Entwine (Billionaire Series) by Evelyn Harper Page A

risky for me to teach
you to handle his investments at the moment. I’ll keep on maintaining them in
your name. This is the net worth – I want you to have it in case anything
happens.”
     
    He
didn’t need to say ‘to me’ at the end of his sentence – we could both feel the
words squatting there, unspoken.
     
    “I
don’t want it,” I told him emphatically. “I can take care of myself, and I
don’t need this money. It’s not mine, and I don’t want it.” I sounded like a
child arguing about a candy bar, but I didn’t care. I wanted him to know that I
couldn’t be bought so easily.
     
    “Amanda,
your uncle would want me to provide for you – the money is yours by rights. He
wanted you to have it – and I do too.”
     
    “Well,
you’re going to have to take it back,” I insisted stubbornly. “I won’t use it
and I won’t accept any money from you.”
     
    “You’re
still so stubborn,” Mathis said with a sigh. “I’m not going to take it back.
It’s rightfully yours and I would be stealing from you if I took it. It’s yours
to do what you like with, even if that means growing an exciting collection of
dust bunnies. It’s up to you.”
     
    I
had to smile at that. Mathis had the ability to make me smile no matter how
serious the situation. Even so, I didn’t want to accept the money.
     
    “I
don’t want it,” I said again. “Mathis, I want to know what’s happening. Do you
really think there is danger for me? Have you decided what you’re going to do
about this crime boss guy? Has he tried to contact you again? I need to know.”
     
    “You
don’t need to know,” Mathis said, and the trace of humor had disappeared from
his voice. “Try not to worry about it, Amanda. It’s my problem to deal with,
not yours. The important thing is that you are safe and provided for. Let me
worry about everything else. In the meantime, you just need to stay away from
me.”
     
    I
almost shouted in frustration, but I kept my temper.
     
    “Mathis,
I can’t help but worry – I need to know what’s happening,” I insisted.
     
    “I’m
sorry,” he said. “Just keep away. Goodbye, Amanda.”
     
    “Wait!”
I didn’t want him to hang up, not like this. I heard him hesitate, and I
blurted out the first thing that came into my mind. “Was there ever something
real between us, or was I just convenient?” I felt instantly embarrassed for
asking him directly, but it was too late now to take back the words.
     
    There
was a long pause on the phone, and for a moment I thought maybe he had hung up,
but when he answered me, his voice was soft and sincere.
     
    “You
should know better than to think you were just a passing convenience,” Mathis
told me gently. “But I’m not the young boy you knew back then. I’ve changed.
I’m a different person from who I was back then. You don’t know the person I am
now, Amanda – and maybe it’s a good thing that you don’t.”
     
    I
opened my mouth, ready to ask half a hundred questions about what he meant, but
he hung up without giving me a chance.
     
    What
did he mean? Was he just trying to keep me away from him? Did he think that by
hinting that he was a different person it would put me off him and make me want
to stay away from him? I remembered again the way he looked at me now and then,
the way his eyes crinkled with humor, and the concern he showed towards me.
     
    In
my heart, I knew he was a good person, and that mattered far more to me than
whether he was the same person. It was foolish to expect that an eighteen year
old boy caught up in a summer romance would be the same person as a thirty year
old man who was experienced with women, rich, successful and smart. Even if he
was a different person, though, I knew that he was a person I could trust and
somebody I wanted to be with.
     
    I
thought back to the suitcase he had given me. I didn’t really have many more
answers now than before I had spoken to Mathis, at least, not the answers