The Love Of Money - Episode 301
31-08-25 (06:36)
I felt slender fingers slip into mine and glanced up to
see Erin standing supportively beside me. She squeezed
my hand before letting go and carefully walking further
into the room.
“You didn’t know about this?” I turned back toward the
door to see Quentin leaning against the wooden frame,
staring listlessly into the room. “How long have you
been out here?”
Quentin shrugged. “About a week?”
“And you didn’t hear anything?” I asked.
“Nope,” he said, looking around the room. He didn’t look
particularly disturbed, which I found strange. I don’t care
what my relationship with my grandfather was like; if a
room in my family home had been ransacked more
than a week ago, I would have been highly disturbed.
Clearly, he could see the suspicion written all over my
face because he said, “Like I said, I haven’t been in this
room in more than a year. Gramps kept it locked.”
“And you haven’t been the least curious about what’s in
here?” I asked.
“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’ve been busy.”
I sighed and looked around the room, feeling my hope
of finding anything here beginning to crumble. “You
guys see anything interesting?” I asked my security
detail.
“That,” Chloe said. She kept her hands in her pockets
the entire time, so she simply nodded at a laptop under
the desk. It had a hole drilled through it roughly where'
a mechanical hard drive would be. “Your visitor knew
what they were doing.”
“Dammit,” I muttered. “What are the chances of it
having a digital hard drive?”
“Computer looks older,” Chloe said, looking doubtful,
“but we can try.
“Safe’s been drilled,” John said, pushing the door
partially closed with an elbow so the hole was
completely visible. “Looks like a clean job.”
“Definitely knew what they were doing,” Chloe said,
peering at the hole in the safe’s door.
“Bar looks good,” Quentin said, and the sound of
crunching glass told me he was stepping into the room.
Chloe, John, and I turned to see him making his way to
a bar along one wall with several bottles of liquor
behind it and a couple of glasses resting on its surface.
“Don’t touch anything,” Chloe groused.
“Make me, Karen,” Quentin said, reaching for one of the
glasses.
“Quentin!” I barked, and he stopped just short of
reaching for the glass. Instead, he turned, leaned back
against the bar, and cocked his head to the side,
appraising me. I could tell he was offended by the tone
I’d taken with him, but he was trying to keep his
emotions in check. The way he worked his mouth
suggested his casual bravado was a facade.
“Well… look at you, walking in here and barking
orders,” he said. He sounded amused, but his tone had
an undercurrent of malice.
“She told us to not touch anything,” I said. “You want
them to find out who did this or not?”
“I don’t care,” Quentin said. “Honestly, I might have
done the same if I’d been able to get in here.”
“Then just leave. We don’t need you contaminating
anything.”
“Fuck that,” Quentin said, any attempt to hide his
contempt fading with every word. “I’ve been coming
here since I was a kid. I’ve been throwing parties here
for years. Suddenly, you show up and start giving
orders? Who the fuck do you think you are?”
Now, I was getting mad.
Sure, Quentin may have had a reason to hate me
because I inherited everything from under him, but he
didn’t know me. I would have been happy to have
another brother to share everything with. He could
have brought his friends back here all he wanted for all
I cared, but not if he was going to be a complete
asshole. I already had one Jacob in my life. I didn’t need
another.
“I’m the guy who owns this place, and you’re
trespassing. I feel like I’ve been perfectly reasonable,
considering I’ve only known you for fifteen minutes,
and I certainly haven’t given any orders, but if you can’t
listen to simple instructions that make sense, round
everybody up and take your party somewhere' else.”
“Hey, baby!” a voice called out from just outside the
office door in the hallway. “Are you in here?”
My blood ran cold.
I knew that voice.
I turned toward the study door.
Natalie blinked as she stared back at me through the
doorway, looking as stunning as she did confused. She
wore a yellow bikini that contrasted beautifully with
her caramel skin. The triangles of fabric over her large
breasts covered most of each mound—making it
conservative compared to some of the others I’d seen
in the house—but left plenty of side boob and cleavage
for my eyes to feast on. The curves of her waist
begged for an arm to wrap around them, and they
flared into very feminine hips that supported a
generous but firm ass. The cut of the bikini bottoms ran
high on her hips, leaving most of them bare and
mouthwatering. Her dark hair hung loosely halfway
down her back, her full lips were slightly parted, and
her dark eyes were wide in shock.
Whatever surprise she was feeling couldn’t have begun
to compare to mine.
“Marcus?” Natalie asked with disbelief in her voice.
“Natalie?” I asked. “What are you doing here?”
I didn’t mean for it to sound so mean or accusatory, but
I was just so confused. Natalie was supposed to be on
vacation with her new boyfriend. She wasn’t supposed
to be standing in my vacation home-turned-drug den.
Well, that wasn’t exactly true… I’d asked her to come
with me, but she made it perfectly clear that wasn’t
going to happen. So why the fuck was I looking at her
in my house dressed like that?
I wasn’t the only one surprised. So was everyone else.
Everyone in that room was stone still, waiting
breathlessly for the answer.
“What?” Natalie asked. She grabbed the door frame
and leaned into the room to look around so she
wouldn’t have to step on broken glass with her bare
feet. “I was invited!”
I balked at that. “Wait… Tyler’s here?” I looked at
Quentin. “You’re friends with Tyler?”
Instead of answering my question, Quentin walked
past me to Natalie, took her hand, leaned in, and
planted his lips on hers. “Hey.”
Natalie kissed him back, but—unable to take her eyes
off me—it was a distracted reciprocation. When she
didn’t look at him, Quentin repeated, “Hey, Nat.”
Nat… that was what I called her. Never mind that half
the people at Marduke called her that, too, but that’s
what I called her… this guy didn’t get to call her that. He
didn’t know her.
Did he?
Natalie finally tore her eyes away from me to look at
Quentin. “Um… what?”
“What did you need?” Quentin asked.
Nat looked back at me. “What’s Marcus doing here?”
I started to speak, “I—”
“He owns the house now,” Quentin cut me off. “He had
plans out here this weekend, and we were just
discussing how to deal with this mix-up. Did you need
something?”
“I, uh…” Natalie started, looking back and forth between
me and Quentin. “I… um… I was just wondering if there
was a good place for Wendy to lie down. She just
threw up and—”
“Sure,” Quentin said, cutting her off. “My room.
Remember how to find it?”
Natalie stared at Quentin for a prolonged moment and
then slowly nodded.
“Go take her there. I’ll come check on her when we’re
finished here.”
Natalie turned to leave but then hesitated as her gaze
fell back on me. She still looked like she was trying to
comprehend what I was doing there, and as I stared
back at her, I wasn’t sure what to do. I wanted to grill
her for information and find out what the hell was
going on, but I couldn’t just do that in front of all these
people… especially when she looked so confused.
“Marcus,” she started to say.
“Baby,” Quentin said, “Could you just take care of that
for me?”
Chewing on the inside of her cheek like I’d seen her do
countless times, Natalie gave one last glance between
Quentin and me before finally turning to leave, brushing
past a new person standing in the hallway—quite
possibly one of the largest women I’d ever seen.
She stood about 6’3” tall, so she had a couple of inches
on me. Her hair was dark pink and shaved on the sides
while the remainder was pulled back in a tight ponytail.
Built like an Amazon warrior, she wore a sleeveless
shirt, well-fitting fatigues, and a pair of black boots that
laced up to mid-calf. Her arms were as thick as my
thighs and ripped, and I could tell the rest of her was
just as muscular under the shirt she wore. She had tits,
but it looked like she was wearing some sort of
compression bra that kept them pressed close to her
chest, making it impossible to know their size. She
wore very little makeup and had a clear, fair
complexion complimented by dark pink lips in a
pleasant cupid’s bow shape.
She also had a large pistol strapped to her right thigh.
“Sorry,” the pink-haired woman said. Her voice was a
little deeper than average for a woman but not
unpleasant. “She insisted.”
“What the fuck is going on here?” I demanded.
Quentin looked around the room at everyone else and
said, “Everyone, clear out! Marcus and I need to talk.”
Erin, Emily, and Natashya looked at me while John
glanced at Chloe. No one actually moved, though.
“I’m staying,” Chloe insisted.
“John,” I said. “Can you escort Erin, my sister, and
Natashya back downstairs? Chloe and I will join you
guys as soon as we can.”
John glanced at Chloe, who nodded her head once. He
moved toward the door. “Yes, sir.”
The girls glanced at each other before giving me
uncertain looks, and I nodded at them in reassurance.
Emily and Natashya turned to leave, but Erin waited a
beat longer as if double-checking to make sure I was
okay. Then she went with the others, and John
followed them out.
Quentin turned and headed back to the bar. “Liz, come
in and shut the door behind you.” The Amazonian
woman complied and leaned against the door with her
tree trunk arms crossed over her chest. She was clearly
some sort of security for Quentin and looked
intimidating as hell, guarding our only way out. Chloe,
who probably weighed a hundred pounds less than this
woman, simply leaned against the office desk, looking
cool and feigning unconcern as she eyed the two
strangers. I was starting to get better at reading her.
“You said your name’s Quentin,” I said, not bothering to
hide the heat in my voice.
“I always hated that name,” Quentin said, reaching
behind the bar and pulling out a fresh bottle. He began
unstoppering it, giving Chloe a look that dared him to
try and stop him. Chloe simply gave him her best dead-
eyed stare.
“My middle name’s Tyler,” he said, pouring a couple
fingers of brown liquor into one of the glasses on the
table. “It’s what my friends call me.”
He took a sip, swallowed it, and smirked. “Nat, too.”
The moment that stupid smirk crossed his lips… that’s
when Quinten Tyler Gerrard took Roger VanCamp’s
place at the top of my ‘most hated’ list.
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To Be Continued... Don't forget to leave a Comment 
