Chapter Twenty-Three
Kingston
S adie’s gaze holds mine.
She doesn’t panic, doesn’t tumble out excuses at me. Doesn’t look startled.
And I give her points for that, I really do, but anger builds in me as she turns, still holding the necklace.
“I wanted a closer look.”
“With your hand? Maybe by hiding it somewhere?”
She looks stunning, elegant, romantic. The black satin dress has a full skirt that ends above her ankles, and she wears stacked heels. The top of the dress is fitted with a plunging V-neck that is lovely rather than obscene. It hints and doesn’t overtly display. The spaghetti straps cross in the back into a pattern that makes up the top part of her bodice.
But stunning isn’t the same and trustworthy and whatever tenuous ways I was making there, teeter.
“No,” Sadie says. She opens her palm. “I wanted to touch it, feel it, study it. And it’s not really something I can go and ask.”
“Of course you can. We can. Or could have.”
She nods but makes no move to put the piece back. “You want your mother to know I want to look at them?”
“Honestly? I really don’t care.”
“Don’t you?”
I cross the bedroom, stopping halfway across the room because I’m interested to see what her aim is. I’m aware her turning up at my place and getting me here was definitely an excuse for this.
The eye fucking she gave when I opened the door? That barreled into her. Me, too. Because it took all I had not to throw her to the wall, drop my shorts, push up between her thighs, and wrap those long legs about me and plunge to the hilt into her.
The sheer effort it took for me not to get a raging hard on?
Steel will and stubbornness on my part.
Both things I clung to with the thinnest of string.
And now?
There’s a reason I’m standing this far from her.
But still…
She looks so goddamn good.
The pulse in her throat throbs. Her eyes are dark, a spark of sheer defiance and lust in their centers and I’m beginning to think I have no problems with fucking her here and now in my brother’s room like some randy fool.
But I’m not going to do that. That’s why I’m standing this far from her. Though I’m suspecting it isn’t far enough. I don’t know what would be.
“Okay,” I say. “You got me. I do care. As in, I care if she’s dabbling in some kind of bullshit to fuck me over. Which I think we can agree, she isn’t.”
“I don’t know your mom.”
“Don’t you?”
She smiles and it’s a little feral. My blood pressure ticks up. “I work for you.”
I let it go because any transaction between them isn’t about fucking me over. It might be my mother playing games, but she’s not out to get me.
“So you do.”
“Aren’t you going to ask me,” she says, opening her palm and holding out the necklace, “if I came to steal this?”
“I think I did.”
“Your conclusion?”
“I think you’re good enough to do it, but you’re also not that stupid.”
For a moment, we both look at it, and the stones glint in the light. For a moment, I think she just might slide it in a pocket or down her top or something, just to fuck with me.
But she doesn’t. Sadie turns and slips it back in place. “I wanted to look at it to get a feel. I need to be able to tell—”
“Athena?”
She casts a narrow-eyed glance at me. “Yes.”
The look is dangerous and sexy as all get out. “How is that coming along?”
“It’s coming.”
I gesture to the door and she starts to stalk past me, but I catch her arm and pull her in close. “Don’t test me by stealing from my family.”
Her lips press together and the withering look she sends me tells me she can do just that and she also won’t. And that it pisses her the fuck off that I said that. “I’ll do what I want.”
“Yeah,” I say, breathing in her sweet and smoke laced scent, “you will.”
And we go back down to the rest of the soiree.
I forget what the charity is. This is probably some offshoot for my slightly reformed, black-hearted brother, Magnus. Who is so far from the ruthless and driven man I know, that sometimes I have to take a step back. It’s not immediately obvious if you don’t know him, and it’s way more pronounced when he’s with Zoey, the woman who stole his heart.
He’s still hard as nails, still driven and ruthless but with rounder edges. And the things he does for the community in Brooklyn where he’s building his vision of the future of tower complex living is real. Because of her.
Even work focused Hudson has loosened up with the bubbly, talkative Scarlett. He’s wound in knots and relaxed. The former is her pregnancy, the latter all her. And of course there’s my lothario brother who fell hard. Ryder still charms women, still flirts, but his eyes, his soul, they’re for Elliot. And it’s not just a new love thing, much as I loathe saying it. It’s one of those long-term things.
For the lot of them.
Idiots. That’s what they are.
My mother chooses that moment to come up to me. “Don’t be a sourpuss.”
“Go away,” I say.
She laughs. “It’s the look on your face when you observe your brothers. You could have your own happiness.”
“I’m happy. I don’t need some woman there, so keep out of it.”
“Do you see a woman with me wearing some kind of bow?”
I give her a long, hard look. “To be brutally honest, I wouldn’t put it past you.”
“Kingston, dear, I wouldn’t subject some poor creature to you. But just so you know, not all women are the one who hurt you all those years ago when you were not more than a boy.”
Turning, I stare at her. “He told you?”
“Of course your father did. We didn’t have secrets, not after I left him.”
“You left him?”
“Your father was a man who didn’t get his priorities straight. Not for a long time. Don’t let pride get in your way.”
Ahead of me, through some people, Sadie’s in conversation with Ryder. I don’t bother with whatever life lesson my mother’s attempting to impart, I excuse myself and make my way over to Sadie, who’s in the middle of asking my brother all about his security.
Whether she’s doing this to fuck with me, or sell him services or whatever, I don’t care. I want to put an end to it. “If you’ll excuse us, it’s time to leave.”
We make our goodbyes and I call a car and bundle Sadie into her coat. Let them think whatever they’re thinking. I just don’t want to be there anymore. It’s not until the car pulls up at her apartment building that I turn to her and break the silence.
“Don’t pull shit like that, Sadie.”
“Like what?”
I breathe out and keep my hands to myself through sheer effort. “Like you were probing my brother for information. Like you were casing the joint.”
“Come on.” She folds her arms and glares. “I wasn’t doing that. I don’t do that.”
“Anymore?”
She eyes me like she wants to smear my insides on the road with her bare hands. And I probably deserve that look. Still, doesn’t make her innocent. At all.
“I was talking to your brother. He asked, that’s all. Believe me or don’t believe me, I really don’t care. Now, I’m getting out of the car and you’re staying there.”
Fine by me. I let her go. “Sadie?”
She stops as she’s about to close the door. And she waits.
“We’ll talk tomorrow.”
“I can’t wait.”
As I head home, I think about it all. We’re no closer to finding the tiara or who has it. On the surface, I do believe her, after all, Ryder’s a phone call away. But she didn’t spend time talking to my mother and finding her with the necklace sits uneasy for all that her excuses made sense and still do.
Thing is, they’re excuses.
Whether they’re also the truth…time it seems, will be the thing that shows me the path.
My brother does call me the next day, saying he wants her information. Said Sadie would put him in touch with someone for his buildings. I’m betting her ex. It leaves a sour taste when it shouldn’t even touch me at all.
Mother? She’s evasive. I call and when she manages to call back two days later—like she leads the kind of life I do where sabbatical means a shit ton of work which I’m plowing through—she needs to, apparently, keep it brief.
I let her. What am I going to do? Hold the woman captive? She’ll talk when she wants and right now, she doesn’t. Apart from reminding me what rides on all this.
Sadie I talk to, too. There’s nothing on the horizon there, but she tells me to keep faith. Those are words she actually uses, like we’re nothing at all and she’s giving me her little professional pep talk and it pisses me off.
Actually, I’m so annoyed I leave the deal I’m working on in the hands of one of my most trusted. It takes a brief email to set the ball rolling there, and then I’m up out of my home office and heading across town to see Sadie.
It’s a warmer day, no sign at all of that light snow we got, and the sky is bright and blue with fluffy clouds that don’t fit in with my mood at all.
If it did, I’m sure it would be a wild and dark storm.
This time, I ring her doorbell and wait for her to let me in, while two tattooed and pierced people sitting on the stoop watch with interest. I ignore them.
“Yes?”
“Buzz me in if you know what’s good for you.”
She doesn’t say anything for a moment and then she sighs and the door buzzes open and I’m at her front door in record time.
It’s open and she’s leaning against the doorjamb in black jeans and boots and an old, fitted The Birthday Party T-shirt that’s fraying at the edges and slightly gray from way too many years of washes.
“I was going to call you,” she says, moving away and leaving me to follow.
I do just that and slam the door shut behind me, my anger around me like a cloak.
“Yet you didn’t.”
“Why are you so pissy, Kingston? I’m not saying you can’t rock the vibe, but I don’t get why.”
“You.”
She turns, holding a folder in her hands. Her gaze is hot on me as she looks at me. “This might lighten your mood.”
I take the folder. I want to tell her it’s her in so many ways. I want to put my hands on her. I want her mouth. Her pussy. I want…fuck, that’s why I’m so pissy as she puts it. I want her and she’s been acting like nothing ever happened between us. Like she doesn’t want me, too.
I’ve wanted women who haven’t wanted me. I’ve wanted round two when they only ever wanted round one. It’s happened. Not often, but it’s happened. And if that were the truth here, I’d live with it. Move on emotionally—not that my emotions beyond want and lust and need are involved—and be fine.
But that’s not the case.
The air between us sings and crackles. It hums. And she looks at me with hunger. She can’t hide that anymore than I can.
That’s why I’m so fucking pissy. She pretends in the worst way possible and then fucks me with her eyes. And yeah, I want all the rounds with her. I want her moaning and shaking apart. I want to pound her. I want to kiss her everywhere. I want to worship and possess. I want her in every way possible.
And I think she wants the same from me.
“Kingston,” she whispers. “Don’t.”
“Don’t what?”
“Look at me like that. You know we’re a bad idea.”
“We’re the absolute worst,” I say and go to her.
I don’t touch her, just open the folder.
We look at each other and she hands me something else, wrapped in cloth. I take it, too, and open it.
And suddenly the lust morphs into excitement of a different breed. “Is…is this the fake?”
“Yes. It was delivered this afternoon, before you arrived.”
“Oh holy fuck.”
“Pretty much what I said. Those are the photos of it to show.”
One of the photos is with the date, and also with today’s paper.
I set them down, still holding the fake. “I haven’t ever seen the original except in photos, but this looks good.”
“Better than good.” And Sadie starts pointing out things. “There are little scratches on the original in the photo. And there’s the engraved stamp always left on his work. As a piece, this could fetch a handsome price. It might be better than the original, but since we haven’t seen it, we don’t know. It should do.”
She’s right, it should. I let her take the tiara and she wraps it and sets it back on her desk and picks up another envelope.
“What’s that?”
“For Jenson, like we planned. Can you get a courier?”
I whip out my phone. “I’ll have one of my subsidiaries here within the half hour.” I rub a hand down my face. “Looks like we’re going to be spending some time together.”
And I sit down on her sofa, getting to work on making sure this goes well.
It takes less than an hour for Jenson to call me. I glance at Sadie, who rises from her desk and comes to sit next to me. We’ve been quiet, both working, keeping our distance, but as I set the phone to speaker, that’s gone.
“Kingston, I got the photos you sent.”
“I have it.”
There’s a silence, long, loaded, and finally Jenson says, his voice low, “So I see. Uh, just, just be careful.”
“What are you saying? You said I had to have it found and I hired someone. We found it, so…”
“Kingston, listen, there might be a fake. We’ll need to make sure.”
“You think I have the fake?”
“I don’t know. I’ll call you back in the next few days, as it’s not due here yet until your birthday. Just be careful.”
He hangs up after droning on about legalese and what we’ll have to do when that time comes. He wants it on my birthday and not before. Sadie’s gaze meets mine.
“That was weird,” she says. “A stipulation? The waiting?”
“Who the fuck knows.”
She smooths her hands down her thighs. “It buys us time.”
“Does it? Because from where I’m sitting, it feels like Jenson is up to something.” I take a breath. “Maybe it’s him and not my mother behind this.”
“You think your father’s attorney stole the tiara?”
“I know my mother wouldn’t.” It just doesn’t fit. And I try and work out what she’s saying. “So it has to be him, right?”
But Sadie shakes her head. “I don’t think it’s Jenson.”
“How would you know?”
“Because,” she says softly, “I’m not sure it’s missing.”