The Heiress Club (COMPLETED)

Chapter 4: The Calm Before the Storm

I win the bet, by the way. The first girl Jasper brings to our lunch table is a gorgeous Egyptian girl whose parents own an oil superpower, and she's from Somerset House. I can always see him whispering things in her ear, his gleaming smile bright and shark-like. More often than not, he 'whispers' loudly enough for me to know that they're talking shit about me. That relationship lasts as long as any of the others from what I've been told. By next week, the girl is gone.

It feels a lot like the calm before a storm. Tense, silent, eerily still.

꧁꧂

"Valentina!" Sparky exclaims as I descend the steps of the private jet. According to him, a friend in Monaco loaned it to him.

"Hi dad," I say, squinting into the setting sun. Monaco is sunny. It's a lot like Italy; I suppose that's a given, considering how close the two are. Even from here, I can smell the salt of the ocean on the wind.

I'm still wearing my school uniform. I had barely enough time to throw some things haphazardly in a suitcase before one of the hired chauffeurs picked me up and drove me to the nearest airport. The flight was a little over two hours, much of which I spent studying. We don't have much homework but after I got my first test grades back, I quickly realised that I kind of needed to study. I was supposed to come here and make connections, I think irritatedly, not do hundreds of pages of practice problems.

But that's whatever. I'll have a nice time in Monaco and go back to school refreshed.

School is nice, apart from the studying at least. There are all sorts of clubs and rich-people activities. There's a golf club, a sailing club, a tennis club—those are more of Es's sort of thing, but I'm not half-bad at tennis myself. There's a chess club, a school newspaper, an equestrian club—those are Jasper's clubs and I avoid them as much as possible. I haven't joined any myself; usually I just drop by occasionally to whichever ones my friends attend and play around. Everyone seems to enjoy my presence.

Then there are the weekends, which are amazing. Most people will fly out to somewhere tropical for the weekend; I stay since Sparky is too busy most of the time. Every weekend there are different people staying and we have a glorious time making our own fun. I remember just last week, someone took us for a drive in a racing car that wasn't even out on the market yet. And before that, there was the time that someone brought edibles and our group got high as kites (I declined to participate—I don't have anything against those kinds of substances, I'd just rather have a clear head).

Sometimes we'll go into the city too—depending on who can drive us, there's fun to be had in Manchester which is only an hour away. We terrorize the designer stores and buy expensive perfume and do basically whatever we want. We haven't snuck into a club yet, but that's on my to-do list. The main thing about staying in York though is the weather, which is very depressing. I'm glad I'm in Monaco now.

We get in Sparky's black Rolls Royce (it's his favourite, he brings it everywhere) and he hands me a pair of sunglasses. I look at the brand label. It's my favourite, at least for sunglasses. "Cartier? You know me so well."

The dusk breeze is cool and refreshing. As we coast around a bend, I can see the ocean—glimmering and expansive. From our vantage on a winding mountain road, all the buildings and yachts of Monaco are laid out beneath us. They cluster at the coastline, all facing the ever-present sea. The sun has dipped below the ocean now, leaving the sky a beautiful dark blue.

"So what are we doing tomorrow?"

"You go have your fun around Monaco. If Noelise is here, I want you to talk to her. Then there's a party on Anathi's yacht tonight, so find a dress."