But it wasn’t a few thousand dollars I was bidding, not after the first few seconds.
Five thousand…eight thousand…twelve…
Mom was scowling at me, but I was past it, downing more champagne and keeping my hand in the air. I wasn’t going to lose this. I got an allowance like any good heiress, but not enough to cover this. She knew I was broke. She just didn’t realize how broke.
Harriet squeezed my knee under the table, but I took no notice.
Eighteen thousand dollars! Eighteen!
“Elaine,” Mom began, but I didn’t listen, just kept my hand up high.
I don’t know why I wanted this so bad.
Lionel laughed at me, trying to brush aside my efforts as nothing, and that made it burn all the harder in my chest, keeping my hand right on up there.
I didn’t have eighteen thousand dollars. I barely had anything left anymore. I’d used it running up debt in places I shouldn’t…in people I shouldn’t. Places and people I could never share with my family without them scoffing at me. The Power brothers were after me and my debts, charging interest at an unbelievable rate knowing full well I was broke.
Twenty thousand dollars!
My mind was swimming in the fear and the shame and the insanity of not knowing my own heart anymore. It was swimming in the need to win, just to be someone, even if it was just for a few short moments of getting the cheers from the crowd.
“Elaine!” Mom tried again, but I didn’t listen.
Harriet squeezed my knee even tighter, but I didn’t listen.
Twenty-two thousand dollars!
The woman battling me was a celebrity wrestler’s daughter who dabbled in modeling. I guess she was trying to prove herself to the room and the tabloids as much as I was.
Twenty-four thousand dollars!
Mom was scowling, even through her false whoops of cheer.
Twenty-seven thousand dollars!
Zelda Hart. The wrestler’s daughter was Zelda Hart.
Twenty-eight thousand dollars!
“Seriously,” Harriet whispered. “Please, Elaine, what are you doing? I didn’t think you had the…”
Her voice trailed off. My hand stayed high in the air.
Twenty-nine thousand dollars!
I felt sick. Hungry for attention. Fit to throw myself from the chair and give up on everything. But it was about the applause. It was about drowning out my own inner demons, just for that one short minute. It was about drowning out the demons of Uncle Lionel and his shadowy friends with their shadowy secrets in the corners of mine.
And drowning out the demon that was Lucian Morelli.
Holy fuck, Lucian Morelli was a demon.
A demon I wanted to possess me and my worthless soul.
Thirty! Thirty thousand dollars!
Somehow, I had to stop thinking about Lucian Morelli.
It knocked me back when Zelda’s hand dropped at the other table. She clapped her hands and let out a cheer for me across the room, and it was on me. Every iota of attention in that whole ballroom was all on me. I’d done it. I’d won some random penguin when I didn’t have enough cash to buy my soul an escape from hell.
My eyes felt glassy. The applause meant nothing when it came. Mom’s disgust still rang loud through my veins, even though she wore a fake smile along with the rest of the crowd.
But then a voice sounded out. A voice that made no sense to me.
“Fifty-thousand dollars,” the man said.
No.
It couldn’t be.
I saw his darkness. I saw the solidity of his stance. I saw the broadness of his shoulders as he held his hand up to the auctioneer like he was the calmest guy on the planet.
Lucian Morelli. My own personal demon.
Unlike Tinsley’s birthday party, he would have been invited to this charity auction. The Morelli family was much like the Constantines, though my mother would throw a fit if I ever said that out loud. We were both rich and amoral. They were as powerful as we were.
That was what made the feud last forever.
My mother’s face had gone stone hard. Lionel was muttering something in her ear. They didn’t like me bidding on the penguin, but they hate even more that a Constantine was bested by a Morelli. It will feel like losing a battle for them.
I couldn’t stop staring.
My hand was trembling as I dropped it back to the table top, because I had to be wrong. I had to be losing my mind.
“And the penguin goes to the gentleman at table five!” the guy on stage called out, and the applause struck up even louder, all for the monster in our midst. “Your name?”
“Lucian Morelli.”
A soft gasp runs through the room. People who couldn’t see him now know exactly who’s in their midst. The Morellis may be a lot like the Constantines, but they’re different in one way. They’re known to be more dangerous.
The applause starts again, louder this time.
It was Harriet who leaned in to my side when the applause started up again, her giggle a surprise enough to jar my senses.
“Is that him?” Harriet whispers into my ear. “He looks intense.”
Yes. Intense is a good word to describe him. His dark gaze met mine, and all that intensity was directed at me.
Chapter Sixteen
Lucian
So many people, cheering and clapping.
I raised my glass to the stage and made a small bow.
Fuck knows how my insanity had sunk low enough that I’d paid fifty thousand dollars just to enjoy the look on that little girl’s face when she saw me stealing her applause.
That’s what it was, of course. It was stealing her applause and seeing the shock and fear on her face when she realized it was me.
It definitely wasn’t me saving her from her own goddamn self.
Though, what was she doing bidding thousands when she had the fucking Power brothers on her back? The head of the family was modest in her applause, pasting on her regal smile as she clapped for me. Her brother-in-law was already half drunk at her side.
Her eyes were on me, and her breaths were ragged, but she didn’t say a fucking word.
I sat myself back down and kicked back, sipping on another mineral water while the table of reality TV stars around me did their best to be caught by the cameras. I hated charity events; they were the very epitome of arrogance, everyone patting themselves on the back for being such selfless saints in their overblown lifestyles.
At least I knew I was an evil piece of shit. My path to hell was already paved in sin. Soon it would be paved in Elaine Constantine’s pain, too.
There were another twenty lots auctioned off by the time the ass of a presenter on stage fucked off and left people in peace. The majority of people got straight up from their tables, doing their usual socializing and gossip.
Elaine was sitting at the table alongside the rest of her family, her big blue eyes honed right in on me. My smile spoke volumes as I stepped away from her mother. I made sure to brush by her seat, close enough that she could feel me. I wasn’t expecting her to up and follow me as I headed to the next round of morons to chat shit to.
“What are you doing here?” she whispered before I arrived at the next table.
My gaze must have been cold and vile when it pounded into hers. “Being a saint to the world, of course. Be thankful I saved you a fortune. Maybe it’ll save your ass a few extra days from the Power brothers.”