Chapter Eleven
OCEAN
“Wait, where are you going?” Coby asked in a panic as she followed me to the door. She looked like she’d been run over by a train if that train was me.
Coby Perry was the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen, but I liked this look on her too—disheveled, dazed, a little traumatized, and looking like she’d been ridden hard, even though I’d mostly kept my hands to myself.
She’d never looked more like mine than she did right now.
As for the reason I haven’t fucked her yet, I had to be sure that when she fucked me back, it was because she wanted to and not because she thought she had to for her survival.
She was vulnerable right now and afraid of the unknown.
I was a patient man and didn’t want to ruin what could be thinking with my dick.
“As much as I’d love to stay in that bed with you and not fuck, I need to work,” I answered as I stopped by the dresser to grab my phone, gun, and key card.
“Oh. Can I come?”
“No,” I denied while holding in my laugh. I’ve been doing a lot of that since I stole her for myself. I expected tears, but she’s funnier than I expected. Easily adapted. A survivor. “You cannot come. I’ll see you for dinner, baby.”
I glanced over my shoulder when she didn’t respond and saw her sitting on my bed now with her knees pulled to her chest and her kissable mouth in a pretty pout.
It all felt pretty calculated, and I had to dig my feet in and stand my ground.
It killed me sometimes how easily she’d gotten me wrapped around her finger.
It’s even crazier how quickly her little ass went from demanding I take her home every five minutes to wanting to be under me all the time.
I’m not going to lie and say I didn’t like it.
If I could wave a magic wand and create a bubble for just the two of us, I would.
But I had to get to the money, so I could blow it all spoiling her rotten.
“Don’t look so sad, pretty girl. I’m going to go get Hunter. That’s what you want, isn’t it?”
“Wait…what?” Coby scrambled to leave the bed while I made a beeline for the door. “Don’t you think I should be there?”
“No.”
“Hunter isn’t just going to come with you. You need me there. I’m the only one who can convince her!”
“Yes, she will, just like you’ll do what the fuck I said and sit yo’ ass still until I come back.”
“But Hunter doesn’t do what she’s told. She’d sooner shoot you in the face.”
I swung around so quickly she almost crashed into my chest. “Even if it means never seeing you again?”
Coby fell silent, and I could see uncertainty and fear flicker across her face—the uncertainty that Hunter couldn’t be reasoned with and the fear of never seeing her friend again if she can’t.
I took advantage of her doubt and tossed her on my shoulder before marching her back to the bed.
She didn’t fight me because she was still worrying about her friend, who was already becoming annoying as fuck.
“Don’t trip, baby girl. I promise I won’t take no for an answer. ”
It was the wrong thing to say. My vow only gave her fear a new direction, and I glimpsed the panic in her eyes before I turned and damn near sprinted for the door.
“Ocean! I swear to God you better not hurt her! Ocean!” she screamed at my back.
I heard her running after me just as I slipped from the room.
My bedroom door slammed behind me, and I quickly swiped my card over the pad just as Coby collided with the door.
The beep and flashing red light confirmed it was locked.
Knowing she’d eventually end up in my bed (I didn’t think it would happen this soon), I’d had the same lock installed on mine because while I might be gone for this girl, I couldn’t turn off the part of me that always thought three steps ahead.
I hadn’t intended to lock her into today, but it only took one mention of Hunter to bring us back to square one.
Even now, Coby’s fists banged on the other side as she cursed me out. “Let me out, you psycho bastard, so I can fucking kill you!”
“I’ll miss you too, sweetheart.”
“Fuck you!”
Already eager to return to Coby, I was grinning as I walked away, but Abel wasn’t when I reached the end of the hall and saw him waiting outside the wing’s double doors. His phone was plastered to his ear, but he quickly hung up with a curse and fell in step beside me.
“What’s up?” I asked as I steered us toward the housekeeper’s office. If Hunter was going to stay with us for an undetermined time, she’d need somewhere comfortable to stay.
“We got a problem. Your pops called a meeting, but he wouldn’t say why.”
And just like that, my smile and excitement fled as I recalled the warning my cousins had brought under the guise of petty gossip. “I know why.”
Pulling out my phone, I quickly sent Priscilla a message before leaving the apartment.
Hunter Parrish would just have to wait.
“The fuck yo ass do now?” my cousin Keefe leaned over to whisper as only the Fola’s leadership—the capteans, my uncle Tyrone, and I sat around the conference table in my father’s study at Glamis.
We were all waiting for my fucking pops to finish taking a shit.
The only sound was the hammering and drilling in one of the rooms my mother was having redecorated.
A bridal suite, I was told.
For Niamh.
“I found her,” I said simply as I ignored the migraine forming and kept one eye on the room.
Most of the men present were of the blood, but that didn’t make us family.
Abel, along with everyone else’s personal guard, waited outside but within shouting distance in case someone (me) decided on a whim to paint these dark walls red.
“Who?”
“My wife.”
“Shiiiiit,” Keefe croaked as he leaned back in his chair and rubbed his head in agitation.
It was possible we wouldn’t leave this room alive if my father somehow found out that I wasn’t just reluctant to marry his choice, but that I’d gone out of my way to find my own. The look Keefe and I shared expressed exactly what we both thought of my father’s trifling ass.
The only ones who weren’t apprehensive about the impromptu meeting were Tyrone and Evan. The latter wore a sneer directed at me while the former seemed resigned to his entire day going to hell.
Tyrone was my father’s comhairleoir1. Other than my mother and me, no one else was closer to the Boss than he was.
Tyrone liked to think of himself as important.
Indispensable. In actuality, Tyrone was a wannabe politician, a sometimes lawyer, and a glorified secretary.
He was also my mother’s younger brother, who sold her to my father in order to become made.
Shitty-ass siblings were something Coby and my mother had in common.
Evan’s bitch ass was the only one of my cousins I didn’t trust because he believed he should be the next Boss instead of me.
To keep me in line, my father let Evan’s dumb ass believe he could really choose him over me, but the truth is that Malcolm would rather slaughter our entire family and progenerate a whole new line than concede the throne to someone else’s seed.
My father believed our empire was his right as a direct descendant of James, but that kind of thinking is exactly what could lead to a civil war within the Fola.
Luckily, my father knew better than to make his feelings known.
The Kilpatricks have been in power since the start, but the Balfour-Young and the Torrances were just itching for a reason to take it from us.
Finally, the door to the study opened, and we all stood in deference as my father entered the room. The largest of us all, he towered over everyone as he walked to the head of the table and took a seat. I sat on his right while Tyrone sat on his left.
On my side of the table were all of the caps secretly loyal to me. On Tyron’s side were all of the ones loyal to my father.
Every seat around the table was occupied, and yet my side was fuller.
It brought a grin that made the other shift nervously, especially when my father took notice.
“Something you want to share with the class, son?”
“They wouldn’t get it.”
“Then let us get on with business. Have you figured out who’s been raiding my dens, or have you been preoccupied with other matters?”
Dodging that obvious trap, I stated needlessly, “I’m your second in command. When am I not preoccupied?”
My father slammed his fist on the table and roared, “Answer the question!”
“Black is still in hiding, but I have people looking for him.”
“Those were not your directives. Michael Black is my concern, not yours.”
“You expect me to find the person hunting him with one hand tied behind my back?”
“I expect you to follow orders and set an example.”
This could have been an email, I thought with a sigh. Drumming my fingers on the arm of my chair, I looked around the table at all the heavy expressions before regarding my father again. “Is there a reason you called us all here today?”
Several people shifted nervously in their seats.
No one else would dare tell the Boss of the Fola to get to the fucking point.
My father sat back in his chair, caressing his beard as he studied me. I could see him weighing the words he wanted to say in his head. Even though he was Boss, he still had appearances to keep. He had to maintain the semblance of control even though it was slipping by the day.
And for now, I had to maintain the pretense of obedience.
“I’ve been informed by our accountant that a significant sum of money has seemingly vanished.
” On cue, the door opened, and Angus stepped inside.
It seems the amount of revenue reported does not match what we received.
” Damn. I wasn’t expecting Roshaun’s treachery to be discovered so soon.
I was hoping for a few more weeks. “Luckily, we were able to successfully trace these discrepancies back to one of your ventures. A nightclub called The Diamond Lounge.”
“Yeah, I know about that shit, and I’ve taken care of it.”