The Heiress Club

Chapter 14: Week Two

CW: mentions of SA

"You came by personally to pick me up? I'm touched," I say overdramatically.

Sparky looks at me severely over his sunglasses. I don't even get why he's wearing them. He can close the windows of our private jet any time he wants. "We're going to Argentina."

My week in Iceland has ended. Now comes the boring part of vacation. "Great," I say. "Do we have strawberry daiquiris on board?"

Sparky gives me a withering glare. "Don't tell me you've picked up English drinking habits."

"I haven't! I was just thinking about how I've always wanted to try a strawberry daiquiri."

"Anyways," he continues, completely ignoring my request for a strawberry daiquiri, "good job making that connection with Rivera. We're meeting his family for a dinner. They obviously don't have time to leave Argentina because of state requirements, so we'll be going to them."

Sparky compliments me, but I know he's doing all the real work. My relationships with people are just little school friendships. He's probably done some real connection-wrangling to make friends with all my classmates' parents.

"Not for the rest of break, I hope."

"We're going to St. Barts after."

Fantastic. St. Barts is all white sand and blue water and superyachts. It'll be enjoyable at the very least. "Anyone we know there?"

"The Mnisis and Rochesters will be there. We're having dinner with them too, next week."

I roll my eyes. Ugh. Rochesters.

Sparky sees my expression. It seems like he's given up on forcing me to be civil with Jasper. "Just enjoy your break. Don't ruin it for yourself."

"Sure," I mumble.

The flight to Argentina is long and boring. I spend most of it idly watching movies that I've downloaded to my computer. There's nothing good; I really need to find some new ones to watch. Or maybe it's just because I'm uninterested. I can't seem to turn off my mind. I keep thinking about Iceland. The pictures in my camera roll that Jasper took. The questions. His answers.

He was lying. Something happened that night, and his reaction was only further confirmation. I didn't expect him to tell me, but I asked anyway just to get that reaction.

My only regret is that he pried so much information out of me during that exchange. I should've lied more. I don't think he's the type to leak all that, but then again, I don't know Jasper nearly as well as I thought I did. I still don't know what happened on that night either.

One way or another, I'll find out.

꧁꧂

Argentina is cold and dry. When we arrive in Buenos Aires, we spend the night at one of the more expensive hotels near the airport. I'm too jetlagged to do anything except scroll on social media and sleep in the next day. I have to heave myself out of bed by the evening though, because that's when we have our dinner with the presidential family.

A special chauffeur greets us at the door of the hotel. They drive us to a northern area of Buenos Aires, one that's near the sea. I can see a visible difference as we get nearer to our destination, the buildings becoming more and more suburban. When we finally arrive at a gate cutting straight into a brick wall, it opens to let us through.

Half of the compound is open to the public, but this part is utilised solely for residential purposes. We approach a white house. It's less imposing than I thought it would; it almost looks like a normal person's house. The chauffeur lets us out and we walk the rest of the way. As we get closer, I see two people on the porch.