In My Neighbor's Bed

Ch. 36: Broken

Shirley chatted on like that for a while. Thankfully, it wasn't too much longer before other people started to arrive. Slowly but surely, a steady stream of company employees and charity guests started to fill up the event center. Soon, she had her hands too full meeting and greeting people as the "CEO's wife" to bother paying attention to me. As were most of the other attendees as well.

Phil was still too busy following Vince around like a little puppy dog to bother with me, and the few other office wives I did know there were with their husbands, trying to make a good impression on the potential new clients. Meaning I had some time to be alone with my thoughts. Although, whether that was a curse or a blessing I couldn't be sure.

My mind just kept circling back to Mason and the hairclip. How in the world could he have possibly gotten his hands on something this expensive? I mean, I knew our neighborhood wasn't cheap, but it's not exactly like people were lighting their cigarettes with hundred-dollar bills either. Mason especially.

I know he joked around about being the "V.P." of his father's company and all that, but if I remembered correctly, he said that they did something with moving and warehouses. Not exactly a bad job, but it certainly didn't sound like the kind of thing where he had that much extra cash to burn. How could he have possibly afforded something like this? He didn't steal it or something did he?

I shook off the thought exactly two seconds after having it. No. I was sure that wasn't it. Hell, I'd probably believe it was a gift from Santa Claus before I ever seriously considered that he might have taken it. However, both of those clearly not being the case, what was the most likely explanation for why he had it?

I thought again about what he told me about his job. They had warehouses, right? And warehouses are used to store things, right? So, I guess it wasn't too much of a stretch to guess that this Violetta company might have stored some of their products or supplies there.

In that case, the most logical answer would be that somebody from the company had given him the hairclip. After all, it's not like things like that were too uncommon in business environments. "Gifts," even really expensive ones, were often passed around between companies and bigwigs as a sort of thank you for "favors." Usually, something like giving them a good discount or screwing over a competitor in some way or another.

Mason didn't really strike me as the type to do either of those things, but the specifics of why he got it weren't the point. The real question was "how." And the more I thought about it, the more that "gift from a supplier" idea seemed like a credible answer.

That thought helped to calm me down a little, but it still didn't help to resolve the other question I still had unanswered:

Why did he give it to me?

However he got his hands on it, there was no denying that it was a very expensive "gift." Not exactly the kind of thing you give to the married housewife next door after a little strip show.

Honestly, even cheap jewelry seemed a little much for something like that. So, why in the world was he dropping something worth fifty-thousand dollars in my mailbox the next day? Did he just not realize the value of it? Or was he hoping that I would notice the value and give him appropriate "compensation" as a result? I mean, I was sleeping with him now.

Again, I shook off the idea almost instantly. No. Mason wasn't the kind of guy to do something like that. I'd met guys like that before. The kind who assumed that spending money on you somehow made them more entitled to you. God, if I'd only realized Phil was that kind of guy sooner...

I sighed and shook my head as if to clear away that thought. Oh, well. That was over now. No point in dwelling on the "what ifs" of a mistake long since passed. The point was, Mason wasn't that kind of guy. His reason for giving it to me was probably the exact same reason I thought of earlier today: he just wanted to. A simple explanation, perhaps a little unsatisfying in its conclusion, but one that fit him really well.