Chapter 18
Delilah
Iheaded to the office purely to get my heart rate down.
It wasn’t working very well.
I was in an absolute whirlwind of confusion, trying to make a damn bit of sense of what had just happened. Relying on the skills of my trade, I focused on grounding myself in the facts.
Fact: Adrian and I were immensely attracted to each other, so much so that without inhibitions, we would have shamelessly and very deliberately crossed the journalist-subject line and fucked like rabbits.
Fact: As fun as that was, I was past the age in my life where I would have enjoyed the thrill of that without reservation. I needed a bit more out of my relationships, even if “a bit more” was genuine interest in going on some dates.
Fact: Adrian…
I could not say anything about Adrian that was a fact. Was he truly uncertain about what he wanted? Was it just yet another compartmentalized decision on his part? Or was it something coldly calculated, a feint to set me up for making love before ultimately blowing up in my face?
I got to the office parking lot and sighed. I put a finger to my lip, biting a fingernail nervously, but all that did was remind me of the way Adrian had kissed me. Of how he had pressed me against the wall. Of how he had slid his fingers across my body, across my clit, almost into…
I shivered as I felt a terrible pit of anxiety within me. I really couldn’t tell if I was anxious because I couldn’t wait to get naked with Adrian, or anxious because I still might be a pawn in his game.
“Fuck!” I uttered in frustration.
I was out of control, and it was a sensation I absolutely despised—a fact, I suppose, for both me and Adrian.
I could sit here and claim that I needed to return to the journalist in me, but here was another fact.
Until something major happened, until the tension was unwound and resolved, that would never happen.
I had a weakness for the King of Diamonds, and I could only speculate if he had a weakness for me.
I got out of my car, grabbed a pair of sunglasses, and began walking to the Las Vegas Times office.
I desperately needed the presence of other journalists, of colleagues, of even Eric, my boss, to ground me a bit.
Wearing shades into the office was nothing unusual with the desert sun, even in the winter, but right now it felt like I was trying to mask a hangover and doing a poor job.
The only difference from others was that this was an emotional, not physical, one.
When I got inside, the smell of hours-ago brewed coffee hit my nostrils, as did the sound of someone typing away. Very briefly, oh so briefly, the sounds brought me into my element.
And then I saw a headline on the wall about King of the King’s Men falling, bringing me back into the world of dark, dangerous men, and my two worlds melded together.
“Good afternoon, Delilah.”
I nearly jumped in shock at the sound of Eric.
“Hi, Eric,” I said. I tried to project calm, but how well did I really do that? Most people had no idea how much an open book they were or how obvious their inner turmoil was; I hoped that being conscious of it made it not so bad, but honestly, I knew better. “Any major new leads happen recently?”
“Uh, no, nothing new,” Eric said, confused. As he should be. As the News Editor, he didn’t do as much journalism so much as he oversaw the work of other journalists. “But I will let you know if I hear anything from anyone.”
“Sounds good, thanks,” I said, hurrying forward, perhaps a bit rudely.
But what was I supposed to say to my boss? Hey, sorry for the question, but the truth is, I just almost fucked the King of Diamonds in a penthouse at an off-Strip casino, and I’m not even pretending to be objective anymore. Talk about a fast track to getting removed from a story.
Talk about a fast track to not having a professional reason to see Adrian any further. Not that such a thing would stop you or him at this point.
I sat down in my office, drew in a breath, and tried to center myself.
Then my phone rang, and my miserable efforts to slow my heart rate unwound. In fact, they outright reversed as I wondered if Adrian was already calling me. But no, it was a number I didn’t have in my phone. I swallowed, said, “Get it together, Delilah,” and answered.
“Delilah Reyes, Las Vegas Times,” I said. At least that sounded smooth.
“Do you know who this is?”
I did. Immediately.
“Leo Morril. How can I help you?”
He chuckled on the other end of the line.
Fortunately, since this was not a billionaire I was being really unprofessional and stupid with, I could get a grip of myself.
He’d try to control the dialogue, and I’d make sure that I got the answers I wanted—or let him make foolish statements trying to avoid such questions.
“Oh, there are many ways you could help me, but I understand that as a journalist, you have boundaries that must be respected,” Leo said. “Funny, though, it seems like the King of Diamonds doesn’t respect those boundaries.”
I felt my stomach drop out from under me. Where… where the fuck was this going?
“Are you calling me for actual news information, Leo, or to waste my time?”
“Such a harsh response so quickly!” Leo said with a laugh.
“What’s wrong with a simple observation?
An observation of the King of Diamonds meeting you for coffee and then driving you to his own casino?
I know that you have access, Delilah, but sometimes access can quickly drift into unethical perks. You know that, right?”
He doesn’t know anything that happened in that penthouse.
“I don’t know where you are going with this, Leo, but I am not here to play games of appearances.”
“No?” Leo said. “I understand. But I would be curious. What would happen, I wonder, if word got out that the hard-nosed, dogged, professional reporter Delilah Reyes was cozying up to the King of Diamonds? No, snuggling up to the King of Diamonds?”
He let the words hang. I wanted to reach through the phone and wring his neck.
“How would that look for your journalistic integrity?”
“Mr. Morril, may I remind you that as a journalist, my job is to report on the news objectively, not to craft a persona for myself. If others wish to do that, that is their prerogative. I have already told you many times over that I am working on a story about the new dynamic between the Vales and the Morrils and what each family has done and will do. If you have nothing new to add to this story, then I will need to hang up and focus elsewhere.”
But Leo just laughed. I didn’t like the laughter. Not because it was wicked or against me; that was obvious. But because it was so sure, so confident. Whatever Leo was thinking, he felt very, very certain he was right.
“You know, you are probably familiar with what happened with the news article about Sarah Carpenter,” Leo said.
“I had nothing to do with that, and I can say that beyond plausible deniability. It’s the truth.
But it’s very clear that whoever on my team had the idea to plant that was an absolute idiot.
Gossip and implications, sent to a tabloid that might have been read by the author’s mom and aunt. Ridiculous and a waste of time.
“But I took note of that. And it turns out, if you want something to really stick, you have to make sure the proper truth is presented. The story’s ‘truth’ about Sarah was nothing.
A billionaire funding an artist who had had an accident in the past?
Yawn, wake me up when the billionaire cheats on her. ”
He wouldn’t. Sarah would kill him if he did.
“But a journalist and a billionaire sharing a car ride from a coffee shop in the morning? Now that is interesting.”
“You, of all people, Mr. Morril, should know that what people see and what actually is real are rarely the same thing. You don’t get as wealthy as you do without controlling the imagery and narrative of everything. You know ‘truth’ is malleable.”
“Oh, Delilah. Even when you are compromised, you can speak the truth. I suppose that is why you are so damn good at your job.”
A pause came. So long a pause, in fact, I almost asked if Leo was still there. But just when I was about to, he spoke up.
“You know, you just said something very interesting. ‘Truth’ is malleable. Don’t you think the so-called King of Diamonds feels the same way? Why do you think he picked that name?”
I could rattle off several reasons why, many of them far more vulnerable and personal for Adrian than even he cared to admit to himself. But I just said, “to show off his wealth.”
“Among other reasons,” Leo said darkly. “But think about it. Diamonds blind, both perhaps literally and in other ways. Adrian may be the CFO of the Vale family, but he’s really just the image person—and he has a way of making sure you see the bling and flash more than the damage done.
So if I may suggest, Delilah, look past the flash.
Look past the heat and the pressure. Look past the lies he feeds you, even the ones disguised as vulnerability.
The real King of Diamonds has edges so sharp, they can cut a man. ”
Leo drew in a breath.
“Be careful, Delilah. You’re walking a very thin line. And in Vegas, thin lines don’t tend to last very long before someone sails right past them. If you ever grow tired of being compressed, we’re more than happy to give you the real story.”
Before I could say another word, Leo hung up. I almost slammed my phone on the ground but settled for putting it down angrily.
It was one thing to get entangled in a mess of my own doing, but a private mess that few others would know of.
I hated the idea of doing something so long as no one noticed—that was how unethical men like King before and Leo Morril now operated—but at least my concerns were limited in scope at that point.
But if the Morrils had eyes on me?
If Adrian’s vulnerability and uncertainty were in fact masks for a lust for sex that even I had underestimated?
What if his partnership and his admittance that he didn’t know what he wanted were not just masks, but deliberately crafted ones from the start?
At least diamonds always knew they were being formed under pressure and heat.
What if I didn’t know the actual amount of pressure and heat I was under? What did that make me?
Dead meat, that’s what.
You’re no diamond to Adrian. You’re just a hot piece of meat ready to be cooked and compressed to his desire.
But every part of my instinct said that wasn’t true. I’d spent years honing my bullshit radar for subjects who pretended to be sorrowful but were just as conniving and cruel as they had been before getting caught. Adrian, truly, really, seemed genuinely conflicted.
Yet I could not pretend in the slightest that I was objective, much less that I knew there to be an objective truth.
I stared at my computer screen, the draft of an article about the Vale family half-written. On the page was the section about Aces Up and a quote from an anonymous source saying, “The Vales say they’re saving us. What they’re really doing is saving what they like of us and discarding the rest.”
I bit my lip.
Leo had, strangely, been right about one thing. He was right to latch on to my point, spoken off the cuff, about the truth being malleable. It just depended on where you were sitting and how you interpreted it.
So, I decided, I needed to do something perhaps foolish but very real.
I needed to strip away the heat. I needed to strip away the pressure. I needed to strip away diamonds, illusions, and blinding light.
And in doing so, I needed to have the real Adrian Vale revealed to me.
Only then could I figure out whether Adrian was sincere in not knowing what he wanted from me.
Only then could I figure out if I was sincere in wanting to cross the thin line that so often vanished in Vegas.