4. Miles
4
MILES
F inally, I could get out of that fucking penthouse and stop feeling so suffocated.
Until now, I wouldn’t have imagined it possible to feel trapped while inside a palace like the one I’d stayed at the past several days. Work had kept me busy enough that I could get away with escaping when I needed to. It wasn’t that I was uncomfortable—far from it.
It was the way the comfort sickened me. Aria had grown up there. Probably running up and down the hall with her sister or watching movies in the obnoxious home theater Magnus had urged me to use on the second floor because not only did the family need a two-story penthouse, they couldn’t be bothered to see a film with ordinary people in a theater—pampered little rich girls while I had gone hungry so many nights, crying myself to sleep, wondering when Mom would come home. Hoping she would bring something to eat. Hoping like fuck, I wouldn’t fall asleep again with a growling stomach and the taste of salty tears.
Who could blame me for needing an evening to myself?
It wasn’t like I was missing much at the penthouse anyway. Aria was out for the night. I’d heard her loudly announce her plans to her mother when she’d caught sight of me coming in from my new office down in The Battery. If the girl wanted me to believe she didn’t care about my presence, she was doing a piss-poor job of it. But that was all right. She added a bit of excitement to my vocation of making sure Magnus regretted ever breaking my mother’s heart.
“He didn’t want us.” Lingering at a traffic light, the bike rumbling beneath me, I could hear her plaintive cries as clearly as if she were in my ear. “I couldn’t have you around because he didn’t want to be a father. Of course, as soon as he locked down that limping little nothing, he decided he wanted to be one after all. How convenient for him.”
The instant the light went green, I shot forward, leaving the cars around me in my dust. She had never come out and said it, but I’d understood subtext even at an early age. I had cost Mom her husband. If it hadn’t been for me, they might have made it work and started a family of their own, the way Magnus had with Evelyn.
The memory wasn’t what left me feeling as bitter as I did that evening, tearing through the bustling city, snippets and flashes of life passing around me. All those years, I’d heard nothing but terrible things about Evelyn Black. She was a homewrecker, a whore, an ugly duckling who’d known she had nothing to offer but her brother’s wealth. “Magnus always did have a weak spot for broken things.” Mom had laughed many times. “She was counting on that when she seduced him.”
Except Evelyn didn’t strike me as the woman my mother had described. Then again, roughly thirty years had passed since she sank her claws into Magnus. Time had a way of changing people, so it wasn’t an impossibility.
“ We’re having a family dinner with Aria and Valentina next week. ” Evelyn had made it a point to tell me when we crossed paths earlier. Aria had all but snarled, then shot her mother a sharp look which she ignored. “We would love it if you could join us. Nothing outrageous, just a nice dinner here at home. I know Magnus would be happy to have you join us.”
Aria certainly wouldn’t be, which was another reason why I’d gladly accepted. There was nothing as satisfying as watching someone walk headfirst into their own demise. It would be like the rabbit welcoming the hunter's snare. And they didn’t have the faintest idea.
Why would they? They had never given a moment’s thought to anyone but themselves. That, if for no other reason, was more than enough cause to set them straight on a great many things. They needed to have their eyes opened.
I wasn’t in the mood for polite company tonight. I’d had more than enough of that.
That is what led me to what I could only describe as a seedy part of town, and that was being generous. I doubted pampered little Aria ever set eyes on anything like this. Apartment buildings where half the windows were boarded up, litter clogging the gutters. Rats scurrying across the street and down the sidewalks. Approaching a corner, I spotted two women attempting to strike up conversations with drivers in cars paused at a stop sign. No doubt one of Magnus’s precious daughters would look at women like that and recoil.
I couldn’t help but think of Mom as I continued on, the two of them whistling in appreciation as I passed. She had never been that desperate. She’d always sworn there were levels to which she would not sink, even for my sake. I was glad of that even now. I didn’t know if I could carry that level of guilt around for the rest of my life.
Up ahead was a bar, and I wondered as I approached how many years its faded sign had served as a beacon for the thirsty, lonely, and dependent. This was where I wanted to be. Around real people, where I could stop pretending for a little while.
It didn’t matter how much money I made, and I had made quite a lot of it. So much so that I hadn’t blinked an eye when I purchased my fully customized Harley-Davidson CVO Road Glide Limited. And I didn’t mind leaving it parked outside a dive bar in the middle of The Bronx either. I could always buy another. That was one thing I had sworn to myself as a kid during those long, hungry nights when I never knew when Mom would be home from one of her many jobs.
When I’m rich, I’m going to buy whatever I want and do whatever I want, and I’ll have so much money it won’t matter.
That goal was now a reality. Fine-tuning my algorithm had been my ticket to millions in profit in the last year alone. Now that I was taking the firm internationally with AI advancements, there was no reason to believe I wouldn’t add another couple of zeros to those figures before long. At least, that was my intention.
Yet as I strolled through a rusty door that squealed hideously on its hinges, I was a regular man. A thirsty man in search of a distraction.
Fuck, I loved it. The stench of stale beer in the air. The slight stickiness of the floors—more than once, it took conscious effort to pull the soles of my boots away from the splattered boards. By all rights, I should have recoiled in horror at the stained tiles overhead, yellowed and somehow still stinking of smoke years after smoking had been banned in public establishments. It was dark, dingy, and at least three of the men sitting at the scarred bar looked like they would enjoy the chance to kick my ass.
I would’ve enjoyed the chance to see how far they felt they could go. It would not have been the first time some piece of trash had taken a look at me and assumed I would make an easy target. I had been fighting for my life early on, and it had never stopped. Only the opponents had.
“Stella Artois with a Jack back,” I told the bartender, ignoring the way his brow creased at the sound of my accent. That was usually the way of it whenever I visited this level of establishment.
The music blasting from the old-fashioned jukebox in the far corner was loud and grating, but it was the raucous laughter of the women drunkenly dancing that drew my attention—four of them, clearly friends, utterly involved in their good time.
One in particular intrigued me—a tall, leggy brunette in a skirt short enough to make the hem flirt with the curve of her ass cheek. Her heavy makeup concealed what might have been a pretty face without it.
One of the women she was with must have noticed the attention I was giving them since before long, the brunette glanced my way after her friend whispered in her ear. We understood each other from the moment our eyes met, and a silent communication passed between us. I wasn’t looking for more than a good time, and neither was she.
Glossy lips curved in an inviting smile before she began crossing the room in a pair of sky-high heels. She wore a tight top with dozens of cutouts exposing vast expanses of olive skin, the fabric thin enough that her nipples were plainly visible. If they got much harder, they would tear through. For all I knew, that could’ve been the point. Everything about her was designed to attract attention, and she had certainly attracted mine.
Of all times for Aria’s curves and sassy mouth to invade my senses, threatening to take over my thoughts, this wasn’t it.
She wouldn’t be caught dead in such an outfit, though I had no doubt she would’ve looked like a wet dream come to life. It had to be the way she closed herself off that made her so painfully attractive and me so painfully hard half the time. I was no better than a young man going through puberty when it came to her. The challenge she presented made her that much more tantalizing.
At the moment, all she did was make the woman in front of me look like a sad, worn-out hag. I didn’t want that. Tonight was all about working out the tension that had built in me over days spent among so-called civilized people.
“Hey, handsome,” she purred upon reaching me, propping her elbows on the bar top and pushing her tits up and out like an offering. “Never seen you around here before. What are you doing slumming?”
Another thing I appreciated about women like her was their candor. It was refreshing after wasting so much precious time around women who couldn’t be bothered to be upfront. “If I’m slumming, then you’re slumming,” I pointed out, winking. “You shouldn’t sell yourself short.”
Her mouth fell open a bit. I had seen this reaction before. “Oh, that accent is the sexiest thing I’ve ever heard,” she breathed out. “Say something else.”
Why hadn’t Aria reacted that way when we met? Fuck, I was allowing the girl to cockblock me when she was nowhere near this seedy dive. “What do you wanna hear?”
“Anything.” She swayed nearer, bringing the scent of beer and cheap perfume with her. “Just so long as you’re talking.”
“I would like to buy you a drink, but I am not in the habit of buying drinks for people whose names I don’t know.” I cocked my head to the side, smiling at how flustered she’d become. “What do you think? Can we do something about that, love?” I was playing it up. There was no resisting the impulse.
“Fuck, that is hot. I’m Jamie.” Her red nails danced up my arm, then back down again. “How about you, gorgeous? What’s your name?”
“Willam.” Because I would be fucked if I gave this girl more information about myself than was strictly necessary. All it would take was hearing my name in business news for her to decide we had a relationship. Then again, what was I thinking? Something told me Jamie didn’t spend much free time perusing the latest developments in the business world. The latest reality TV scandal was probably much more her speed.
“It’s nice to meet you, Willam.” The way the name rolled off her tongue sounded like sex or at least the promise of it. I had watched countless women twist themselves into knots, trying to attract the attention of men they believed were weak or stupid enough to fall for their bullshit. The only thing they had going for them was the possibility of trapping a wealthy man and squeezing every last dime out of him before moving on to the next target.
“Likewise,” I told her, smiling to myself when she released a soft groan of hunger and desire. I could have taken her then and there on top of that filthy bartop, and she wouldn’t have protested.
“Do you like motorcycles?” I asked, chuckling when her eyes widened. “Mine is parked outside. It’s a limited-edition Harley-Davidson, fresh off the factory floor. Are you familiar with the brand?”
“Who isn’t?” Something told me I could have made up a name, and she would have salivated. Again, Aria came to mind, this time the memory of her neutral reaction to what normally made women cream their panties. Why was everything involving her so damned difficult? I needed to get her out of my head, or she would ruin my night.
“I would love to take you for a ride.” My attention landed on her mouth and those glossy lips. She would leave a red ring around my cock before the night was over, and that part of my anatomy twitched in anticipation.
“Baby, you can take me anywhere,” she purred, sliding her hand up my arm and over my shoulder, then draping her arm around my neck. “Anywhere you want. And you can put it anywhere you want,” she added in a breathy voice, her lids lowering.
The idea of flying through the night with this woman wrapped around me was almost fully formed in my mind's eye when a buzzing from my jacket pocket tore my attention from her. “Excuse me.” She leaned away while I located the device and checked the ID. Unknown number . “Hold that thought,” I told the woman whose name I had already forgotten while draining what was left in my glass.
It was much too loud inside. I answered the call on my way through that screeching door, stepping out into the cool night air before greeting the caller. “Miles Young.”
“Miles? This is Colton Black. I think you met my sister a few days ago.”
Of course, Evelyn’s nephew. “Cousin Colton,” I replied, injecting much more warmth into my voice than was present. “It’s good to hear from you.” He had probably gotten my number from Magnus.
“Are you busy tonight?” he asked. There were voices in the background, many overlapping, like he was calling from a club or a bar. Something told me it was far different from the one in front of which I stood.
Glancing toward the door I had walked through, remembering the woman inside, I replied, “Not very.”
“How about coming out and having drinks with us? Everybody wants to meet you.”
Interesting. “Who is everybody?”
“Our whole group. My sister is here with another one of our cousins and a couple of friends. And, of course, your stepsisters,” he added, chuckling like it was a joke.
Aria was with him. This night had become much more interesting, and my thickening dick certainly agreed. “I would like to meet everyone,” I told him, grinning to myself at the idea of how pissed off she would be when I showed up wherever they were.
She never bothered hiding her contempt. I would see if she could hide it in front of her friends and family without her parents’ presence.
Naturally, I would make her look like the little fool she was. By the end of the night, the rest of them would sing my praises and assure her I would never do anything to the family I was so glad to be part of.
“I’ll send you the location,” Colton assured me.
“I’ll be looking for it.” By the time I ended the call, I was brimming over with anticipation. This would be a hell of a lot more fun than fucking some nameless skank in the hopes of working a little frustration out of my system.
I was about to set off for my bike when another idea occurred to me. Would it work? It might take a little convincing, but I had no doubt I could sell it.
It was time to up the stakes a bit, and Colton Black may have inadvertently given me exactly what I needed to do just that.
Pulling my phone free from my pocket again, I placed a call, grinning in anticipation of what was to come.