6. Sterling
STERLING
I strode into the Kingsley Consortium boardroom, my expression schooled into that bland, businesslike calm that made old money men nervous. I knew the game. I was born in it, bred for it, sharpened by it. But that didn’t mean I had patience for being summoned, like a subordinate.
The room was a museum of power, with walnut paneling, old oil portraits of dead Kingsleys with colder eyes than mine, and a table long enough to host the Last Supper.
They sat around it in designer suits, like vultures in Armani.
Men who’d earned their fortunes off the backs of women they wouldn’t dare acknowledge in public.
Men who sipped legacy like bourbon, neat and unquestioned.
The chairs were arranged with militant precision, but the atmosphere carried the slight charge of discomfort. The tension of men who built their kingdoms on silence, now forced to confront the son who refused to be quiet.
"Sterling," Harrington began, already clearing his throat like a guilty priest. "We felt it necessary to convene, because of recent concerns regarding your expansion strategies. Some of us believe-"
I cut him off, with a smile that didn’t reach my eyes. "Some of you believe what, exactly? That growth should wait until your golf season ends?"
Whitmore, the ever-measured relic of my father’s era, interjected smoothly. "We understand your ambition. But with the current media attention-"
"Ah, the media," I murmured. "You mean the gossip blogs your wives read, before their plastic surgeons open shop?"
No one laughed. They weren’t supposed to. This was theater, and I was both lead and executioner.
"Gentlemen," I said, letting my tone drop like a guillotine. "Let’s be clear. My father is gone. The last champagne toast at his memorial is flat. My mother’s shares? Signed over. To me. I own the majority. You don’t get to pretend this is still your sandbox."
A pause. Then stillness. The kind of silence that money couldn’t interrupt.
"And while we’re airing grievances," I continued, "let’s not pretend this sudden concern is about fiscal conservatism. You’re worried because I don’t have a family. Because the image of a single, black billionaire threatens your investor branches."
That struck a nerve. Whitmore flinched. Harrington’s jaw ticked.
"Let’s call it what it is: bigotry, legacy anxiety, and fear that I might choose a woman you wouldn’t bring home to Palm Beach."
Harrington bristled. "Sterling, with all due respect, tradition matters. Stability matters."
"You mean optics," I said flatly. "You mean a wife with the right lineage, a womb with the right pedigree. You mean a black man, in a white empire, who doesn’t rock the boat."
The tension climbed. Good.
"I understand the game," I continued. "You want an heir. A ring. A reason to believe I’ll play house like my father did."
"And if that woman came from a known family," Whitmore added carefully, "it would help settle the nerves of the more conservative investors."
"You want a ring in the quarterly reports," I said, eyes narrowing. "Marriage as a tax strategy. An heir as insurance."
Whitmore didn’t argue.
"You want assurance that I won’t pass this empire off to someone who doesn’t drink martinis at the same clubs. Someone whose blackness doesn’t come pre-approved."
"Sterling-"
I raised a hand, cutting them off. "I’m already engaged," I lied smoothly. "Out of respect for my father, I delayed the announcement."
Murmurs of approval rose. Relief softened the edges of their tailored posturing.
Harrington raised a brow. "And the lucky woman?"
I smiled. "You’ll meet her soon enough."
A beat. Then they moved on, to projections, dividends, and luxury vineyard debates, like they hadn’t just tried to script my future.
But that’s what men like them did.
They bought control. Assumed their money could decide what love should look like.
Let them sip their aged whiskey, and smile into their old power. Let them believe I would toe the line.
They could keep their club memberships, their board seats, their mistresses with bleached hair and tight smiles. They could keep pretending their empires weren’t built on the backs of black, and brown, labor. Let them play golf with senators, and toast to legacies they inherited, not earned.
Because the woman who’d bear my name wouldn’t fit their world.
She’d burn it, and I’d hand her the matches.
Stepping out of the building, I adjusted my cufflinks, my mind already elsewhere.
My hummingbird. My beautiful, curvy little hummingbird, whose thick thighs and plush curves made me want to wreck her every time I saw her.
She had a body that begged to be claimed, dark and full, with skin like the richest onyx, smooth and deep.
Her tight curls framed her face in wild defiance, a halo of untamed beauty, that suited her just fine.
And those full lips, thick, soft, made to be bitten, had been driving me to the brink of madness, since the day she walked into my world.
It had been too long since I’d seen her. Even if I’d just had her seconds ago, it wouldn’t be enough. I wanted her in my space. Enough to lull her into a false sense of security, to let her believe I’d changed. That illusion ended tonight.
As I slipped into the back seat of my waiting car, the driver already knowing the destination, I leaned back, tapping my fingers against my thigh.
Anticipation coiled in my gut, a dark hunger curling around my ribs.
My hummingbird had tried fighting me, doing everything in her power to pretend I didn’t exist. It was almost cute. Almost.
The car pulled up to the Kingsley estate, the grand old house looming against the twilight sky. I hadn’t seen her since that morning. But I knew she was here, because Frankie had texted me an hour ago.
She’s at the estate. Already settled in.
I didn’t ask where. I didn’t need to. She always gravitated to a library when she felt cornered but defiant, public enough to feel like a statement, secluded enough to hide how shaken she was. And in this house, the Kingsley library was the only room that offered that illusion of safety.
The moment I stepped out of the car, the staff made themselves scarce, as they always did. They knew better than to linger when I was around, especially when I came back silent, sharp-eyed, and starved for control. The mood that made lesser men flinch, and sent the staff scattering like shadows.
I moved through the estate like it was mine, which it was, and let the hush of the halls guide me.
Every expensive antique, every towering oil painting, every vintage decanter in the corner cabinet, was a reminder of the Kingsley dynasty.
And none of it mattered, compared to the woman curled up in the next room.
She was exactly where I knew she’d be, curled into the armchair in the library, her thick thighs pressed together, tight curls spilling over the armrest of a worn leather chair. A book lay open in her lap, though she wasn’t reading it.
Her posture was perfect in that calculated way, like she’d practiced poise as a shield. She didn’t look up, but I knew she felt me. She always did. The air changed when I entered. A shift in pressure. A crackle of something unseen, but undeniable.
I took my time crossing the room. My loafers sank into the Persian rug with every deliberate step. When I reached her chair, I leaned down slowly, placing my hands on either side of the armrest. Caging her in without touching her.
Only then did she look up, her deep brown eyes flashing with irritation and something else. Something softer. Something she hated feeling.
“What do you want, Sterling?” she asked. Her voice was steady but tight.
I smirked. That sharp tongue of hers never failed to amuse me.
“You, hummingbird,” I said simply, voice pitched low enough to skate across her skin.
I let my gaze drift down, drinking her in.
Her sweater was slipping off one shoulder, exposing skin that begged to be marked.
Her dark skin was flawless, warm and soft, and glowing, even under the muted lighting of the library.
She was always so unaware of herself, of the way she tempted me without even trying.
I wanted to touch her. Not just her skin, but her breath, her heat, the space between her neck and shoulder where her scent lingered. I imagined my hand sliding beneath that sweater, fingers tracing the dip of her collarbone, the curve of her breast. Slow. Possessive. Certain.
“We need to talk.”
Her fingers tightened around the book in her lap. “I don’t think we do.”
I chuckled, shaking my head slowly. “That’s adorable, little sis. But you don’t get to decide when we talk. I do.”
She exhaled sharply, shifting like she was about to stand, but I didn’t move. Not an inch.
“Don’t call me that, and move. You’re in my way.”
I tilted my head, considering. “Am I?”
She waved toward the open space behind me. “Clearly.”
I reached out, trailing my fingers lightly along the edge of her jaw, just enough to make her breath catch. “That’s because you keep running. And you know how I feel about that, little sister.”
Her jaw tightened. Her nostrils flared. But her eyes, those dark defiant eyes, dipped for the briefest second to my mouth.
“Don’t fucking call me that,” she hissed between clenched teeth. “And I’m not running. I just don’t want to deal with whatever game you’re playing.”
I hummed, straightening, but not giving her space. “Oh, but you are playing, little hummingbird. You just don’t realize it yet.”
She shifted again, thighs squeezing tighter together, a reflex she probably didn’t realize I caught. But I always noticed the way her body betrayed her, even when her mouth resisted.
Her eyes burned with defiance, and I could feel the heat crawl up my spine. She always did that to me. Lit me up and cracked me open.
“Go antagonize someone else, Sterling. I’m not in the mood.”
I smirked. “See, that’s the thing. You don’t get to tell me what to do. That’s not how this works.”
Her hands curled into fists in her lap. “And how does it work, exactly?”
I leaned in again, lips barely an inch from her ear. “You belong to me. Always have, always will. That’s how it works.”
She sucked in a breath, and I felt her body tense. Felt the war she waged against herself in that moment. Her thighs rubbed together again. Her lips parted on a breath she didn’t mean to release.
“You’re insane,” she whispered.
“And you love it,” I replied.
My hand slid to the back of her neck, tilting her chin upward. Her lips parted wider. Her breath hitched. My thumb brushed over the soft column of her throat, slow and deliberate.
“Say it,” I murmured, eyes locked to hers. “Say you feel it too.”
“I don’t,” she whispered, but the quiver in her voice betrayed her.
I leaned in, just about to claim her mouth, then paused. Drew back enough to meet her eyes, to deliver the real reason I was there.
“We’re getting married, Zara.”
Consent was a luxury the quarterly report couldn’t afford.
Every tick of the stock line said marry the girl, secure the heir, muzzle the board.
She could spit, claw, even hate me, but the numbers were non-negotiable.
The moment she slipped my ring on, Kingsley shares stopped bleeding.
Love was optional. Legacy wasn’t.
She froze.
And then she laughed, a short, bitter thing that didn’t reach her eyes.
“You’re joking.”
I didn’t move. “I’ve never been more serious.”
Her gaze turned razor sharp. “I would never marry my bully.”
My mouth twitched. “Then you’ll marry the man your bully became.”
She opened her mouth to respond, but a sharp knock at the door shattered the moment.
She jolted, cheeks flushing. She shoved at my chest, putting precious inches between us. I let her. But not before I dragged my fingers slowly from her neck to her collarbone, memorizing the heat of her.
I turned slowly, irritation prickling under my skin, as one of the staff hesitated in the doorway.
“Dinner is ready,” the woman said, voice soft and eyes averted.
Zara gripped the armrest like it anchored her. Her chest rose and fell with ragged breaths. Her lips were still parted.
“Looks like you get to escape for now,” I murmured, standing straight. “But don’t think this conversation is over.”
She didn’t answer. Couldn’t.
I turned to the servant, giving her a curt nod. “We’ll be right there.”
Then, with one last glance, I left the library.
But in my mind, I was already planning the next move. The next conversation. The next time she’d be close enough to break.
And next time, there would be no interruptions.