Rock Hard

“You think I’ll stop with just the title?” he asked, unable to contain his cold mirth. “I’m going to ruin you, boy. Everything you’ve enjoyed of your privilege as my son will be taken from you by the end of business today. The trust fund, the respect. All of it.”

“You can’t do that,” I said. “It’s not yours to take from me I—”

“Oh, on the contrary,” he interrupted. “Your trust fund specifically stipulates that it go to my son. And, by the end of business today, I’ll have had the paper work to disown you filed with the courts. You’ll have no claim to a single pound of that fund… a fund that my new baby boy will gladly inherit when he comes of age.”

“You disgusting old bastard,” I hissed. “You piece of shit.”

My father laughed again, this time more uproariously than I’d ever heard it. It was the sound of his victory. Without the trust fund I was destitute and homeless. He’d won.

“Goodbye Tristan, and good riddance.”

He hung the phone up with a click and I threw mine across the room with a clattering crash. My heart was hammering from my anger, the back of my neck hot with it as I stared at the muted news caster saying something about the entire affair. I didn’t have to turn the sound on to know she was making some kind of horrible joke.

Good riddance to you, too, I thought, leaning back against the headboard as I watched them show the same few photos again and again across the screen. Maybe this will be for the best. I took a deep, calming breath and tried to collect my thoughts. There was an upside to all of this, and I just had to find it.

Now that I was no longer a member of my father’s family or even a member of the aristocracy I was more than free to live my life as I saw fit. I’d already told Gwen that I cared nothing for the title so long as I had her and I had meant every word of that. The more that I began to think about it the better all of this was working out for me.

I would be able to be with my sister, given now that I wasn’t bound to my father’s family by the same legal binding that would have made me refer to her mother as my own in any capacity. In fact the simple thought of not having to worry about hiding anymore filled me with a joy I hadn’t felt since I was much younger. The thought of walking out with Gwendolyn in public made my heart soar to new heights. We didn’t have to sneak or hide any longer. We didn’t have to pretend that our love for one another was anything other than what it truly was.

It was Gwendolyn’s gasp that brought me back to reality from my thoughts. I turned over to find her staring at the television, her eyes wide with shock as she saw the two of us kissing on screen. Her face was pale as a sheet.

“I suppose they were going to find out sooner or later…” I said, trying to perhaps break her from her shock. “And… now that my father is disowning me we can finally be together. We don't have to hide anymore, Gwennie.”

She turned to look at me, her face incredulous and her eyebrows raised.

“Do you honestly think what just happened was a good thing?” she asked, her voice tense.

“Well, yes,” I said, a laugh breaking from my lips. “We don’t have to hide anymore! We can be together out in the open and no one can—”

“What have you done?” she whispered, looking at me in horror. “You ruined everything that I’d built for myself… and I let you!”

Gwen backed away from me in the bed, tears streaming down her face, a sight I hoped never to be the reason for. My chest felt cold and I was suddenly aware of just how vulnerable I felt with my clothes off.

“What have you done?”

ROYAL PRICK

Chapter 17

“Leave,” I said, fighting back the torrent of tears threatening to soak my face. “Just get out, Tristan.”

“But this is for the best!” he said, trying to make me see some brighter side of my life being ruined. How could my reputation being dragged through the mud possibly be a good thing?

“You really have no idea what you’ve done, have you?” I asked, laughing incredulously. “How could you not understand that you’ve ruined everything that I’ve made for myself?”

“It’s just words!” he cried, as though that would make it all better. “It doesn’t mean anything!”

“It means something to me!” I shouted, my face burning red with anger. “My reputation is everything in my business! And now I have a scandal over my head! How are my clients going to trust my discretion when I sleep with my own client! Let alone the fact that you’re my stepbrother!”

Tristan frowned, though the confusion on his face somehow told me that he still didn’t completely understand. How dense could one person be? I wondered.

“I want you to leave, now,” I said, my voice trembling with and effort not to start sobbing right in front of him. I wouldn’t give him the privilege of seeing me weak. “You’ve caused more than enough damage already.”

“But Gwen, I—”

“Get out!” I screamed, picking up the nearest thing I had and throwing it at him—which happened to be my phone. He was more than lucky that I wasn’t trying to hit him. “You’re just like they always said that you were. Your father way right, all you ever do is ruin everything you put your hands on! I never should have agreed to help you, I should have known better than to think you wouldn’t find some way to make this into another one of your media circuses.”

He staggered back out of my bed, once again hurrying to pick up his clothes and put them on before I lobbed another projectile at him, one that wouldn’t miss.

“Go!” I shouted at him again, my voice breaking.

Tristan didn’t say a word as he picked up the rest of his things and left. It wasn’t until I heard the front door close that I allowed myself to cry.

How could he be so stupid? I asked myself. How could I?

How would they trust a woman who can’t keep her hands off of her own stepbrother?

I want to slap him as hard as I could, make him pay for the way he could just drag someone down into the mud and not once bat an eye. He had the privilege of being born into a life of money and power—a life of wealth that he never had to lift a finger for. I was never so lucky as that. I had to put my blood, sweat, and tears into building my business from the meager little thing that it was from my days at the university. My entire life was in that business, and he had taken a flame to it all.

I needed to do damage control.

I dug around in the bed where I’d thrown my phone, surprised not to have even one call from Tina to warn me. Either she was swamped with handling the fallout or something was terribly wrong. I dialed her up and waited for the phone to ring.

She answered after the first one, and I could already tell she was fighting not to panic.

“Marm,” she said, “you’ve seen the news?”

“Tell me how bad it is,” I said, bracing myself for what I knew would be bad news.

“I’ve had clients calling me all morning to cancel their services with you, marm,” she said, and I could feel the worry in her voice, not just for her job, but for the company she’d help me run for the past few years. Both our hearts were in this business and I knew Tina hated to see this just as much as I did. “I’m sorry, but I’m not sure how well we’re going to weather this.”

I sighed, trying not to cry over the phone as I did my best to come up with some sort of plan.

“I’ll need to make a statement—a message to our clients apologizing for bringing them into the spotlight. At this rate they’ll all be investigated to find out whether they were slept with as well. By the time the day is over they’ll be trying to make it sound like I’ve been running some sort of escort service.”

“I’ll prepare something within the hour, marm,” Tina said dutifully.

“Thank you, Tina,” I said. “I’m not sure what I’d do without you.”

“You’ll not see me abandon you, marm, that I can promise.”

After I hung up the phone I descended into a mess of tears.

&nbs

p; ROYAL PRICK