Page 89 of Power

I didn’t turn around. Couldn’t. Because I knew that if I faced him now, with rain streaming down my face, masking what might or might not be tears, whatever came next would change everything.

His hand closed around my wrist, and he slowly turned me to face him. Lightning flashed overhead, illuminating his face in stark relief. Jaw clenched, eyes blazing, hair plastered to his forehead by the rain.

He looked nothing like a billionaire CEO now.

He looked like a man on the edge of something dangerous.

45

SCARLETT

I looked up at Jace, standing there in his almost-drenched suit. His green eyes were fixed on me, attentive and questioning. ThatForbes-cover-worthy haircut framed a face that was just unfairly handsome. All of it dripping wet from the thunderstorm raging as much around us as in my heart.

“This is uncharted territory for me,” Jace started. “I never intended to hurt you or diminish your worth. I see your talent, your drive; you’re more than deserving of that promotion. I thought I was helping by moving quickly, but I never meant to upset you.”

His words washed away some of my anger, but good intentions didn’t erase the reality check I’d just received. Jace wielded the kind of enormous power that could create a new position with the stroke of a pen while I’d sacrificed weekends and sleep just for a chance to be considered.

“You know this is something that no matter how hard you try, you’ll never understand,” I began, my voice steady despite the tremor in my chest. “You’ve always had power. You were born with it because of your money, your family’s influence. One phone call from your parents could probably make most problems disappear.”

Jace’s shoulders tensed slightly, but he remained silent, giving me space to continue.

“I shoved a kid once and was suspended for three days. My grades suffered,” I said. His jawline tightened, the first hint that my words were landing. “In high school, my friend shoplifted a shirt worth one hundred and one dollars—one dollar over the felony threshold. She’s been a convicted felon ever since, struggling to find work.” I faced him directly. “But if your friends had done something similar, their parents would’ve probably called the prosecutor or judge. Any charges probably would have disappeared entirely.”

“Scarlett,” he started, his deep voice soft.

Lightning illuminated the sidewalk, cars sloshing past with the scoop-slap of their wipers.

I held up my hand. “We live in different worlds, Jace. You’re swimming with a current rushing you forward. I’m not saying you don’t face obstacles or hardships, but the current works for you, not against you. Your chances of landing where you want to be are high. When you speak, people believe you.”

His eyes never left my face, conflict evident as recognition dawned that I might be right.

“I grew up fighting against a current designed to push people back and hold them down. My father held me down. Even an abuser was believed more than my mother.”

Jace’s hand twitched at his side, as if wanting to reach for me but thinking better of it.

“I finally break free, put myself through college, get my mom out, build a career from scratch,” I said, words tumbling faster, “and then some privileged man who probably never heard the wordno, whose problems magically disappeared, who never learned you couldn’t abuse power … he and I ended up in the same room, and he tried to take it all away.”

Jace stepped forward, his muscled frame rigid.

I shook my head. “That’s something you can’t understand. I know you’ll try, and I appreciate that. But you’ll never fully graspwhat it’s like to know that if you raise your hand against someone powerful, the most likely outcome is that your career will end while he gets nothing but a slap on the wrist. That’s the power you represent to me now. And I don’t know if it’ll ever be something I can get past.”

He ran a hand through his hair, momentarily disrupting it before it fell right back into place.

Even his hair obeys him, I thought bitterly. Even when he was in the middle of the thunderstorm, his hair did exactly what he probably wanted it to do.

“Let’s look at more examples. How many times did you go to bed hungry? Did you wonder where your next meal would come from?” I stepped closer. “I did. My father would raid the cabinets as punishment.”

Jace’s neck tightened, a vein popping out.

“How about college? Did you wonder how to pay for it? I worked three jobs, applied for every loan and aid possible. It was almost impossible. I bet funding wasn’t even on your to-do list.”

He opened his mouth, then closed it again.

“And consequences? Does the world throw the book at a Lockwood, or do they appreciate your family’s donations?”

Something in his face darkened. His Adam’s apple bobbed with … was that guilt?

“Then job interviews. Have you ever had a boss threaten your promotion by putting his hand on your thigh, making it clear there was only one way you’d get it?”