CRUEL LEGACY (Cruel #3)

Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Natalie

This was the moment that would determine it all.

Would Penn play the game? Would he chase me here, as I suspected he would? He’d said that he wanted this. That he would wait for me. But a week of radio silence as I’d figured out my next move meant anything could happen.

Especially considering what had happened to me.

I wasn’t the same person I’d been when we had s*x in that hotel suite at The Plaza. I wasn’t the same person who had turned him away because I wasn’t ready for a relationship. I was someone…something else entirely.

I didn’t know where that left me.

Let alone us.

But I dared to find out.

I had to.

My eyes skimmed the crowd as I sipped my glass of champagne. My dress drew looks like a moth to a flame. People whispering behind their hands. I was sure they were explaining who I was. The risk I’d taken in showing up tonight. And I just tilted my chin up and let them look, let them talk. With luck, it’d get back to the people I wanted it to. It would snowball from there.

I smiled viciously at the thought of Katherine’s face when she found out that I was back in the city. But that wasn’t here or now.

I couldn’t predict how Katherine would react. But I was making my own way now. No longer waiting with the ball in her court.

Right now, I needed to focus on Penn.

My phone buzzed, and I glanced down at the message that had come in from him.

Fuck.

I laughed despite myself.

Yes, that’s the idea.

What are you wearing?

That’s cheating.

Any hints?

I took another sip and tried to reel in the giddy feeling at the center of my chest. Penn was dangerous in every way to my heart. But I figured I should give him something.

I flipped to the camera and took a picture of the crown necklace dangling at my throat. The crown that he had given me a year ago. The crown that I’d thrown at his feet when I found out about the goddamn bet. The crown that he’d returned to me when he decided to pursue me again.

Even though my heart still skipped when I was near him, I’d been certain that I’d never go back to him. Never allow myself to fall into his trap again. And yet, here I was, in his necklace. Maybe I’d catch him in my trap this time.

I approve.

The pad of my finger traced his comment before I returned the phone to my clutch. He’d find me. I was sure of it. Not that I intended to make it easy for him.

I went looking for him in hopes of drawing out our game and the anticipation. But I found Jane first.

Jane Devney was a force of nature. Shoulder-length ash-blonde hair and hazel eyes with a small stature that might make you overlook her. But she had stepped into the Upper East Side and claimed it as her own. She’d opened Trinity with sheer willpower and the enormity of her connections.

Tonight she looked stunning in a rose-gold dress as she clutched on to the arm of Court Kensington. Penn’s brother looked so much like him that it was sometimes jarring. While they were similar in looks, they were opposites in personality. Even if he wasn’t as bad as Penn had always made him out to be…or at least to me.

I evaded Jane. I wasn’t ready to see her yet. Or to hear her excitement at me being back and how she was right that it had all blown over. When I was certain that it hadn’t.

I escaped into a crowd of people and came out on the other side to find Penn standing there with none other than Harmony Cunningham, the daughter of the designer whose dress I wore currently.

My smile disappeared. I knew that Penn and Harmony had history. He’d used her to make Katherine jealous—or so Lewis had said. Right now, I didn’t know what to think of them. She was standing awfully close with her hand on his arm. Not that he looked pleased by it.

I hated the jealousy that settled in my stomach. It was an emotion I wanted to snuff out.

I retrieved my phone, snapped a picture of them standing together, and sent it to Penn with one line attached.

Wrong girl.

Then I creeped deeper into the crowd, keeping my eye on him as Harmony left his side and he checked the message. I reveled in the smile that lit up his features. He looked as sexy and alluring as James Bond. Dark hair artfully styled, blue eyes wide and bold, tuxedo crisp and tailored to his incredible build. But it went beyond that. To the casual confidence that had been bred into him. From living in this world with its expectations and scandal and silver spoons.

He was an enigma. It was what had drawn me to him in the first place. The Manhattan royalty playboy who wanted a different life. Who was so much more than what he portrayed to the world. The morality that he so fiercely tried to cultivate. The duality of his character that strove against his upbringing for a better life.

We all stumbled. We didn’t all get back up.

I circled Penn like a lioness stalking her prey.

He might be coming for me. But I was keeping him in my sights. Drawing it out until he got closer.

I turned away for a second to grab another glass of champagne, but when I looked for him again, he was gone.

My eyes widened in surprise and then scanned the room. Where the hell had he gone?

I walked carefully around the perimeter of the club, trying to figure out where I’d lost him. Every guy was in a tuxedo. Everyone was in a mask. That was the point. That was the fun. But I’d thought I had this figured out.

Then I felt strong hands brace my hips, a hot body press into my back, the flush of a breath against my neck. My body tensed at the first brush of his lips against the most sensitive spot behind my ear.

“Found you,” he breathed.

I relaxed back into him. “How did you know it was me?”

“I’d recognize you anywhere.”

“Even with my hair up?” I teased.

My sheet of silvery-white hair was my most telling feature. And I’d purposely had Amy pin it up so that only a few tendrils fell down around my face and over my shoulder. Otherwise I’d have stood out like a spotlight on a dark night.

“I know the way you move,” he said, our hips swaying to the tempo of the music. “My hands know every inch of your body. They long ago memorized your gentle curves.” He slid his hands forward over my hips. “I know the shape of you, the sensuous way you walk, the confidence in every step.”

Something got stuck in my throat at his words. I tried to push it down. Down and away. “Oh?”

“Oh, yes. With your shoulders back, chin up, eyes steady.” His lips trailed down my neck, capturing me completely. “You might not have been born into this world, but you carry yourself as if you belong in every situation. Even when you’re terrified.”

“I’m not terrified,” I said hoarsely.

“Of course not.” He sounded disbelieving.

Maybe he wasn’t a hundred percent wrong. I was afraid of this world, of failing. But I wouldn’t fail. I couldn’t.

I turned in his arms and wrapped mine around his neck, staring up into his dark mask. I wanted nothing more than to peel it from his face and look up into his perfect features. But I wouldn’t. Not yet.

“Well, you found me. I guess that means that you can have me.”

“I guess it does.”

“How exactly do you want me?” I purred seductively.

“In every way,” he said seriously.

“Shh,” I said, pressing a finger to his lips. “Don’t complicate things.”

“Is this all it is then?”

I stared up into those big blue eyes, willing him to see the truth. “Would you be mad if it was?”

He pursed his lips. “This doesn’t feel like you.”

I laughed at his words and ran my hands up into his hair. “Doesn’t it?”

A muscle flickered in his jaw at my nonanswer. Because of course, this wasn’t me. I wasn’t me anymore. That was what this world did to people. It changed them. He was the one who had taught me that. And he’d been right.

“I thought you said that you wanted me,” I told him.

“I do.”

“Just not like this?”

His hands roamed from their position at my hips, up, up, up until his thumbs ran under my breasts. “I want you like this.”

“This is what I want,” I told him. “You said you’d wait for me. However I was.”

“I knew that you’d still be hurt after what happened, but this isn’t exactly…”

I stepped back, aching with the absence of his hands. But Penn was already pulling me back into him.

“You don’t have to play games with me.”

“Who said I was playing games?” My lips coyly curved upward.

“You forget who I am. I know it when I see it.”

“I’m offering myself up, Penn.” I spread my arms wide. “Here I am. Take me.”

“You’re just offering s*x,” he corrected.

I lowered my arms with a sigh. “Is it ever just s*x with you, Penn?”

His voice turned low and gravelly as he dragged me tight against him. “Not with you.”

Then his lips were against mine. And I forgot about how I had planned to keep him at a distance. I forgot about Amy’s warning that there was no way I could handle Penn Kensington. No one could handle him. It wasn’t possible. I forgot everything.

There was a reason that I’d fallen for him seven years ago on one blissful night in Paris. Why he’d won me over in the Hamptons a year ago. Why I’d never been able to get him out of my system for the next year. Not even while I was dating someone else.

Penn Kensington had ruined me for all other men.

And this one kiss proved that all over again.