by May Sage
"Desmond is into her. No other possibility."
No wonder he seemed out of sorts. Hester remembered Desmond telling her that he'd never had so much as an infatuation; the poor guy was probably completely lost.
"What do we do now?"
"You," Lillie said, "are going to be nice and accommodating when he needs to change his schedule. And he will. And as for me...I guess I needed to talk to Callum anyway. Time to pop by his office and bump into the unicorn."
King of Kings, Book Five
unexpected excerpt
Callum King wasn’t one to hesitate. Even as a child, he’d known his mind. Yes, he did enjoy Brussels sprouts. No, he didn’t like liver. He’d tried once. Never again. His willfulness had saved him a fair amount of time and energy over the years.
And yet, he pondered the issue at hand again.
There was the picture of a woman on his seemingly untidy, yet organized, desk. Green eyes, dark mousy hair. Pretty overall. Nothing special.
Lillie Ryker had come to him asking if the woman could be auctioned off at The Tower. She needed money. Some trouble with an ex-boyfriend. The answer should have been yes. Of course, he could help. Lillie was one of his elder brother’s rare friends, after all.
But he’d said no, no way, then maybe. Something had made him reluctant. Something in the woman’s green eyes.
They were wide, bright, and innocent. If the rest of her was pretty enough, her eyes almost verged on extraordinary.
He sighed, pulling his phone out of the inner pocket of his jacket and calling Lillie.
The woman picked up on the fifth ring. “Your friend,” he said without preamble. “What’s her name?”
“Pandora.”
Of course it was.
“Don’t tell her I gave you her full name. She goes by Andie.”
“I would, too, if my parents hated me,” he quipped.
Lillie laughed. “Does that mean you’re going to include her in the next auction?”
“I’m still thinking about it,” he replied, marking a pause. “You said she’s staying at your place?”
Lillie was silent for a moment. “Yes. You want to meet her?”
“Yes. Today. See if she’s free. I need the whole story before I make my mind up.”
He could whisk her away to Holland and hold her auction at the Amsterdam Tower, where no one would legally blink at the nitty gritty…
Or he could finally set the plan that had been flirting at the edge of his mind in motion.
He needed a wife for a little while. She needed a place to stay.
Maybe they could help each other out.
Power Games
If you are enjoying Kings of the Tower, try the standalone spin off from Hail to the King: Power Games.
You’ll see all your favorite characters and understand how they ended up in DC ;)
* * *
Charles had started to realize that the woman he’d admired for years, and perhaps even loved, was no angel. No angel lied with so much ease. What she was, though, he didn’t know. Not yet.
She opened her door and took a step back to let him in.
He’d never seen the Imperial suite; it was similar to his, except for an extra room, and the large balcony giving a clear view of the White House.
Charles headed out that way and breathed in and out, attempting to clear his mind. Eventually, she joined him, handing him a tumbler filled with amber liquid. Whiskey, no rock, a dash of water. She knew him well.
It wasn’t even two in the afternoon, but he drank it nonetheless. He needed it today.
“Why?” he asked, finally.
“You were framed,” she shrugged. “I saw you walking in the hotel last night. I heard you next door. You were here all night.”
Not with her, though. And she’d lied. “He was with me all night,” she’d said, to the police, no less. Reporters had been within hearing range. No doubt they already had a hashtag trending.
She was a true American sweetheart loved by almost everyone, and she’d compromised that for him.
It wasn’t only the fact that they were both entangled in a murder now; even if—when—they were cleared, she would still be that girl, in the eyes of the people. The one who’d fooled around with a married man. No such scandal had ever been attached to her name until now.
“That’s not an answer.”
Why had she risked all that for him?
She managed to force a smile. “And you don’t need one. We’re in this together now, that’s all that matters.”
It hit him, then. She wanted to be in this mess with him. By his side through this and for what would come after.
His mind was racing.
“What will we say?”
She bit her lip.
“That we met seven years ago, at Dad’s. That we go along, then. I was a young girl who made you laugh, although you were in no mood to joke around. Since, we’ve met perhaps a handful of times, and exchanged a few words,” she said. “Until two years ago, of course.”
Charles raised a brow. That much wouldn’t be hard to recall, as it was exactly what had happened.
“We don’t have to complicate this more than necessary. When I’m asked, I’ll tell them that I found you very handsome then—and that nothing happened at all between us. You and Izzy were together.”
That sobered him. Izzy. His wife. His corpse of a wife.
“I can’t do this.”
“You will.” She closed her eyes. “We will. We must, now.”
She was right. They had no other choice.
“Two years ago, you saw a lawyer about a divorce.”
He almost asked how she knew that, before recalling that he’d told her himself.
“Did you discuss it with Isabella before backtracking?”
He nodded, slowly.
“Good. She would have talked of it with her closest friend, in that case. That may be useful. So, you wanted a divorce; but with the elections coming, you both decided to delay the proceeding. That explains where I come in.”
Charles was shaking his head. “They’ll find my sperm. Inside her. I was with her the night she was killed—earlier, right before the benefit.”
Vanessa didn’t so much as raise a brow. “Well, you were married. We’ll make it clear that our association was purely platonic. I was a friend you sought comfort from, when things were difficult at home. Nothing more.”
He laughed out loud. “Who’ll believe that, Vanessa? Who? You look like every man’s wet dream, and you’re twenty-seven. You, simply being my buddy?”
Vanessa didn’t bother to point out that it was the truth. They were friends. This discussion wasn’t about facts as much as perception. Their whole world was about what people thought of them.
She shrugged again. “I have, on a number of occasions, publicly said I’d never fuck a man before marriage. So yes, they’ll trust that we weren’t…involved. They’ll also understand the semen issue, should it arise. We’ll say that, recently, you were trying to patch things up. That night, you had sex, then she brought me up, again, although you’d told her a thousand times that I was simply a friend.”
Charles watched the woman, closely, studying her features. They betrayed nothing. She didn’t know. Of course, she didn’t, how could she?
Don’t pretend I’m the problem, Izzy had hissed. I’ve seen you, staring at that posh slut all night. You haven’t looked at me that way for a decade—that’s our issue.
He’d denied it. She hadn’t been wrong, though. Their problem hadn’t just been her; not anymore. He’d wanted an out, he’d wanted more than their dysfunctional, destructive, cold relationship.
Now he had it, and it made him feel sick to his stomach, because Izzy was dead.
Oh, God. Actually dead. And he had been the prime suspect, before Vanessa stepped in.
“After that argument, you needed a breather, and you came to me.” Vanessa grinned as she improvised. “We spent the night watching Star Wars re
-runs and fell asleep.”
“Star Trek,” Charles argued, in an attempt to somehow lighten the conversation, although he felt the ground beneath his feet open up, swallowing him whole. Because surely, if this facade did work, he was bound for hell, and so was Vanessa.
Back to reality, he protested her suggestion. “They could interview any boyfriend of yours and that entire theory would crumble.”
“No one will have a word to contradict me, I assure you.”
He swallowed with difficulty. Was she saying what he thought she was? Fuck. Twenty-seven, and built for sin, with her long legs and her perfect ass. How on Earth was she still a fucking virgin?
He didn’t question it out loud, because he knew why. She’d told him a long time ago. He’d just expected that she would have changed her mind by now and spread her legs, like any other woman out there.
First mistake. Vanessa had never been just any woman. She never would be.
“The best lies are laced with truth. Didn’t your mama tell you?”
“My mother forbade me to lie at all.”
Vanessa tilted her head, her long dangling earrings sparkling in the dim light of dusk.
“What an interesting world you lived in. But we’re in mine now, and I know its rules.”
She did.
From ages eight to sixteen, she’d lived in the White House; the five following years, she’d spent at Yale, before surprising everyone when she’d gone to Hollywood, instead of passing the bar and joining her family’s law firm. She’d excelled, her connections and her voice landing her right at the top. Over the course of the last five years, ‘Nessie’ had built her own empire, full of adoring fans.
She knew what she was doing; she’d lived under public scrutiny most of her life.
“It’s never going to work.”
“Charles,” Vanessa said, smiling sadly, her delicate hand resting on his cheek, before she straightened the knot of his tie, “it’s already working.”
Charles hated her then. He hated her scent, her hand, and the way his heart beat when she was this close. He hated the fact that she was perfection. The fact that they would get out of this room and sell their lies without any effort.
Because there was more truth than even she had known in the lies she’d woven to keep him out of jail. And worse yet: every single lie she’d invented, he wanted to be true.
“You’ve thought of everything, it seems. So, tell me, Vanessa, when am I going to propose? I’m sure it’s penciled in somewhere in this imaginary life of ours.”
Because that was the reason she’d helped him, the reason she wouldn’t say out loud. Why else would she risk so much for him?
This run might be screwed before it had even started, but he’d try again, and she wanted to be First Lady.
“If we want you to win this election? Soon.”
No, she was no angel.
Quite the opposite, in fact.
“Did you kill my wife?” he asked her.
He had to. And he had to observe her very closely to see if any of her features would betray a lie. None did. “No.”
“But you want to take her place.”
It wasn’t a question, but she answered nonetheless.
“Yes.”
Available now.