Page 39 of The Damaged Billionaire's Obsession

Da always warned me about how much I loved money.

“The allure of wealth nurtures the seeds of sin, Siobhán,”he'd say.

I didn't love money, per se. I just had a healthy respect for it. I doubted my parents realized how poor we were. We managed to eat okay, and I only got a room to myself because I was an only child and some new convert’s family hadn’t need it. Yet.

Most of my clothes came from the quarterly Harmonial gathering giveaways and charity shops. Some of them were actually decent, but being the daughter of a master, I was often last to pick. Most normal clothes were off-limits in the Sect. If it didn't look like a gunny sack or seem like it was about to fall apart, then we had better let some poorer person have it. If it accentuated the figure in any way, then it was sinful.

Which didn't help if you were trying to catch the eye of your secondary school crush. Tall and muscular, with thick, surfer hair and baby blue eyes, Jake was the star, the Fly-half of the school's rugby team.

And in a torrid, tumultuous relationship with Margo O’Hara, a girl who looked like she could have been on a runway somewhere.

I would sigh, knowing I was overreaching, but even a girl like me could dream. I had to accept, though, that contrary to the way my dreams went, Jake would never notice me.

Not unless I did something.

And so one day after school, I took a big risk and wrote Jake a letter offering tutoring, and signed my name along with the tiniest heart on the bottom, a small clue to my real feelings.

After I left the letter in his desk and went home, the enormity of what I’d done dawned on me. What if he laughed in my face? What if he showed everybody? Or, the worst outcome, if it ever got back to the Sect that I wrote a love letter to a boy?

I'd stayed up all night obsessing, regretting my decision, knowing there was no point sneaking out of the house to try and retrieve the letter because the school would be closed.

I was determined to be the first one in class the next morning so I could get the letter out before Jake or any of his friends saw it.

To my horror, the desk was empty when I got there.

I'd freaked out, finally confessing to Maeve, the only friend I was allowed to have because her parents also belonged to the Sect. We'd both crossed our fingers, praying no one saw it.

Nothing happened throughout that day, and just when I was thinking that I might have escaped an embarrassing fate, miracles of miracles, Jake Tyler approached me after school.

He was so much hotter up close, and he was nice, smiled a lot, and actually took me up on my tutoring offer. He'd suggested that we wait for half an hour after school, three days a week.

I fell in love. Even Maeve was green with envy, but she'd sworn not to say anything and to cover for me by waiting for me, so our parents truly believed we were studying.

So, three days a week, Jake and I would wait around after school. Only, we never studied. He always wanted to talk about himself, about rugby, about his family, his relationship with Margo. I couldn't even charge him. I didn't want to cheapen what I had with Jake by exchanging money.

He never once asked me about me, but I didn't mind in the slightest. There was nothing about me worth talking about anyway. Besides, with the amount of attention I was getting from those baby blues, I wouldn’t have been able to string intelligent words together.

When I did manage to say something, it was always to agree with him, validate his feelings, or praise his performance in a recent rugby match.

Of course, I attended all his games. I did all his homework and everything else he asked of me, including fading into the background when his friends came along. I didn't even mind that he kept going out with Margo. He’d already told me theydidn't love each other; they only pretended to date to keep up appearances and make their families happy.

When he and Margo finally broke up shortly before debs, I couldn't believe my luck.

I wasn’t allowed to go to debs, but I knew that if Jake ever asked me, I would find a way to go.

Or die trying.

Maeve and I had talked about it at length and decided if he ever did ask me, she would have to go too, so that we would have a plausible cover story.

We'd started planning and perfecting our cover story about setting up a Harmonial youth devotion retreat. I had some money hidden away from all the tutoring, so we snuck into an 'unapproved' charity shop and got ourselves dresses, hiding them in Maeve's school locker.

All these in the event of Jake asking me to debs.

He did not in fact, ask me. He asked Fancy Richmond, another senior. I was heartbroken but said nothing at first, although it was written all over me.

When I eventually plucked up the courage to tell him how I felt, he’d laughed in my face, saying that even though he liked me and all, he had a reputation to protect. He also pointed out that being so rich and popular, there was no way I could hide going to debs with him from my parents and Sect folks.

I supposed he had a point there.