Page 23 of Duchess (Royal Harlots MC: National New York Chapter #1)

Caleb

I was alone in my office, pouring myself a drink, when she arrived. I could feel the heat of her presence when she entered the room although not a word was spoken.

"It’s been a long time, Duchess. I presume you're here for Sanja?" I asked.

When I didn’t receive an immediate response, I looked at her over my shoulder.

My breath literally left me. I felt as if though time was standing still and in the center of it all, only her and I were left.

She was even more beautiful now than the images and memories I'd been left with.

Memories that accompanied me well into the depths of my lonely nights and sullied my dreams.

She wore a red leather jacket over a white silk tank top and a striped pencil skirt with a high slit. High enough for her to be able to ride her motorcycle. Black Stiletto heels completed the outfit. Those heels did shit to my whole fucking being and I hated her for it.

Stay angry.

Stay focused.

"I'm not here for chit chat, Caleb. Tell me where the girl is and I'll be on my way."

I fully turned to her as the door snapped shut and locked behind her. I wasn't to be disturbed.

"The girl is safe. For now."

She turned slowly away from the locked door and those electric blue eyes of her trained on me and narrowed.

God, how I loved to see her get all fiery on me.

"I missed you," I whispered as I took a sip of the amber liquid in my glass tumbler.

She looked taken aback by my comment and I couldn’t blame her. I always showed my contempt for her, even though that’s far from how I truly felt, but now was not the time to dive into those feelings.

I continued the conversation as if I hadn't just confessed what I felt for her. "You've changed, Stephanie. Forgotten about us. I'm hurt," I grabbed my heart in jest.

“I’m not here to participate in your crude games, Caleb. I’m just here for my girl.”

I slowly brought my hands down and narrowed my eyes on her. We could both feel the atmosphere growing thicker between us. That slight electrical current played havoc on us, igniting triggers in us both.

"Did you think I'd forget what you did?"

"There was nothing to forget. I left with what I came in with. That should have been enough."

"Oh, no." I shook my head. "Now you know that’s not true, Stephanie. You left with more than that, didn't you? Twenty million more."

Her eyes never wavered.

Not even a flicker of remorse. Not one fucking blink that gave away guilt or fear or acknowledgment. She stood there like a stone statue, calm and cold and pretending like the past never touched her.

Like she hadn’t disappeared with twenty million in clean cash.

Like ten million in product hadn’t vanished without a trace.

Like she hadn’t known exactly what Alan was doing and decided to keep her pretty mouth shut.

She kept that from me.

Me!

And no one crosses me. Not then. Not ever. But she didn’t just cross the line, she set fire to it and then disappeared into the ashes of what she’d destroyed for ten fucking years.

"I went on with my life, Caleb. Not sure what you’ve been doing with yours, but… "

"I spent it searching for you!" The words tore out of me, loud and raw, echoing off the glass walls like a damn outcry. The rage that had simmered for a decade erupted, and I slammed my hands against the desk, the impact sharp enough to rattle the furniture.

I stood, slow and deliberate, taking calculated steps toward her.

She backed up, just one step, but it was enough. I saw the flinch, the hesitation she didn’t want to show. Good. She should feel something. She should feel me .

"Every minute of every day," I growled, voice low now, dragging out the ache behind every syllable. "Ten fucking years of tracking ghosts and chasing shadows. I burned men to get answers. Buried them when they couldn’t give me what I wanted. I tore cities apart looking for you."

Her shoulders squared, but I saw her jaw clench. She didn’t look at me. Wouldn’t. And that was the part that told me everything.

"At first," I said, stalking her as she moved, "I swore I’d kill you. That was the plan. Hunt you down. Make you beg. Put you down like a traitor."

I cornered her near the edge of the office. The floor-to-ceiling window behind her reflected the tension between us.

"But that would have been too easy."

She finally looked at me then. And in her eyes, I saw it. Rrecognition of the man I’d become. Of the price she’d put on my soul the day she vanished.

"You don't get to pretend like nothing happened. Not with me. Not after what you did."

I leaned in close, breathing her in like a man starved.

"I don’t want revenge anymore, Stephanie."

My lips curled into a smile that didn’t reach my eyes.

"I want you to remember every second of what it means to belong to me."

“Is that what you think you did?” She raised her chin up, defiant as she met my stone-cold gaze. “Coming into my bedroom, attacking me the way you did. Abusing me without my consent.”

"I did not… "

"You didn’t?" she snapped, cutting through my denial like a blade. "How about when you killed one of my girls? Was that not enough pain for you?"

Her words sliced through the room like a whip, each one laced with venom, rage, and grief.

My pulse thundered behind my eyes, not from guilt, but from the bitter realization that she would never understand why.

Never see the hunger. The torment. The obsession that wouldn’t let me sleep or breathe without her in my blood.

I stared at her, my voice low and dangerous. "I admit it. I stalked you. I watched you. I tasted you when I shouldn’t have. I broke into your space because I needed to remind myself you still existed. But I did not lay a hand on that girl. That wasn’t me.”

“Liar,” she seethed.

“There are others out there who want to hurt you, worse than I ever could. Real monsters. Ones who don’t give a damn about you, only what they can take.

You have no idea how I will tear them apart with my bare hands if they ever touch you.

And I swear to you, I will torture you with every wicked thing I know, again and again, until you remember exactly who you belong to.

Until you stop running. Until you understand that your soul’s already mine. "

She took another step back, her defiance turning into something colder, more distant.

"I don't believe you. And you have no idea what I’m capable of. What I’ve had to do to survive," she hissed, but her voice trembled with the weight behind those words, as if daring me to push harder.

I took a step closer, eyes locked on hers, my voice once again dripping with venomous intent.

"And you don’t know what I’d make you survive if anyone else even thinks about touching what’s mine again.

Pray it’s me breaking through your door next time, because I’m the only devil who knows how to torture you and still leave you breathing.

Anyone else, and you won’t be left standing, Duchess.

That’s not a threat. That’s a fucking promise. "

She opened her mouth, fire behind her gaze, but I cut her off with the weight of everything she made me become.

"And you don’t know what I became because of you," I growled. "But you’re about to. Because I’m not fucking done. Not even close. And if you think surviving me once was hell, baby, you haven’t seen what I’ve got planned for round two."

“You will pay for what you did.”

“Will I?” I chuckled. “You dare to threaten me when I am the one holding one of your own, captive?”

“Fuck you.”

I smiled, reaching out and sliding my fingers through a soft strand of her dark hair. “There’s something you don’t know, Stephanie. Something I kept from you, from my family, for a long time.”

Her breath hitched as I took a step closer. “Turns out…you can't kill a Duchess!"

As she turned to run, I grabbed her around the waist and drew her back into my chest.

"Caleb, what are you doing?" She tried to squirm out of my grip, but my hold on her was like steel. She wasn't going to get away so easily.

Turning my head into her hair, I pressed my lips to her ear. "See, because you don't kill royalty, you own it."

She stiffened in my arms as I spoke my truth.

"I'm not yours to own," her whisper was filled with fear.

I leaned into her, securing her arms in mine as I spoke. "You owe me twenty million dollars, Duchess, and there's only one way I can see you paying that back."

"I owe you nothing," she gritted, struggling out of my hold.

"I beg to differ."

"You have no proof of it and even if I did, I still wouldn't pay you." Gripping her arms, I spun her around to face me. "Do you have any idea what you have done to me? What you are currently doing to me?"

Anger emanated from her cobalt blue eyes, shooting daggers at me. "I honestly don't give a flying fuck, what I may be doing to your small appendages."

The cruel smirk she gave me only served to light a fire deep inside me. My hands itched to bend her over the nearest console and have her adhere to a sound spanking, but that would have to wait until I had more control of the situation.

"Your smart mouth was always going to get you in trouble."

She tilted her head, that amused expression still playing on those lush lips of hers. Lips I had dreamed of for so many nights.

No woman could compare to Stephanie Winters. Not one. It didn't matter how beautiful. How smart, how good they were in bed, nor how fast I came on their tongue. Not one compared to my Duchess.

I played games with myself all these years. Trying to convince myself that I was crazy. That I had been drugged and deceived.

How could I possibly love a woman as plain and insignificant as Stephanie Winters?

But they were all lies I told myself because Stephanie was nothing but significant in my life.

She ruled every waking hour. My obsession with her grew throughout the years, along with my desperation.

And in that despair, I thought I could never live another day without her.

There were several moments in my life where I figured it was just best to end it. End the turmoil. End the wait.

I had pressed the barrel of that gun to my temple more than once. But then thought to myself, what good would that do, when I couldn't take her with me.

She leaned in and whispered. "In trouble by whom? Some lowly bodyguard?"

It was my turn to smirk at her. "No. sweet girl. By the Turkish Karanlik Prens . Soon to be King himself."

I lifted the lapels of my expensive suit jacket open as I presented myself to her. "You're looking at the head of the Turkish Mafia, my Duchess."

Her eyes widened, and she barely breathed as I pressed her up against the door. "And he gets what he wants when he wants it."

"Impossible," the word fluttered against my lips as her hands pressed against my chest. It was the first touch she'd ever initiated, and it made my whole body grow hard.

"You really have no idea what you've done to me," I whispered back, her eyes drawn to mine.

I slid my hand into her hair and cupped her cheek. "You've always been so precious to me, Stephanie."

"What the hell are you talking about?" She uttered in disbelief.

"Which part? That I'm the head of the Turkish Mafia or that I think you're beautiful."

"The former," she bit out.

I smirked again, stroking her soft cheek with my thumb as I leaned in and pressed my lips to her ear.

"Blood. My hands are dripping in it."

As I slid my hand down to the curve of her throat. “And I’ll shed more for you if I have to.”

I felt her swallow nervously as my thumb stroked the side of her jugular. She was so fragile, so defenseless. In one fowel swoop I could cut off her breath and end it all right here. Both her life and mine, of course.

"You're a psychopath,” she breathed.

I gripped her throat, and I felt her body stiffen against mine. Her hands reached up over my own. "I'm much more powerful than that. I have the full intention of making you beg for me, Duchess. And I want your screams as you do it, because only then will I be certain that you're mine."

"I will never…"

"Shhh," I pressed a finger to her lips.

"I wouldn’t say never, Tatlim . You also thought I'd never find you and look where that has gotten you."

I dragged my thumb along her bottom lip and felt her shiver. The redness of that lip was almost hypnotic. My lips hovered over hers. A ghost of a kiss lingering between us.

I pulled away, just as suddenly as I had captured her. Straightening my jacket, I took a moment to give her a once- over and then reached for the door. "I unfortunately have a full schedule, Miss Winters. Perhaps we could continue this another time."

It took her a moment to realize I was kicking her out. And when she did, that fire I loved so much, sparked in her eyes.

"I didn't come here to be treated as your toy. You will not control me or anyone around me."

Her stance was fierce and stunningly beautiful. "I'm not trying to control you; although it seems I’ve already accomplished that."

She narrowed her eyes on me as she came at me, bringing herself toe to toe with me. "I want my girl, Caleb. I do not want to bring anyone else into this, but I will if I have to."

I leaned forward, bringing my eyes level with hers. "Your girl has been sent home since you got here."

She stumbled slightly back, and I watched as the heat from her eyes swept to her cheeks as she balled her hands into fists.

"Until we meet again, Duchess."

I waited by the open door for a minute until she finally grabbed her bag and swept passed me, leaving that aroma of wildflowers behind.

"This isn't over," she stated as she left.

"I hope not," I whispered, watching her hips sway before she disappeared down the hall.

I pointed to my secretary and watched as Laura scurried around her desk and ran up to me.

"Yes. Sir."

"Find out that scent she's wearing. I want that scent everywhere by the time I get here tomorrow." "Yes, of course, Sir."

I shut my door and went back to my desk, already thinking about the next time we'd meet. I wouldn't be as nice to her in our next encounter. I promised her she'd scream, and I was planning on stealing those screams from her just as she'd stolen everything from me.