to my investment strategy. I steepled my hands and met her sharp blue gaze head on.
“I saw the signs. I had an opportunity. I moved. My lawyers feel confident I’ll be cleared. The firm wants to distance themselves from me in case the Justice Department launches an investigation targeting me individually. That’s the real reason. The official reason is they want to allow me to focus on my defense.”
“Are you still employed?”
“It’s a paid leave of absence. But that managing director I mentioned?”
She nodded.
“He called last week, and they terminated his employment.”
“What will you do if they do that to you?”
“Live the beach life?” I held my hands up in the air and smiled, even though I felt nothing close to a smile. The whole situation burned me up and left me powerless. No other firm would touch me until this situation cleared. The only thing I could do was trust my lawyers when they said it would one day be behind me.
“That really sucks.” She reached out and squeezed my knee. Nothing in her attitude led me to believe she thought I was guilty. Every person in my office looked at me like I had to have done something wrong. Even my dad spoke encouraging words, but the unspoken message assumed guilt and that I might need him to call in favors. Poppy’s warm expression showed no judgement, like maybe she understood what it was like to have the world assume the worst about you.
“Thanks.” I stood and found my way to the back wall of windows. Turning my back to her, I feigned an interest in the outdoor view. I felt her watching, unabashedly studying me. Fine by me. I had her where I wanted her. “You’ll move in?”
“I’ve got four more weeks on my lease.” Her tone reeked of apology.
“Perfect. Plenty of time to plan the move.”