Beauty & Chaos (The Dark Alliance #3)

CHAPTER ONE

TRAVIS

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Strength in silence: revenge is a patient man’s game. We act in the shadows and never reveal our hand too soon.

That’s our code. The one Maddox, Parker, Killian, Zayne, and I made while attending school as young men and discovering we shared similar pasts.

One of abuse by our fathers.

If I’d known it would take almost two fucking decades to get my chance, I don’t think I would’ve agreed to it.

My patience is running out.

Still, in those years I’ve created an empire I never dreamed of. Or did I? Certainly, when it looked like I could go pro as a golfer, I had lofty dreams. Then something shifted, and I knew I’d be more content in business.

After all, my father was a famous actor, and I’d spent my early years being paraded in front of the camera. Wishing someone could see my fear and pain and save me.

They never did, of course. Leo Taylor is beloved by millions around the world. The action hero of their childhoods. While he was the evil monster in mine.

So, I walked away from the game, but not completely. I combined golf and business and now own three of the most prestigious golf courses in the country.

That and the most exclusive members-only adult club.

It’s located just outside Manhattan. You can’t find it on Alliance golf website; it’s by invitation only. Most people would have to forgo six months’ mortgage payments to pay the annual fee.

Most of our members boast eight-figure net worths and return for the upscale and discreet provocative ambience.

It’s also the weekly meeting spot for me and the boys. We run large billion-dollar organizations, but Friday night is ours.

Well, mostly.

Parker and Maddox have fallen in love, and apparently, hanging out in a sex club is not what you do once you’re in a relationship. I wouldn’t know. I have, as Parker calls it, pussy on tap, so why would I settle down with one woman?

I have no answer, because he’s right.

I’m only thirty-three.

If I ever decide to, there’s plenty of time.

Honestly, I’m reasonably careful about who I stick my dick into. Mouth or pussy. When you’re the boss, you need to be smart. Consent is king, and women get these expectations that I don’t have time to deal with.

Emotions.

Dreams of a big white wedding.

Kids.

Ugh.

None of that worked out well for my family, so I’m happy serving and enjoying multiple orgasms. Know your place in the world, I say. I created mine.

Then there are the gold diggers. I can spot them within three minutes of entering the club, and it’s not just women. The proposals I’ve had from men would make your head spin.

The last time, a well-known musician who thought a regular agreement could be made between us got so dramatic, I yanked him up by the shirt and gave him a warning.

“If I wanted to suck your cock, I could do it here whenever I wanted. But I don’t, and you being a little bitch about it isn’t going to change my mind.” My eyes dipped to his crotch. “Or that thing grows another few inches.”

He, who will remain nameless, gasped.

“Now get out of my club before I cancel your membership.”

I probably could have handled that better. It’s not like I’m callous and dead inside, I’m just...yeah, I might be.

Listen, I love my friends, treat my employees with respect, I’m proud of my success, and enjoy good banter, but I have shit I still need to deal with.

This isn’t a pity party, but those deep wounds I carry around are the reason I’m currently sitting in the dark in my penthouse glued to my phone.

My tie was tugged loose a few hours ago, my shoes kicked off, and I gave up walking across the room after the third drink and now have the bottle on the table in front of me.

“Jesus Christ.” I curse as I keep listening.

I reach for the twenty-five-year Macallan and top up my glass. Again.

Holy shit, I can’t believe I stumbled across this.

Brooklyn McKenna. The McKenna Files.

She’s not someone I thought would hold my attention this long, despite being fucking gorgeous and intelligent. Is there anything sexier than a woman with a smart mind? Especially for a man who has pussy on tap.

The answer is no.

But that’s not why I’m listening to her podcast...okay, it might have been why I started listening after the algorithm served her up. I made that sound dirtier in my head, but I’m going to stay on track...

She’s an investigative journalist—aren’t they all—and appeared to be discussing celebrity gossip. Honestly, I’d rather sit and listen to Zayne rave on about AI policy and the...

Yeah, I can’t even finish that snore-fest of a sentence.

I hope robots don’t destroy us but listening to him rave on and on about how policymakers need to put processes and restraints on them is not my idea of a good time.

I saw Terminator.

I think we’re fucked either way.

Brooklyn McKenna’s breasts drew me in, but it’s the actor who’s getting a star on Hollywood Boulevard next month that kept me listening to her video. Or rather, that she has reason to believe he was involved with sexually abusing women he worked with in the past.

I believe her.

Because it’s probably true.

She’s talking about my father, Leo Taylor.

It’s not a stage name. I changed my surname the moment I legally could and did a pretty good job of burying any links between us.

Essentially, I disappeared.

My inheritance from Mom, who died when I was five, was accessible when I turned eighteen. I paid for my own college tuition and told my father to stay out of my life.

He did.

I barely heard from him after he’d sent me to Phillips Academy boarding school when I was ten. Something he’d done to save himself more than me. Although he’d done both.

Not that he deserved the credit.

It was Sofia, my nanny, who was responsible.

But I’m leaping ahead.

Most media outlets talk about my father, and it’s not always positive. He’s been accused of being a bully and a handful of other things that celebrities have to deal with by those attempting to make some cash.

Or get their fifteen minutes of fame.

Brooklyn’s show, however, is going viral, which I guess is why it appeared on my phone.

Fucking thing probably knows he’s my father.

I’d seen that he was getting a star a few days ago, and like anything to do with him, I tried not to let it get to me, but here I am, five whiskeys later and a crick in my neck.

Motherfucker.

The only thing that asshole deserves is a twenty-year sentence and a prison cell for life. Oh, and a cellmate named Rick.

A star on the Walk of Fame for a lifetime of achievement? No fucking way.

Not after what he did to me, and by the sounds of it, other people.

“We’ll dig deeper into these allegations about Leo Taylor and let you know what we find. Tell me below in the comments whether you think Leo Taylor is guilty, or if he deserves his Hollywood star.” Brooklyn says from behind her laptop.

Tempting.

I could give her a lot of dirt on my father, but I didn’t spend the last twenty years building a new life to front the media and tell them what he did to me.

Shrinks might tell you it’s therapy, and maybe it is for some people. Not me. I plan to destroy him, and I know the opportunity will present itself.

Could this be it?

Destroying him, as he did to the little boy I once was, is the only thing that I feel will help me let it all go.

I drop the screen and recline back into the sofa, putting my feet up on the coffee table. Then gaze out of the floor-to-ceiling windows across Manhattan.

A plan starts to formulate, and the corners of my lips turn up.

I need to think through all the details further and find out more about this Brooklyn McKenna—who I’d quite like to meet—but this could work.

Without showing my hand, staying in the shadows, I can manipulate this situation and bring him down.

Hard.

It’s well past time I exacted revenge on the man who stole my innocence. Who filled my nights with terror and taught me that nowhere is safe in this world.

The one man who should have done the exact opposite.

“I’m going to fucking destroy you, you asshole.” My voice is rough in the darkness. “Completely.”

Even better, the pretty lady is going to do all the work.

Honestly, it’s fucking perfect.

I couldn’t have planned this better myself. Of course he’s hurt others. As a victim and young child, I didn’t stop to think he might have been doing something similar to other people. As an adult, I try not to think about him.

Mostly I never do.

But he has hurt others and will continue to.

There’s a sense of obligation to assist in him being stopped, but again, I will not go public nor destroy the new identity I worked hard to protect.

Cops don’t give a shit.

They want to get their guy.

I watch TV. I know how it works.

Almost the best part of this is my father probably thinks I’d accepted my fate and moved on with life.

Wrong.

Wrong, wrong, wrong, motherfucker.

My net worth is ten times his. The narcissist was more interested in his fans and walking red carpets, while I was amassing my billions and biding my time.

Impatiently.

It’s only the boys who kept me out of jail in my twenties. We all did it for one another.

But I still spent nights wondering if Leo ever regretted what he did. Was there any part of him who cared for the small boy whose mother had just died and desperately needed love and comfort?

I never got it.

Or rather, not in the way that was loving or safe.

What I would have done to be invisible to him in the end.

The first time was the most shocking. I was five and asleep. The feel of his hands on me was confusing. I knew it was my dad, but his hands were in places, and doing things, that didn’t feel right.

Then the horror set in, and his hand covered my mouth.

He told me what would happen if I told anyone, as I whimpered and cried.

I was scared.

That fucking cunt.

Most of the week he went to work, and I attended school, so everything was normal. I thought—hoped—he’d never do it again.

Then the weekend arrived, and Sofia, my nanny, tucked me into bed and headed to her wing in our Los Angeles mansion in Beverly Hills. As she did every night. Friday night he brought a woman home, as he’d started doing just weeks after Mom died.

That was confusing and made me sad.

But it was Saturday, when he returned home alone, drunk and banging around, that my hopes were shattered.

The door clicked open, and I began trembling as the covers were shifted.

“No, Daddy,” I whimpered and got a smack over the head for it.

The sound of a door clicking open still triggers a PTSD reaction within me. I don’t talk about it or show it, but it’s there. Sending a slither of terror through me.

Understandably. This went on for five fucking years.

Night after night, I smothered my cries in the pillow, disappearing into the safe place inside my head. Essentially shutting down my emotions and senses.

It’s how I do it now as an adult.

Then one night, after I’d had a fever that day, Sofia came to check on me. She found my father standing beside my bed with his cock in one hand, the other gripping my face, forcing my mouth open.

Not that he had to force by that point. I was trained like a fucking monkey.

The shame of which I still live with today.

The next day, she was gone.

But she did save my life.

The following week I was sent to Phillips Academy and have not seen my father since.