Total pages in book: 176
Estimated words: 167257 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 836(@200wpm)___ 669(@250wpm)___ 558(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 167257 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 836(@200wpm)___ 669(@250wpm)___ 558(@300wpm)
“You know Ruen’s pissed at you, right?” I overheard someone say. Intrigued, I looked up from my perusal of the lobster tails in search of the voice. “Diamond earrings won’t get you out of the dog house this time.”
There.
I found them skulking in the shadows by the windows as Mr. All-American scoffed like buying a girl jewelry was a ridiculous notion when really he sounded…jealous, almost like he resented Ky for being the one to drape Ruen in diamonds.
I guess those earrings were real, after all. A priceless trinket you only wore during special occasions—like tea with the Queen. Meanwhile, Ruen was casually wearing them with an outfit that looked like it came straight out of Forever 21. She hadn’t even bothered to remove them before placing the oversized headphones on her head.
“Let me worry about that,” Ky murmured, head down as he broodily stared out the fogged window with his hands stuffed in the pockets of his suit pants.
“Seriously, what were you thinking? We just got back, and you’re already trying to start a war with the Kings?”
“We needed to know how big of a threat they posed, didn’t we? Now we know.” He looked up, and I could swear his gaze found mine in the window’s reflection. “We know their weaknesses too.”
My gaze darted back down to the lobster tails.
No way he was talking about me. He couldn’t have meant me. I was nothing to the Kings. Also, it sounded like Ky had purposely provoked the Kings. If Rowdy, Roc, Golden, and Joren found out, this party would turn into a bloodbath that would probably end with them killing the witnesses, too, so I made the decision right then to keep my mouth shut. I owed the Kings nothing. Sure, they took me in—sort of—and gave me a job, but I was earning my keep, and they made sure I regretted it every day. Not exactly a recipe for inspiring loyalty.
“That’s great, Ky,” Christian said, sounding anything but impressed, “except we need them as allies, not enemies.”
Ky turned and openly watched me now as he sat on the window sill and whispered something in Korean. “결국 다 똑같습니다.”
Whatever it meant, it made Christian abandon his attempts to reason with him and storm away.
“You’re wasting your time,” I told Ky after a long moment of contemplation. It was pointless pretending I hadn’t been listening. “Whatever you want from them, I can’t help you get it. Rowdy doesn’t care about me; he only wants to fuck me. I’m just an employee to the rest of the Kings and not a very good one.”
“Has he?”
I frowned at his question. “Has he what?”
Ky pushed away from the window and came to stand next to me, facing the opposite direction. He was so close I could smell his soap and had to tilt my head back to meet his black gaze hooded by monolids. “Has he fucked you?”
One sweep of his tattooed finger down my arm, and I took a step back. “I don’t think that’s any of your business.”
I tightened my grip on my fork in case I needed to stab him, but after a few seconds of waiting for him to pounce, I realized I was no longer his focus. Instead, he was staring over my head, amusement playing on his small but pouty mouth.
“Apologies if I made you uncomfortable, Miss Beck. It might please you to know how wrong you are, though.” He didn’t bother to clarify before he strolled away. I’d only just loosened my hold on the fork when a familiar cologne invaded my senses, and I tightened my grip again.
“Atlas.”
Sucking in a breath, I spun around to face him. Rowdy had been clear across the room a moment ago, and now he was standing in front of me. “What do you want?”
His lips parted to answer, but I grabbed my food and walked off. I wasn’t interested in what he had to say.
A part of me expected him to come after me, but he didn’t. Of course, he didn’t. Because despite what Ky thought, I wasn’t wrong.
Rowdy didn’t give a damn about me.
The party lasted a few more hours, and by the end, the last of the stragglers were either too drunk to drive or had already passed out.
It didn’t matter to Rowdy, though.
He’d disappeared from the party for a while after I’d snubbed him and had returned just in time to order everyone to go home. When the grumbling started, and everyone stayed put, Rowdy pulled out the shotgun he’d hidden behind the bar, cocked it, and yelled for them to get the hell out or get blasted.
Sobered, the guests scattered like roaches, pushing and shoving to get through the door because not one of them had to question if Rowdy was crazy enough to start shooting.