“I have a debt to you I intend to pay.”
Wait, what? I pressed my feet a little firmer into the ground, ready to stand up if I had to.
“But it’s not financial, and it has nothing to do with power.”
My feet lifted up just a bit, but I still kept my eyes intensely on him. I was not ready to just easily accept what he would say.
“My debt is from you not trusting me because I saw you as something to be gained, not to be with.”
I sat back in my chair, though I still could not quite let go of my belief that this might yet be a game.
“See, I played the game as King of Diamonds for so long that I forgot there are some things that you cannot put a price on,” Adrian said, finally taking a sip of his coffee. “You, Delilah Reyes. You are invaluable. I cannot ‘pay’ for you, but I intend to show you how you are invaluable. How you are priceless. And it starts not with a grand gesture of power or wealth, but with a simple conversation.”
This wasnotthe conversation I expected to have. Which, maybe, was a good thing. I found myself gradually opening myself up to him, of letting go of some of that guarded attitude in favor of willingness to listen.
“You asked me what I wanted from you, or perhaps better said, what I meant when I said I wanted you. I have come to realize that what I meant by that is that I want you, DelilahReyes, the woman. Yes, I will not deny I want your body. I want you in my bed. But that is not where my desire for you ends.”
He looked like he was about to stand up but thought better of it, removing his hands from the chair arms and putting them back on the table.
“You are the one person who challenges me to be better, who challenges me not just to be a persona but a person. More importantly, you are the one person who could actually get me to change in that regard. Perhaps even more, you are the one person who I realized I could not live with losing. The one living person.”
He did not elaborate, but I knew his family and his history well enough he did not have to.
“I no longer wish to control you, Delilah. I just wish to be with you. If that means you get Adrian Vale and not the King of Diamonds, whether that be in bed or on a plane or at dinner, then so be it.”
Wait…
Wow.
I sat there almost aghast, mostly floored at what Adrian had just said. If there was manipulation behind this, it was far beyond what even the most powerful sociopaths I had known could pull off. There was a rawness to this that even I would have felt uncomfortable hearing, and while a small part of me had wondered if he might apologize for what had happened before, I knew a man like him would be damned if he ever apologized for anything.
Yet even if he had not, he had just laid out that he would not be repeating his mistakes.
Doubt slowly began to recede. Even if Adrian Vale was not a fully changed man, he was a man trying to change, trying to move toward being a man, not an image. The emotion I began to feel was almost… wonder.
Amazement, really. Amazement that even the King of Diamonds could learn to be human.
“Now, this is the part where I give you a choice,” Adrian continued. “I said coffee, and I meant it. But there is nothing more I can say that pulls back additional layers. I have told you the truth about me and what I want from you. If you wish to stay longer, I have an exquisite dinner with cocktails ready for you. But if even that offer concerns you, or if you have too many doubts, then walk away. I have shown you more of myself than I have to anyone, perhaps even my brothers. I can do nothing more but to offer a progression. The choice, Delilah, is now yours. What will it be?”
The immediate answer came to mind, but I forced myself not to rely on the initial impulse.
Adrian… was sincere. Honest. Again, I could not fathom anyone being this good at manipulation. It was possible, but extraordinarily unlikely.
I swallowed.
“I accept,” I said.
The thoughtful answer, in this case, was the same as the impulsive answer. And what that meant for the rest of the night…
“That was what I wanted to hear,” Adrian said. He snapped his fingers, and almost instantly, two servants came out with covered plates. When they unveiled them, I looked down at ribeye steak, scalloped potatoes, and asparagus—a meal cooked perfectly and smelling unbelievably good. Seconds later, red wine appeared as if out of nowhere.
“Now then,” Adrian said, “let’s enjoy a nice dinner, shall we?”
The food was delightful, the conversation easy, and the scene almost romantic. Everything discussed was superficial now, more casual to someone eavesdropping—Adrian, for example, asked me about my most interesting article, while I asked himabout his best vacation—but everything also had an undertone to it that could not be ignored. When he asked me a question, for example, his gaze held me in place, not even looking down to cut his steak. When I listened to him, I found that I could not turn my eyes off of him; without even trying, he had me captive.
Gradually, bit by bit, the voice in my head warning me to be careful faded. It hadn’t entirely disappeared when I had agreed to dinner, but by the time that we finished, I had all but forgotten it was gone. It was glib to say good food and great drinks did that, but the truth was, Adrian’s approach was intoxicating. He was no longer trying to play a game; I wouldn’t have even called what we had a game.
Instead, we had something better.
