Page 17 of One More Kiss
I took a menacing step toward his desk then quickly stopped myself. If I killed him, he couldn’t tell me where she was. “Are you the one who told her about it?”
“Delilah knows?” he croaked.
“Why do you think she fucking left me?” I roared.
His gaze shifted for a moment before he lifted his shoulder again. “There are plenty of reasons.”
My hands balled into fists at my sides. “Such as?”
“Keeping your history with Nicole from her. How you treated Delilah like some dirty secret, when she’s the most precious person in this world.” He ticked off his fingers as he listed each crime I’d committed. “Not cherishing her. Making her feel like she isn’t worth your time. I could go on.”
I flinched, knowing he wasn’t wrong. “Which of those made you decide to help her leave me?”
He looked me straight in the eye when he said, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
And I almost believed him.
Heart pounding against my ribs, I knew it was useless to make threats. Or rip him apart with my bare hands like I wanted to. He knew where she was. I could sense it. But until he understood I loved her more than anything—this fucking hotel included—he wouldn’t tell me anything.
“Meet me at Samuel Vincent’s office at nine tomorrow morning,” I told him, turning for the door.
“You need a witness for when this hellhole becomes all yours?”
Pausing with my hand on the knob, I shot him a cold glare over my shoulder. “Guess you’ll have to wait and see tomorrow.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
nash
Security stood on either side of me when I pressed and held the doorbell the next morning. My lawyer had sent over the documents that officially made the Royal Phoenix entirely mine. As soon as I had the papers in hand, I’d called the staff who worked in Joseph’s villa.
Out of the chef, three house managers, and a butler, none had been sad to be reassigned. I wasn’t sure if it was relief at not having to deal with Nicole any longer or the twenty percent raise I’d given them.
From the moment Howard’s will was read, I’d been looking forward to this day. That anticipation only doubled after that bastard Joseph married the greedy bitch who answered the door in only her skimpy nightgown. A sleep mask was pushed up over her eyes enough to see. My security hastily looked away when one of her tits spilled out of her barely there top.
“Nash?” she grumbled, blinking away the last traces of sleep. “Why are you being obnoxious so early in the morning? Where the hell is Paul?”
“The butler has been given a well-deserved raise for having to put up with your diva ass and reassigned to one of our long-term-stay guests.”
“You can’t do that!” she screeched, wide awake now, causing the men on either side of me to cringe at the sharp noise.
“Cover yourself. No one wants to look at your sagging tits.”
Gasping, she tucked herself back into her nightgown. “They do not sag! My plastic surgeon is the best in the country.”
“What’s going on?” Joseph complained as he appeared behind his wife. He tightened his robe around himself, finger-combing his thick, dark-blond hair so it wasn’t as unkempt.
Seeing me and the team of security I’d brought with me, he tensed. “What the hell is this, Phoenix?”
“Moving day,” I announced, a hard edge to my tone. “These gentlemen are going to make sure you get all packed up and safely off the premises.”
“The fuck they are! You can’t do this. Just because the shares of the hotel are solely yours now doesn’t mean you can just kick us out. I’m entitled to this villa. My father left it to me and—”
“Let me remind you of what was bequeathed to you.” I flipped to a marked page in the stack of papers I held. “Ah, yes. All the money that was in your father’s accounts—and only that. Nothing about property. Or stocks. Or any other assets. Just the cash. Which would be cut in half if you spoke about the details within the will to anyone outside of myself or Samuel Vincent Sr. Unfortunately for you, Nicole let it slip that you had been confiding in her.”
All the blood drained from both their faces, but not even the sight of the growing panic in their expressions—something I’d been relishing witnessing—could give me pleasure. There was no satisfaction for me. All I wanted was them out of the hotel so I could get to Vincent’s office and sign the papers that would give Lily the half of the hotel she’d always deserved.
Rage quickly replaced Joseph’s panic. Grabbing Nicole by the arm, he jerked her around to face him. “You spoke to Nash? After I explicitly told you not to tell anyone?”