The Dirty Dozen: Damsel Edition

by Kay Maree

  Harleigh’s face lit up at the sight of him, but the expression she wore wasn’t one that signaled she was just happy to be able to say a proper goodbye to her best friend. No, this was a look of sheer, unadulterated joy. A look I recognized instantly because it was one I saw reflected back at me in the mirror every morning.

  I realized too late that, Harleigh, the girl who has been like a sister to me was undoubtedly in love with the boy she grew up with. Sound similar? Of course, it does. However, their situation is vastly different to mine and Dante’s.

  Where Dante and I spent a lot of time together, we still had our own interests, our own friends, and weren’t as entrenched in the MC lifestyle like Harleigh and Lyric are. They, on the other hand, were two peas in a pod. Born almost exactly two years apart, clubhouse legend says that the moment Lyric laid eyes on Harleigh for the first time, he fell head over heels in love.

  From the day Harleigh learned to crawl, they were inseparable. Lyric was a holy terror as a child. According to his mom and dad, Jonas and Blaine, Lyric was incapable of sitting still; he had one speed, and that was full throttle. Unless, of course, your name is Harleigh because with her, it was as if Lyric was a different person altogether.

  “Hey chick, you okay? You kind of spaced out on me there,” Harleigh prompts.

  “Yeah, I’m okay. I was just thinking is all,” I reply vaguely.

  “Mmhm. What about? Please tell me it was dirty, perverted thoughts about how spectacular Cole looks without a shirt on,” she pleads, fanning herself in an overly dramatic fashion.

  Rolling my eyes at her, I snuggle my little man into my chest, praising Jesus he’s finally come down off his sugar high. “Ah, I think you’re confusing you with me. I’m a happily married woman who has a far better specimen of her own to ogle.”

  “Avoidance; a sure fire way to know a bitch is lying,” Harleigh giggles. “Now spill it, sister. I know it had to be heavy because your eyebrows did that little frowny thing they do when you’re trying to sort through something.”

  Shaking my head, I confess, “Honestly, babe, you think you do, but you really don’t want to know.”

  “Oh,” she mumbles, apparently correctly guessing the direction my thoughts had traveled in.

  Stretching across the distance between us, I take her hand and squeeze it in what I hope is a supportive gesture. “Harleigh, you need to think about going to see someone to talk about whatever is robbing you of the chance to find happiness.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I am happy,” Harleigh insists, but I don’t believe her for a second.

  “No, Harleigh, you’re not. Not truly, anyway. You do a good job of hiding it, but when you let the mask slip, it’s blindingly obvious to anyone looking that you’re hurting,” I tell her, scared shitless that I’m overstepping by saying this to her. “It’s been four years, Harleigh. Don’t you think it’s time to answer one of the dozens of calls he makes every week?”

  The light in Harleigh’s eyes disappears with my question, and her mouth tightens into a thin line. “No. No, I really don’t. You were there, Faye. You were there, so you know. You heard what he said, and there’s no coming back from that shit. Not for me. Now do me a favor and just drop it, okay?”

  “Not a chance in hell, hellcat,” Dante’s deep rumble sounds from the doorway. “Fuck that. We’ve all been tiptoeing around this shit for too long already, so I’m going to say what my wife is too nice to.”

  “Dante, don’t,” I warn.

  “I love you, baby, and I love your girl too, which is why she needs to hear this from someone who cares a whole hell of a lot about her and only has her best interests at heart.”

  Oh, boy. This isn’t going to end well.

  Harleigh doesn’t move a muscle, but I can sense she’s already checked out. Her mind is elsewhere so there’s very little chance Dante is going to get through to her, but that doesn’t mean he won’t try.

  “Babe, look at me,” he says in a tone that doesn’t broker any room for argument. “Hear me when I promise that I did this for your own good.”

  “Harleigh Belle,” an even richer sounding voice than my husband’s rumbles.

  Harleigh is up and moving so quickly I’m scared she’ll trip and fall headfirst into the pool. All worry aside, though, Lyric looks good for a man who has been living without the other half of his soul for the last four years.

  Lyric’s shaggy blonde hair is pushed back from his forehead with an expensive pair of sunglasses, but even still, I can see it’s been a while since he’s had a trim – something Lyric used to do like clockwork every few weeks. The cerulean blue eyes, framed by thick, dark eyelashes were once alight with mischief, but now seem dull and muted in comparison.

  But the most noticeable difference, by far, is how much bigger Lyric is and the number of tattoos he has now. He must have put on, at least, fifty pounds of muscle since we last saw him. And that is no minor feat, considering he wasn’t small to begin with. Not to mention, although Lyric’s dad, Jonas, is the best tattoo artist in Colorado, Lyric wasn’t particularly interested in adding to his collection of body art. One was enough he always said.

  He and Harleigh have matching tattoos that they got together the day they turned eighteen. Aside from Harleigh’s being on the left side of her rib cage and Lyric’s is on his chest, they are identical in every way.

  The quote is so simple, yet so stunningly beautiful in its simplicity, that it makes me wonder if when Harleigh looks at it in the mirror every day, she feels the same.

  Seduce my mind and you can have my body.

  Find my soul and I’m yours forever.

  “You are not here,” Harleigh states, staring at Lyric and finally putting an end to the silence. Glancing between Dante and me, she narrows her eyes on my husband. “He’s here because of you. You called him, didn’t you?”

  “No, babe. He’s here because this is where you are,” Dante volleys.

  “Bullshit! He’s known where I was the whole damn time and hasn’t bothered to visit before, so why now? It’s awfully convenient, don’t you think? Especially since Faye just decided she and I needed to take a trip down memory lane and all.”

  Harleigh’s body is vibrating with anger, and for the most part, I don’t blame her. I would be livid if someone stuck their nose into my personal affairs too. But I like to think that eventually, I’d come to accept they were only doing what they thought was best in order to help me.

  “You guys wanna stop talking about me like I’m not standing right fucking here,” Lyric wisely interjects.

  My husband and my best friend can bicker for hours if you let them, so I appreciate Lyric putting a stop to it before they could start in earnest.

  “Sure,” Dante shrugs.

  “What part of, You. Do. Not. Exist. To. Me, do you not understand? Was it the word ‘not’ because you’ve never been very good at taking no for an answer?” Harleigh snaps waspishly.

  Lyric takes a step toward Harleigh, which has her beating a hasty retreat. But with one word, her body freezes solid and her hands begin to shake. “Yours. I’m yours, Harleigh Belle. The question is, are you still mine?”

  And that’s Dante’s and my cue to take our sleeping son and leave.

  About the Author

  Born in, New Zealand, Natasha moved to Australia the year she turned eight. Growing up with a younger brother and two loving parents, it wasn't long before she realized my love of reading, creative writing, all things rock 'n' roll, concerts, ripped jeans and vintage, heavy metal t-shirts.

  With the support of her husband and three children, she was able to break into the Indie Author scene with her first self-published title, Burnt, Book One in the Devil’s Spawn MC series. Since then, Natasha Thomas has gone on to write many titles in both the MC and Contemporary Romance genres, many of which have made the Amazon Bestsellers list, and become an International Bestselling Author with the release of Knight, Book
6 in the Vengeance MC series.Also by Natasha Thomas

  More by this Author

  Tools series

  Screwed

  Vengeance MC series

  Call Me…Vengeance

  Fury

  Jonas

  Gage

  Cash

  Knight

  Jump

  Sarge

  Diesel

  Devil’s Spawn MC series

  Burnt

  Floating

  Savior

  Captive

  Broken

  Forged

  Legacy

  Forever After Novella series

  Mine

  Yours

  Claimed

  Owned

  Seduced

  Desired

  Patricks’ Brothers series

  Staking Her Claim

  Eye See You

  Eye’ll Find You – Coming soon

  Dark Knights series

  Tainted

  Tarnished – TBA

  The Salvatore Princess

  THE DIRTY DOZEN – DAMSEL EDITION

  Ann Mickan

  THE SALVATORE PRINCESS

  Copyright 2020 Ann Mickan

  All Rights Reserved This book is a work of fiction. Any references to real events, real people, and real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the Author’s imagination and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, organizations or places is entirely coincidental. All rights are reserved. This book is intended for the purchaser of this e-book ONLY. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage retrieval system, without the express written permission of the Author.

  Blurb

  Mia Angelina Salvatore’s days as the princess of the Salvatore empire come to an abrupt end when the king and queen are killed in a freak holiday accident. Without her father’s indulgence of her every whim, and his seemingly bottomless bank accounts, she is suddenly faced with taking control of the empire before her father’s officers assume power and leave her with nothing but her name.

  Mia, the princess, soon finds herself recast into the role of damsel in distress and in desperate need of a knight in shining armour riding up on his white charger to save her and her empire.

  In a sea of pretenders and imposters, will she be able to recognise the one with her best interests at heart. More importantly, will she let herself trust him to take control of the empire and protect her heart as well.

  Prologue

  Mia Salvatore had been her father’s princess all her life. Even before she was born, he’d indulged her every whim and fancy. Each time her mother, Gina, had mentioned an idea or a craving, it had been given Antonio’s full attention until it was fulfilled. And so it had followed after she’d made her way into her privileged world. No matter what her mother or nannies said, all little Mia had to do was flash her father her sweetest smile and her every wish was granted. This behaviour had also gotten her through her childhood and teenage years at the exclusive girls’ academy she was driven to each day by her father’s spare driver, Duncan, in the dark blue Mercedes sedan her father had bought especially for her use. At least one afternoon every week, Mia sweet-talked Duncan into taking her on a deviated route home from Pattinson Girls Academy, always keen to meet up with her group of similarly privileged friends for something sweet to eat and some shopping in their favourite stores and boutiques. For much of her young life it seemed that her most pressing problem was remembering which colours and styles of designer shoes and clothes she had in her walk-in robe at home, and even that wasn’t really a problem because a girl always needed a spare pair of red stilettoes or another party dress, didn’t she?

  When Mia graduated from Pattinson’s at the age of eighteen, she did so with excellent skills in the three D’s – Deportment, Designer Label Shopping, and Diva Behaviour – along with a distinction in the field of Entitlement. Somehow, despite the best intentions of her mother, Gina, and her various staff during her formative years, she had truly grown up to be Antonio Salvatore’s princess.

  With the tedious monotony of attending school removed from their days, Mia and her group of friends easily filled their time with much more pleasant activities. Tennis and golf coaching at the Country Club, massages and beauty treatments at their favourite Day Spa, brunches, lunches, and high teas at the various ‘to be seen at’ restaurants around town, became their new daytime routine, whilst attending charity balls and dinner parties filled their evenings. Of course, there was always a long list of eligible young, and not so young, men vying for their attentions, but none of the girls were particularly interested in complicating their privileged existences. While their fathers were paying for every little whim and fancy that crossed their minds, without expecting them to do anything in return apart from looking gorgeous and saying ‘Thank you, Daddy’ from time to time, why would they.

  Mia, Phoebe, and Meredith played their princess roles to perfection, right through until their twenty-first birthdays. None of them seriously contemplated the thought of ever needing to get a job or have a career. After all, what would be the point of that? Their fathers were more than happy to finance the lifestyles they’d been raised to enjoy, and at some point in the future, they would each land a similarly wealth husband who’d be so desperately in love with them that they’d give them everything they wanted. Besides, there was always a long line of working-class people wanting to work, and the girls saw it as their duty to give those people the chance to do so. The only inconvenience the girls could foresee in the plan they’d been hatching since their early teens was the fact that their future husbands would require them to have a least one child as an heir to their fortunes. However, since Meredith’s father was the plastic surgeon all the socialites went to, she’d already come up with the solution that would rectify any damage that responsibility wrought on their prefect bodies. They had everything mapped out to ensure their perfectly indulged lives continued exactly as they were. By their calculations they each had approximately two years to meet and marry their Prince Charmings, ensuring that any children were born before they entered their thirties, thus giving them the best chance of a fast recovery of their figures and lifestyles.

  Mia and her friends slept easy every night, secure n the knowledge that they would continue their perfect princess lives until they were one day crowned as queens.

  Chapter One

  The day of Mia’s 21st birthday party dawned bright and crisp, promising perfect conditions for the evening her mother and the event planners had been working towards for the last few months. There was a huge marquee in the garden, complete with flooring inside and leading paths, thousands of fairy lights, and tables to be decorated with lavish floral centrepieces, silverware, and everything needed for a luxurious dinner for nearly two hundred people. Of course, as is the case with these sorts of affairs, there were a lot of people invited purely because of their position or business connections. These were the people Mia was expected to make polite conversation with, showing them how sophisticated her family was. There were the families of her group of friends from school, who were also part of her parents’ circle of friends. She had socialised with these people throughout her life and was comfortable with all the members of their families.

  There were also a new group of invitees, now that Mia had reached her 21st birthday. A group she was less than impressed about including, but had given in to her father’s insistence. These were the young men and their parents, whom her parents considered as suitable prospective husbands for Mia. Over the last few months, as each of her counterparts had reached this milestone age, these same young men and their parents had been included on their guest lists. There were all polite enough, handsome enough, and able to engage in interesting enough conversations so as to have he
r parents smiling encouragement at her. However, none of them had held Mia’s interest beyond their initial meetings. So much so, that when they would approach her during the course of an evening, asking her to dance or have a rink with them, she couldn’t recall their names or which empire they were the hear to. This was a constant source of frustration for her parents, who often reminded her of the importance of making a good match from with their circle.

  Phoebe and Meredith were all a-flutter with the excitement of being pursued ad were happy to give out their phone numbers and accept dinner invitations, but Mia couldn’t see the point if she couldn’t even remember their names. She was determined not to bow to the pressure to put herself out there on what felt a little like a glorified on-line dating site.

  Even with all that being taken into account, she was just self-interested enough not to let her misgivings in any way impede her father from fully opening her wallet and providing her with the most lavish party their circle had seen for years. She wanted her night to be the new benchmark that all events were measured against from now on, as well as retrospectively. Luckily, her mother and the team of event planners were also committed to the same goal and had exquisite taste when it came to decorating and menu choices.

  As Mia and her mother, Gina, glided through the leafy streets on the way to having their hair, nails, and makeup done, it was difficult to tell who was the most excited. Several times, Mia caught Duncan’s amused expression in the rear-view mirror, casually rolling her eyes in response. She didn’t have it in her to try to rein her mother’s enthusiasm in, especially while it was working in her favour, but she didn’t want to spend her day with her mother gossiping about the other girls and mothers who would be at her party. That, and absolutely not about her mother’s pick of the invited young men and their families’ fortunes. She had to change the direction of the conversation… and quickly.