It wasn’t that unusual for me to receive gifts—the citizens of Monaco were generous and so were my many fans around the world. Parcels went through vigorous scans and checkpointsbefore they made it into the castle, but this one had a little extra finesse to it. Someone had put some effort in.
Ooh, maybe it was from Shep. A thank you for being such a good fuck.
I grinned as I picked up the parcel. No note. This was feeling more and more like Shep. Expensive silk ribbon, textured, masculine box, it felt luxurious under my fingers—like Shep’s body.
I really should’ve tried harder to tempt him into coming home with me. But he’d been right—there were too many cameras and wandering eyes at the exhibit for me to really put my all into it. Because whenever Shepard Winchester was in a room, the cameras always found him.
Good-looking bastard.
I stroked the tail of the ribbon before taking hold and tugging it free. Then I picked up the box and took off the lid. Inside, nestled on a bed of black velvet, was a red flash drive, and the first thing that popped into my mind was Lucien’s club. Black door or red? I wondered which room Shep would pick. Maybe that was what this was, an invitation—a sexually explicit one—for when we got back to the States.
Liking that idea more than I probably should, considering who Shep’s ex was, I grabbed my laptop, wanting to see what was on the drive. Moments later I was sitting with my back to the headboard, my shoes on the floor, and the flash drive in hand.
“Okay, let’s see what you sent me, Mr. Winchester.” I inserted the drive, and a video loaded on the page, the screen black, waiting for me to hit play.
I snatched up my headphones, just in case it reallywassomething R-rated, because I couldn’t imagine what else he’d send in such a seductive box.
Ready for anything, I pressed play—and whenIappeared on the screen walking into a certain building in Istanbul that wasno longer, I quickly reached out and hit the stop button as if my computer was about to explode. In fact, I shoved the laptop onto the mattress and jumped off the bed.
What the actual fuck?
Who? How? What was I looking at? But when it didn’t burst into a fiery ball of flames, I gingerly reached for it, turning the computer until the screen was facing me.
Then I hit play again.
There on the screen—just like in the first email that had been sent to all my brothers—was me. But instead of walkingoutof an exploding building like some kind of vigilante, I was walking in the front door. It had me from different angles too. Back, side, and,putain, the front.
There, staring back at me like some kind of dumbass, was my recognizable royal face.
Except itwasn’tme.
One: I would never blow up a building in the light of fucking day. Come on, where would the light show be? And two: I would never be dumb enough to enter the front door and look up at the fucking camera while I was committing a crime.
Bitch, please.
Who the hell was doing this? Because it was really starting to piss me off.
Oui, I’d been in Istanbul. But I hadn’t done any of this shit, and if the rest of my brothers got one of these packages, they’d definitely think?—
“Motherfucker.”
I snatched out the flash drive and slipped it back into the box, shoved my feet into my shoes, and headed to the door.
I wasn’t about to sit around here and let King, Shep, and everyone else think the worst of me. Fuck that. I was sick and tired of always looking like the bad seed, the wild fucker who had no discipline.
So I had impulse issues. I generally tried not to let them run free in situations that might see me wind up dead. The fact some asshole knew enough about me that he’d zeroed in on the one thing that would make my brothers doubt me made my blood boil.
I’d never betray my Libertine brothers. They were family. But the fact they were all questioning me was infuriating, and I couldn’t let this latest piece of fake video have them talking about the best way to discipline me.
I stormed out of my room and had a quick word to the guard outside. By the time I reached the side entrance, a car was waiting for me.
“Bonsoir,Your Serene Highness,” my driver said, and I didn’t even have it in me to tell him to call me by my name.
I slipped into the back seat. “Villa Monaco,merci.”
As he pulled out of the palace’s grounds, I stared down at the box on the seat beside me like it might still self-destruct. Truth be told, I was kind of hoping it would. But that wouldn’t help me if everyone else had received the same package.
I just needed to get to Shep and clear the air before King called him and demanded my head be shipped back to him in a box. Okay, so maybe he’d demand my entire self so he could rip my head off himself, but still, I needed to get to Shep and explain…
