Page 82 of The Crowned Garza

When he eventually sets me down, he kisses me with gusto.

“Can’t wait to have you all to myself this weekend.” Cannabis is strong on his breath. “Feels like I haven’t held you in forever.”

We haven’t been able to spend time together for roughly two weeks because I’ve been working double shifts in order to get the time off for this trip. “Are the others here yet?”

He drags me off to the jet. “Yep.”

When we’re on the jet, that already reeks of marijuana, one of the guys from the friend group yells, “Tillie G the Boss has arrived!”

Two are already doing lines on a table.

Creed Nelson is a billionaire heir andfarfrom a poster boy for good behavior. He’s cheerfully irresponsible and unruly in the way one would expect a twenty-two-year-old one-percenter with everything at their fingertips would be. His friends, all trust-fund babies, follow his lead.

Admittedly, this isn’t the healthiest group of people to be around, but it’s the first time I’ve legitimately been a part of a friend group. These people are so high in the clouds of wealth, influence, and self-focus that they couldn’t give a rat’s ass who I’m related to, and have never even asked. I’m nowhere on their wavelength of affluence and they accept me. Ever since they bought outREALEone evening for a private dinner event.

On purpose, I bump my knee against the table with the lines, messing it all up. “Hey, snowmen, go to the back with that shit.”

“See? She hasn’t even been here a minute and she’s already bossing us around.”

Despite their grumbles, they get up and move to the back. It’s been like this since we started hanging out; they’ll carp that I’m bossy and assertive but then do whatever I tell them anyway. Not necessarily because I’m Creed’s girl, but because they’re really just a bunch of fucked-up rich kids with mommy and daddy issues silently begging for guidance. Since I’m the only one who’s ever sober in the group—sober in that alcohol’s the only substance that enters my system, in a responsible fashion—they trust and listen to me. Like passengers trusting a pilot to land them safely.

I shuffle to the seat next to Vicky, and before I’m even seated properly, Creed cups my face and kisses me hard.Gah!He’s just so good at making me feel cherished. I bask in it.

“Mmhhmmm, I missed your intoxicating smell, babe.” He bumps his forehead to mine. “By the way, you look sexy as fuck in this top. Can’t wait to have my face between those tits later. You’re a smokeshow.”

The intercom crackles with the pilot requesting Creed to the cockpit. He gives me another quick kiss before heading back up the aisle.

“He’s so different with you,” Vicky comments, a forlorn hue to her voice.

“Pretty sure he’s just always high,” I say with a laugh.

Her returned smile is wistful.

Vicky is childhood friends with almost everyone in the group and is also Creed’s ex-girlfriend. One who’s still very much in love with him. It’s quite possible they hook up behind my back, but I don’t care. Vicky is such a chill, down-to-earth ball of gorgeousness that I’ve developed a detached attraction to her. Enough that I talked her into a hot threesome with Creed and me the last time we hung out together. It was fun and so damn sexy, and I’m hoping she’ll be up for it again this weekend.

When she leans over the armrest and gives me a tentative kiss, I know it’s a done deal. I also know she didn’t kiss me because she wanted to kissme. She just wanted to taste Creed.

A few minutes later, Creed returns from the cockpit with a perplexed expression, rubbing the back of his neck. “Babe, can I talk to you for a sec?”

“What’s wrong?”

He jerks his head to the door, indicating he’d rather talk outside.

Vicky shrugs when I shoot her a questioning glance.

Once we’re outside, I press again, “What’s the matter?”

“I don’t understand what’s going on, babe, but the firm that handles our security and surveillance flagged you as a security risk.”

“Me? What the hell?Howam I a security risk?”

“I have no idea. The pilot said they’re under strict instructions not to take off with you on board.”

“Wait, you’re kicking me off?”

With a loud groan, he rubs his hands down his face. “The thing is, Dad doesn’t know I’m taking the jet and I’m afraid that if I push back about this, the firm will tip him off. You were there the last time he threatened to cut me off, babe. You saw how serious he was. I’m all out of strikes with him.”

The laugh that leaves me is humorless. “This is ridiculous.”