03 - Trial by Blood
Page 14
If I want the throne – and god help me, I do – then I have to straighten up. Or at least, appear to straighten up, for a period of three months. No more orgies or one-night stands with the gorgeous models I prefer. No drama or bad press.
I have to be good. Like my dear, dead brother, or my father will give the throne – and the rest of my inheritance – to a cousin.
It’s a challenge, one he doesn’t think I can handle. But those are the kinds of challenges I thrash best, and I have every intention of doing it to this one. Hell, maybe I’ll claim the throne before he’s dead, force him to abdicate, and just take it, the way I’ve closed most of my business deals.
People don’t fear me for my status as the Crown Prince of Nijala. They fear me because they know I will do whatever it takes, however deep I have to wade into the grey waters separating right from wrong, to get what I want.
“Your limo awaits you, Mr. Micah,” Jamil said. “The gala with the … ahem, debutantes your father has chosen for you will begin in two hours. Some of the wealthiest women in the world will be present, the kind of women who will make you a respectable queen.”
“I need several,” I mutter and stand. I’m half dressed for the party. I’m not accustomed to my father – or anyone else – interfering in my life, and I hate it. My life is mine to control. I go where I want. I do what I want. I fuck who I want and as many women as I want any given night.
“You know how your father feels. A respectable wife, and as many mistresses as you can keep quiet.”
“That worked before there was the internet. You’ve seen how badly that ended for him recently.”
“True. It’s a gamble, Mr. Micah.” Jamil hands me the jacket that goes with my tux. “I’ll let the driver know you’ll be down in fifteen minutes.”
“Thanks, Jamil.” I accept my jacket and rest it on the back of the couch. I watch him go.
My mind has been working quickly since yesterday morning, when my father’s edict came out. Jamil is right: I need someone respectable, someone my father can’t object to, someone the people and press will accept. What I fear: that means a woman I have no interest in.
“Think, EJ,” I tell myself. “You’ve gotten out of bigger pickles than this.”
I pick up the Guide to American Slang for the Clueless off the coffee table to make sure I used pickle right. I was raised in the British school system, even if I’ve lived in the US for a year. I’m still learning American slang.
“At least I got that right.” I toss the book on the couch.
No great ideas pop up about my situation. I’m drawing a complete blank. I need a fucking drink.
I stride across the penthouse to the spacious kitchen, which is quiet and dark. Flipping on the light, I go to the full bar and pour myself a drink of two hundred-year-old bourbon. The chef is gone for the day at my request, because I expected to eat my dinner at the art gala.
I’m hungry now, though, and grab an apple from the pyramid of fruit stacked on a counter. Munching quietly, I again try to figure out some way around my father’s insane edict.
An odd sound – like that of something scratching at a door – draws my attention.
If this place has rats … I leave the kitchen and follow the sound, ready to call the owner of the hotel directly for an unpleasant conversation.
The sound is moving around my penthouse. Puzzled, I pause in the living room to listen for it again, unable to imagine how big the rodent is to be making so much noise. Snatching my cell off the couch, I trail the weird sound upstairs, past the master suite and to the luxurious study with its leather-paneled walls and exotic wood floors.
It’s not a rat standing in my study but a trim woman with a nice, perfectly feminine hourglass shape, rounded ass, long brown hair.
And a gun.
I look from the kind of ass I love fucking to the weapon in her hand.
Stalker or jaded one-night stand? Because those are the two kinds of uninvited women I normally find in my home.
“Who the fuck are you?” I demand.
She whirls to face me. She’s a pretty woman, in her early twenties, with bright blue eyes the color of the butterflies that gather in the palace gardens every spring. She’s wearing a look of surprise on her face, like I’m the one standing with a gun in her study.
“You have sixty seconds to convince me I shouldn’t call my security detail.”
Chapter Two: Natalie
Shit. This isn’t exactly going as I planned. He wasn’t supposed to be here. I was supposed to have time to set up, figure out exactly what I wanted to say, and then prep an escape route.
Too late. But there are too many people relying on me for me to back down now.
I face him, ready to light him up, and stop. I’d seen his photo on the news, in the celebrity stalking newspapers in the checkout aisle of the supermarket.
On the sign in front of my family’s apartment building, announcing his company is evicting everyone to make way for another stupid mall. He’s smiling in the picture, like he relishes the idea of kicking poor people to the curb. Like we need a new mall around here anyway … how is that more important than housing for the poor in a city where there’s already a dearth of affordable options?
I know he’s handsome, but I’m not expecting him to be breathtaking in person. Chiseled features, perfect white teeth, large brown eyes and bronze skin covering a trim body he clearly takes care of.
He’s got an intensity around him I don’t expect, either. After all, he’s portrayed by the media as a spoiled rich kid who just flashes his money or status around to get what he wants then gallivants off with an armful of models. In all his pictures, he’s wearing a smug smile, as if he knows no one will turn him down. In person, I understand why. He’s got an animal magnetism that makes it impossible for me to look away.
A man with no cares in the world doesn’t look like this. His stare is sharp, his gaze intelligent, and his stance confident. He has a light British lilt to his low, gravelly voice that gives his tone a dark, musical quality.
He’s not at all afraid of me, and I’ve got a gun. It makes me uneasy to know the incredibly sexy man is not losing his mind right now. Does he know something I don’t? Did he trigger some alarm and in sixty seconds, I’ll be on my way to prison?
I’m feeling desperate, because I am.
“I’m here to make you a deal,” I say with far more control than I feel.
“You?” His gaze sweeps over me and lingers on my breasts.
I resist the urge to cross my arms. It’ll be hard to hold a gun to his head that way.
“Your company is evicting my family and neighbors from their building. I’m here to bargain a piece of information I found out about you in exchange for them staying.”
His look grows sharper, and I know I’ve got his attention. He has secrets, or he wouldn’t be interested.
“What piece of information?” he snaps.
“We’ll get to that when we get to it,” I reply. “Do you even know what I’m talking about?”
“No. I don’t give a shit either. I evict thousands of people to make way for my pet projects.”
My mouth drops open. I’m not expecting him to be so candid or unapologetic. What kind of man is this?
“What? You hoped to appeal to my good heart?” he asks mockingly. “Good hearts don’t amass billions. I don’t care about anyone’s sob story. But blackmail, I’ll listen to. A man like me has a reputation to consider.”
“Reputation? You’re a piece of shit!” I almost yell.
“I’m not the one with a gun who broke into someone else’s house.” He tosses back the amber liquid in his drink and slams the glass down on a table. “Talk. Now.”
I’m too angry to speak.
He gives me a knowing look, one that makes me want to smack him hard, and crosses to a chair. Sitting, he folds his hands behind his head and waits, eyes never leaving mine.
I’m feeling flustered, and it’s more than the
anger burning inside me. It’s the way he looks at me, his body language. He’s sexy and confident. He’s got nothing to lose.
Suddenly, I realize I do. The gun doesn’t give me the upper hand with a man who has no fear, but it will definitely lengthen any prison sentence I get. He knows it, too.
“Look,” he says. “Why don’t you sit down? Relax. Tell me about yourself.”
He’s still regarding me like he would someone who refused to jump when he told them he needed a soda. He makes no attempt to be friendly, despite the words.
“Let’s start with what project you’re talking about.”
I have a feeling he’s manipulating me – or trying. Maybe I’m stupid, but I need to answer this question.
“Tenley Apartments. You’re wiping out the block to make room for some sort of mall.”
“Ah. My latest project. A hundred million dollar expansion. We’ll replace the shitty housing with high-rise condos and an upscale mall. It’s a community project.”
I roll my eyes. “You’re moving out poor people to make way for rich ones.”
“Rich ones pay more.”
I can’t believe how callous he is. He really, truly doesn’t care about anything but his money! He’s calm and serious, his body open. It’d be so easy just to raise the gun and …
I can’t believe I’m thinking these thoughts.
“It’s the only housing left inside Borough limits,” I force myself to say calmly. “The people who live on that block rely on city transportation to get to jobs slopping shit for rich bastards like you.”
“Not my problem.” He drops his hands and leans forward, genuine curiosity crossing his features. “You’re one of them? The poor masses?” The mocking tone is back.
What a dick. I start to pace. I’ve never shot a gun in my life and had hoped just having one would give me some sort of control.
He doesn’t seem to care. About anything. Even the weapon in my hands.
“Let me guess. Your … parents live there. Friends. Other family?” he asked. “Are they criminals like you?”
“They’re good people!” I tell him angrily. “They’re respectable but poor. And this is the first time I’ve ever even …” I stop suddenly, realizing what I almost said.
Amusement crosses his dark eyes. He stands and moves towards me, slowly, his gaze never leaving mine.
“Aren’t you scared? Don’t you have any sense whatsoever?” I demand, waving the gun. “I could blow your head off.”
“You won’t,” he replied. He pauses though, waiting until I’m done waving the gun before stepping forward again. “It’s not who you are.”
“You know nothing about me.”
“I know you’re desperate. Desperate people are unpredictable, yes, but you’ve never hurt anyone in your life. You won’t hurt me.”
I hate him more and more each passing second. I have the gun – and I’m the one backing away. The closer he gets, the more my courage falters.
I move to put the couch between us. He stops on the other side of it, and I glare at him. I can smell him- a combination of man, lightly sweet cologne, and something else I can’t quite place but which winds through my senses like a drug that makes me want to step closer.
“Since we’ve established you’re not a killer, let me shoot down any hope you have of blackmailing me,” he continues, unconcerned. “I pay too much money for my secrets to be kept quiet. There’s no way someone like you can discover the good ones. Which means, there’s a ninety nine percent chance you’re either bluffing or have a secret that’s been splattered across the front pages already.”
I don’t know what to say. Somehow, he’s turned this completely around. He might as well be carrying the gun, because I feel like running away as fast as I can and drinking myself to sleep to forget how horrible this experience is.
“The odds are securely in my favor. I’m willing to take the chance that you don’t have shit on me,” he finishes. “Now … what’s your background?”
I frown, not understanding his sudden change of subject. “I’m not telling you anything about me!”
“I know where your family lives.” There’s a predatory gleam in his gaze. “If you were competition or a threat, I’d use that information against you. It’s how it’s done when you’re playing with the big dogs. Which you are.”
I’m silent. He’s scaring me.
“You know that, right, little farasha?” he asks more softly, his last word in what I assume is his native Arabic. His brown eyes search my features in intent consideration. “You walked into the house of the biggest dog and threw down the gauntlet. Now, you should be trying to figure out how to get out of here, whether or not what you have on me is enough to protect your own family.”
I can’t speak. I doubt the information I have on him will matter. Nothing can reach this man at all.
He waits for a moment then draws a deep breath. “You’re not the normal kind of … competition I deal with. So, I’ll do for you what I’d never do for the others. You can leave. Now. No questions asked. I won’t hunt you down or even bother to visit the apartments where your family lives. It’ll be like this never happened.”
His offer is starting to sound good. This guy is nothing like what the papers paint him as. He’s shrewd – and smart. I’m beginning to think he wasn’t handed his success in the business deals he’s made. He didn’t earn it, either.
He took it.
He steps away from the couch and motions to the door.
I need a backup plan.
“Go. I’ll forget this, and you never appear in my life again.”
I start to leave, overwhelmed and furious. Circling the couch, I hesitate then move towards the door. I hate myself already, and I haven’t even left his suite! My mind is filled with images of my family and friends and the other residents of Tenley. I don’t even know how many people live on the block. It’s got to be in the thousands, though.
I exit the study but pause in the hallway.
If I leave now, I’ll never have this chance again. What if today is all that stands between my family and their ability to live a decent life?
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