King for a Day (The King Trilogy #2)(4)
Author: Mimi Jean Pamfiloff

“Shit!” I snapped my hand back. What the f**k? My head started to spin again. Being near these items was not only freaking me the hell out, but it was taxing my body and mind. The items were just too powerful. Which was also why I couldn’t understand how King left this stuff out. There was only one lock on the front door. That was it. No security system. No guard dogs. Yet there was a ton of stuff he wouldn’t want people to steal. Stuff like a jewel-encrusted gold crown that sat in a small, unlocked, glass display case. It was exquisite with several large aquamarine-colored gems, beautiful red garnets, and several nice-sized diamonds, including one that looked to be several carats and seemed to radiate its own light.

“Wow. I want a diamond like that,” I mumbled aloud and reached for the case, wanting to get a better look.

“I wouldn’t touch that if I were you. There are traps all over the place,” said a deep, familiar male voice.

Startled, I snapped back my hand. It took a moment to recognize the man in front of me because he’d covered up his blond hair with a Giants baseball cap and wore a gray hoodie. Not his usual look.

“Mack! Oh my God!” I ran and threw my arms around his neck. “Where have you been?”

My weight knocked him off balance, and he stumbled back a few steps. “Errr…nice to see you, too?” He peeled me off.

“Where have you been?”

“Laying low and keeping an eye on this place for King.” He flashed that easygoing, boyish grin I appreciated in moments like these. I appreciated it almost as much as his ability to make me feel safe or fly a jet with zero turbulence. Mack was an ex-military-pilot-something with a shady past who ended up working for King after getting mixed up with a sadistic woman in 10 Club. In Mack’s own words, “I knew I needed to get away, so King helped me.” I still didn’t know exactly what had been done to Mack, but I wasn’t sure I wanted to.

“What the hell happened to King?” I asked frantically.

Mack shook his head toward the floor and shoved his hands in his jeans pockets. “I wish I knew.”

“So do I.” I thrust the letter at him, and he read it quickly. Unlike me, he knew exactly what it all meant.

“Fuck.”

“That was pretty much my reaction, too,” I said. “Talia delivered it.”

His baby blues lit up. “Talia? This is bad. She was one of King’s biggest allies. Fucking Vaughn.”

“Is that who’s behind this?” Not that I felt surprised. Vaughn was, hands down, King’s biggest adversary as well as the Club’s president.

“Who else would be insane enough, and pissed off enough, to try to take King down?”

I’d have to trust Mack on that because, frankly, I didn’t know the other club members, although I’d seen them at the annual party I attended a few weeks back. There were congressmen, famous actors, and CEOs of large companies. It was shocking how many people had ten billion plus in the bank and a yearning for evil. Both were requirements to belong.

“Mack, I know it’s none of my business, but are you considered part of the inventory like I am?” I waved my hands through the air at all of the stuff crammed on the shelves.

Mack smirked. “King didn’t brand me, nor would he ever, if that’s what you’re asking. But I am under his employ, so to speak, and if the vultures move in, I’m fair game. So is Arno.” Arno was King’s chauffeur and the world’s quietest man.

“So the Club will take you guys, too?” I asked.

“Yes.”

Oh no. So now we’d gone from King being missing to my life going down the tubes, to Arno and Mack coming along for the ride. The shit kept piling on.

Okay. Stay calm. You can figure this out. And luckily, Mack was now there with me. He knew way more about this secret world than I did.

“Talia mentioned the rules. Do you know what they are?” I asked.

Mack scratched his jaw covered in golden-brown stubble. “I read them a few years ago, when…” he hesitated, “when Miranda first inducted me.”

Miranda was the psycho woman he’d belonged to at one point. I only knew that because he’d mentioned her name once, and I’d never forget the look in his eyes when he had. He hated her. He hated thinking about her, talking about her, and I’m sure he never wanted to see her again. Whatever she’d done to him had to have been pretty bad.

“And the rules I remember aren’t going to help us.” Mack began rattling off the policies pertaining to the Club members’ secrecy obligations. Members were also not permitted to kill other members, nor could they attempt to acquire another member’s possession if marked off-limits. And by “possession,” I assumed they meant “person.” Mack had told me that was the reason King had tattooed me with a “K.” He didn’t want anyone making a play for me, a disturbing fact that triggered feelings of both relief and outrage. Because while the concept of being someone else’s property is archaic and belittling, “belonging” to a man like King was like being the property of a god. An evil god, but powerful nonetheless. And a part of me felt a little bit safer knowing I couldn’t be traded away, willy-nilly, to some psycho like Vaughn.

Not that I accepted being King’s property. Because I didn’t. And I never would.

Mack continued on about some other random stuff having to do with membership fees.

“How much are the dues?” I asked.

“A billion dollars,” he replied. “Roughly.”

Oh my Lord. “That’s steep. What’s the money used for?”

Mack shrugged. “I can only assume for bribes. The purpose of the Club is to support the members’ pursuits, most of which are illegal. I’m sure the money also pays for the other privileges they enjoy—expediting border crossings to just about any country with no questions asked, immunity from the IRS, body disposal, etc.”

“Lovely. So the Club basically gives them diplomatic immunity—completely above the law.”

“Yes. The only laws that matter are the Club rules, and they’ll even break those if they can get away with it.”

I gave that a moment of thought. It was the strange thing about 10 Club; they were a secret society of some of the most influential, wealthy, and cut-throat people. They bartered with each other, creating a network of sorts to support their illicit fetishes, quests for power, or whatever things they wanted or needed that couldn’t be obtained through traditional channels. And from what I saw, they had no scruples or objections to breaking laws, including killing people. However, they seemed to be afraid of pissing off the Club. I supposed it made sense to not want a bunch of psychos after you.