Blood and Trouble (RBMC: Helena, MT #3)

1. Ava

Ava

I stood on the balcony overlooking the Paris skyline below, ignoring the tightness in my chest and anxiety in my gut.

Lights twinkled in the distance while a gentle summertime drizzle coated the landscape.

Laughter and low, dulcet chattering echoed from the open doors behind me, beckoning me to get my tail back in there.

My absence would be noted and questioned, but I needed a moment to collect myself.

I’d been on this European business trip for three weeks now, and the long days had started to catch up to me.

I’d been meeting with dozens of potential investors and partners, and I had one signature to show for it.

Joyeaux International closed last Tuesday, and only because Pierre enjoyed being the first at things.

I needed five more like him, and not one of them would put a pen to paper until someone with a name and influence did first. Pierre wouldn’t cut it.

I needed a bigger name, one with generations of wealth and status behind it.

Conditions precedent all the way down. If any piece fell out, they all did.

I took a slow inhale of my cigarette, blowing it out with a deep sigh.

Do it. You’ve done harder things for less.

“Those things will kill you,” said a familiar voice as footsteps drew closer to me.

One side of my mouth twitched, and I turned to face my business partner/bodyguard, Lycan, as he leaned against the metal railing next to me.

“We all have to die someday,” I replied, taking another relaxing draw.

“That’s bleak.” He held his hand out and waved two fingers, gesturing for me to hand it over. Amused, I held the cigarette out. He took it, inhaled, and turned to face the beautiful skyline, leaning his elbows against the railing. “What’s got you all morose and chain-smoking by yourself?”

“One cigarette hardly counts as chain-smoking.” I brushed hair out of my face and straightened, steeling myself against what I needed to do.

I’d quit four years ago, but old habits and all that.

I only ever did it to pump myself up, to give myself five minutes for a private breakdown before donning my frigid mask and steel backbone to get the job done.

Lycan shifted his gray-blue eyes to me and pulled his lips into an incredulous grin.

I ignored the girlish pitter-patter in my heart.

Yes, he was beautiful, and he knew it. At six-three with pale silver-blond hair, Lycan could bring even the most conservative puritan to their knees.

He flirted relentlessly with everyone, even the other security detail we’d hired.

All he had to do was flash that killer smile, and people tripped over themselves to do whatever he asked.

My twin sister, Maeve, and my younger sister, Sol, had warned me about him.

Unabashed playboy. Ruthlessly singleminded. Shamelessly hedonistic.

“He’ll fuck anything that moves,” Sol had said.

He’d been the consummate professional, at least to me. I probably should have been thankful. I didn’t have the time or the patience for all that. Not now. Maybe not ever.

When he’d first shown up for the flight to Europe, he’d been dressed in cowboy boots, dirty denim jeans, and a leather cut that said “Royal Bastards MC: Helena, MT.” My first task had been to take him shopping when we landed in Paris.

I’d be lying if I said he didn’t clean up well.

A bespoke suit and a pair of custom-made leather shoes would make anyone shine, but on Lycan, it rattled some long-forgotten cage inside my heart.

Regardless, I wouldn’t have someone representing Vanderbilt Holdings who looked like they just walked off the ranch or climbed off a motorcycle.

He needed to embody the part of a boardroom executive, and after a full closet of tailored clothing, I was surprised he could play it just as well.

“You’re avoiding the question,” Lycan said, handing the cigarette back to me. I finished it down to the filter and stabbed it out in the ashtray next to me.

“What makes you think something’s wrong?” I forced my voice to stay steady as I drew up my mental shields, reinforced my armor, and stuffed my emotions way down inside where they belonged.

“For three weeks, I’ve watched you walk into these ridiculous soirees and sweet-talk rich assholes into turning out their pockets.” He narrowed his icy gaze on me. “Tonight, you’re quiet. Nervous.”

“Nervous?” I laughed. “Me? Never.”

“I can smell it,” he said.

I cast a disbelieving glance at him.

“If I can, they can, too.” He nodded toward the party inside, the one with said rich-assholes mingling around, congratulating each other on their magnificent displays of capitalism and wealth. “So, go on then. Out with it.”

In the time we’d been shuttling around Paris, we’d developed a hesitant friendship…

as much as I could say anyone was my friend besides my sisters.

The Vanderbilts were the richest family in Montana.

We owned an immensely successful cattle ranch that my father had turned into an energy empire.

We supplied and controlled most of the clean energy on the eastern side of the United States, and if I were successful here, we’d expand our enterprise internationally.

All I had to do was walk in there and demand it.

Sweet-talk it out of the men who could make it happen.

Last year, Vanderbilt Holdings had formed a tentative alliance with Royal Unlimited, the official incorporation of the Royal Bastards Motorcycle Club.

Our families had been enemies for years, but when Sol fell in love with their vice president, Orion, we’d become family.

So far, the agreement had been profitable for both sides.

Old bad blood had been washed away, and when my eldest sister and current CEO, Guin, asked me to represent our interests globally, Lycan was elected as the representative for the RBMC.

We were in this together, but arguably, the stakes were higher for Vanderbilt Holdings.

A few weeks ago, an enemy club had ransacked our ranch, killed our entire herd and everyone who worked for us—twelve men the police still had listed as missing.

We were under investigation by insurance auditors and local authorities, attention we didn’t need or want right before we tried to expand globally.

What had once been a networking and exploratory tour had quickly turned into securing a do-or-die acquisition.

No one had said default out loud yet, but they didn’t have to.

I’d done the math. I knew how imperative this was.

Turning to face the party, I found the source of my dread towering over the crowd.

Scott Fitzgerald. Tall, blond, and just as handsome as I remembered.

Probably just as arrogant and slimy, too.

Current chief financial officer for Fitz Global, formerly one of the most prestigious energy organizations in Europe.

“You see that man over there?” I jerked my head toward the offending individual, and Lycan turned to the side, following my gaze.

“The balding dude with glasses?” He scoffed. “You could have him calling you Mommy in twenty minutes.”

I laughed and playfully smacked his arm. “No, the one standing next to him. The one closer to my age.”

“Hmm.” Lycan clicked his tongue. “What about him?”

“His name is Scott Fitzgerald IV, Seventh Earl of Pembrook,” I explained. “He and I used to date, once upon a time. It’s been over for a while.”

I didn’t have a long list of ex-lovers like Maeve, nor did I routinely let other people into my heart. I had too much to do—law school and the family business and millions of things to accomplish. Scott had wanted something more serious than I was willing to give.

Everyone else on this trip had been a stranger I could out-prepare, some name on an agenda with a title next to it that I could sweet-talk into whatever I needed.

Scott knew me. He’d call me Lonnie and reminisce about summers spent on yachts in the south of France.

He’d make it personal, and I had a hard time with anything personal.

You have to do more. Fix it. Get him to sign.

Everything they have left is sitting on you.

“He looks like a douche,” Lycan said, dismissing Scott to turn back toward the skyline. He grabbed two glasses of champagne off a tray as a server passed by and handed one to me.

I sighed and turned toward him, exhaling the weight of the long evening ahead.

“He’s got four generations of a name attached to grids and licenses that Vanderbilt would have a difficult time getting,” I said. “He’s the key to securing our global expansion.”

Lycan looked at me with curiosity. “What’s the problem?”

“Securing his partnership is a big deal,” I said, “and I know when I walk in there, he’s going to call me his stupid little pet name and pretend like nothing ever happened between us and we’re still old friends.

I don’t do personal, not like this. Anyone gets too close, and I just…

” I didn’t know how to explain. Anytime it got personal, I shoved them away.

I didn’t let people get close because I didn’t trust anyone besides myself (and maybe Maeve), and Scott knew too much to make this a fair fight.

“I needed a moment to get my head on straight. That’s all. ”

Lycan hummed and nodded. “Is that his wife next to him?”

“The one currently forty months pregnant with their fourth child? Yes. Bea. She was friends with Maeve and me at boarding school.” I gulped another big swallow of alcohol and thanked God for liquid courage. I’d need all the help I could get.

“She looks like you,” he said.