can just fill that in.”
What the fuck?
“Is three hundred enough?”
“What?” I figured he was giving me three hundred dollars to keep me afloat until I found an apartment of my own, and though the offer was considerate since he didn’t have to give me anything at all, I still wanted nothing to do with taking this man’s money.
“I’ll make it four,” he said.
“I don’t want your money.”
He stopped writing and looked up at me, his eyes blazing. “You don’t have a choice.” He finished writing the check, placed it on the edge of the counter, and put the pen back carefully in its place. “You’re going to leave this apartment, Drew, and you’re never going to speak to either of my children again. And you will never speak of this to another person. If anyone finds out about this, it’ll ruin any shot my fucking idiot of a son has at making something of himself, should he ever decide to do the right thing. As it is now, I’ll have to figure out how to get him excused from his finals.”
I heard what he was saying about Brody, but I didn’t focus on it. I was too caught up in thinking about a life without Sophia.
“No.” I shook my head. “I understand that I can’t pretend to be Brody anymore, and I won’t fight you on that. But Sophia and I…” I’d never said the words I was about to say, but if I had any chance to convince Mr. Mason that my relationship with Sophia didn’t stop here, this was it. “There’s something between us,” I said. “I love your daughter.”
“Does Sophia know that?”
“I’ve never told her,” I said softly.
Mr. Mason grabbed his coat and pulled it on, clearly not willing to bend. “Then you’ll keep it like that,” he said. It was a directive, an order not to be argued with. “Sophia’s a good girl. She’s smart and determined, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to let her settle for someone with a sketchy background and no education. You’ll just bring her down, and if you don’t realize that, eventually she will.”
And there it was. The lion had finally clawed at me until I couldn’t fight back. At least not in any way that made me think I could win.
“You’re no good for either of my kids, so stay out of their lives.”
“You think I’m going to stay away from the woman I love for four hundred dollars?”
“No,” he said, grabbing the door handle. “You’re going to stay away from her for four hundred thousand.” With that, he closed the door, leaving me standing in an apartment I wondered if I’d ever see again.
Mr. Mason was right about one thing: Brody was a fucking idiot.
Then again, so was I.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
S O P H I A
Standing in front of the door of my sorority, I tried to get my breathing under control. This was it. All the bullshit of the last couple of months had led me to this moment. I would either vanquish Aamee to the depths of hell where she belonged, or I would be able to free the kingdom so that we could live in perpetual sunshine and happiness.
I was clearly losing my mind.
I took one more deep breath and went inside. There was a steady murmur of voices coming from the large room where we held our meetings. When I walked into the room, all the conversations going on ceased as everyone’s eyes fell on me. It was a tad overwhelming.
“Hey,” I said dumbly, because what the hell else was I supposed to say? I’d been waiting for this decision for months, but now that it had arrived, I wanted to be anywhere but here.
“Hi, Sophia,” Sam said, her voice friendly but professional.
I looked around at all the officers gathered at the front of the room and was suddenly overcome by how seriously they took all of this. They all stood there in cute outfits, perfectly pressed and tailored, with their makeup and hair done impeccably.
I’d thrown on jeans and a sweater of questionable cleanliness because of my parents’ surprise visit and also because I’d been too busy fucking my secret boyfriend over the past few days to do laundry. Our priorities were so wildly different, and I wondered if they’d always been or if this was a relatively new development.
“Why don’t you come sit over here? Aamee has called an emergency meeting to address some…concerns.” Sam’s eyes cut to Aamee when she spoke,