King of Sloth (Kings of Sin, 4)

Your sister is pregnant.

Four words shouldn’t have the power to nauseate me, but they did.

I reread the email for the dozenth time. Soon after I received it that afternoon, Xavier’s friends decided they’d had enough of the cove. They’d wanted to sail to another beach, but I’d convinced Xavier to drop me off at the resort first. Thankfully, he’d done so without comment.

Now here I was hours later, sitting in my bed and staring at the first piece of direct correspondence I’d had from my father since the day I walked out of his office and out of my family.

Of course he would break his years-long silence for Georgia. She was my full sister, but we’d never clicked the way I did with Pen.

And now, she was pregnant.

I’d known it would happen eventually, but I hadn’t expected it so soon.

The smoothie I’d forced down for dinner sloshed in my stomach as I read the rest of his message again.

In true George Kensington form (and yes, my sister was named after him), the message was stiffer than a freshly starched tuxedo at the Legacy Ball.

Sloane,

I’m writing to inform you that your sister is pregnant. Given the circumstances, it’s time you make amends and release your childish grudge against an incident that occurred years ago. Pettiness is not an attractive trait.

Regards, George Kensington III

I thought my indignation would’ve run out of fumes long ago, but it intensified with every reread.

It’s time you make amends and give up your childish grudge.

Childish grudge? Childish grudge?

The phone creaked from the force of my grip. Trust my father to still pin the blame on me instead of his favorite.

Part of me recognized the clichéd irony of my situation. Poor little rich girl wasn’t as loved as the golden child, the one who could smile and dance and charm anyone in the room. Georgia could cry like a normal human and act like the perfect socialite. She was the daughter my father had always wanted, and I was the disgrace.

If I were watching a movie starring me, I would scoff at myself, but this wasn’t a movie. It was my life, and as much as I pretended it didn’t bother me, my broken relationship with my family would always be a sore spot.

I tossed my phone on the bed and stood.

If I thought too hard about Georgia’s present life, I’d start thinking about the past, and if I thought about the past…

No. I wasn’t going there.

Determination hardened my nausea into steely resolve.

Fuck Georgia, fuck the past, and fuck my father’s attempts to guilt me into apologizing for things they’d done wrong. It would be a cold day in hell before I crawled back to them.

I was doing just fine without them, thank you very much.

Pressure built behind my eyes, but I set my jaw and ignored it as I rifled through the closet for something to wear.

Most evenings, I preferred a quiet night in with a book, wine, and movies.

Not tonight.

Tonight, I wanted company.

XAVIER

After I dropped Sloane off at our villa, my friends and I stayed out on the water until sunset. We grabbed room service at Luca’s place before hitting up the resort’s famous nightclub.

Objectively, the club had great music, great service, and great drinks. I would change a few things—the retro lighting design didn’t fit with the futuristic vibes, and the layout of the VIP lounge didn’t flow as well as it could’ve—but overall, it met my criteria for a memorable night out.

So why wasn’t I enjoying myself?

“This is fun,” Luca said. He and Evelyn had gotten into a fight earlier, so their whirlwind hookup was dead before it fully revived. “Right?”

“Yep.” My enthusiasm rivaled that of a prisoner on his way to death row.

What was Sloane doing at the villa? Was she eviscerating some poor rom-com again? Her reviews were vicious, but I found the passion with which she wrote them oddly charming. She was so reserved all the time that it was nice to see an area in her life where she fully let herself go.

Luca said something else, but I barely heard him.

What the hell was in that email she’d gotten? She’d said it wasn’t a work thing. Was it her family? Her friends? Her unconfirmed mystery lover? If only she were here so—

A flash of blond caught my eye.

I stilled, my gaze honing in on the newcomer turning heads. Platinum hair. Ice-blue eyes. Legs that went on for miles.

She looked exactly like Sloane, but it couldn’t be her because… holy hell.

Heat crawled beneath my skin as she strode through the room, either unaware or unimpressed by the eyes following her.

Rich cobalt silk poured over her frame, baring her shoulders and stopping high enough on her thigh to tease the imagination without revealing too much. Silver heels added four inches to her height, and her skin glowed like pearls kissed by moonlight.

I grimaced. Pearls kissed by moonlight? Where the hell had that come from? I wasn’t a poetic person in the least, but she looked good enough to inspire Shakespeare himself.

It wasn’t her clothes or her body.

It was the way she moved, looser and more fluid than normal.

It was the way she carried herself, confident with a hint of vulnerability.

And it was the way she commanded attention without trying, like she was a fucking goddess among mortals.

I’d never seen anything like it.

She stopped in front of me and Luca, and my blood burned just a little hotter in her presence.

“Sloane Kensington entering a nightclub for fun.” I hid my body’s visceral reaction behind a lazy smile. “Someone check the temperature in hell. It must be freezing down there.”

“Very original.” Now that she was closer, I spotted a telltale flush on her cheeks. Was she already drunk?

It was so out of character, I could only stare, astonished, as she took a fresh drink from Luca’s hand and downed it in one smooth pull.

I cast a warning glare at my friend. Now that Evelyn was out of the picture again, I didn’t want him getting any more ideas about using Sloane as a rebound. She was a mutual acquaintance. Any relationship between them would be too complicated, obviously.

So would any relationship between us, which was why I switched to water and made a pointed effort to stay away from Sloane for the next hour as she circulated the room.

Unfortunately, the VIP lounge was a confined space. No matter what I did or who I talked to, she was always there, occupying my thoughts and drawing my attention until whatever conversation I was holding drifted into silence.

“Dude, just ask her to dance.” Luca hadn’t left my side on the banquette, though he’d suddenly become fascinated with something on his phone in the past twenty minutes.

Across the room, Sloane said something to the DJ, who nodded and smiled at her in a way I didn’t appreciate.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I tipped my head back and closed my eyes, trying to erase her image from my mind. Were DJs allowed to flirt with club goers? Wasn’t that a professional liability or something?

“Sloane.” Luca’s voice was barely audible over the music. “You haven’t looked away from her once since she showed up.”

“Because I don’t want her surprising me. She’s like a predator in the wild. You have to keep an eye on her at all times.”

“Right.” I could hear the smirk in my friend’s voice. “So you don’t mind if I dance with her then?”

My eyes popped open, and I lifted my head to glare at him. “Actually, I do fucking mind, and not for the reason you’re thinking of. That shit will get messy.”

“Why? She’s your publicist, not mine. I barely know her.” “She’s your sister-in-law’s best friend.”

“So?”

“So?” I sputtered. “So that’s messy.”

“Says the guy who hooked up with his roommate’s ex.” “That was in boarding school, and that was different.” My roommate had been an asshole. “Vivian will kill you if you touch Sloane.”

“No, she won’t. And all I said was I wanted to dance with her, not sleep with her.” Luca shrugged. “But hey, you never know. We’re on vacation. I could get lucky.”

I wasn’t a violent person, but in that moment, I’d never wanted to punch someone more than one of my oldest friends.

“If you—”

An eruption of cheers interrupted me midsentence. My gaze swung toward the DJ booth, where Sloane was dancing on a neighboring tabletop.

Sloane. Dancing. On a tabletop.

Hell must be an ice playground by now.

Every pair of eyes in the room was glued to her as she swayed to the music, which had transitioned from a dance mix to a sultry rendition of the latest R&B hit.

Either I was the world’s best dance teacher, or she wasn’t merely drunk—she was wasted.

On the bright side, I’d been right. Her stiffness came from overthinking, and when she wasn’t so focused on making every move perfect, she danced…well, she danced in a way that ignited every cell in my body.

I rubbed a hand over my mouth, torn between watching and stepping in. Sober Sloane was going to hate this in the morning.

My lips curved at the thought of her reaction, but my amusement died a quick death when one of the other club goers climbed onto the table, grabbed her by the waist, and started grinding against her.

My reaction was so swift, so visceral, that I couldn’t have explained what happened next if someone put a gun to my head.

One second, I was sitting.

The next, I was up and across the floor, my vision tinting with scarlet as I bulldozed through the startled crowd.

Sober Sloane would’ve kneed the guy in the balls for touching her. Drunk Sloane had no such qualms.

She turned to face the guy whose hands crept perilously close to her ass. If she moved another inch, the throng of people crowded around the table would get a perfect view up her skirt. Several already had their phones out, but they quickly dropped them when I approached.

Whatever they saw in my expression made them scramble out of the way as I climbed onto the table and yanked the guy off her.

I towered over him by several inches, but even if I hadn’t, the fury churning in my gut would’ve given me an unfair advantage.

He made a noise of dissatisfaction. “What—”

“You have three seconds to leave,” I said, my voice deadly calm. “Three.”

I didn’t make it to two before he gulped and disappeared into the depths of the club. Fucking coward.

Part of me was disappointed I didn’t get the chance to slam my fist into his nose, but there were more pressing matters at hand.

I faced Sloane again. She hadn’t noticed her dance partner’s absence or my arrival; she was too busy taking shots with one of the clubbers on the ground and, consequently, giving everyone an eyeful of her cleavage.

I grabbed the double shot of tequila before it reached her lips and tossed it to the side.

“Hey! I was—” Her protest cut off in a yelp when I swept her off her feet and tossed her over my shoulder. I didn’t trust her to walk straight in those heels after God knew how many drinks.

“Let me go, you Neanderthal!” She pounded on my back as I carried her off the table and out the door.

The club sat on several hundred feet of prime oceanfront real estate, and it didn’t take long before the sound of the waves overpowered the music leaking into the night air.

“Be careful what you ask for.” I dropped Sloane on a thick patch of white sand. I was tempted to dunk her in the ocean to sober her up, but even I wasn’t stupid or assholish enough to do that.

Yet.

“You asshole.” She pushed herself to her feet with surprising grace given her inebriation. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“What the hell do I think I’m doing? I think I’m making sure you don’t wake up to photos of your bare ass splashed all over the fucking internet!”

Her glare skewered me to the spot.

As always, Sloane was glorious in her wrath. On any other night, I would’ve sat back and watched that cool mask of hers explode in the most spectacular way, but she wasn’t the only one seething tonight.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she said. “I’m not you. People don’t care what I do in my free time.”

“That’s not true.” I care. The thought rose, unbidden, before I banished it. “You’re a Kensington and a high-profile publicist, and the cameras are always watching. You’re the one who taught me that.”

“I’m a Kensington in name only.” A tiny flicker of vulnerability crossed Sloane’s face and stabbed at my chest before her expression iced again. “You’re always telling me to ‘loosen up.’ Now that I am, you have a problem with it?”

“I have a problem with some random guy groping you in public,” I snapped.

“Why?”

Because the thought of anyone else touching you fucking kills me.

“Because.” Irrational anger blanketed my words with heat. “It’s not you.”

“Stop acting like you know me.” Her voice rose to the level of a shout. “We are not friends. We are not dating. You are simply a client, and you are the one who forced me to come here. You have no right to act like my boyfriend or handler.”

“I’m trying to help!”

“I don’t need your help!”

Every piece of vitriol dragged us closer until we stood inches apart, our chests heaving and our bodies shaking from the force of our convictions. Animosity blazed between us, fanned by years of pent-up frustration and a spark of something far more dangerous. I didn’t know why I cared so much because she was right. I had no claim on her beyond work, and I was always telling her to loosen up.

But not like this. Not when it came from a place of pain rather than freedom.

“You’re right. I don’t know you,” I said. “But I know Sloane, and Sloane would never put herself in a situation like the one you were in. Sloane would’ve kicked that guy’s ass, and she would’ve pulled you out the same way I did.”

Part of my intervention had been selfish, but another part had stemmed from true concern. Who knew what photos and videos people grabbed before I got her down?

Perhaps I was overstepping, but screw it. It was better to be safe than sorry. Sloane’s professional reputation meant everything to her, and she would never forgive herself if one drunken night jeopardized what it’d taken her years to build.

“Well, maybe Sloane doesn’t always want to be Sloane.” Her heels wobbled in the soft sand, and she let out a curse before yanking her shoes off. “Also, I hate when people talk about themselves in the third person.”

My phone vibrated with an incoming call, but I ignored it. “Stop deflecting. What happened this afternoon? Why did you leave?”

I’d bet my entire inheritance the mysterious email was directly related to her desire to drink herself into oblivion.

My phone vibrated again. I ended the call without looking at it. Sloane swallowed. She was more fragile beneath the moonlight, her hair a gilded silver instead of ice-blond, her eyes shining with a wary truth that only the depths of night could lay bare.

More than anything, I wanted that truth and, by extension, the trust that came with it.

Let me in, Luna.

She opened her mouth, but a familiar ringtone cut her off. Her eyes shuttered, and fragility hardened into cool professionalism as she turned to take the call. “This is Sloane.”

Fuck. I rubbed a hand over my face, frustration chafing beneath my skin.

I’d never hated the invention of the cell phone more than tonight.

“Yes, we are…I see.” Her tone changed, and an ominous foreboding prickled my scalp. “Of course. I’ll handle it.”

Sloane hung up and faced me again.

A heavy sensation dropped like a lead weight in my stomach. I knew what she was going to say before she said it, but that didn’t soften the impact of her words.

“It’s your father,” she said, her eyes sober for the first time since she showed up at the club. “He’s taken a turn for the worse. They don’t know if he’ll make it through the night.”