I sighed. “You’re tearing this family apart.”
“There’s no family here, Carter. Just my mom and me.”
“Fine. We’re not a family. Hell, I never wanted a family. But I at least want to do right by your mother, and I need you to play along if that’s going to happen.”
“I’m here,” she pointed out. “I’m playing nice.”
“Fine. I guess that’s all I can ask of you.”
“I guess so.”
We lapsed into silence for a second and I got another look at her. She glanced over and caught me staring, but I only smiled at her, not bothering to look away. For a second, I thought she was going to throw her sunglasses at me, but instead she just sighed.
“Okay, fine. Maybe I’m not making this easy.”
“I never said I wanted easy, darling.” I grinned at her.
She ignored me and went on. “I just don’t want to see my mother get sucked into one of your stupid scandals.”
“That’s fair. Nobody wants that.”
“And yet here you are, married to her.”
“It’s only a scandal if we get caught.”
“What makes you think you’ll get away with this one?”
“I’m an optimist, Emily, my dear.”
“Stop that. You know you’re not old enough to be my father, right?”
“I’m well aware.” I grinned at her. “But I’d love to be your daddy.”
She sighed, shaking her head. “I don’t know why I bother with you.”
I laughed. “Come on, where’s your sense of humor? Our situation is pretty funny.”
“Not to me, it isn’t.”
“Fine. Let’s at least call a truce.”
“Truce?”
“Try not to look at me like you want to kill me for a while.”
“And what will you do?”
I leaned toward her. “I’ll try not to look at you like I want to fuck you.”
She blushed and stared at me for a second. “Okay,” she said. “I can try.”
“Good. I can try too. No promises though. Because I do want to drag you into my bedroom and fuck your warm, tight cunt until you’re begging me not to stop.”
“You’re breaking the truce right now, you know.”
I laughed and looked away, taking a deep breath to calm my hammering heart. “Okay,” I said. “One more thing.”
“What?”
“A little present for you.” I reached into my pocket and dug out the phone, holding it out for her.
She took it tentatively. “What is this?”
“It’s a prototype phone that Valor is working on.”
“I didn’t know you guys were making a phone.”
“Nobody does. This is the second one in existence.”
“Seriously?”
I nodded. “Seriously. I want you to test it out for me.”
“I thought this was a gift.”
“It is a gift. You can control the whole house through that phone.” I paused for a second. “It’s also insurance for you.”
“How?”
“If shit goes wrong, sell that phone.”
She laughed. “One phone won’t be enough to cover the damage you cause.”
“If you play your cards right, I bet you can get at least fifty grand for it. Probably more if you get a few tech blogs bidding on it.”
“Wait, seriously?”
I nodded, standing up. “Seriously. Like I said, it’s only the second one in existence. The tech media is going to want to get a hold of that pretty badly.”
“And you’re just giving it to me?”
“Like I said, it’s a gift and it’s insurance.” I turned and started walking away.
“Carter.”
I paused and looked back at her.
She smiled at me. “Thanks.”
“Sure. Just try not to lose it.”
I turned and headed off, wondering how long I was going to be able to keep this truce. Probably a few hours at most.
5
Emily
Maybe I was too hard on Carter.
The phone thing seemed like a big deal. I did some quick Googling later on and found out that prototype phones like the one he gave me could sell for serious cash, just like he said. But more than that, a leaked prototype could totally wreck a company’s plans and cost them millions.
The phone wasn’t just insurance. It was also a promise. Carter was serious about all of this, or at least serious enough to gamble big money and bad press.
He was probably already gambling bad press, but still. That night, I found myself on the couch, fiddling with all of the functions on the phone.
He wasn’t kidding. I really could control most of the house with the phone. I could lock my doors, turn on the stove, even start the ice maker in the freezer. I could control the TV if I wanted to. It was actually pretty amazing that all of these things were connected up and easily accessed through a single phone. There was all the normal functionality built into it like apps and all that, and it felt pretty cool to hold, but the real impressive part was the home control aspect.