Nothing to Gain, page 1
part #7 of Nothing To. Series
Copyright © 2023 Scarlett Finn
Published by Moriona Press 2023
All rights reserved.
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
First published in 2023
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form on by an electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.
All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
www.scarlettfinn.com
NOTHING TO…
Nothing to Hide
Nothing to Lose
Nothing in Between: One
Nothing to Declare
Nothing to Us
Nothing in Between: Two
Nothing to Say
Nothing to Gain
Nothing in Between: Three
Nothing to You
One Wild Night: Nothing to This
Nothing to This
Read them in order for maximized reading pleasure.
For other titles from Scarlett Finn, please read on after the story.
Click here if you’d like to email Scarlett.
Enjoy!
Contents
ONE
TWO
THREE
FOUR
FIVE
SIX
SEVEN
EIGHT
NINE
TEN
ELEVEN
TWELVE
THIRTEEN
FOURTEEN
FIFTEEN
SIXTEEN
SEVENTEEN
EIGHTEEN
NINETEEN
TWENTY
TWENTY-ONE
TWENTY-TWO
TWENTY-THREE
TWENTY-FOUR
TWENTY-FIVE
TWENTY-SIX
TWENTY-SEVEN
TWENTY-EIGHT
TWENTY-NINE
THIRTY
THIRTY-ONE
THIRTY-TWO
THIRTY-THREE
THIRTY-FOUR
THIRTY-FIVE
THIRTY-SIX
THIRTY-SEVEN
THIRTY-EIGHT
ONE
“Women put up with you because you buy them diamonds.”
Xander Gauge was used to his buddies not pulling their punches, but even that was damn on the nose for Lance.
“Geez, tell me how you really feel why don’t you,” Xander said, taking their food from the room service cart to slide it across the suite’s dining table to each of his friends.
“It’s true,” Ethan said, grabbing a fork, using it to gesture around the penthouse suite. “You don’t even have an apartment. You move from five-star hotel to five-star hotel. Luxury is your norm.”
“There’s no point buying somewhere,” Xander said, sitting at the circular table with his friends. “Which city would I settle in?”
“Exactly the point,” Ethan said, jabbing the fork his way before spearing a vegetable.
Narrowing his eyes, he shook his head. “What’s the point?”
“The point is, without a lot of gravy, a woman like Courtney Sarandos doesn’t go with a guy who only calls her once a month.”
What the hell did that mean? Ethan was busy with his food when his brows rose, but Lance was ready to explain.
“Diamonds are the gravy,” Lance said. “We’re just saying no other guy would get away with treating women the way you do.”
Almost offended, Xander couldn’t believe his ears. “I’m respectful of women. What the hell?”
“You’re respectful when you’re with them,” Lance said, adjusting to twist more toward him. “Nine times out of ten, how do you get a date?” Xander didn’t respond. “Your people call their people, right? Or the other way around. There’s no… spontaneity.”
“I’m a shit date. Is that what you’re saying?”
Both Lance and Ethan shook their heads. “You don’t go through what the rest of us have to,” Ethan said. “For you, it’s like browsing a catalog. You see someone you like and get Topher to figure it out, then the beautiful, incredible model just appears in the restaurant or outside the event, just there, like you called and ordered her to your bed.”
“Okay, that’s not true.”
But his friends were on a roll. “Women agree to go out with you because they Google you or their people know who you are. They hear ‘rich’ and ‘not an ogre’ and they give you a shot,” Ethan said. “You don’t need to run the gauntlet like the rest of the population.”
“It’s not like you two are out trawling dive bars every Friday night. You clean up good too… You should, I pay you enough.”
Lance opened a hand at Ethan. “And that’s before we even get to how they fall over each other to be perfect for him.”
“Oh, yeah,” Ethan agreed. “Bet they get up to all kinds of kinky shit trying to impress him.”
Exasperated, his mouth opened wide before he got to seeking words. “What the hell are we talking about now?”
“You don’t live in the real world, buddy,” Lance said, eating some more. “Get used to it.”
Ethan leaned over his plate. “You date them while you’re in town… At most, they get a date a week, maybe every other week, depends how busy you are.”
“We’re all married to our jobs,” he said, not appreciating how his friends singled him out.
Neither of them listened. Was he on mute?
“A month later,” Ethan said. “You blow out of town with a ‘see ya, babe.’”
Lance laughed. “But still they’re calling, asking when he’ll be back.”
“Yeah, and when he eventually makes time a million weeks later, they’re happy to be sitting there waiting… On their backs and ready.”
“Okay,” Xander said, dropping his flatware in a clatter on his plate. “What am I? A gigolo now?”
“Sort of the opposite actually,” Ethan said, frowning at Lance, who was nodding.
“We’re saying,” Lance said. “They’re so eager because in the interim, Topher’s been on it, racking up the spend on your Cartier account.”
“I don’t—” Xander stopped talking when his friends laid knowing looks on him. “Okay, it’s possible, just possible, we have accounts with a couple of jewelers.”
“And it’s never him that actually chooses the thing,” Ethan said to Lance.
“No, Topher does that… or he just gives the jeweler a price bracket and an address.”
Both guys turned to him again. “You don’t live in the real world.”
“And no woman would put up with you if it wasn’t for the sparkly, expensive perks.”
“I’m fundamentally unlovable,” Xander said. “That’s what you’re getting at.”
Again, his friends laughed, leaving him in the dark.
“Buddy,” Lance said, slapping a hand on the table. “How many women in the last…?” he thought about it for a second, “let’s say five years… How many of them have brought up marriage with you?”
“All of them want a future,” Ethan said. “Usually after they’ve been dating him for ten minutes.”
“All of them love you, if you want to put it that way.”
“Not that they actually have a damn clue who he really is.”
Lance nodded. “He doesn’t know them either. When does he have time to get to know someone?”
“How did all this come from my telling you I ended things with Courtney?” Xander asked.
“You ended it because she wanted a ring, and you just didn’t have the time.”
“They’d been dating six months,” Ethan said. “He always needs a regular date over the holidays. And he leaves a little time after, just so they don’t get suspicious.”
“Shit, who have you been talking to? I was getting this same rhetoric last Saturday at Reid’s engagement party too,” Xander said. “Courtney and I were dating six months, so what?”
There was a thread of pity in their next bout of laughter. “He doesn’t even know if that’s an appropriate timescale,” Lance said. “The minute women talk commitment, moving in or marriage, you are out of there.”
“I should stick around?”
“No,” Lance said. “They don’t love you. They want to be with you because you’re rich.”
Ethan shook his head. “If you weren’t rich, your relationships wouldn’t last a week.”
“What’s his average?” Lance asked Ethan. “About ninety days, right?” Ethan nodded. “By ninety days women who’ve only been out with you a handful of times start talking about the next step.”
“Which is right about when you break it off… because you don’t know how to have a real relationship.”
“And the women you choose don’t either. The money’s what they’re interested in.”
“Because no regular mortal woman would put up with you.”
“Nice,” Xander said, nodding slowly. “So all the women I date are shallow?”
Lance shrugged. “And vapid most of the time.”
The guys didn’t mean this. Couldn’t… Except he knew them well enough to read their sincerity.
“You’re wrong,” he said while suspecting they could be right on the money. “Yes, I have experience with different kinds of women—” His friends’ sudden blast of laughter cut him off
“You date exactly the same woman over and over,” Ethan said. “Every one of them is cookie-cutter glossy magazine perfect.”
“Gorgeous, glamorous, money-obsessed.”
“I’m surprised you could even tell them apart. No real woman spends six hours getting ready to meet for dinner.”
“Real woman, real woman,” he said. “Who is this real woman?”
“A woman who doesn’t know you’re worth the gross national product of a small country,” Lance said. “A woman who holds down a job. Who pays her own bills… and doesn’t have an entourage constantly reminding her how gorgeous she is.”
“How come this is all about me?” he asked, leaving the table to go to the wet bar. If ever there was a moment for a drink, he was in it. “I don’t see either of you rushing to put rings on anyone’s fingers.”
“We have real relationships,” Ethan said. “Women actually dump us.”
“Yeah, they bust our balls when we don’t call or show up too. Women hold us to account.”
“And they expect us to share.” Share? His surprised attention sprang from the decanter in his hand paused in midair over the glass. The conversation had taken a sharp, interesting, turn. “Our feelings,” Ethan groaned in explanation, glaring at him. “Not the fun kind of sharing you get with all the models lined up waiting to take their turn in your bed…” Rather than stop at a regular measure, he tipped just a little more into the heavy-based crystal tumbler. Solidarity had to come from somewhere. If not his friends, liquor would do. “I bet you lose count sometimes.”
If that was envy in Ethan’s tone, he didn’t know what the hell he was talking about. “When do I have time for these orgies?”
His friends carried on, still not listening apparently.
“Yeah, we have to talk, get sensitive,” Lance said. “We can’t just grunt a few words about our shitty day and then get our cocks sucked.”
“This is a great conversation,” he said, swinging the glass to his lips. “We should do this more often. Next time we’ll rip one of you apart.”
The weight of his friends’ expectation hung in the air as he gulped the much-needed alcohol. Now, apparently, they wanted to listen. Instinct demanded he argue. To tell the guys they were wrong. That he did have real relationships. That the women he dated weren’t superficial and two-dimensional.
Except if they were wrong, he wouldn’t have complained about every woman he dated being quick to bring up marriage. Even the younger women, those in their early twenties, they all eventually talked about serious commitment.
His friends weren’t wrong about the quality of his relationships either. He didn’t connect and share. For months, maybe years, everything had felt mechanical, like he was going through the motions. At work, he knew what was expected of him. New investments, listening to pitches, the excitement of a risk, those were the things that warmed his blood.
But in his personal life… When was the last time he’d listened when a date was talking? Really listened? He couldn’t remember. They’d go for drinks, for dinner, and they’d tell him about their careers or their friends. He’d hear them. The words went in. They just didn’t linger. He’d respond appropriately but couldn’t recite any of his own mutterings. Conversations like that didn’t stick.
Professional Xander could be bold or harsh, whatever was required. Personal Xander spent most of his life numb. Work was always on his mind. Dates felt like a waste of his time. During them, he usually focused on how quickly he could get back to work or some situation connected to the business. When was the last time he’d been enraptured by a woman? The last time he’d been in the moment with one? He couldn’t remember that either. In fact, he had no memory of ever being consumed by a personal relationship the way he was by a professional one.
Lowering the glass, he exhaled. “God, it’s depressing.”
Rather than commiserate, his friends smiled and nodded in agreement. Even his friendships were professional. Ethan Atwell was his CFO, keeping a tight rein on the many strands of Venture International Incorporated, VII, colloquially known as “Seven.” Lance Payne was his Chief Operations Officer, working his ass off to keep the wheels turning in the ever-expanding juggernaut.
“Want to talk some more about the Summit Sponsorship?” Ethan asked.
That inspired such interest, he took a step toward the table. “Yes. God, please.”
“No, no, no,” Lance said, not so quick to move on. “We don’t identify problems and then ignore them. Did we get as far as we did by giving up?”
“What are you thinking?”
Ethan might be interested to know; he wasn’t as eager. That light in Lance’s eye was ominous. He’d seen it before. Inspiration had struck his buddy. In business, that worked out for him. Lance’s ability to think fast on his feet made him good at what he did.
“We practice our people skills,” Lance said, rising to go over to the file box in the corner. “For ninety days, he’s got to make it work with a real woman.”
“What are you going to do?” he asked. “Cut my allowance?”
“No, you keep your money,” Lance said, retrieving a file. “You just can’t tell her about it. You don’t tell her your real name or what you really do. She’s got to believe you’re just a regular Joe.”
“Why would I agree to that?”
“The business won’t suffer,” Lance said, mirroring him in his approach to the table until they came to a stop on opposite sides. “You do what you do, just… I don’t know, rent a shitty, regular Joe looking office with crappy furniture and a fake plant… You do what you do remotely. We’ll pick a random city in the US. Topher will rent you an apartment, basic, one bed.”
“You want to set me up in a drug den?”
“No,” Lance said on a snicker. “You can live in a nice, safe neighborhood. The aim is to prove our point, not to get you killed.”
“Your point that I can’t keep a woman happy without money,” he said to his friend’s shrug. “Aren’t we getting a little old for frat boy games?”
Thirty-five wasn’t exactly ancient, he just didn’t have the patience for screwing around like he used to. Which was maybe the foundation of his buddies’ point and why it was breaking through. His professional life was soaring, yet he was unsatisfied. Going to bland hotel suite after bland hotel suite, his personal life was a revolving door of blah. If it wasn’t some corporate function, it was a charity event, or a date with a perfectly fine woman.
He was the job. Nothing more. He loved the job. But he was good at it, maybe too good. The challenge used to be his favorite part. He’d gotten so good, it was almost impossible to fail. Seven was so huge now that even he couldn’t control every nuance. That was when he’d set up the Summit Sponsorship. The program invited start-up companies to pitch ideas for investment. It was supposed to help him recapture the high of the early days. Sometimes he got glimmers of that stimulation, but there was no exhilaration anymore, no real thrill.
“If you’re scared…” Lance said, smirking.
Deadpan, he looked at Ethan. “And now he thinks he can bait me into it.”
“I think it’s worth a cool million.”
A million dollars was nothing. Why would he play along for the sake of such a measly amount—Lance held up a file and then tossed it across the table.
He didn’t have to open the file to know whose it was. “BlueGold,” he said, recalling their disagreement earlier in the day. “It’s a dud.”
“And we’ll never know,” Lance said, his smile becoming much more satisfied as he folded his arms. “Because you make the calls.”
“You want us to stake our professional judgment on a personal bet?”
Lance shrugged. “You make it ninety days committed to the same woman, a regular woman, who doesn’t know about your personal wealth, and we’ll never talk about it again.”
“If I don’t, you get the million investment.”
“And we find out who was right, you or me.”
The Summit Sponsorship always brought disagreements. He called the shots. So they’d never found out if the companies Lance and Ethan went to bat for without his support would’ve been a good investment or not. It was a bone of contention that could often lead to different companies coming up in conversation throughout the year.
