And after that?
Well, after that, we did it all over again.
I glanced in the mirror one last time, tucking a strand of hair behind my ears and making sure my lipstick wasn’t smudged.
Hey, a girl’s gotta look good for date night, right? Even if “date night” involved dinner with the three most powerful men in three kingdoms, at arguably the most exclusive restaurant in the all three of those kingdoms.
I frowned at the empty apartment and pulled my phone out, shooting a quick text to Emma.
Still at work?
Yeah. Sorry. Busy.
Emma had been gone from the apartment since the night of my Club date. She claimed it was because she was buried at work at the newspaper, but I worried a little that falling into whatever this was with my three princes was straining our friendship.
Can we do movie night soon? Lots to catch up on!
There it was. I mean, I wasn’t sure how much of it I was going to share, but I couldn’t keep all of this inside forever. And Emma was my best friend.
That would be fantastic ;)
I sighed.
Good. Happy face emojis were a good sign.
I fired off a quick text to Anya, who I’d also been dying to catch up with since that night.
Hey, let’s talk soon.
We’d texted briefly the day after that night we’d bumped into each other at the club, but only because I’d sent her something close to two hundred texts demanding to know if she was okay.
She was, of course. But still vague about whatever had been going on with her that night.
I glanced at my phone. No response from my cousin. I decided to call her repeatedly later until she answered. But for now, it was time for my date.
It was a gorgeous evening, so I decided to wait outside in the park across from our building for the town car Luke was sending. I grinned to myself as I found a bench, closing my eyes and letting my hair blow in the gentle wind as I thought about what was going on in my life.
This was, without a doubt, crazy. But it was the good kind of crazy. The insane, toe-curling, can’t-wait-to-see-what-happens-next kind of crazy.
And I really couldn’t wait to see what happened next.
“You know, I always knew you were a whore.”
I gasped, yanked from my daydreaming by the sound of Dan’s voice. I recoiled, jerking away from where he’d just sat down on the bench next to me, and I started to get up, when his hand grabbed my wrist.
“Sit,” he growled.
“Fuck you, Dan,” I spit. “Let go of me.”
“Or what?” He grinned wickedly.
“My boyfriend will be here soon.”
I swallowed thickly, an icy chill creeping down my back.
“Oh, your boyfriend, huh?” There was an unsettling look in Dan’s eyes.
“You do mean boy-friends, right?”
I froze.
Dan just grinned wider, seeing the look on my face.
“The same boyfriends who the rest of us have to call Your Highnesses, right?”
Oh God…
Dan reached into his pocket, and I watched in haze, like in a horrible dream, as he slowly pulled a phone out. He thumbed it open and clicked on videos, and my whole body froze.
“You know, you boyfriends might want to invest in some better security for their little get-togethers. I mean shit, they’ve got the money.”
Dan started to push play, but I stopped him, shoving the phone away and sucking in breaths of air.
“Such a whore,” He spat. “I mean three guys, Julia?”
I wanted to melt into the ground and disappear. And it wasn’t because he was making me feel bad for what I’d done — I didn’t, and I knew that even if he was making it seem so tawdry, what I had with Victor, Luke, and Micah was so much more real than that.
But it was that he was making me feel so exposed. That video exposed me, and worse, all of them. If it got out — Jesus, I mean I’d be in trouble, and probably dragged all over the tabloids and social media. But to them?
To my three men, it’d be the end of everything. A scandal like this would destroy them.
“You know, this is great stuff, Jules,” Dan said, his little laugh sending knife stabs through me. “Fuck, I could sell this for a goddamn fortune, you know.”
I shriveled, feeling cold and broken.
“What do you want?” I said quietly.
Dan grinned. “I want you to come with me.”
I jerked my head up. “Excuse me? Not a chance.”
“No?” He shrugged. “Well, then maybe this little home video gets sold to a porno company.” He turned his wicked gaze on me.
“You don’t want this getting out, Jules,” he said flatly. “For you, and definitely not for them.”
I shook my head, looking away so he wouldn’t see the tears threatening to spill.
“I’m parked over there,” he growled, standing. “Let’s go.”
My date, my beautiful night with my three princes — I knew I had to walk away from it. I hated Dan with everything I had, but I knew if I didn’t leave right then with him, he was crazy and asshole enough to do as he’d threatened.
And I couldn’t let that video out. Me, it would hurt, but that I could get over. For them though, the scandal would be fatal. I knew enough about the political climate of the three kingdoms to know that each country’s senate houses were itching for reasons to get rid of the monarchy entirely.
That video would be the end for all three of my men.
And I couldn’t let that happen. No matter what it meant for me.
“Let’s go, now,” Dan hissed.
I looked over at my building, watching with dismay as the black town car came to a stop out front.
I turned my back on it, and them, and the night I had planned, and the future I’d dared to hope for.
“Fine,” I spat at Dan. “Let’s go.”
Chapter 15
Victor
“Something’s wrong.”
Micah slammed his phone down on the desk, his eyes blazing as his jaw tightened.
Yeah, no shit.
When Julia never answered Luke’s driver’s calls — for over thirty minutes — he’d called us. When she never answered any of ours too, we started to freak out. Micah had just gotten off the phone with the restaurant, in case for some fucked up reason, she’d gone there by herself and turned her phone off or something. But she wasn’t.
Something was definitely up.
“I’m not being paranoid, right?” Micah growled, pacing the room and running his fingers through his hair.
“No,” Luke muttered from the window of his office, his voice tight. “No, something’s fucking wrong. She wouldn’t just disappear like this.”
“She might have gotten cold feet.”
They both glared at me, but I didn’t back down. Hell, someone had to say it.
“You know it’s not outside the realm of possibility,” I said, my voice heavy. “This is a lot for her to take in, and the other night was a lot of new stuff for her. She might’ve…” I trailed off, shaking my head.
I wasn’t even convincing myself, let alone them. And besides, I knew what I was saying was horse shit.