Cruel Captivation - Kelli Callahan Page 0,1

prompts, “Well, Asher. Answer your father. He needs to make sure you aren’t completely incompetent and understand that you are not to run off with the tramp he wants.”

I roll my eyes, wondering how the hell I ended up with two parents that dislike me because they hate each other so much. “I know to keep my mouth shut, to clap when I need to clap, and not chase tail, or get anyone pregnant until you get the donations you need.”

“If you can flirt with a few of the wives and milk them for a few thousand, I’d appreciate it,” dad winks at me, and my stomach turns when I know he thinks of me as his way of making millions because he thinks I’ll sleep with whoever for him.

I sleep with women for me and it isn’t because I’m using them or think they are objects. I know when women want me, and I obviously want a beautiful woman, but it’s deeper than that. I’m not wanted anywhere else in my life. My parents hate me. The rich fucks I got to school with are assholes and don’t want to be friends with me. They just love that I have money.

Granted, most women probably only sleep with me because I am Asher Haven, but I don’t sleep with them to get off.

I sleep with them to get lost and to feel something other than the fucking hate I have for my life. The moment I’m eighteen, I’m out of here. My parents are going to wake up one day and realize I am gone. I’m not going to leave a note. I’m not going to call. I’m not sending a fucking postcard.

I am out of here in four months.

The limo comes to a stop outside of the event center, and the driver runs around the back to open up the door. My mom reaches her hand out for the driver to help her out. The cool night’s air whirls into the car, adding to the ice that’s already frozen tundra in the cab.

I follow behind her, and the flashes from cameras come quickly, blinding me. I’m a professional, and I don’t let it get to me. I lift my hand and wave, buttoning the blazer of the tuxedo I’m wearing, and smile, making sure my dimples show.

Everyone loves the handsome son of Senator Mike Haven. I’m the golden boy.

The flashes multiply when Dad steps out of the car and takes my mother’s hand. We all smile, pretending to be the cookie-cutter family that’s nothing but happy.

We start our way to the front doors, and security is blocking the reporters from getting too close. Microphones are being shoved in my face, and the journalists throw questions at me.

“Asher, do you plan to go into politics like your father?”

“It’s been said you were accepted into Stanford; is that true? Are you going? What about your legacy to your Dad’s school? Yale? Have you given that any thought?”

“Is it true you’re engaged?”

My god, I’m seventeen. Why the fuck would I be engaged? Unless my parents have set up a marriage I have no clue about. I probably am engaged and I don’t even know it. I keep my mouth shut when it comes to the reporters. It’s another rule I have to follow. I nod, then slip inside the doors just as security opens them.

I let out a breath when I’m inside and survey my surroundings, wishing I could be anywhere other than here. I thought I was excited to be here, but this gala is just like every other one. Expensive, tasteless food, great booze, fake people, and I’m too tired to care about any of it after what happened in the car.

Tucking my left hand in my pocket, I reach and snag a glass of champagne off the caterer’s tray as he walks by. No one cares that I’m seventeen and drinking. I do what I want. Sipping the bubbly, I see the one woman that never gives me the time of day.

Heather Thomas.

She has beautiful brown hair that is cascading down in luscious waves but clipped all to one side, sliding down her shoulder. She has long legs and a dress that doesn’t do her figure justice. She has an hourglass shape and tits I want to lose myself in, but that isn’t the main thing that draws me in. It’s her smile, her grit, her take-no-shit attitude.

Every time she sees me, she hates me, and I think she