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CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

VALE

Funny how a few days can change your life.

For me?

I’m dressed in the couture fashion Nadine brought to our suite at The Mercier. A glam team just finished my makeup and hair while a piercer waits to give me the final touch.

In the mirror’s reflection over the dining table, I look like a different version of myself and love it.

I’ll always have a gothic heart, but I can drip with some boujee French fashion, too.

But my twin?

Her life changed on an NFL dime. In a matter of days, Beau Bronson and his teammate Colton Hawke whisked Blair away to a Caribbean island. But now she’s blowing up my phone, and instinctually, I know something’s wrong.

I answer her FaceTime call. With one glimpse at my new look, Blair’s pressing her face to the screen. “You look like a New York City socialite. What is that? Chanel?”

“How do you know Chanel?”

“Because,” she scoffs, “I got champagne taste on a box of wine budget. That’s a couture bouclé Chanel jacket, and it’s pink! What the hell? I’m gone for three days, and you’ve moved to the Upper East Side. I swear, if you have an ankle-biter yipping dog in your Birkin bag, too, I’m having you committed.”

I tell her my glow-up is for a meeting with Nash, and she’s all shook.

“ Vaaallleee, ” she drawls suspiciously. “What’s going on? You’re not eloping with your best friend’s dad or some shit like that. Because I’m your maid of honor no matter how fucked up the union.”

“We’re not eloping, you naked nosy ho.” I caress my hair, twisted into an elegant chignon. “It’s a meeting. That’s it. Quit asking questions I won’t answer.”

“Quit saying you have a meeting with Mr. Allen when I know you’re fucking him and someone else tonight. Probably Tarzan with the way y’all ripped the sex swing from the ceiling at Delta’s.”

Meeting? No, it’s my initiation.

And Tarzan? Try Jace. He’ll be the someone else tonight, and only tonight.

I’m dying to tell Blair about it. Keeping this from Alena is bad enough, but usually, I tell my twin everything. Hell, we share the same DNA. When she fucks too much, I get the yeast infection.

But I’m thankful to have Wren now. She’s here with Nadine, sitting on the sofas in the living area, sipping champagne and looking highly amused as Blair and I resolve her NFL double-dick dilemma and get to the bottom of all of Blair’s pain. It’s the same as mine.

Our dad.

Blair has a different relationship with him. I think my dad sees himself in me and our mom in Blair, which makes him kinder to her. But still, he’s broken our hearts too many times.

Blair fears she’s repeating the same cycle, going from being the daughter of a famous athlete to the girlfriend of one.

Or maybe two?

She worries she’ll get hurt again. She stresses about Beau, saying he’d never treat her like a distraction, but “What if I am,” she frets, “and he loses and resents me for it? Like Dad did?”

“Look…” My heart softens. Yes, I fight with my sister. It’s only because I love her with a ferocity I can’t control. “Think for yourself, not for someone else.”

Tears brim in her eyes. “That’s what Mom used to say.”

“Exactly, and that’s what she’d say now,” I sigh, knowing we miss her. Then I see Nadine sipping champagne. She’s another strong woman blessing my life, so I tell Blair, “I never thought I’d say this to my boss-bitch bookish twin, but just do it. Be a WAG.”

Her face twists. “A WAG?”

“A wife and girlfriend of a high-profile athlete.”

Because I’m about to be a queen, a Belle to the Beast I love, so I hope my sister can follow her heart, too. No matter the risks.

But she scoffs at my advice, so I tell her, “Then be the girlfriend in love with that cute guy from college that you write all your alien porno love books about. The guy who really loves them and loves you , too.”

That’s who Beau is to Blair, and Blair is to him—the one who got away.

And that’s what Nash is to me.

The sweet man who brought me red tulips and cheeseburgers. The brutal man who ended my nightmare with Chad. The tender man who held me by my mom’s grave, and I cried even harder in his arms, holding me for the first time … because I couldn’t have his love then.

But now, I can. I will.

I end our call knowing I’m far more than some man’s daughter he neglected or some boy’s victim. I’m a woman, born for this.

I’m not afraid to sit beside Nadine as the piercer, working with gloved hands, carefully marks me as a queen with a gold and diamond bezel-set Monroe stud.

Yes, it hurts.

Yes, I’m proud.

“This diamond is my gift to you.” Nadine pulls me into a tight hug. “I’ve always wanted daughters, too, and now you’re like mine. You have my love forever, moya doch.”

It’s the first time I’ve heard her speak Russian, and I don’t know the language, but I know from her warmth it means my daughter .

But to me, it means more because I can feel the scars on Nadine’s back, the welts of tortured flesh under her soft, silk Chanel wrap dress.

“Thank you.” I squeeze her tighter.

She leaves with a kiss on my cheek and one on Wren’s. We’re left in the suite to share one more glass of champagne and a secret I’m dying to know.

“Can I ask who your second king is?”

Wren twists her petal lips. “I’m not supposed to say yet,” she whispers as if we’re not alone, “but I think you can guess.”

I search her eyes, and her brows raise.

“Nash?” I gasp.

Quickly, she nods, worried like I’ll be mad. “Just once,” she rushes, “and he didn’t finish like the others. He held back. We didn’t even kiss. He didn’t even look me in the eye. It’s like part of him was there, but the rest wasn’t.”

How do I feel about this?

I search my shocked heart, and all I can find is … love.

Nash kept his honor to his family, but he didn’t give his heart away. That’s what Wren’s telling me. Woman to woman, I know what she means. I’ve had so many men fuck me who never gave me their heart. We were there for a reason, and I could never find mine.

Until I found Nash. With him, I find my heart; I find my reason.

That man has waited over twelve years for me and did what he had to do with Wren. He helped Sire, and as Wren’s second king, it’s all Nash will ever do with her. If he ever needs to, he’ll protect her, as he should.

“Nash was sweet,” she explains, “because I wasn’t that night. It’s like the animal in me came out, and I wanted all of them; I’m not ashamed to admit it.”

“You shouldn’t be. I get it. They’re hot.”

“They are,” she licks her lips, “and when I told them to take me like beasts, they did. Sire likes it like that. I do, too. He’s my pastor and twenty years older than me, and I guess our love is so taboo; why not? All I feel is loved and safe with Sire. And then you add in his hot brothers?—”

“ All of them?” Yes, I’m digging. “You mean all seven?”

“No.” She shakes her head. “Only five, including Nash. To Sire, Nash is his brother, probably his closest. But one of his brothers isn’t into women, and the youngest? The one who should sit in the seventh king’s chair? I’ve never seen him.”

“He wasn’t there?”

“Like you, I was blindfolded for some of it, so maybe he was, but when I could see, no, he wasn’t there.”

“Who is he?”

She shrugs.

“Who’s the gay brother?”

She smiles. “You’ll find out tonight, and I love his queen. You will, too. I swear, if you close your eyes, our fellow queen sounds like Matthew McConaughey.”

Paint me so goddamn curious, I’m dying.

“Listen,” Wren reaches for my hand, “there’s more to know that’s not my place to tell you. But please,” her eyes beg, “don’t leave us. Be a queen with me, and let’s raise our babies together. Then one day, we’ll be sixty like Nadine and badass, hot grandmothers like her, too.”

I laugh, nodding because I can see it. It’s a vision beyond my wildest dreams.

Standing by the floor-to-ceiling window in our hotel suite, I watch the day melt into dusk. Wren left an hour ago, and anticipation claws inside me.

All the questions, too.

In a normal life, I’d be a fool to agree to this initiation, to consider marriage and children with a man who’s told me he hides secrets.

But clearly, I don’t want a normal life. I want this one.

Because what I do know about Nash is more than anything I’ve ever seen from another man. He’s fiercely loyal and deeply loving, and yes, he’s a little homicidal and a real dickhead when he’s grumpy, but I kind of love that about him, too. He lets me fire the snark right back.

Happy, horny, in love, and fearless: this pretty much sums up my current state when a heavy knock startles me.

“Poison!” Nash barks, “Let’s go! We’re late!”

This murderous meat dagger.

I storm toward the door, my mouth about to fire as I swing it open, “That’s not my fau—” but a bouquet of red tulips greets me.

They lower, and that damn, sexy smile slings its sunshine. “You never did tell me why you love these so much.”

Don’t cry. Don’t cry. Don’t mess up your eyeliner.

“They were my mom’s favorite.”

Nash softens his smirk.

“Symbolically, they’re supposed to evoke passion, love, and romance.”

“Oh,” he grabs my waist, crushing the bouquet between us, “they do.” His eyes take in my face, hair, and Chanel suit before they land on my new piercing. “Damn, poison. You truly do kill me with your beauty.”

“You like my new look?”

“I love your other look, too. But now you look like every dream I’ve had of us together except…”

His face twists, scrutinizing mine.

“What?” I drop my chin. “It’s a mod look with a smokey eye and nude lip.” My dramatic lashes blink with insecurity. “You hate it, don’t you? It’s my hair.” I reach for the two gold combs in it. “I can take it down. I can braid it or?—”

“Don’t you fucking dare; I’ll get that privilege later.” He sets the bouquet on the table in the foyer. “You’re just missing something.”

“My Mary Janes?” I glance down. “I wasn’t vibing them tonight. Nadine gave me these.” I click my nude, high-heeled Louboutins. “I feel like a sexy Dorothy in them.” I close my eyes, mimicking her in The Wizard of Oz . “There’s no place like an orgy. There’s no place like an orgy.”

I make Nash laugh so hard, he hugs me, smushing my face against his quaking chest.

Tonight, he’s not wearing his usual, either.

He’s in a fitted black suit, a white starched shirt, and hallelujah, he left it unbuttoned, his ink on proud display, and his deep brown eyes. No glasses tonight. No disguise, either.

It’s just Nash, smelling like sweet leather and looking like a Tom Ford mafia lollipop my mouth waters to lick.

“I bought something for you. It’s why I’m late.” He reaches into his jacket pocket. “I don’t know if they go with your new look, but they screamed, ‘Vale meets seventeen thousand dollar earrings.’”

My savage man is joking … my hot accountant is not.

He cracks the jewelry box open, and I gasp. They’re black diamond earrings shaped like little, coiled snakes with long, dangling tails. “Oh my god,” I sigh. “They’re too expensive. I can’t accept them.”

“The hell you won’t. I’ll spoil you into being an even sexier brat.”

“Nash, I can’t wea?—”

“Vale,” he looms over me, “my queen wears my jewels. Always.” Tenderly, he kisses the new diamond above my lip. It’s sore, but…

Okay, if he insists.

While he removes the arrangement from the flower vase left by the hotel and sets my tulips inside it, I put on my new earrings. They dangle, tickling my neck.

They have me smiling to Delta’s while one of Nash’s guards drives us in a black Mercedes—the symbolism not lost on me. When we arrive, I clock armed security lurking in every dark corner. Silently, I hold Nash’s hand while he leads me inside. Jace isn’t at his usual post. Some random guard sits there instead as we stride upstairs.

“Is everyone already here?” I whisper.

“Almost,” he answers. “I’ve warned you.” We stop at the top of the landing on the third floor. Gently, Nash lifts my stare to his. “You know what happens tonight. You know what I have to do.”

Of course, we fuss about it one last time before I insist, “I want you to do it.” Then I kiss him as passionately as I can.

How else can I shut his sexy mouth? How else can I convince him I’m in a make-me-your-queen-in-an-orgy kinda mood?

The door at the end of the hallway slowly opens, stopping us. I glance at the ominous sight and stifle a gasp.

It looks like a scene from that hot, soft porno mafia movie. You know, the one with a year of kinky kidnapping and sexy spit?

The doorknob, keyhole, and hinges on the black door gleam in gold. The Acanthus carvings on the black columns and molding around the door glimmer in gold leaf, too. They glow in the sconce light illuminating the dark hallway while large silhouettes loom in the doorway, candlelight flickering behind them.

It’s Axel … with five men shadowing him and one petite woman standing by his side.

She’s dressed like me in a Chanel skirt suit, but hers is navy. What thrills me is that she’s wearing a black silk blindfold over a black lace bondage hood, with her hair, eyes, and face concealed except for her ruby lips.

Around her neck is a dainty, black collar; its gold chain attached to the handle Axel gently tugs. She smirks at his control as classical music, Tchaikovsky, the Russian composer, gently lulls in the background.

With a snarl, Axel taunts Nash, “Is your princess ready to be a queen?”

But, you know … I don’t buy Axel’s extra asshole act anymore.

Yes, he looks like a sinister son of a proud bitch (who I love), but there’s more to him; I’m beginning to give the asshat a lot of credit now.

So he can take a seat, asking Nash because it’s for me to answer, “Yes. I. Am.”

Our steps aim for the room.

The silhouette of the kings blocking my view is eerie and erotic. All the while, I feel like someone’s watching us. Tingles crawl up my spine, so I whip around and see an empty hallway and the ivory-paneled door to the demonstration room cracked open. The room is dark as usual.

I know we’re safe here, so why do I sense we’re not alone?

Fuck it. I roll my eyes. This old house is haunted, I know.

So I grin, silently inviting the ghosts to join my initiation, too.