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God, I have to get this woman back to our hotel room. If I can’t fuck her for at least three hours tonight, I think I’ll regret it for the rest of my life.
I lean down to kiss her again. She draws back, looking up at me.
“Thank you, Declan,” she says. There’s a frozen moment afterward where she looks like she’s about to say something else—something serious—and I brace myself for whatever’s to come. But she shakes her head a little bit and repeats herself instead. “Thank you so, so much. This is the best birthday I’ve ever had.”
“Well, we’ll have to top it next year,” I murmur. I kiss her again, and feel her smile against my lips.
She doesn’t know it, because I don’t say it out loud, but that’s a promise. I will top it next year. Already, my mind is in overdrive, thinking of potential ways to create a perfect day—no, week—for Sophie.
A chartered yacht in the Mediterranean. No, a trip to the Caribbean, an open-air villa just ten steps from the beach. Monaco, Spain, Tokyo, Hong Kong—
I want to take her fucking everywhere.
A ping from my cell phone draws my attention, and I reluctantly release Sophie to fish my phone from the pocket of my jacket, which I’ve left draped on the back of the chair.
As soon as I glance at the screen, a chill goes down my spine.
My hand tightens on the device. I look over my shoulder at Sophie, whose smile fades at the sight of my expression.
“Declan? Is something wrong?”
I shake my head, but that’s a lie. Quickly, I scroll through the dozens of missed emails, trying to get the gist of the situation from all of them.
Then I lift the phone to my ear to listen to the first of a litany of voicemails. They’re all left by different people, most of them shareholders or executives from Dynasty.
This message, though, is from Cole. Which worries me even more. Because if something is so bad that Cole knows about it… this is more than business. There’s something personal about this particular disaster.
“Hey, man.” Cole sounds weary and anxious. “I know you’re in Paris right now with Sophie—congrats, by the way, that’s a huge deal, and tell her I said happy birthday—but I just wanted to make sure you’ve heard the news.”
My jaw clenches.
“It’s fucking Johnathan. He’s courting your shareholders. I saw it breaking in The Journal about half an hour ago. He’s attempting an honest to god hostile fucking takeover.”
The sound of blood in my ears almost drowns out the rest of Cole’s message. I can’t believe this. How dare he? After everything I’ve built, all the effort I’ve put in to distance myself from him, he thinks he can usurp me? Take away my life? Take away what I have?
“I figure you’re probably getting all kinds of calls and shit from other people right now, but I just wanted to call and make sure you were okay. I know I can’t do much, but I’m in your corner, okay?”
Cole’s right—he can’t do much. As reassuring as his support is, all I want to do right now is hurry to the jet and get myself in front of my traitorous shareholders. That, and punch my father’s lights out. That too.
“Okay. Be cool, man. You’ve got this. He’s a fucking slimeball, and it’s not gonna happen.”
The message ends there, and I stand frozen for a long moment.
“Declan?” Sophie sounds worried.
“It’s my father,” I all but growl. I lower the phone from my ear before the next message in my inbox can play.
“What’s going on?”
“He’s trying to take over Dynasty.”
Chapter 45
Sophie
Declan’s face is rigid, his entire body taut with leashed tension.
“He—what?” I blink at him. “How?”
