Chapter 3 - The Gilded Leash
Two thousand miles away, in a glass penthouse overlooking the marina in Miami, Lauren was discovering that luxury had its own set of rules.
The first three months with Chase Bennett felt like stepping through the glossy pages of a magazine she had been reading through a shop window her entire life.
There were no grocery runs to Trader Joe’s. There were no discussions about utility bills or 401(k) allocations. Chase had an assistant named Chloe who handled everything from dry cleaning to stocking the sub-zero refrigerator with cold-pressed green juice and alkaline water imported from Iceland.
When Chase took her to dinner, they didn’t look at the right side of the menu. They sat at corner tables reserved for "preferred clients," drank four-hundred-dollar bottles of Super Tuscan wine, and rubbed elbows with venture capitalists, crypto millionaires, and athletes.
Denise was in heaven. Every single day, Lauren’s mother demanded photos for her Facebook page. Denise posted constantly:
*“My gorgeous Lauren living the life she was always destined for! So proud of my girl for knowing her worth! #Blessed #HighValueLife #NeverSettle.”*
Denise even took to subtly mocking Ethan in the comments of her posts whenever her suburban friends asked about him: *“Ethan was a sweet boy, but some men are simply built for local roads, while others are built for the Autobahn. A mother knows when her daughter is meant for the grand stage.”*
Callie was equally thrilled, frequently flying down on Chase’s companion passes to spend weekends by the pool, drinking Aperol spritzes and charging designer shoes to the black credit card Chase casually left on the kitchen island.
But by the fifth month, the weather inside the penthouse began to shift.
It started with small corrections.
Lauren was getting dressed for an evening gala hosted by one of Chase’s commercial real estate partners. She put on a stunning emerald silk dress she had bought with her own money two years ago—a dress Ethan had once told her made her look like a classic Hollywood movie star.
Chase walked into the walk-in closet, adjusting his platinum cuff links. He stopped, looked her up and down with a clinical, detached eye, and frowned.
“What is that?” he asked.
Lauren smiled, turning before the full-length mirror. “You remember this? I wore it to my cousin’s wedding.”
“It looks off-the-rack, Lauren,” Chase said flatly. “The hemline is uneven, and the fabric looks cheap under gallery lighting. Take it off.”
Lauren’s smile faltered. “Chase, it’s real silk. It cost six hundred dollars—”
“Six hundred dollars is what we spend on bar tabs, babe,” he interrupted, not even looking at her as he inspected his watch. “Chloe had three dresses from Saint Laurent delivered to the foyer this morning. Wear the black one with the side cutout.”
“The cutout is really high,” Lauren murmured, a knot tightening in her stomach. “It feels a little... revealing for a corporate gala.”
Chase took two steps toward her, his fingers gripping her chin. It wasn’t a caress; it was an alignment. His grip was firm enough that his signet ring pressed uncomfortably into her jawbone.
“When you’re on my arm, Lauren, you represent the Bennett brand,” he said, his smile bright and entirely devoid of warmth. “I didn’t bring you down here to look like a schoolteacher from Connecticut. Put the black dress on. And fix your hair. The curls look messy.”
He dropped his hand and walked out.
Lauren stood in the silent, cavernous closet, her heart hammering against her ribs. For a fleeting second, an image flashed in her mind: Ethan, standing behind her in their tiny bathroom, his hands warm on her hips, kissing her bare shoulder while she curled her hair, laughing because the mirror was fogged up from his shower.
*“You look incredible, Lo. You could wear a burlap sack and you’d still be the prettiest girl in any room.”*
She shook her head violently, chasing the memory away.
*Ethan was boring,* she reminded herself fiercely, staring at her reflection. *Ethan was poor. Ethan had no ambition.*
She put on the Saint Laurent dress.
As the months rolled on, the leash tightened. Chase’s "generosity" came with receipts she hadn’t expected.
He didn't give her an allowance; he gave her access to an account that he audited every Sunday evening. If she spent money on something he deemed frivolous or unaligned with his aesthetic, he simply locked the card for forty-eight hours to make a point.
When she brought up finding a job in PR in Miami, Chase laughed out loud.
“PR? For who? You want to work sixty hours a week to make seventy grand? That’s pocket change, Lauren. Your job is to look incredible, keep the penthouse organized, and be ready when I need to host clients. That’s what I pay for.”
*That’s what I pay for.*
The phrase echoed in her ears for days.
Worse, Chase had a temper that flared without warning. If an investment deal went sideways or his father criticized his quarterly performance at the family office, he would come home smelling of bourbon and cold rage. He never hit her, but he broke things. He would sweep a collection of crystal decanters off the marble sideboard, shatter them against the wall, and then stand over her while she cowered on the couch.
“Look at this mess,” he would sneer, his eyes bloodshot. “Clean it up. And don’t bother Chloe with it. I don’t pay her to clean up your domestic incompetence.”
When Lauren called her mother, crying in the bathroom with the water running so Chase wouldn’t hear, Denise had zero sympathy.
“Lauren, pull yourself together!” Denise hissed over the line. “Every powerful man has an edge! You think men who make millions of dollars a year are soft and gentle? That’s what you left Ethan for! Men like Chase have pressure you can’t even comprehend. Your job is to soothe him, make yourself indispensable, and get him down the aisle! Has he mentioned the ring yet?”
“No, Mom,” Lauren wept quietly. “He hasn’t mentioned a ring once.”
“Then stop complaining and step up your game,” Denise ordered. “Callie needs an internship at his father’s brokerage this summer. Don’t ruin this for the family over a few broken glasses.”
Lauren leaned her forehead against the cool marble tile of the shower wall.
May you like
Downstairs, she heard the front door slam. Chase was home early. And he was shouting for a drink.
***
