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I’m met with another silence that extends for so long that I feel the need to speak again. “Henry? You there?”
“I’m going to murder you. When I get my hands on you, little brother, you are minced-fucking-meat, you hear me? I’ll—”
There’s a scuffle on the other end of the cell, and suddenly, Liv’s centering voice comes down the line, calm and soothing as ever. I can instantly feel my shoulders relax, knowing she’s going to fix everything.
“Alex?”
“Oh, sweet girl, I—”
She cuts me off, her tone brooking no argument. “Don’t‘sweet girl’ me, Alexander Sebastian DeMarco.”
My eyes blow wide open, and I push my overly long hair back out of my face as I exhale heavily.
“This is why you left early, isn’t it?”
I murmur an affirmative, knowing she’s referring to my nephew Nathan’s christening earlier today in London. I’d gotten both the call from Vaughn alerting me to my impending doom and another from the guys in IT regarding a possible hack into our systems.
I’d practically run from my sister Mila’s penthouse without so much as a farewell, flying straight back to New York within an hour of leaving.
“Sit tight.” Liv’s firm voice comes down the line. “Henry’s on his way to you."
* * *
“More.”
Vaughn tilts his head questioningly, quirking a dark brow. “Shouldn’t you be keeping a clear head in a crisis?”
“Shouldn’t you be pouring me more fucking whisky?”
I blow out a breath as he fills the tumbler, then I return my face to my hands to ponder how I could have fucked up so monumentally.
“A sex tape!” The words are muted behind my palms, so I drop my hands to repeat myself louder this time. “A damnsextape, Burton. Itcan’tsee the light of day.”
A tumbler of whisky finds its way into my hand, and I raise it to my mouth, grimacing as the gulp I inhale burns all the way down. I feel it warm the recesses of my stomach, welcoming the pain. Deserving the pain.
No one loves you, Alexander. No one cares.
My mother’s sharp words from that day long ago ring in my mind, and I forcibly push them away with a deep gulp from my tumbler.
Shifting back around behind his desk, Vaughn barks a laugh. “You afraid the world’s going to see your pencil dick?”
“Don’t be jealous 'cause I got the most perfect of Goldi-cocks, Burton!”
He snorts as he takes a sip from his own tumbler, settling into the chair opposite mine. “Great title, actually. ‘Goldi-cocks and the Three Beavers’ has a nice ring to it.”
I squint my eyes, shooting daggers at this asshole who somehow has grown to attain the title of friend since my move to Manhattan to run the US Headquarters for DeMarco Holdings six years ago.
Vaughn is the only bastard son of his prolific late father, Valentine Burton, owner of two elite member-only sex clubs.
Valentines in London is currently being run by Vaughn’s legitimate half-sister, Vivienne. Valentines in Manhattanwasbeing run by Verity, Vaughn’s other half-sister, until their father died. He’d never acknowledged Vaughn—another topic we bonded over—and so Vaughn had made Verity an offer she couldn’t refuse, though he’d kept the details to himself.
She’d up and left Manhattan, paving the way for Vaughn to dismantle Valentines in order to build his own legacy while pissing all over his sperm donors. He’d renamed the club Rogue, implementing all new requirements for entry and membership, making it the hottest spot in the country right now.
“You’re a proper asshat, you know that, right?”
Vaughn shrugs wryly, then chuckles into his whisky as a sharp knock sounds on his office door, but before he can acknowledge it, the door swings wide open to admit my Chief Financial Officer, Grayson Hunter.
He’s wearing a skeptical look on his face as he surreptitiously closes the door behind him.
