Page 13 of Synced to Us

“Uh…” Wyn shuffles in place, a wrinkled khaki blazer thrown over his arm. “Not sure I can, ma’am. This outfit’s a little tight.”

My attention flings itself against his groin before I can stop it. On an inward curse, I force my eyes back up. “Don’t ma’am me. I’m not your mother.”

A wince crosses his face. Curious, I angle my head but keep my expression blank.

“So, are we going to do this?” Wyn folds his arms, thinks better of it, then lets them hang at his side.

“Sure. You can stand. I doubt this will take long.” I turn to my computer, bringing up the spreadsheet I’d created when I arrived at five. “The amount in your checking is pitiful, as well as your savings. I see you own a property upstate with significant debt. If we sell that for a reasonable sum and pay off your creditors, coupled with your consistent royalties from Nocturne Court, I’m pretty sure I can double, maybe triple, what you’re making now with the right strategy. What’s with this four-figure payment every month that digs into your royalties? You haven’t logged it as anything but ‘miscellaneous.’ If you halted those payments, I could add it to your investment portfolio.”

“I’m not selling.”

I jolt at the unexpected conviction in Wyn’s voice and spin on my chair. “Excuse me?”

“I’m not investing, either.”

I frown. “Wyn, I’m not sure you understand what I do.”

Wyn lowers his chin, his oceanic stare seemingly slipping into my body and glaring directly on my soul. “I perfectly comprehend what you do.”

I say, quieter, “I thought you were here for my help.”

“I am. To a point. Give me advice, but leave it at that. You’re not getting control of my money, and neither is this succubus firm.”

Leaning back in my chair, I hold his gaze for a moment, although the time drifting between us sends shivers down my chest. If Wyn loosened his hair tie, I’m certain I’d be attempting to tame a lion. “We don’t just take over. You, as the client, have complete decision-making control.”

Wyn’s brows come down. “I don’t believe you.”

Straightening, I flatten my palms on the desk. “Fine. If advice is what you want…at the rate you’re spending, you’re bleeding money. And if you won’t tell me what you’re spending it on, my best advice is to clean up your debt, triple your assets, and find a new job. Otherwise, you’ll be worse off in a month than you are now.”

“How worse off?”

My lips thin in thought. “That miscellaneous money you’re sending out? Forget about paying it next month. Or any others.”

Wyn exhales through his nose, and for a moment, I read true worry in his expression before the skin around his eyes relaxes and his hands unclench. “You’re the money lady. Tell me how to do this without investing in anything. Explain to me how to keep making my payments without losing my shirt.”

“A job,” I say, softening despite the thorns in his voice. “Maybe sell your instruments. Stop renting studio space. And then, when it gets too tight, think of releasing your property upstate.”

“I can’t...” Wyn trails off and glances out the window behind me, the line of his jaw cutting through his skin. “This is all I am. Giving up my music would be like signing away my soul. I don’t belong in a place like this, an office, wearing these—fuck, this costume.” He pulls at his shirt, the tell-tale sound of a tear cutting between us. The stretched-out fabric falls from his fingers, and I wonder how much has ripped and if his back is exposed and how those muscles might ripple as he tenses.

A disgusted sound leaves my throat at my imagination’s unwanted brashness, but Wyn reads it in an entirely different way.

His stare grows shadows as he glowers at me. “This may mean shit to you, but I need to find fame again and my songwriting can do that. It has to. That success is what shot me out of the gallows and made me me.”

Closing my eyes, I try not to react to the hollowness in his tone. It makes me think about his home life, and if we grew up similar. It never occurred to me I’d have something in common with Wyn or we’d share the same pain. But his voice, it sounds too much like my own when I’m alone, late at night, curled up in luxury sheets but swallowed up by the darkness coating my heart.

I sever the emotional pull toward him by opening my eyes, telling him what I told myself all those years ago. “Then you have to give up some of your assets.”

“Assets.” He laughs mirthlessly. “Sure, ‘cause that’s what they are, not a poor man’s collection of trinkets.”

“Wyn, I’d love to help, but save from moving your money around, I can’t—”

I cut off, my attention drifting from the intensity of Wyn’s bottomless gaze to the glass wall separating my office from the hallway. Dennis passes by with his usual dismissive flair, until his attention falls on Wyn and he stops in his tracks.

My coffee nearly tips over in my hands. I let loose a guttural whisper. “Jesus, no.”

“What?” Wyn asks. “Do you have more tough love to dole out because I gotta admit, lady, you suck at it. Do you make all your clients feel like losers, or—”

“Shut up.”

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