King's Passion (22 page)

“It's not a problem. I completely understand.”

They started moving in a strange circle where he was slowly working his way to the door while she was working her way around from the door.

“You know, in a lot of ways you could almost pass for your brother's twin.”

“We get that a lot,” Xavier chuckled, but he still kind of looked at her odd.

“Is there something wrong?” Victoria finally asked.

“Not really, it's just… You look like someone I used to know. That's all.” He studied her face again. “In fact, you could pass for her twin, too.”

Victoria suddenly had a strange feeling come over her. “Really? Who?”

“Just this girl.”

He tried to wave it off suddenly, but something told Victoria to press for an answer. “What was her name?”

“Karen.”

E
amon arrived at the Gregory estate feeling like a teenager picking up his prom date. Only this wasn't an ordinary house. It was a huge estate that showcased the extreme wealth Mondell Gregory had amassed over his lifetime. He didn't know a whole lot about Victoria's father—just the basics. He knew that Victoria was very fond of him, which was why she chose the same career. He knew from experience that men of Gregory's status tend to be very proud and bullish, which meant this meeting was likely to be very painful.

Fortunately for Eamon, he wasn't intimidated by men like Gregory. In his mind, they both put on their pants one leg at a time. He only hoped that he would be able to win his approval to marry his daughter. If not, he was sure that they would miss him at the wedding.

He rang the doorbell and stepped back. While he waited,
he practiced his speech in his head. About a minute later, a stoic older gentleman opened the door.

“May I help you?”

“Yes. Is this the Gregory residence?”

“Yes. It is.”

“Then I would like to see Mondell Gregory. That is if he's in.”

“May I tell him who is calling?”

“Eamon King.”

Finally the butler's expression changed. His brows stretched up a half an inch while his gaze raked Eamon from head to toe. “Please. Come in.” The butler stepped back and opened the door.

“Thank you.” Eamon flashed him a smile as he stepped into the house. His eyes roamed around the grand foyer and he immediately thought about his Uncle Roger's home in the Carolinas. His only hope right now was that Mondell Gregory was nothing like his uncle.

A chair scraped somewhere in the house and then there was a series of footsteps tapping and pounding the marble floor. A couple of seconds later, a large, trim older man who matched Eamon's height but had caramel-colored skin and piercing green eyes strolled into the foyer. Behind him stood an elegant woman with soft eyes and a kind smile.

“Eamon King!” The man thrust out his hand.

“Yes, sir. That's me.” He threw his hand into the outstretched one and shook it mightily. There was instantly a subtle contest between them as the two extended their handshake a little too long.

“Mondell Gregory,” he said. “Perhaps you may have heard of me? I have a daughter that you seem quite fond of.”

“Yes, sir. I am quite fond of her—extremely so.”

With those words, his wife clutched his hand while her smile stretched even wider.

Eamon turned his gaze toward her and offered her his hand, as well. “And you must be Ceyla.” He waited until she placed her small hand into his before he lowered his head to press a kiss on the back of it. “It's a pleasure to meet you both finally. Your daughter has told me a lot about you.”

“Well, I'll be honest, son, it's easier squeezing water out of rock than to get her to tell us anything about you. I don't mind telling you that I didn't too much like it.”

Oh, boy. This is going to be harder than I thought.
Eamon cleared his throat. “Yes, sir. I'm sorry about that. We should have come together a lot sooner than before now.”

“You mean before you got my daughter to move in with you in that place they call
Sin
City?”

Okay. Much harder.

“Mondell!” Ceyla snatched herself from his side and quickly stepped in front of her husband so that she could loop her arm through Eamon's arm. “Please forgive him. He's a little cranky when he hasn't had his breakfast yet,” she explained smoothly. “In fact, we were just getting ready to eat. Would you care to join us?”

Eamon expelled a long breath. “Actually, I'd love to.”

“Good. Come with me.” She started to lead Eamon away, but managed to flash her husband an annoyed look.

“What? We were just having a civil conversation,” he said.

Ceyla didn't bother to answer but marched Eamon to the breakfast table. “Victoria had sent me a few pictures of you, but I have to say that they hardly do you justice, my dear.”

“That's awfully nice of you to say,” Eamon said, trying his best to mind his p's and q's. But after meeting Mondell, he knew that beyond a shadow of a doubt before this was all over with, he was going to be baptized by fire by the time Mondell got through with him.

When he was led into the dining table, there was an array of food spread across a grand mahogany buffet table. To his right, he saw a crowd of people already sitting and eating their breakfast. He flashed them all a big smile.

“Good morning.”

The four women at the table all stretched their brows high while their eyes lit up with interest.

“Well, who do we have here?” one of the older women said, straightening in her chair and taking her time surveying every inch of Eamon—to the point that he almost felt violated.

“Oh.” Ceyla patted Eamon's arm. “Let me introduce you to everyone,” she said. “Right here, we have my
older
sister, Fiona.”

“Hello, sexy,” she said with what Eamon thought was a cougar growl.

“Uh, nice to meet you.”

The woman held on to his hand. “No. The pleasure is
all
mine. Trust me.”

There was another rake of her eyes and then Eamon had to forcefully pull his hand out of hers.

“Fiona, behave,” Ceyla chastised in a low whisper. “And over here is my younger sister Brenda.”

“How do you do?” she said simply.

Ceyla continued around the room and when they reached Lolita, she sprung out of her chair like she'd just been poked with a pin needle and stood so close that her breasts jabbed his chest.

“How do you do?”

“Uh, just fine.” Eamon didn't need Ceyla to tell him that she was Fiona's daughter. Their kinship was more obvious in mannerisms than in looks.

Ceyla clasped her hands together. “I'm sure that all of you are curious to know just who this young man is.”

“I'm hoping it's the new pool boy,” Fiona said, slathering on some lipstick.

“Good lord,” Mondell mumbled, looking like he was disgusted by everyone's performance.

“Actually, no,” Ceyla said. “This is Eamon King.”

“Hello.” Eamon stood there smiling while one by one their mouths dropped open so wide, he was able to make out that a couple of them had their tonsils removed. There was one exception—Lolita. She looked so angry that with his head turned at a certain angle it looked like there was steam rising out of her ears.

“So this is how they grow them in Las Vegas?” Fiona finally said after picking up her jaw. “I now see why your daughter ran away from home.”

Eamon laughed. “Actually, I was born and raised in Atlanta.”

“I swear that girl gets everything,” Lolita complained.

Eamon didn't know what that meant, but suddenly he thought he preferred to be grilled by Mondell than to continue to stand there like some prize Thoroughbred.

“Come.” Ceyla tugged his sleeve. “Get something to eat. As you see we have plenty.”

“Thank you.” He drew another deep breath and grabbed one of the plates and started picking out what he wanted for breakfast. It was quite a spread but he kept it simple with eggs and bacon.

“Would you like some orange juice?” Ceyla asked.

“By God, Ceyla,” Mondell barked. “There's no need to
mother hen him to death. I think that he knows how to fix himself breakfast.”

There was a quick pop and Eamon turned around in time to see Mondell rubbing the back of his head while Ceyla hissed another warning, “Behave.”

The small interplay reminded Eamon of his own parents and he relaxed a little bit more. When he returned to the table, he smartly elected to sit next to Mondell rather than what looked like his instant fan club.

“So,” Mondell said, turning to him. “Victoria said that we would meet you soon. I didn't think it would be this soon. What was it? Were you hiding out at her apartment to see if the coast was clear for you to come and see me?”

Eamon didn't understand the question. “No. I decided to fly out here on my own.” He cleared his throat when he met the man's gaze. Maybe he was a lot more nervous than he thought. “I really wanted to talk to you one on one.”

Mondell's left brow lifted as Ceyla perked up.

“Do you, now?”

Eamon nodded confidently and then glanced around. “Is Victoria here?”

Her parents looked at each other and then turned their confused looks on him.

“What do you mean, dear?” Ceyla asked. “Victoria flew back to Vegas last night.”

Eamon nearly dropped his fork. “Oh. I didn't know.”

“I believe that she went back early because she was missing someone.”

She gave him a telling look and it cheered him considerably. “Well, I guess we must've gotten our wires crossed. I came out here to surprise her and she came back home to surprise me. Classic.”

Mondell's smile slid wider. “That means I'll have you all to myself.”

Fiona spoke up. “You can always share him.” The inappropriate joke fell flat while everyone gave her a shake of their heads.

“So what do you say that we finish our breakfast and then we can go to my study so that we can have a talk?” Mondell suggested. “Sounds good.”
Let's just hope that I survive it.

He felt a vibration at his hip. He glanced down at his phone and read his brother's name on the screen. “Excuse me. I need to take this call.”

 

The minute the name left Xavier's mouth he knew that he messed up. “You know what? Now that I'm really getting a good look at you, I see that I'm mistaken. Please, don't pay any attention to me and my ramblings. I'm sure if my brother told you anything about me, I tend not to know what I'm talking about pretty much most of the time.”

Victoria just stared at him.

“In fact,” he continued. “I even have very,
very
poor eyesight from time to time. I've been meaning to get my eyes checked. I've just been busy and—”

“Please. Stop,” she said, shaking her head. Then she closed her eyes and drew in a deep breath. “You mean to tell me that I look exactly like Eamon dead ex-girlfriend? The one that died the day he was going to propose to her?”

Never in his life had Xavier wished like hell that there was such a thing as a time machine. If only he could just rewind the clock a few minutes and not have given her Karen's name. What on earth was he thinking? Eamon was going to kill him, but damned if she didn't look just like her. Same face, same height. How did Eamon not see the similarities? And now what was he supposed to say?

“Look. I think that maybe I should just get my things
and go.” He started toward the door. “I'm really going to be late for my flight back to Atlanta.”

Victoria pressed her mouth closed and Xavier could see a tide of anger rising. Yeah. He definitely put his foot in his mouth big time. “Hey, it was…really nice to have met you. I really hope to see you again soon,” he offered weakly and then hurried up and got the hell out of there.

Once he made it to the safety of his car, he quickly grabbed his cell phone and called Eamon. “C'mon, bro. Pick up,” he prayed. Just when he was convinced that he was about to be transferred to voice mail, Eamon came onto the line.

“Hello.”

“E, man. Thank God you picked up.”

His brother's voice suddenly dipped in concern. “What? What is it? Did something happen at the club, or has Quentin been arrested again?”

Xavier sucked in a deep breath. “I wish it was something like that.”

“This sounds really serious. What is it?”

“First, you got to promise me that you're going to forgive me for what I'm about to tell you.”

“Are you serious?” Eamon huffed out a deep breath. “I'm in the middle of something here. I don't have time to play—”

“I'm not playing,” Xavier stressed. “Promise me.”

There was a brief pause over the line. “All right.”

“That's a promise?”

“Yeah. Yeah. It's a promise.”

“Good.” Xavier felt like a weight was lifted from his shoulders, but not much. “Your girl came back home today.”

“Yeah. I just found that out. I'm up here at her parents' place.”

“Look, man. I wasn't prepared when I saw her. I mean… had I known then I wouldn't have just—”

“What did you do? You didn't sleep with her, did you?”

“What? No.” Xavier pulled the phone away and made a face at it for a second before putting it back up against his ear. “Give me a little more credit than that?”

“Sorry. It's just that you're really acting weird and I'm feeling a little pressure with Victoria's dad. He's not too happy that we've been living in sin apparently.”

“I told her,” Xavier spat. It was just best to put it all out there. Let it lie like roadkill.

“You told her what?”

Is he serious?
“I blurted out that she looks like Karen. I mean, bro, the girl could pass for her twin. One minute I'm taking a shower, and the next I think I'm staring at a ghost.”

The line went silent.

“Hello? Can't you hear me?” He pulled the phone away again, but this time to see that the call had been dropped. He pressed speed dial, but this time Eamon didn't pick up.