Page 21 of Duchess (Royal Harlots MC: National New York Chapter #1)

Caleb

P resent Day…

"Sir?"

That voice cut through the silence just as the rim of the glass met my lips. The whiskey hit hard. It was too sharp, too bitter, but right in line with everything my life had become. No sweetness left in it. Just bite and burn.

Leon stepped inside, shoulders squared, jaw tight, that unreadable expression he always wore when he was going to inform me of something I wasn’t going to like.

I’d been waiting for years for this. Years of silence.

Years of half-assed leads and bullshit sightings.

Years of trying not to let the weight of her ghost bury me alive.

I should not have underestimated her the last time I'd seen her.

I should have taken her, not even given her a chance to breathe, to fight back.

That was my fault. It was all on me, and I goddamn knew it.

I stared back at Leon. Out of all the men I trusted, he was the one who had never given me a reason to doubt him.

We’d been through hell together... real hell.

Not the kind people whispered about after bar fights, but the kind that left scars and turned you into someone you barely recognized.

The kind that shed blood and turned you into monsters.

That's what the Turks did to me and everything around me. It ruined it.

Still, even trust had a limit. And mine was hanging by a thread.

“We found her.”

Those three fucking words. I’d heard them too many times to count. They were always spoken of with too much certainty. Always meant to pacify me, to buy time. And every single time? They were lies.

“Say that again,” I said, not because I didn’t hear him. But because I needed to give my rage a reason to focus.

Leon didn’t flinch. “We found her.”

I set the glass down, slow and deliberate, the sound echoing like a warning. My fingers twitched. The only reason I wasn’t throwing it across the room was because I needed to hear the rest.

“You realize I’m done playing games, Leon.” My voice was low, hoarse from nights of smoking too much and sleeping too little. “I’m done chasing ghosts.”

“It’s not a ghost,” he said. “It’s her.”

I stood, rolling the tension out of my neck, jaw locked so tight it felt like it might snap. I didn’t want to believe him. Believing meant hope. And hope was a fucking cancer. The more you fed it, the deeper it grew until it owned every inch of you.

I wasn’t letting that sickness in again. Not unless he could prove it.

"Where is she?"

"New York City. “He said simply.

I frowned.

Ten years.

I’d spent the last fucking decade ripping the country apart to find her.

Scouring every lead, every corner of this goddamn world.

I’d put men on every coast, in every club, and I even tried to plant one inside the Royal Bastards, following her brother and father.

The idiot we had finally put on the job had gotten himself killed in a crossfire with the Bloody Scorpions, and now I had no eyes in ears on the inside.

But he did let me know she was protected.

The Royal Bastards weren’t just any club. They had armor, and no one got in without permission, and you sure as shit didn’t get out without shedding blood. If they knew where she was, they weren’t saying a damn thing. Not to me. Not to anyone.

I couldn’t blame them, not really. If I were them, I’d keep her under lock and key, too. But the truth? I didn’t give a fuck about any of them. She might be their Princess now, but she was my Queen before she ever set foot in that clubhouse.

And now… now I had leverage. I had a location.

In the last five years, I took every opportunity that dangled in front of me and turned it into a weapon. I played the game so well within my family, they never even saw me take the board. I had no mercy; I was vicious in my control.

Now the family calls me the Karanlik Prens , or the Dark Prince.

I don’t wear the crown. Not yet. But I own every shadow the light’s too scared to touch.

My grandfather still breathes, still clutches tradition like it’s going to save him.

The family thinks I wait out of respect, but they don’t know I’ve already laid the foundation to rip that crown off his rotting skull the second he falters.

Every move I’ve made, every body I’ve buried, every alliance I’ve bought or bled for… I built it all for her.

My Queen. My Duchess

And all she wanted to do was run away. But this cat-and-mouse game was starting to become a burden. One that ate at my soul. And I was not about to let it take me alive, not unless she suffered as well.

“How did you find her?” I asked.

“It was by pure accident, Sir.”

I dropped onto the dark leather loveseat across from my desk, the only comfortable seat in a room that was built to intimidate any weak soul who dared to enter it.

The walls were lined with shelves full of books, files, and deep reminders of the men that I’d had to bury to get here.

Smoke, leather, and dust clung to everything, but although it seemed harsh, it was familiar, and it was mine.

A thick rug muffled the cold click of shoes, and the vault behind the shelves held truths better kept locked away.

I swirled the last of my whiskey, watching Leon, and waved my hand to him to continue.

“She owns an escort service. Calls it Violent Delights. ”

A smile curled on my lips. Of course she did. It sounded just like her, a pure, fucking violent delight.

“And how do I get to her?”

“You don’t. She’s been under the radar for years. Still goes by the name Duchess in her inner circle.”

“Fuck. Me. She kept the name?”

“It seems like it, Sir. And she’s been untouchable for years.”

“That’s impossible,” I growled. “Nobody is untouchable.”

“Well, nobody we talked to has ever seen her. They didn’t even know what she looked like. She keeps off social media platforms and seems to have her own people in the dark web who move money for her. She doesn’t touch it.”

“Fuck. Me. Then how the hell did you track her?”

Leon raised a brow. “Did you know female biker clubs existed?”

I looked up, curious despite myself. “A female MC?”

“The Royal Harlots MC, to be exact.”

“So you’re saying she belongs to this… club ?” I grimaced.

Leon smirked. “She doesn’t just belong to it, Sir. She’s the fucking President.”

I had to admit, I was surprised. Genuinely. It was the first time in years anyone had caught me off guard.

“And what about these Violent Delights?”

“High end, VIP escort service. Anybody who is anybody with power has used these girls, but it’s not easy to get to them.

You have to be thoroughly vetted which means clients go through heavy background checks, financial screening, credit history.

If you don’t have the money or the reputation, you don’t get access. ”

I leaned back into the loveseat, smiling to myself. Completely fucking impressed. “Smart girl.”

Leon gave a slow nod. “The clients also sign an ironclad contract. It states that if something were to happen to any of the girls, the client is held accountable. Word is, if the contract breaks in any way? She handles it personally. Tracks them down and puts them in the ground.”

I raised a brow knowing why she’d done that. The girl my grandfather had killed was on the news a few days later. A brutal attack on her body, her mouth sewn shut, probably by Ozan himself. Disgusting. SHe didn’t trust anyone and I couldn’t blame her for that.

“She’s most definitely my Duchess.”

“She most certainly is and she’s made a name for herself.”

“Tell me more about these Harlots.”

“Right now, we don’t know how or when they came to be.

They were ghosts until one of our guys, a contact inside the Bloody Scorpions, had a run-in with them.

Let’s just say it didn’t end well. He gave us what little intel he had before he went dark.

We sent another man in after that. He managed to get out, but just barely. ”

“They’ve been operating out of a tucked-away building near the South Street Seaport,” Leon explained, his voice low and steady.

“It’s a smart move. The area is tourist-heavy, busy day and night, and close enough to the harbor that anything questionable can be moved in and out quickly.

Industrial enough to keep curious eyes out, polished enough to blend in. ”

He shifted slightly. “The guy we sent followed one of the girls after she left the building on her motorcycle. But he didn’t make it far. They clocked him after two blocks. Cut him off before he even had a chance to tail her properly.”

“What happened to him?”

Leon paused. “He rider veered him off the bridge, put him in the harbor. She got away by the skin of her teeth. But not before the street cams picked her up weaving through the East River crossings.”

Leon handed me a thick manila envelope. “This is who he caught on camera coming out of the building.”

He tapped the envelope. “I pulled every bit of CCTV we could access, tracked her from the piers across lower Manhattan. Between the traffic cams and retail systems, we built her route frame by frame. That’s how we found her.”

I slid the photographs out slowly, the first image hit me square in the chest. Dark jet-black hair tumbled past her shoulders, curves in all the right places.

She looked stronger. Harder. There was steel in her eyes, like she dared the world to try her.

A new sharpness to her mouth, a tension in her jaw that hadn’t been there before.

I wondered if I had given that to her. A different type of mark that I found I wanted to soothe.

Her eyes… those hazel brown eyes, always made me feel this sense of protectiveness.

The ones that used to flash when I pushed her too far.

The ones that held fire, fury, and everything that ever brought me to my knees.

They hadn’t changed in all these years and they hadn’t seen what I’d done during that time to protect her from my grandfather’s grasp.

She had been trying to disappear for years, and she’d done a pretty good job at it until now.

She’d let her guard down and I finally had my hands on her.

But what pissed me off the most wasn’t the ten years I’d spent tracking her down.

It was the fact that she'd been under my fucking nose this entire time, hiding in plain sight, mocking me. Daring me to come to her. As if I wouldn’t tear the world open just to find her.

Silently, I vowed she would pay for putting me through all that turmoil.

“Book me a flight to New York,” I said, my voice sharp.

“Yes, Sir. Would you like me to book you a hotel, Uptown?”

“No need. I’ll be staying at the apartment. It’s close enough to the Seaport that I can move when I need to.”

“Yes, Sir. Would you like me to accompany you?”

I shook my head as I downed the last of my whiskey in one burning gulp. Standing, I adjusted my suit jacket and buttoned it with a slow, deliberate tug. The suit was armor in the form of tailored fabric, and I was getting ready for war.

“No. I want you here. Eyes open. Ears to the ground. If my family makes a move, I want to be the first to know about it.”

We were raised to love with your heart, but rule with a blade tucked behind your back. And in my world, family meant fuck all when power was on the table. Cousins, uncles, brothers… they’d all slit your throat if it meant another rung up the ladder.

“Also,” I added, pausing just before I opened the door, “get me access to one of her girls. The most expensive one. I don’t care what it costs.”

I met Leon’s eyes. “If I can’t get to her, then I'll have to make her come to me.”

“Yes, Sir.”

I took the manila envelope with the photographs with me. Entering the bedroom, I spread them across the bed to take a better look. I memorized every curve of her face. Every inch of her body. She knew she’d always belonged to me, which is why she hid from me.

She never knew how much I loved her. How deeply, how violently, how completely obsessed I’d become.

She ran once but I’d make sure she wouldn’t do it again.

Stephanie Winters was mine.

And the Duchess? The Duchess was everything I’d ever wanted and more.