21. Adrian
Adrian
Holy fuck.
In keeping with the theme of being what I knew Delilah wanted versus my usual King of Diamonds mentality, I focused on her pleasure and her body.
Normally, to be frank, I was a selfish lover; I had no problem giving orgasms, but it was entirely done so that when the woman got to me, I got my brains fucked out.
But in this case, with Delilah Reyes in my bed, I felt like an animal torn between two instincts at first. The instinct to dominate and control, and the instinct to be selfless.
The latter won out, but I had a feeling that next time, the former would win out.
This had been necessary, still enjoyable but needed for this to happen.
I was so fucking thrilled it had. Delilah was a fuck unlike anyone I’d ever had before. Maybe it was because I had focused on her and not myself. Ironic, I thought, considering what Cassius and Delilah herself had told me beforehand.
But when Delilah fell asleep in my arms—which was not that much after I had fallen into bed and let her snuggle in my arms—I began to feel strange concerns I had not expected to feel.
When was the bottom going to fall out?
The Morrils were still out there. I had never been in a spot like this emotionally, and if I were to follow in Cassius’ shoes, I was going to do something stupid sooner rather than later. Delilah still had to figure out her journalistic endeavors and how that fit in with me.
No.
That was Adrian Vale thinking. The younger brother. The one overshadowed by others.
The King of Diamonds would be fine. He’d figure shit out. I would figure shit out.
I drifted off to sleep shortly after, convinced that no matter what happened, I would be fine.
I woke up the next morning alone.
Alone?
What the fuck?
I scrambled around the bedroom, looking for any sign of Delilah.
“Delilah?”
I heard nothing in response. Seriously, what the fuck? Had I been so eager to get her, to consider the deeper possibilities, that I had failed to realize that I was the one being played?
“Delilah!”
That made no fucking sense. She had so much more to lose than I did, and she had so much more at risk if she didn’t act carefully. Why would she leave without a word in the morning?
“Delilah!”
Then I saw it.
A note was on the door leading to the outside. I read it carefully.
“I had to run, called into a meeting at work. Journalist lifestyle, unfortunately. But looking forward to seeing you soon! Call me and let’s do dinner.”
I nodded to myself. This wasn’t ideal; I’d hoped for a solid morning fuck, and I never liked the idea of something or someone else taking those closest to me away.
If Delilah was to be mine, the idea of some journalistic source scooping her away was not going to fucking happen.
It was understandable for the moment, but I had more money than I knew what to do with; she’d never have to work a day in her life again.
All in due time, I supposed. But still, this left me running a bit hot.
And then my phone rang.
This was putting me in a sour mood. I didn’t much care for morning calls, something my brothers and all my staff knew. Anything before ten a.m. had better have been an absolute emergency, or they’d be experiencing an emergency dealing with me. When I got to my phone, I growled.
“Dante,” I said as I answered, “someone had better be fucking dead for calling this early.”
“You’ll wish they were dead.”
Who the fuck are “they?” Already in a pissed off mood, this was not helping matters in the slightest.
“Sounds like the Morrils have done some digging on us, and there’s a story coming out this morning accusing Allure’s charity fundraisers of being fronts for fraud, among other things.”
“Are you fucking serious?”
“Yes, and they’re targeting you in the article.
Adrian, I know we’ve been trying to keep this legitimate, and I get why.
Cassius desperately wants to not be the Black Reapers, and he refuses to get his hands dirty.
But he doesn’t know about this yet. He doesn’t need to know this call happened. What do you want me to do?”
I barely heard Dante’s words. I was busy searching for the article, and it didn’t take me long to find it.
Thankfully, it had not been published in the Las Vegas Times; had it been, let’s just say last night’s bliss and shared experience with Delilah would have taken on a very dark, very unsettling turn.
But all the same, the article was damning.
An anonymous source that claimed to work for our family company said I was embezzling on the regular, that I’d slit my brothers’ throats for a larger company share, that I’d betray trust for a profit…
none of it was fucking true. We were ruthless, but we liked to say the only entities we didn’t fuck with were the FBI and the IRS.
The idea that we’d commit embezzlement or fraud for a few extra million dollars was beyond fucking absurd.
The absurdity of the article mattered little, however, in what I wanted to do to the fucking Morrils.
This wasn’t a business attack; this was a personal blow.
I could not fucking allow this attack on our name to go unnoticed, and frankly, I was leaning toward what Dante was suggesting.
Cassius was playing nice and within the bounds of gray ethics, and yes, that had gotten us to where we were.
But getting to the top and staying at the top required two different things.
Getting to the top required uncompromising focus, discipline, execution, and determination.
Staying at the top meant warding off your rivals, including those who were willing to play fast and loose with the rules, both explicit and implied.
We’d tried to play nice with the Morrils; we’d let the story on Sarah slide, we’d let some of the poaching of our employees rub off our back, and we’d even taken legal but powerful measures to keep the Morrils off the Strip.
That was fucking done. The Vale reputation, my fucking reputation, and the future of the Vale empire were all at stake.
“Adrian? The fuck you want me to do?”
“Stay tight,” I said. “I need time to think about what the fuck we’re going to do.”
I didn’t give Dante a chance to answer. Frankly, when I went back and reread the article, I came to realize this was less an implication of our families as a whole and a more personal, targeted attack on me.
I was getting to be fucking furious, so much so that I nearly threw my phone against the wall in frustration.
I had to do something.
But what?
I stewed as different options went through my mind.
It was difficult to detach my anger from what made sense; I could have hired a hitman to take out one of the Morrils, but that was an escalation that went way the fuck beyond what the situation called for.
Even I was well aware that if we assassinated one of the Morrils, our lives were on an immediate short clock.
I wished like fuck that the Black Reapers were still in the business of violence, but Cassius had failed badly.
Dante had failed badly. At some point, you had to recognize who was willing to help and who wasn’t, and the Black Reapers could not be bribed or coaxed into helping. Period. End of fucking story.
I had to…
I had to hit them where it would hurt most.
Their wallets.
But how?
It was a question not easily answered, and I spent literally the entire day in my penthouse trying to figure out how to strike back at them.
I thought about hiring someone to rob one of them, maybe even mug them at night to send a message, but they had security.
They were not living in a shack down the road.
Maybe I could get someone to rob one of their houses; that seemed more reasonable.
It would send a message while avoiding too absurd an escalation.
And then it hit me.
They wanted to call Allure a sham? They wanted to claim that our art gallery was a front for fraud?
I would ensure that whatever art they had wouldn’t so much be a sham as a fucking torn piece of paper on the floor. I’d find the right underground crime syndicate to go to their casinos and ruin what they had.
This train of thought blew up in my mind, seeming more and more appropriate. We’d cover our tracks appropriately, of course. We may have played by the book, but there were certain things in the court of public opinion that needed to never be presented, even if they were not illegal.
A part of me, though, hated the idea of destroying good art. Especially if it could hang… no, not in a public space here. That all but begged us to put a sign on our casino saying “Guilty” in neon red.
But in my penthouse? Maybe even in my office?
Oh, what a fucking delight of an idea.
It would be like when warriors from the olden days took enemies’ weapons and even heads and mounted them for others to see.
It would not be public for everyone to see, but it would serve as a reminder for me that when push came to shove, all bowed to the fucking Vales.
The King of Diamonds would exert pressure on whomever he wanted, whenever he wanted, and he would never again see his family name threatened.
And what will Delilah think of this?
I brushed off the thought, even though it warned me that what I wanted to do might not sit well with her. She surely had to know what she was getting into, however.
It took some calls and some messages, but eventually, after reconnecting with Dante and explaining my plan, we had enough leads lined up that in the coming days, we’d find someone to speak to who could help us.
I was mildly disappointed to know revenge would take a few days, maybe even a couple weeks, but I was not disappointed to realize we had options that didn’t involve pussyfooting around the subject.
By the time everything had wound down, it was past sunset.
The work with Dante—and without Cassius or Lucas, the former to keep him out, the latter to avoid leaks—had invigorated me and absorbed all of my attention.
It had been some time since I’d had something that so effectively consumed me, and when such things came along, I tended to obsess over them. You could say Delilah was one of them.
Delilah.
Shit!
I realized only then I’d forgotten to call her for dinner. I looked down at my watch. It was just barely after six.
As a billionaire, I could get into any hotel at pretty much any time, but suffice to say, no amount of money could make me go back in time to inform Delilah that I still wanted to do dinner. Still, better late than never. I picked up my phone and called.
No answer.
Not a concern, I told myself. She was on the phone frequently with her job, and I knew that she’d call me back.
When she hadn’t called ten minutes later, I began to get annoyed. Because I hadn’t called her that morning or afternoon, she was now ignoring me?
Then I realized something.
Her job required her to work odd hours. There was a very good chance that… that she’d gone into the office to do work. Work that I didn’t want her to do.
Almost certainly in the same way she didn’t want me to do the work the King of Diamonds wanted to do. She’d want me to be an effective CFO, sure, but not the ruthless asshole who dominated those who opposed me.
How fucking ironic, I thought bitterly. She was just like me, choosing her work over talking to me. And yet, she was doing this almost certainly because I had chosen this vengeance in the first place. After all, she’d left the fucking note, not me.
In other words, being consumed by vengeance, anger, and jealousy had caused me to push her away. My instincts had failed me.
I headed downstairs, texting for a ride to pick me up to the Las Vegas Times, in an odd mixture of hurry and dragging my feet. I had to get to Delilah… but I desperately did not want to face up to the consequences of my actions. Maybe I was exaggerating it, but…
No, you know what? I would smooth this over.
This would be fine. I needed to stop acting like a scared child.
I got in the car, ordered the driver to go as fast as safely possible to the Times office, and to wait for me outside.
I looked over his shoulder; it said I’d be there in about eight minutes.
I could only hope that in eight minutes, I’d find the proper balance of confident smoothing out without losing myself to the persona that had made me blow past the offer for dinner.