by Megyn Ward
“Noon…ish.” Another lie. It’s not even ten o’clock but if I tell her that, she’ll complain about how I woke her up at the crack of dawn. I hop down from the bike and grin a little at the noodle jelly feeling in my legs because it means I worked hard. “I’m going to hop in the shower. There’s breakfast in the kitchen if you’re hungry,” I tell her, even though I can’t imagine that she’d be hungry after eating her own weight in burritos less than five hours ago.
She gives me that fish guts look again—not because I offered her breakfast but because my offer implies that she’ll have to get up and get it herself. Whatever—part of me hopes she’ll get bored and leave while I’m in the shower.
No such luck.
Liz is still here when I emerge from my room, showered and dressed, an hour later. She’s still camped out on the couch, a fresh room service tray parked next to it, watching while the bellhop pours her coffee and the maid who comes in to change sheets and collect my used towels scoops fruit salad onto her plate. Not her job but I imagine Liz snapped her fingers in her face and made it her job.
“I meant it you know,” Liz tells me around a mouthful of chocolate croissant. “You’re not fun anymore. Like, I’m for real starting to worry about you.”
“You’re starting to worry about me?” Pouring myself a cup of coffee from the silver pot on the cart, I add a healthy dose of cream and sugar. “Because I didn’t go out with you guys last night? Seriously?”
“You haven’t been out in weeks,” she reminds me, flicking an irritated hand at the maid when she sets her plate of fruit salad down in front of her. “I mean—I get it. You were crazy enough to break things off with Nik. I’d be embarrassed too.”
“I think the word you’re looking for is better,” I snipe back at her. “I finally came to my senses and ended things between Nik and me for good and I’m better for it.” Instead of waiting for her to snipe back, I focus on the older woman who’s using a pair of silver-plated tongs to transfer pastries from the basket on the table to Liz’s plate. “Thank you, Rosa,” I tell her, giving her a flat, I’m sorry my friend is an asshole smile. “I don’t need anything today, you can go.”
Rosa blinks at me a few times. “But the sheets—”
“Leave them,” I tell her with an encouraging nod. “I can change them myself.”
Rosa looks at me like I suggested she jump off the balcony. “No, Miss.” She shakes her head at me. “I can’t do that. Miss Hawthorne—”
“Is in Paris, so she’ll never know.” I give her another smile. “Please, Rosa—it’s okay. Just go.” Before Liz makes you cut her cantaloupe into bite-sized pieces.
She cuts Liz a quick, guarded look before giving me a nod. She doesn’t want to be around her any more than I do. “There was another delivery, Miss,” she tells me, gesturing toward the dining room table. When I look, I feel my stomach drop and my heart picks up the pace like it did this morning when I thought about leaving the hotel for spin class.
Flowers.
White roses.
And another gift box tied closed with a blue satin ribbon.
“Thank you, Rosa.” I say it again, forcing the smile to stay put while she hustles out the door, taking the bellhop with her.
Ignoring the delivery, I sit down in the chair across from the couch. “We went to that art opening a few weeks ago,” I remind her before snagging a few madeleines from the basket of pastries on the coffee table. I leave out the part where I had to force myself to go and spent the entire night looking over my shoulder.
“That wasn’t a few weeks ago—that was in April.” She narrows her eyes at me. “And you skipped The Met last weekend—what the fuck, Delilah? Do you know how hard it is to get an invite to that?”
The Met Gala. The biggest event of the season. Wall-to-wall celebrities. Only the A list of the A list is invited to attend. I was supposed to go—my dress—an absolute work of art, handmade by an up-and-coming designer—is still hanging in my closet. “I told you to come get my invitation,” I remind her. “They wouldn’t have cared.”
She rolls her eyes at me because we both know that isn’t true. They would’ve laughed her right off the red carpet because she isn’t me. “What are you doing tonight?”
Nothing.
My plan was nothing.
Stay in.
Hide.
“Silver is supposed to have her baby any day now,” I say, giving her the excuse I worked out in my head while I was in the shower. “I need to be straight in case—”
“Booor-rring,” she sing-songs at me with another eye roll. “It’s Friday, Delilah. You can’t stay home on another Friday night for Christ’s sake—you just can’t.”
“We’re twenty-five, you know,” I say while breaking a madeleine in half. “Maybe we don’t have to go clubbing every night.”
Liz blinks at me like I’ve lost my mind. When she finally recovers, she scoffs at me. “For the sake of our friendship, I’m going to pretend you didn’t just say that.” She says it like I suggested she buy off the rack or drink tap water. “I mean—right now, you’re Delilah Fiorella. You need to capitalize on that while you still can.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I feel it again. The dread that’s taken up permanent residence in the pit of my stomach.
“It means this—” She waves her fork at the delivery Rosa brought up. “The attention. The fame. The flowers and gifts. The paparazzi following you around. It isn’t going to last forever. You should be capitalizing on it while you still can instead of staying inside and riding your stupid stationary bike around imaginary mountain trails or whatever because it’s all going to be gone someday and you won’t be Delilah Fiorella anymore—you’ll be your mother.”
My mother.
Astrid Hawthorne.
Hotel heiress.
Aloof and beautiful.
Cold and untouchable.
This time, the panic and dread I feel roiling around the pit of my stomach has nothing to do with the flowers on my dining room table. Dropping half a madeleine into my cup, I watch the bubbles it makes while it soaks up coffee. “So what do you suggest I do?” I ask even though I already know what she thinks I should be doing—dancing on tables and flashing my crotch at anything with a camera.
“How long has it been since you hosted an event?”
Months.
It’s been months—even before the gift boxes started to accompany the flowers.
“Awhile.” I give her an evasive shrug while I use a spoon to fish the cookie out of my cup. “But no promoter is going to want to put something together, last minute.”
When I say it, Liz arches an eyebrow at me because it’s a lie—just an excuse—and we both know it. I’ve been MIA for a month. I could call any promoter in the city and they’d move heaven and earth to get me into their VIP last minute. They’d even pay me for the privilege.
“So call your brother-in-law. The one that owns Level,” she quickly clarifies because I’m obviously too stupid to know which brother-in-law she’s talking about. “I’m sure he’d let you host something small and intimate.”
Tobias isn’t my brother-in-law.
Not for lack of trying on his part. He’s probably proposed to Silver about a hundred times since they found out she was pregnant again but she keeps turning him down because our dad really did a number on us. He’s a brilliant chef and a keen businessman but he’s also a serial cheater who keeps getting married and every time he says I do, they keep getting younger and younger.
To say we have trust issues when it comes to men is an understatement.
“They’re getting ready to have a baby, Liz,” I remind her while trying to drown one of my madeleines in my coffee cup. “Now is not the time to capitalize on anything.”
She rolls her eyes at me again. “What about the other one?” She frowns at me because she knows I’m being cagey on purpose. “The super-hot blond—he seems pretty savvy. He’d probably jump at the chance to get you back in
to one of his clubs.”
Jase.
She’s talking about Jase.
We’ve had a few superficial conversations but nothing that would suggest that I’m free to just call him up and start demanding favors. Before I offer up any sort of protest, Liz does what Liz does and steamrolls right over me.
“We’ll whip up a guestlist—Nic is here. He can—”
“No.” I cut her off with a quick shake of my head. “No Nik. I don’t want him anywhere near me.”
Because she thinks I’m being dramatic, Liz rolls her eyes. “Seriously, Delilah. You’re being ridiculous—you can’t host an event without—”
“Yes, I can,” I tell her firmly. “If it’s my event, I can invite or not invite anyone I want—and I don’t want Nik there.”
“Okay, okay.” She holds her hands up like I pulled a gun on her. Like I’m being unreasonable and might be unhinged. “Whatever you say.”
“Not that it even matters,” I tell her, even as I feel my resistance to the idea start to fade. Because I haven’t seen Gray in a month and that realization makes me anxious for some reason. “Because I can’t just call Jase and—”
“Yes you can. You’re Delilah Fiorella,” she reminds me. “You’re the club queen of Manhattan and you can do any-fucking-thing you want—now call Blondie and tell him you and your friends want to play in his clubhouse.”
SIX
Grayson
IT’S A DUMB QUESTION.
I mean, I knew who the mystery influencer was, even before Angel managed to push the words code blonde out of his mouth because there’s only one reason Jase would call the club line to hand down directives instead of calling me directly.
Only one name he’d avoid saying to me at all costs.
Delilah Fiorella.
I haven’t seen her in weeks.
It’s like she just vanished into thin air.
Which is weird because even after my brief and disastrous decent into madness, she kept coming in. Acted like it never happened. Like she never kissed me. Like I never kissed her back. Never touched her. Never almost did a hell of a lot more than just touch her. The night after it happened, she was back in the VIP with all of her trashy, rich friends, wreaking havoc and treating me like shit under her designer shoe, same as always.
To be fair, she was probably drunk.
Or high.
Or both.
Back then there was a rule about her drinking in my club. She was a minor and while I grudgingly conceded to Jase and let her in when she showed up, I wouldn’t let her booze it up on my watch—but that doesn’t mean she was sober that night. She couldn’t have been sober.
Because I pulled her, half-naked off a stripper pole and she kissed me.
I still think about it.
Every time I see her, I remember what her pussy felt like on my fingers—soft and wet. Warm and tight. The way she moaned my name when I teased their callused tips against her slick, swollen entrance. And every time I hear someone say her name, I remember the way the sound of it burned its way up my throat when I finally gave in and said it.
How quickly I gave in to her.
How quickly she won.
Because I’m a lot of things but stupid isn’t one of them. Delilah was playing with me that night. She kissed me because she was bored and restless and looking for something—or someone—to do. A toy to play with to pass the time and if I hadn’t come to my senses, she would’ve gotten bored and laughed in my face.
Because it was all a game to her.
She doesn’t even remember it happened—that’s how much it didn’t matter.
Whenever I think about her, I remember that too.
And I get pissed.
Really, really pissed.
I try to remind myself that she was just a kid. A spoiled, messed-up kid. Barely legal and almost certainly smashed, but even though both of those things are true, I still feel like someone kicked me in the nuts, every time I see her.
So knowing she’s the influencer Jase is bringing into the club for a last-minute event is fucking irritating beyond belief because that means I’m going to have both hands full of Hurricane Delilah’s bullshit and after a month of calm and quiet I’m just not mentally prepared for that kind of abuse. I’ll probably end up going to jail by the end of the night for assaulting that Dutch dickhead she likes to suck face with whenever I’m around.
Actually, I’ll probably end up in jail before then because I’m currently in the elevator of The Bright Group’s corporate office, on my way to murder my brother.
When I step off the elevator, the gatekeeper—a sleek, icy blonde that looks like she was genetically engineered in a lab—picks up her head and immediately scowls at my lack of three-piece suit and designer haircut. “Can I help you, sir?”
The way she says sir, makes my eye twitch. Like she doesn’t really mean sir at all. Because I’m wearing jeans and boots and my skin is a little too brown to be a sir.
“Nope,” I say, nailing her to her seat with a quick, hard glare on my past her desk.
“Sir, you can’t just—” This sir is tinged with alarm because this is every video she’s ever watched about workplace violence and she knows it. She’s the frontline of defense and she can’t remember what she’s supposed to do next. Behind me, I hear her wrestle her desk phone’s handset from its cradle and furiously punch at the keypad. “I need security to the 50th floor as soon as poss—”
Yeah.
Call security.
That’ll help.
Laughing out loud, I keep striding down the hallway, ignoring all the wide-eyed stares and slamming office doors that follow in my wake while the build-a-blonde chases after me, shouting at me to stop—either too brave or maybe stupid for her own good.
I don’t stop.
I keep going.
Jase’s office is at the end of the long hallway—right next door to the office he insists on keeping open for me here. My name and title are etched on the frosted glass door and everything.
G. Bright
CSO
I’ve never even stepped foot in it.
I’d rather step in a bear trap.
Because I already have an office I don’t want and I need another one like I need a goddamned hole in my head.
Jase’s office is straight ahead, its door propped open slightly. Honing in on it, I focus on the sound of my brother’s voice, his smooth, rich tenor reaching into the hallway while he reassures whoever he’s talking to that there’s no trouble at all. I’ve been wanting to meet you for ages now. I’m happy you reached out.
Behind me, Build-a-Blonde makes a last-ditched effort at protecting her boss by shouting his name.
“Mr. Bright!”
She’s too late.
I’m already kicking his door all the way open, mouth open on an angry growl. “What the absolute fuck, Jase?” I snarl, glare pinned to where I expect to find him, feet kicked up on his huge, corporate desk, phone wedged against his ear—the definition of rich asshole while he sweet talks some other rich asshole. “Where do you get the balls to just—”
He’s not there.
The chair behind the desk is empty and the phone on top of it is unmanned.
Wheeling my glare around the room, I find him sitting in the lavish conversation area on the other side of the room. The heavy glass door rebounds off the wall and come back, forcing me to reach out and stop it before it smacks me in the face. I almost let it. I almost catch four hundred pounds of bullet-resistant glass in the head because he isn’t on the phone.
Delilah is here.
Sitting right here, not more than ten feet away from me.
And jesus, she looks good.
Better than good.
She looks perfect.
Long, pale blonde hair shining in the sun streaming through the windows of Jase’s office. The thick fall of it piled on top of her head in one of those sexy, loose buns, whisps and tendrils of hair framing her gorgeous face. She’s wea
ring a simple sundress—pale yellow cotton—and a pair of white strappy sandals that probably cost more that I make in a month. Seeing her makes me realize that I’ve never seen her in the daylight before. Makes me sorry I’m seeing her in it now because she’s even more beautiful than I thought. She looks like summer. Warm and soft and so fucking perfect I get that kicked in the nuts feeling before she even says a word.
“Mr. Bright—” Build-a-Blonde finally catches up to me and shoves her way past me, probably looking for an opportunity to throw herself between me and her beloved boss. “I tried to stop him but—”
“It’s okay, Lara,” he reassures her. “This is Gray, my—”
“Employee.” I spit the word at him, practically daring him to call me anything more. “I’m an employee. A very pissed employee.”
“Okay…” Jase smirks at me. “This is Gray, my very pissed employee.” Looking at the woman next me, he smiles. “We’re fine here.”
Lara shoots me a quick, hostile look. “But—”
“You can go.” He gives her a brief, dismissive smile. As soon as she’s gone, Jase resettles himself into his chair. “Delilah,” Jase says in that dumb, perfect voice of his. “You’ve met Gray, my… what are your again, exactly?”
Fucking dick.
“Security.” It comes out rough. Pitted and garbled. About as unperfect as it gets. “I run club security.” I give him a quick hard look, warning him not to say another word about it. “So, imagine my surprise when—”
“CSO,” Jase corrects me, throwing that stupid made-up title at me, probably just to make my jaw twitch. “Grayson here is the chief security officer for entertainment operations for The Bright Group.”
“Gray and I do know each other but I’m afraid we’ve never been properly introduced—” Delilah rises from her perch on the couch. Crossing the room she moves toward me like she’s walking a catwalk, hips swing slightly, perfectly manicured hand extended in front of her, a ring with a canary-yellow diamond as big as my thumb flashing in the sun. When she started wearing it last year, the tabloids were in a tizzy because it was rumored her boyfriend, the Dutch Count, gave it to her. More diamonds stuck in her ears. A rope of them hanging around her neck. She probably has handfuls of them stuffed in her pockets. For some reason, the thought of it pisses me off.
