Despite the Gentleman's Riches: Sweet Billionaire Romance (For Richer or Poorer Book 1) Read Free Page B

possessed no cellphone to turn off, then the organizer took my arm and drew me further away from the crowd that had gathered around the snack station. Usually, actions like this one would have made my knees go a bit weak as I imagined that Brett had finally come to his senses and decided to ask me out on a date. But for some reason, the fish-sticks-and-pizza guy's face drifted up in my mind instead. Before meeting Mr. Movie Star, I'd thought that Brett was handsome, but now I realized that the organizer's face was a little childish and soft around the edges. No firm jaw slightly covered with the hint of a five-o-clock shadow, no blue eyes that seemed to pierce my skin and head straight for my soul....
    Remember, Mr. Handsome made you lose your job , I grumbled silently, forcing my flight of fancy to make an emergency landing. Cuadic was my real life, the reason I was able to put up with creepy landlords and soul-crushing jobs, so I'd better pay attention during my three hours of reality per week. Because the truth was that, while I really did care about my crusading efforts to extend lifespans (and had harbored a major crush on the organizer for years), my perfect-attendance record at Cuadic meetings was primarily due to feeling accepted among its members in a way I never did in the outside world. Despite our differing incomes, the middle-aged ladies of Cuadic embraced my weirdnesses, and I wanted to enjoy fitting in while I could.
    I turned my attention back to the guy in front of me, who had started our conversation without preamble. "Tonight we're going to be strategizing about the public hearing next week," Brett said, his eyes earnestly gazing into mine with a stare that had attracted so many middle-aged women to our cause. "I know you said that you'd be willing to make some posters for us to hold up outside the building, but I was hoping I could count on you to speak as well. I think more of our neighbors can relate to you than they can to the Señora," he added, the organizer's hint of a smile offering to share the joke with me. But this time I frowned instead of playing along.
    While it was true that Brett and I had laughed together about the Señora in the past, the organizer's joke now seemed to be in bad taste. Sure, the so-called Señora was a humorous figure, the ultra-rich ex-wife of a coal company executive who had joined our group as a way of thumbing her nose at a cheating husband. While the rest of us showed up at protests in old jeans and t-shirts, the Señora emerged from a slick sports car in heels and pearls. She thought hefty contributions to the cause would buy her new companions' affections, too, but nobody ever invited the Señora out for ice cream after a sit-in. In the end, although anyone could join Cuadic, that didn't make the Señora one of us.
    But was I any more a member of the group? I suddenly wondered if "Virginia Beauty" was my only nickname, or if Brett and company had dreamed up a less-fond moniker that they used behind my back. Was I equally laughable, the poor little trailer princess whose car roared as it pulled up out front because I couldn't afford to get the muffler fixed? Did the other Cuadic members sneer at all of my late-night cramming sessions as I used free library books to try to catch up to their level of education, hoping to make myself worthy of their organizer's notice?
    Whether my suspicions were true or entirely off base, though, I cared too much about the cause to let my insecurities sway me from the path. "Sure," I told Brett, agreeing easily. "I'll speak at the public hearing." No matter that stage fright would keep me up half the night beforehand, and that the action would make my job hunt even harder. I'd brave my way through the former, and would figure something out when the time came to pay the bills.
    I promised to speak at the hearing...but I didn't stay and bask in Brett's presence the way I usually would have. Instead, pretending that I'd developed a sudden