Other Books by Drea Blackery:
New York Heirs Series
Arrogant (Book #1)
Untamed (Book #1.5)
Broken (Book #2)
Charming (Book #3)
Devious (Book #3.5) – Coming Soon
Charming
GABRIEL
I never intended to fall for the woman
who ruined my life. But when I met her,
she was nothing like what I expected.
Lena Hastings confuses the hell out of me.
The most quiet, shy, lonely girl I’ve ever met—
and also the smartest. The bravest.
I may have been brought up in spotlight, but
Lena shines brighter than anything I’ve ever known.
Little do I know that she holds a secret that
can tear us apart before we even begin…
LENA
Darkness seems to follow wherever I go,
and solitude is where I find my solace.
Until Gabriel Easton comes crashing into my life,
burning like the brightest star.
He wants me for himself, but we’re too different.
He’s everything I’m not, for one.
Strong. Confident. Perfect.
Loved by millions across America.
But even though I’m keeping my distance,
my heart and body wants what it wants…
Disclaimer and Trigger Warning
Depiction of attempted sexual assault. All events, people and places in this novel are dramatized and do not represent real life scenarios. If you need to, please seek help and support from the right organizations.
Copyright © 2020 by Drea Blackery.
All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher, except in the case of brief quotation embodied in critical reviews and certain noncommercial uses permitted by the copyright law.
Resemblance to actual persons, things, living or dead, locales or events is entirely coincidental.
This novel is dedicated to all the queens for whom
the darkness feels overwhelming
and the light seems out of sight.
The storm will pass;
keep holding on.
Playlist
Beautiful People (feat. Khalid) — Ed Sheeran, Khalid
breathin — Ariana Grande
Catching Feelings — Inigo Pascual, Moophs
Ruin My Life — Zara Larsson
If the World Was Ending (feat. Julia Michaels) — JP Saxe, Julia Michaels
Crashing (feat. Bahari) — ILLENIUM, Bahari
Contents
Other Books by the Author
Disclaimer
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Epilogue
Arrogant (New York Heirs #1) – Exclusive Excerpt!
About the Author
Copyright
“All or nothing gamble, my man. It’s the only way to lose.”
—Gabriel Easton to his hedge fund manager
“Don’t panic, don’t panic, oh my god, please don’t panic—”
—Lena Hastings to herself every other hour
“It seems to this writer that the most important thing Gabriel Easton has ever done is to be born an Easton.”
— Also Lena Hastings, published anonymously in The Tattler Mag for The Naked Truth About Gabriel Easton
[Transcript begins]
Hannah: A veeeryyy good morning to all our listeners, you’re tuning in to WeHeartRadio 103’s weekly segment, #StarGazing! Our guest Star today is someone you’ve all been begging for! Any hints, Jo?
JoJo: He’s the winner of this year’s People’s Choice Awards and Time Magazine’s Top 20 People to Watch. It’s none other than Gabriel Easton! Welcome to our studio, Gabriel, thanks for joining us!
Gabriel: Pleasure’s mine, thanks for having me.
JoJo: Gabriel, can I just say that you look so good! Han, how does he look so good this early in the morning?
Hannah: And he smells so good too!
Gabriel: [laughs]
Hannah: It’s been a crazy year for you, Gabriel. You’ve swept up all the popularity choice awards, and you also closed the Fall/Winter show for CK earlier this week.
JoJo: Can you tell us about your experiences, and what made you want to do it?
Gabriel: I guess I just wanted to try something new. It was a great experience, Brooke and the team were amazing, and it was really cool to see what goes on behind the scenes.
JoJo: Amazing! Now we also heard that Easton Entertainment just launched a new charity initiative.
Hannah: To our listeners, Easton Entertainment is the media arm of Easton Group, founded by Gabriel’s grandmother Jemima James AKA Queen James. Gabriel, can you tell us more about this?
Gabriel: Sure, and in fact that’s actually what I came to talk about today. So we’ve just launched an initiative with Changing Lives NYC to provide free college education to at-risk children in New York.
Hannah: That is SO cool, Gabriel, thanks for sharing! Education is so important!
JoJo: Ladies, don’t we just love a guy who looks out for the little ones?
Hannah: We sure do, Jo! Now, earlier this week we asked all you listeners to post your buurrning questions on Twitter. What we all want to know, Gabriel, is WHO are you wearing today?
Gabriel: …
Hannah: Gabriel?
Gabriel: That’s it? Two seconds of talking actual
JoJo: [laughs] Well—
Gabriel: What other questions do you have? Can I have a look?
[Rustling papers]
Gabriel: … What am I wearing, how I do my hair, what’s my workout routine, what do I smell like, boxers or briefs—
Hannah: Uh—
Gabriel: —Am I seeing anyone, what’s my ideal date, what’s my favorite sexual position. [laughs] Seriously?
Hannah: …
JoJo: …
Gabriel: …
JoJo: Let’s take five—
Gabriel: Nah,
[Transcript ends]
Good Guy Gone Bad? Will the REAL Gabriel Easton Please Stand Up???
Helena Hastings, The Tattler Mag
20th July, Saturday
RELATED: Let’s talk about TIME’s 25 Most Influential People On The Internet today: Featuring Lil Nas X, AOC, Jameela Jamil, Gabriel Easton, and more!
PSSSTT! Before you go any further, click here to read our VIRAL article, The Naked Truth About Gabriel Easton!
Since our feature article about him last month, billionaire heir (billionheir?) Gabriel Easton has been indulging in even more naughty behavior! We at The Tattler Mag are addressing the latest reports about last night’s scandal at a certain upscale club in N
YC!
Photos and videos circulating online show the billionheir to the Easton Group fortune exchanging punches with not one, but two men! OMG.
Very unprincely behavior for the bachelor voted “Most Likely To Be Prince Charming in Disguise” in our monthly poll in March! Nobody knows the reason for this compromising situation yet, but dare we allege that it’s over a woman?
SPEAKING OF COMPROMISING SITUATIONS, peep our gallery of Gabriel and all the times he was caught cozying up to his carousel of hot girl flings!
The Internet believes there’s an explanation for the recent antics from our favorite Heir, from throwing his drink at a paparazzi, glass included to flipping off his fans.
Here’s what our Twitter followers have to say!
User @ivegotbuns_hun23 gushes,
“lmao he’s so naughty but so fine tho!! Yummmmm”
@kylieeeeee0904 jumps to Gabriel’s defense!
“Obv he’s struggling with something we can’t see and is in a very dark place. Give the guy space ffs.”
@sad_n_boujee weighs in.
“GUYS. CAN. WE. ATOP. MAKING. UNTALENTED. PEOPLE. FAMOUS??? like okay he’s hot, BUT WHAT ELSE?!?”
And shockingly, @justice_4_gabrieleaston lays the blame at OUR feet!
“its cuz of that HORIBLE article yall wrote!! Yall made him out to be a BAD GUY who dosn’t deserve what he has, and he has’nt been”
“the same since than!!!! HELENA HASTINGS U R A BULLY!!!! Thats right we all know it was u who wrote it!! Y don’t u own up to it!!! 4 SHAME!!!!!”
Well, @justice_4_gabrieleaston, we’d love to think we are that influential, but we’re sure that Gabriel Easton couldn’t care less about that little viral article about him! After all, this heir has been in the spotlight since he was two years old! (P.S. click to see his baby pictures—so CUTE!)
We at The Tattler have this to add: it looks like Naughty Gabriel will be sticking around for a while! A source we spoke to allegedly overheard our Golden Boy say last night that he’s “sick of putting on a f**king show.”
Now what could that mean? Was his charming personality just an act all along? But one thing’s for sure. Whether he’s naughty or nice, we can all agree that Gabriel Easton’s still making hearts race all across America!
Tell us what YOU think in the comments below, and don’t forget to FOLLOW US for all the latest juicy gossip!
You read it here first!
XOXO,
The Tattler Mag
There are two kinds of people in the world: those who love Gabriel Easton, and those who fucking hate his guts.
It didn’t matter which camp you belonged to, because at the end of the day, you have heard of me.
Walking down the street? There’s my face on the newsstands, soulful brown eyes beckoning you over for a closer look.
Scrolling through your Instagram feed? There’s my golden, tanned biceps and eight-pack, slick from the sea I just emerged from Baywatch-style.
Fucking around on YouTube? Surprise, there’s me again, casually running my hand through my hair that took stylists five hours to perfect, showing you around my skyline penthouse as I reveal the answer to the poll: “Which type of boyfriend is Gabriel Easton?”
The most voted answer: The sexy, attentive, charming boyfriend, AKA the one who will meet your every need in and out of bed and ruin you for any other guy.
As far as America’s concerned, Gabriel Easton is perfect—
—and that’s exactly the kind of shit that would fuck with your brain.
Because no one can be that perfect.
Not even me.
A pile of magazines landed on the desk in front of me, the angry slam jerking me from my thoughts.
I barely spared the covers a glance—I already knew what they were.
Instead, I sat back in my chair and crossed my leg ankle to knee, idly watching the skinny elder woman pacing behind the desk like a caged tigress.
Regular grandmothers were sweet and made never-ending batches of chocolate chip cookies. Mine took perverse pride in her resemblance to Cruella de Ville, sans the crazy hair and the puppy coat.
I narrowed my eyes at Jemima Ethel James, who was infamous in New York for One, her devotion to high couture, Two, her short bob that looked like a shiny black helmet, and Three, being a bitch to anyone stupid enough to cross her.
On second thought, maybe I shouldn’t rule out the puppy coat just yet. She probably had one stashed away somewhere.
“Explain this.” Jemima jabbed her smoldering cigarette at the scattered magazines on the desk.
“What?” I narrowed my eyes at the glossy covers and did my best to look like I’d never even seen a damn magazine before in my life.
Not easy, considering that it was a close-up shot of my face plastered across the front cover of The Tattler.
A very unflattering shot, might I add, complete with my post-party hangover face and a circle of helpful red arrows pointing at my bloodshot eyes. No perfect hair in sight this time.
I frowned and looked closer.
Jesus, this was just downright offensive. Did I actually look like this pissed-drunk?
“Don't play the idiot with me, Gabriel!” Jemima snatched up a tabloid and shook it at me. “Is this how you're spending your time now? With whores?”
She flung the magazine at my head, but I ducked just in time for it to go whizzing past my ear.
Those “whores” were simply socialites who liked their partying, but I decided not to point that out just now.
“The tabloids blow things out of proportion,” I tried in a soothing voice.
“And they’re all filled with half-naked photos of you!” Jemima yelled. Her smoke-ravaged voice sounded like it was about to crack. “You’re making a fool out of me!”
Okay, that much was—unfortunately—true. My gran had spent the past six decades cultivating her image as a peer of the American elite, pristine and wise and goddess-like in her perfection. If my parents were the Beckhams of America, Jemima had to be Queen Elizabeth in horn-rimmed glasses and bright red lipstick.
And I guess my recent headliners made me the embarrassing equivalent of a college-era Prince Will.
“My social activities aren't gonna ruin your reputation, Gran.”
“My reputation? My reputation? What about my stock prices? Easton Group’s points are plummeting lower than your standards, you idiot! You’ve lost me fourteen million dollars!”
“For real?” I frowned. “Damn, that’s news.”
“Gabriel, what is going on?”
“Nothing,” I exhaled wearily. “I’m just sick of pretending.”
Jemima didn’t need to question what I meant.
“You don’t get to decide when to quit,” she snapped. “I decide that, and my answer is never.”
And that right here folks, was the dark side of Easton Entertainment, where the money flows in like a never-ending run of Cats, and where the act continues long after the curtains fall.
The guy you know as Gabriel Easton—the wholesome, charming guy-next-door-of-your-dreams that half of America was in love with?
He doesn’t exist. It was all a fucking farce.
Gabriel Easton the Perfect Heir wasn’t born in Johns Hopkins Hospital, he was born in the Director’s Boardroom of Easton Group as part of Jemima James’s plan to create the perfect family image for her empire.
Every smile, every laugh and every word that came out of me was orchestrated for the cameras—even when they weren’t rolling.
My body? A team of trainers and a personal chef.
Hair and clothes? Celebrity stylists.
My education at Yale? World-class tutors—and the fact that the entire line of Easton’s graduated there didn’t hurt either.
Every word I said on camera was pre-planned by a PR team and crossed checked by my manager. Twice.
Hell, I couldn’t even take a shit without someone hearing about it. The bottom line was that none of me was organic. I was as natur
al as a fake tan in winter.
I sighed, folding my arms and cracking my neck. “Thirty years is a long time to keep up an act, Gran. I don’t know how you’ve done it for eighty.”
“I’m not acting,” Jemima snapped.
I leveled a dry look at her. “No one is perfect 24/7, Gran, not even you.”
“And certainly not you. If your intention is to let the world know how foolish you are, congratulations! You’ve succeeded!”
That was…also true. Just mere weeks ago I was loved all across America, and now I was—I narrowed my eyes at the bright yellow headlines on People’s Mag—“an entitled playboy endowed everywhere but inside his head.”
My lips curved reluctantly.
That wasn’t half bad.
“I have the right to live however I want to, Gran,” I said.
“You have the right to shut your trap hole too, but we can’t all have our way,” Jemima muttered, puffing on her cigarette like her life depended on it. “You will stop this nonsense immediately, Gabriel. No more whoring and…” she narrowed her eyes at another magazine, “…getting high—what the hell does that mean!”
“Recreational drugs,” I offered.
Jemima looked close to imploding, her eyes bulging so dangerously that I could see the edges of her tattooed eyeliner. “How did I end up with a grandson like you?”
“Is that a rhetorical question, or are you really asking? ‘Cause hint: the answer has something to do with the lack of protection.” I frowned. “Hold up, did protection even exist back in your day? 1600s, was it?”
I ducked in time for another magazine to hurtle past my head. “Gran, please stop trying to kill me. I thought I was your favorite grandson.”
“Alex is my favorite!” Jemima snarled with her teeth still around her cigarette. She flung the last of the magazines at me and it hit me square in the chest—not that it had much impact.
Charming (New York Heirs #3) Page 1