Chapter One
Brooke
I am the vault, the secret keeper. The one that knows all of my father’s dirty little dealings. For years, my knowledge has been the one thing that’s kept me alive.
After all, I was indispensable to my father the moment he realized I loved computers. He saw potential in me and carefully nurtured it. I was too young to realize he was preparing me to be the record keeper behind his criminal enterprise.
Now I know everything about his businesses—the legitimate ones and the not so legitimate ones. I know who owes him money, how much, and exactly what will happen to them if they don’t pay up.
“If the three of us are to live, you must run,” Bruce, my uncle who’s not really my uncle, interrupts my thoughts. He’s staring out the hospital window into the city lights below. It’s dusk, and Atlanta is just coming to life. My father owns this city. Hell, he owns almost all of Georgia at this point. Maybe not directly and not in the way most people think. But in every way that counts, he does.
All of the knowledge I have has protected me from my greedy stepbrothers who wanted to take over my father’s business. Oh, they’d never come out and challenge Lionel Lancaster directly.
But tonight, he’s lying in a hospital bed and unresponsive. He had a heart attack a few hours ago and was rushed into emergency surgery. Right now, Bruce and I are hiding him. The three of us—our lives are intertwined. If my father dies, so will I. So will Bruce.
There will be a power struggle now within our family. My brothers will with the support of my conniving stepmother attempt to take everything my father has built. The only stumbling block is me and the things I know. That’s why Bruce is telling me to run.
If my brothers get me to decrypt my father’s information, they’ll have the keys to the kingdom. After that, both my father, Bruce, and I will be of no use to them.
I’ve survived in my father’s world long enough to know what happens to people who are no longer of use. They end up in a barrel floating out to sea or in the swampy marshlands where the gators quickly hide any evidence. Neither end appeals to me.
“You’ll watch over him?” I ask quietly, staring at the ashen face of my father as he sleeps in the bed. It’s strange to see the mighty business mogul looking so frail in a white hospital gown. Part of me wants to lean over and shake his shoulder. I want to shout into his ear that he needs to wake up.
Medically induced coma means that won’t work. I think something went very wrong with the surgery, but the surgeon won’t talk to me. He only talked to Bruce. That’s why Bruce had him brought here after I found him this morning. My father was doubled over on the garage floor clutching at his chest. I knew better than to call my stepmother or anyone else who supposedly loves him. No one loves Lionel Lancaster. They just fear him. It’s a sad legacy and if my father has his way, it’ll become my legacy too.
“I’ll buy you as much time as I can,” Bruce says.
I’d ask who we can call in favors with, whose couch I can crash on for a few days. But we both know that’s a silly idea. In a moment like this—when so much is at stake—the families in Georgia will be shifting alliances. Knowing who to trust is tricky in a situation like this. Trusting the wrong family will get me killed.
“Should I go to—” I ask, thinking of an old family friend.
He turns from the window then, silencing me with an upheld hand. I know the rules better than anyone. Bruce should be told nothing. Nothing that they could squeeze out of him. Not that I think he would betray me. Bruce has been my father’s oldest friend. I can rely on him.
“Where is Cruella?” It’s what I call my stepmother, both for her love of expensive furs and her cruelty toward anyone that’s not my father or her sons.
He checks his watch. It’s Bruce’s job to know where every member of the family is at all times. My father might put on a good show of loving family man in front of the world. But we’re more like his pets. Pets he keeps on tight leashes. “She’ll be at the gala in an hour. If you go now, you’ll be able to slip inside.”
I cross the room and give Bruce a quick hug. He’s the closest thing to a friend I have and I’m not sure if we’ll ever see each other again. He presses a quick kiss to my head before murmuring, “Run far, Cookie.”
As soon as Cruella and her sons are gone, I slip into the house. They haven’t paused to wonder where Lionel is yet because he normally works late and as for me, well, no one really cares. I stay inside this house most days. My father doesn’t let me get too far. I could say he’s an overprotective doting dad but that’s not true. I’m a business asset and he can’t risk losing me.
I grab the emergency bag I keep ready. Dad always insisted I have one with a spare identity. Now I know why.
I take one last look around my room. I’ve always wondered what it would be like to be free. To live my own life. For a moment, the idea of running into the wind strikes me. I could forget about the fake identity cards my father gave me. I have enough of a head start that I could start over as someone else on my own. Except things don’t work that way in my world. I’d always be looking over my shoulder. Always anticipating the day when Bruce would show up and drag me back into the family. Because once a man like Lionel Lancaster owns you, he doesn’t let go.
No, the smart thing for me to do is continue to wait. To bide my time. If my father survives this, he’ll hunt me to the ends of the earth. The old scar on my back burns again and I rub it absently.
Forcing back the memories of a scared little girl, I run through a catalog of people I could stay with. That’s when a pair of smoldering brown eyes floats into my mind.
Ryker Sullivan.
He’s a former Army Ranger turned scowling cowboy. He’s tough, unyielding, and so very hot. He’s also my ex-boyfriend’s dad.
Three years ago, I met him at Ian’s birthday party. I’d always hated Ian, but my father insisted I date him. It was good for business, and I knew better than to defy Lionel. No one—not even his daughter—is allowed to do that.
What I hadn’t counted on the day of Ian’s party was Ryker showing up. He’d come in jeans and a leather jacket with a white t-shirt beneath it. The jacket stretched so tight against his arms that I was certain he’d burst out of it like the Hulk.
It was obvious he hadn’t been told the event was black-tie. Most of the guests wouldn’t deign to speak with him. The few that would made no attempt to hide their scorn. He was an Army Ranger, a man used to working with his hands if those callouses were anything to go by. That meant he was beneath them.
I never saw Ryker lose his cool. I watched him through the whole party, fascinated by this man who could walk into their world without being the slightest bit uncomfortable. He was a man completely confident in himself, and I envied that.
Maybe that’s why I slipped outside after he did. He was on the balcony, leaning over and treating me to a view of the most perfect denim clad ass I’d ever seen. He blew out his breath slowly. Only the slight tilt of his head gave away the fact that he realized he wasn’t alone anymore.
“You’ve been watching me all night, Tigress,” he said. His voice was rich and warm, like the brandy I sometimes drank when my father offered it to me.
I joined him on the balcony, leaning over the railing. I looked out over the expansive gardens that Ian’s father owned. Like my father, Adam Barrett was into extravagant displays of his wealth.
“I’m curious about you,” I admitted as the cool night air washed over my heated cheeks. I hated these fancy events. I hated pretending that everyone here liked each other. They were a bunch of vipers. Just like my family, Ian’s is filled with greedy bastards all waiting for their chance to betray each other. Why wasn’t I getting that vibe from Ryker? Why did he feel like a man set apart? And why was that so damn sexy?
From the corner of my eye, I watched his full lips twitch. I’d amused him though I didn’t know how or why. Still, I waited for him to tell me more about who he was and why he was here. He seemed like the type that would be more comfortable sitting on his front porch with a cold beer than at a black-tie event with the city’s most elite criminals.
When it was obvious that he wasn’t going to tell me anything, I finally asked the question that was burning on the tip of my tongue, “Adam hates you and Ian despises you, but you’re able to waltz into this party. Why haven’t they just killed you?”
He’d laughed then. It was a dark, gritty sound. “Because they know if that first bullet misses, I’ll rain down hell on them.”
His words made me shiver even as my panties went damp. He was unafraid, unflinching, and uncompromising no matter how powerful his enemy.
Shaking off the thoughts, I turn off the lights and prepare to go find my ex-boyfriend’s dad. I need a warrior and Ryker Sullivan is the man for the job.