Mafia Doctor's Secret Baby (Forbidden Kings #1)

Prologue

KATIE

As I step into the crowded hall, my breath catches in my throat.

This is…this is nothing like any of the other fundraisers I have attended over the last six months.

And ever since I began interning at Councilor Stern’s office—a great supplement to my final year of studies as a political science major—I’ve attended plenty of these things.

It’s one of the most important parts of the game, keeping money coming in, keeping people engaged with the message, keeping them passionate about everything we’re doing.

But those other events…

They were formal, staid…normal. Tonight, the hall—which used to be a cathedral before it was turned into one of the most famous and exclusive venues in the city—is packed with people hiding behind masks, wearing daring outfits, their faces obscured, their eyes dark in the dim light.

The low buzz of conversation fills the air, but I can’t make out exactly what anyone is saying, as though they want to make certain that they keep all of their secrets to themselves.

I take a deep breath and steady my peacock-feather mask on my face. When I told one of the other interns, Cara, about my outfit for the evening, she rolled her eyes at me and laughed.

“Peacock feathers are bad luck,” she said, digging an elbow into my side.

“Maybe in journalism,” I countered, a reference to her own major. “But in politics, they’re all good news.”

And that’s what I’m trying to remind myself right now, as I stand here in this room, feeling as though the eyes of everyone in the entire place are on me.

When Councilor Stern told me about this event, he mentioned that it might be a little different to what I’m used to—but he promised me it would be a good time, a chance to meet with some of the most rich and powerful people in this city.

“Like who?” I had asked him, with great interest. I know the only way I’m going to get ahead in this business is by making connections, and every chance I get to pounce on a new one, I will take it. But he just grinned, shaking his head.

“Why do you think they wear the masks? They don’t want people to know who they are. Not tonight, anyway.”

And that was all the warning I got for what I’m walking into right now.

I scan around, searching for Cara—she said she was going to be here tonight, but she’s chronically late in almost everything she does, so it shouldn’t surprise me that she’s already flaked.

And besides, I’m not even sure I could pick her out in this crowd…

I move toward the bar, thanking God that at least I’m old enough to drink now—it might not make me entirely comfortable, but it’s a small mercy to help take the edge off.

I wonder briefly if I’ll get asked for identification, but my boss’s words echo in my ears.

Nobody wants to be known here. Because what happens here…

It isn’t part of the face they present to the rest of the world.

I order a glass of champagne, figuring something celebratory is the best thing for an occasion like this, and sip on it slowly while I lean on the bar.

I’m not sure if I want someone to talk to me or not.

Besides the feather mask, I’m wearing a matching emerald-green dress that’s a little more daring than what I might normally go for in the workplace, but it feels almost conservative given what everyone else around me is wearing…

There are women with slits so high it looks like one wrong move might expose it all—or with necklines so low that all it would take is a toss of their hair to slip loose.

The men are immaculately dressed too, the suits fitted, the scents of their expensive aftershaves mingling in the air around me.

A few pass by and catch my eye, and I swiftly look away, not wanting to invite a conversation that I know I won’t be able to handle.

But then, much to my shock, a voice sounds from beside me—low and amused, as though he’s clocked on to my game already.

“You can’t hide out here by the bar all night, you know.”

I glance around to find a man looking back at me.

He’s wearing almost a full-face mask, apart from a curve that takes a chunk out of the white ceramic over his eye and cheekbone.

His eyes flash with something I can’t quite read, sending a shiver down my spine.

They’re the most piercing shade of gray, but it’s not just the color that has thrown me for a loop—no, it’s the way he’s staring at me, as though he longs to take a bite out of me right then and there.

“I’m not hiding out,” I shoot back. “I’m waiting for a friend.”

“Oh, right,” he replies, demonstratively looking around the room. “And where’s this friend now?”

I press my lips together. “I don’t know,” I admit, and I can see his eyebrow cock slightly out of the corner of my eye.

“You really came here to meet someone?” He chuckles. “What is this, your first time?”

“It is, as a matter of fact,” I reply. “I’m here because I work for?—”

He lifts a finger to silence me. Normally, I wouldn’t let some random man tell me what to do, but there’s something about the movement of his hand that makes it impossible for me to think straight. My lips part, half in shock, half in protest, but I stay quiet.

“I don’t want to know who you work for,” he replies. “And neither does anyone else here. They want to blow off some steam. Leave the real world behind for a while. And I suggest you do the same.”

He looks behind me to where the bartender is standing.

“Two more of whatever she’s having.”

And with that, he settles next to me once more, gazing out over the crowd with an impassive expression that I can’t help but stare at.

I don’t know what’s going on here. I’ve never had a man speak to me the way this one just did.

Never. And, in any normal situation, I would have snapped back just for quieting me with a gesture.

But the air in this place feels different—no, I feel different.

And maybe there is a part of me that wants to see where the rest of this night can go, if I just sit back and let it happen.

“So I guess this isn’t your first time, then?” I ask, as I lift the glass of champagne to my lips and take another sip. Maybe it’s the alcohol, or maybe it’s the presence of the man beside me, but I suddenly find that I’m not searching the crowd for Cara with quite as much keenness as I was before.

“Of course not,” he replies, as though it should be obvious. “I know this place well. It’s infamous, actually.”

My eyes widen slightly behind my mask, and I turn to him. “For what? What’s it infamous for…?”

He chuckles again—a low, warm sound that seems to reverberate all the way through his body to light up his face. “Oh, you really don’t know,” he remarks.

I lean forward, lowering my voice. “Is it drugs?” I wonder with concern.

I figure that, at a place as exclusive as this, there has to be a reason why they’re so cautious about the people they let in. Maybe they want to make certain there are no cops sniffing around.

He shrugs. “Sometimes. But I think it’s more the sex than anything else.”

He lays out that word, sex , with a lazy tone, wrapping his mouth around it as though savoring it for a second before he lets it go. A cold shiver rushes down my spine, and I feel a heat beginning to warm my lower belly.

“Sex?” I whisper back to him, feeling stupid.

I glance around once more, and now that he’s said it, the pieces are starting to fall into place—the way the women are dressed, the way the men are touching them, the way the conversation is so low and intimate.

These people came here because they want to give in to whatever carnal desires the rest of their lives inhibit them from.

“Mhm,” he replies, lifting the glass to his lips and taking a sip. I can’t help but let my eyes linger on the way his lips skim over the top of the glass, my head spinning for a moment as I take in the sight of it.

“You’ll see couples sneaking off all night,” he murmurs, keeping his voice low, pushing up the sleeves of his light-blue shirt. It hugs his body beautifully—not that I’m paying attention to anything like that, of course, because I’m not here to pick up some guy.

“Sneaking off where?” I wonder aloud. I don’t know why I’m even entertaining this conversation with him right now.

For all I know, he could be laughing at me behind his hand for being naive enough to trust that he’s telling the truth.

He could be winding me up because it’s so obvious that I’m new here, and I don’t stand a chance of winning this battle.

“Oh, you want to see?” he asks, and his voice is suddenly laced with devious intention. His eyes are locked onto mine, taking in my reaction, and I swallow hard as I try to contend with what he just said.

“With you?” I reply.

“I don’t see how else you’re going to find them,” he teases. “Given that you don’t know anything about this place.”

I stare back at him for a long moment, and then cross my arms over my chest. “I think you’re fucking with me.”

He raises his eyebrows at me. “Oh, yeah?”

He takes a step toward me—I can smell his aftershave, a deep, amber cologne that wafts off his neck as he moves in to close the distance between us.

“Well, how about we make a deal,” he offers. “I can take you down there, to where these rooms are. And if it’s nothing, if I’m trying to make an ass of you, then I’ll buy your drinks for the rest of the night. Deal?”

He extends his hand to me. I eye it for a long moment, not certain I believe this game that he’s playing. If I’ve learned one thing in politics, it’s that if a deal seems too good to be true, then it likely is.

“And what happens if the rooms are real?” I counter.

He cocks his head to the side. “You just said you don’t believe me. If you really think that, why does it matter what would happen if they’re real?”