Chapter Twenty-Five
Kingston
I t takes me a little more time than I’d like to set things in motion with the jet. It’s not often I get nervous, but yeah, this afternoon that’s heading fast to early evening I’m just that. Getting nervy.
A sleek black car pulls up at the small airfield in Teterboro, New Jersey, home to most of the private jets. And yes, I keep mine here.
My heart starts to tattoo hard against my ribs, pushing that nervous energy up and into excitement as shapely legs appear in low-slung heels.
Sadie places her hand on the top of the door and emerges. The dying sun is setting its glow on her shining dark hair she’s got smoothed down. Another look, another Sadie. She’s a chameleon in subtle ways, and I like each woman she puts forth.
Could a man ever get bored with her?
He’d have to be dead, and even then…
She’s in red, a far cry from her usual black, and it’s a Twenties vibe she has going on.
I run my gaze over her as she strides up, the sway of her hips holding my attention a little longer than I’d like.
“Traffic.”
“Welcome,” I say, “to the joys of city living.”
“We’re in Jersey.” She frowns, and looks up at the Bombardier 7500. “Fancy.”
I gesture to the stairs. “I like quality. And this is good for long haul flights as well as short. I don’t really need a collection of these.”
“Just watches.”
“I like watches, Sadie.”
Her gaze hits my wrist. “You’re not wearing one today.”
“With your habit and whatever the fuck we’re going to? I left it at home.”
I’m wearing a black suit, like she said. Not a tux, but a suit for events I almost never go to unless made.
She climbs the steps and I admire her ass. It’s shapely, compact, and I know exactly how it looks, how it feels under my bare palms, my mouth, against my body as I fuck her from behind. It’s perfect.
“Stop fantasizing about me,” she says without looking back.
It should annoy me she put that together. But it doesn’t. I grin and follow her up. “And give up a delightful hobby? Not on your life.”
Sadie taps her fingers against the leather of the sofa in the middle section. We both have drinks—Hibiki whiskey in clear, thick glass tumblers. It’s a short trip we’re making to the middle of nowhere, Ohio, but…
“Not a fan of flying?”
“It’s not high on my list,” she says. “Especially small craft.”
“This is luxury and it’s one of the best in the world.”
“And small.”
“The biggest of the private jets, Sadie.”
“Fuck off.”
I swallow my grin. Sadie, the woman who it seems lets nothing get to her except perhaps me, hates flying. It gives her a more human edge, a vulnerability. And I like it. Then again, I seem to like everything about this woman I apparently don’t like.
And here I thought I’m not the type to lie to himself.
I do like her.
I’m not sure how. In what way. Lust, absolutely. Her mind, her personality, how she looks? They flow into each other, top down, bottom up, and yeah, that’s a huge part of her.
But the rest, what it means?
I have no fucking idea. Because I don’t trust her in a lot of ways. Right?
“Whatever you’re thinking, stop,” she says.
“Me?” I sit back opposite her and cross my legs, the smoothness of the ride a slow flow over me. “If say, the tiara is at this thing, won’t it push the price up if I appear?”
“If it is. We’re going to find that out. The more pieces of the puzzle we have, the more we can discard the ones we don’t need.”
“The price?”
“You can afford it.”
My gaze moves over her slowly. “I can afford most things. The question is, do I want to spend?”
“You can’t afford to leave stones unturned, not if you want the truth and the actual tiara. Because that’s what you’re in this for. We have the insurance, which will let you save the business.”
I nod and sip my drink. “Bidding to get my own property?”
Now she smiles. “I never said you had to do that.”
“I’m bait?”
“Exactly.”
Whatever I thought the place we’d be going to isn’t this. We’re in Ohio, outside a small, exclusive town where some of the rich like to play because it’s not known. But country club with a hint of masked ball vibe is not the image I had in my head.
We stand out, even in masks.
No one says my name, they don’t need to, even if they know I’m there, which given my height some do. It’s hard to tell who is who with the masks covering most of the faces except mouths, but I recognize one or two. The rest, I have no idea.
They know Sadie, though, and she’s striking in red.
Her mask accentuates her eyes, and the cat-like shape to it isn’t lost on me.
I’m bait, she said to me on the drive from the private airfield to here. Bait to let those who know that I want my tiara and I’m willing to buy it. It’ll push up the price, but…
Well, the rest of what Sadie said is sublime, ballsy, and bordering on diabolical.
If she finds it, she’s going to steal it.
After the sale.
“When does it all start?”
“It has,” she says as we move about the room. She points to a waiter. This one is new and carries small shots, and he has his entire face covered in mime paint. “The host’s right-hand man.”
He comes to us and she takes a drink and a napkin. His gaze skitters over me and then back to Sadie. We’re in a big room, classic country club vibe and look with the tables and chairs and sofas. A long, sleek bar in the back and subtle and boring music piped in at just the right background level. But when she meets his gaze, she manages to make the entire room shrink down to us and him and he just nods and leaves.
She’s good at controlling situations without a word. And I’m more than impressed. I want to mark her as mine.
She doesn’t look at me. She’s studying the napkin, which looks like it’s a small piece of cloth, not paper, and frowns. Words are printed on it and she crushes it in her hand and says, “Come with me and don’t say anything.”
I swallow a sigh and make a small gesture and we begin the weirdest tour of a room I’ve been on. I’ve made the rounds at parties where I don’t want to talk to others and don’t, all while seeming like I’m not actually ignoring people, but this takes it to a whole new level.
This is slow and leisurely and her fingers brush mine as we walk. Deliberate touches to slow me down, to move me on, and each and every one of them sends a different cascade of heated awareness through my blood.
People talk to each other and some leave quietly. But all through it, I hear one thing over and over: Lower East Side.
It could be anything, and—
“We’re going.”
I look at Sadie as we head to the door. “Now?”
“It’s not here, but I think I know where it is. There’s another sale.”
It all clicks. “Let me guess. Lower East Side.”
It’s raining and cold at three a.m. when we get back to Manhattan. Sadie was on the phone and texting for most of the trip back so I got to observe her and she’s easy on the eye. Impressive, too.
The piece of material, the bidding form, is in my pocket and I squeeze it like some sort of talisman as we sit in my car outside a run down looking bar on the Lower East Side.
This isn’t hipster or the next best thing. It’s the kind of place that a certain type go to because the drinks are cheap and the pour heavy and the place is dark and anonymous. I don’t need to go inside to know that. I’ve been to places like this before, because sometimes a man needs to just have a drink. Or conduct business no one else needs to know about.
So the fact so many sleek cars have pulled up and well-heeled types have gone inside is telling.
I don’t know these people.
No one here is wearing masks.
Even the dressed down ones have money. I can always pick out money. It’s like an aura.
“I’m not staying behind, Sadie,” I say for the ninth time.
She breathes out. “This isn’t like Ohio. This is the real deal. The other real deal. These are people you don’t mess with.”
“The tiara wasn’t on auction in Ohio. You think it’s going to be here. Which, if it’s not stolen, means Jenson’s selling it.”
“We don’t know that. I’m going to find out. I want to see who is buying.”
“I didn’t hear any conversation about the tiara,” I say. “Just this part of town.”
Her fingers curl about my arm and it’s like she’s just reached in me and curled them around something deep in my chest. “I know the code words. This is a different sale. As I told you, the other was both legal and illegal. This is all illegal. As in stolen goods. And you need to stay here.”
“No.”
“This isn’t your world.”
I look at her hand and then her. And something in me shifts. I place my hand on hers. “It’s not yours, either, Sadie.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” She tries to pull her hand free, but I don’t let her. Her skin is soft and warm and I might not trust her in some ways, but I do in others. And for everything she might or might not have done, this sordid thing isn’t her world.
Not now.
And maybe not ever.
At least not in the way she’s thinking.
“Sadie, you aren’t part of the dregs.”
“But that’s exactly what I am.” She swallows. “Don’t romanticize what I’ve done and who I am because we fucked.”
“I’m not. I see you.”
“You see what you want to see.”
“Yeah, you.”
“I know these people. They might have money, but they’re from my world. They created it. I just manipulated it.”
Something in me hurts because she’s speaking soft and there’s a wall and behind that wall is pain and the vulnerability her Athena spoke about. Sadie doesn’t like people getting close and she shoves. Hard.
But I’m more stubborn than she’s ever even begun to assume. And I know this world suits her because they all keep to themselves. They don’t want to get in to her center. They want to use and she takes that and turns it.
And if Sadie Hess wanted to rip these people down to owning only used garbage bags, I’ve a feeling they all deserve it.
These are the type who build fortunes on misery.
“You’re not going in alone.”
“Kingston.”
I squeeze her fingers. “No. Let’s use me. Push up that price. If someone has it, let’s find out.”
And before she can say a word, I’m out of the car.
We go down through a door at the back of the bar. The stone steps and rough walls leading to the basement level are dank and cold. An earthy, musty scent coils around us as I slip my fingers through hers.
Her gaze touches mine and I give her a cool smile. Voices rise and grow louder as we approach a door with a burly guy.
“Raven,” she says.
He gives the smallest nod to the door next to him and we go through, into a different world.
It’s not pretty. But it’s painted black and has low lights with black sofas like it was some kind of speakeasy club.
No one speaks to us, but eyes are on us, hard and greedy. Those are the ones I peg as connected, as criminals who have made it to the top by all kinds of means and now like to collect things that make them feel more powerful, give spice. At least, that’s how Sadie put it and I can see it.
Even with those mega rich, the shadowy kind who probably have shares in half my things, who don’t commit nasty crimes, but simply don’t care where money comes from, I can see they’re the type looking for their next claim, their next thrill, and the room is buzzing with Sinclair.
Finally, a thin man of average height and build, with peppered black hair and a lined, hard face peels away from the rest. “You think you’re gonna get it back?”
“Let’s say I’m interested.”
“And with the Raven herself.” He turns. “Sadie. I want the tiara, not the man.”
“Marconi,” she says, and a bolt of electricity passes through me.
Oh holy fuck. This man is more than connected. He’s a head of a crime family. Mafioso. I don’t need to know him to know who he is, and Sadie knows him.
“Unless he’s got more things I want.” Now his gaze moves over her in a way that makes me want to rip his throat out.
But Sadie just smiles. “He might, but he’s not into sharing those. And everyone here wants the same thing. The tiara.”
We get a tight smile and the man moves on and she looks at me. “Don’t talk to people.”
“I don’t think anyone’s going to believe I’m a mute.”
“Not with that smart mouth, Kingston.”
I drop my head so I can use that mouth against her ear. “Keep flirting like that, Sadie, and I’m going to get all kind of ideas.”
“Stop that.”
“Make me.” I slide the knuckles of my hand down her spine, reveling in the thinness of the material, the way her skin is like soft and warm silk. She shivers and my cock starts to pay a hell of a lot of attention.
Sadie turns and those eyes are on me, melting, liquid heat. And I’m caught in them, in her, and I’m not sure I want to find a way out. “Kingston…”
She touches me, her hand coming up to my chest and we’re caught in a cocoon of heat and awareness. But she turns away, like she’s ripping herself free with all the strength she possesses. And Sadie takes a step back.
Her phone. It’s ringing in her small bag, but she makes no effort to fetch it. Instead, she takes another step away, looking around. She goes suddenly still, gaze like a laser on something I can’t see ahead where some big men have come into the room and stand. I go to her and I stop too, my breath and lust vanishing.
There it is. Under glass. The tiara. Other jewels are around it in their own glass prisons. And it’s as close as we’re going to get to the merchandise.
A woman steps out from the small crowd. She’s sleek and pretty and ageless and dressed in black old school Chanel. I know, because I think my mother once owned the same outfit. She has perfect blond hair and I’ve never seen her in my life. She starts calling out numbers and when Sadie shifts, I’m aware she’s placed a bet.
The numbers are low, so I’m assuming it’s shorthand or code.
I’ve been to auctions before. But nothing like this silent one where those here know the moves.
In the middle of it, Sadie grabs me and leads me out, and I let her because I don’t really know what the fuck is going on.
I wait until we’re in the bar. “Did you just spend my money?”
“No. I bid your money. Thirty million.”
“That all?”
She drags me outside and my car is still waiting. I open the door for her and follow her in.
Sadie glows, excitement makes her cheeks pink, and her pulse throbs. This shit turns her on, and—
“I didn’t want to buy it, Kingston,” she says, sliding close. She lifts her face to mine, lips almost brushing against my mouth, her breath warm, her scent evocative as it winds around me like a lover. “I wanted to know who would.”
“And do you?”
She slides her fingers down my cheek, a deliberate tease. “Yes.”
“So—”
“This is where I take over, Kingston.”
“Sadie—”
“In more ways than one.” And then she slips her fingers down and over my chest.
Her mouth meets mine.