“I’m telling you, man! I didn’t do anything...” An obvious lie. The kid tried to fend Carter off with his skinny arms, but Carter wasn’t about to get himself dirty by touching the little slimeball.
Instead, he growled and the kid jerked violently back into the wall, nearly giving himself a concussion. Carter held up the phone and deliberately deleted the dirty pictures of his sister though it was a mostly symbolic gesture. He’d already wiped the copies from the cloud—along with every piece of information the idiot punk stored on it—and already tracked down all the other digital and hard copies of the photos themselves. Carter darkened the phone and tucked it away in his inside jacket pocket.
Alice needed better taste in men.
“If I hear from you again or find out you’re trying this crap with other women, I’ll be back. And I won’t be so nice next time.”
The prepaid Visa card the kid had demanded from Alice was long empty, appearing filled with cash long enough for him to think the money—one freakin’ million dollars—was there before it drained out. With his face calm and emotionless, Carter let him know that fact too.
“What? You—you can’t do that!” More terrified by the loss of the money he’d stolen from Alice, he grabbed his phone, swiped and tapped the screen a few times. Carter gave him a couple of seconds to check his accounts and verify that Carter Diallo didn’t make threats. Only promises.
Frantic eyes grew wider when he saw what was on the screen. “Please! I swear, I didn’t mean anything by it.” The phone dropped to the wrinkled sheets that smelled of sweat. Yelling and pleading, the boy grabbed for Carter’s suit jacket but Carter stepped neatly back, avoiding his hands.
He was big, but fast when it counted.
“Yes, you’re wiped out,” Carter said. “You can move in with your mama, get a job at a fast food joint. Whatever it is, you better not try this aga—”
Just then his phone rang. It was a particular ring tone. Each of his siblings and parents had their own. It was Kingsley, his oldest brother and CEO of the Diallo Corporation calling.
“Carter,” he answered although his brother obviously knew who he’d dialed.
Or at least he hoped he did. The last thing he wanted was to get another naked-butt dial from his brother who was crazy in love—and lust—with his fiancée and bride-to-be, Adah.
Kingsley, a former member of the workaholics club except when he escaped to Aruba once a year to windsurf or whatever, was making it work with Adah. She lived in Atlanta and already had a business of her own there. Nothing she could easily relocate to Miami. At least not according to Kingsley. But Carter could clearly see the solution to that “problem.”
“We have a situation,” Kingsley said. “How soon can you get back to Miami?”
“That sounds serious.”
“With the pending IPO, everything is serious now.”
“Right.” The decision to go public with their family’s multibillion-dollar beauty corporation wasn’t one that all the involved siblings and board members were crazy about, Carter included. But it was what most of them wanted so he’d gotten on board. “What’s the problem?”
Turned out that their brother Jaxon, a local Miami celebrity and member of the corporation’s board of directors, had gotten into trouble. Again. Normally it would be nothing but a blip in the Miami papers, another way for their notorious brother to impress women and get more of them into bed. But—and this was a big but that Carter didn’t agree with and was only going along with to keep the family peace—with the pending IPO, the public scrutiny from Jaxon’s increasingly stupid antics could bring ruin to the company’s stock as soon as it was offered.
Carter grunted. “That damn kid...” Jaxon was eleven years younger than him.
“Yeah. I keep telling Mom to ship him off someplace—”
“Right. Like anyplace could keep him secure, much less out of trouble.”
“Like I was saying...” Then Kingsley laughed, rueful and irritated at the same time. “...she basically told me the same thing you did. And I agree.” They’d all like for that not to be the case, but Jaxon was his own brand of stubborn. And reckless.
“We’ll deal with it. Just tell me the rest.”
While his brother filled his ear with the latest problem he had to deal with as the company’s “fixer,” he brought up his messenger app and let his assistant know he needed an earlier flight back to Miami. By the time he had all the details of the latest Diallo disaster, he had a plane ticket already downloaded to his phone.
He’d already checked out of his hotel, figuring it would be easier to take care of business first before heading back to the Las Vegas airport.
“All right, I’ll jump on the first available flight and meet you in the office.” He shrugged back the sleeve of his suit jacket to glance at his watch. It was almost six. “My assistant will let you know my ETA.”
“All right, sounds good.” Kingsley sounded relieved.
“You just gonna stand in my hotel room all day?” the kid interrupted. The fear was leaching fast out of his little rodent-like face.
Carter knew just how to fix that. “The room is all paid up until tomorrow. But I had the receipt mailed to your house so you can know just how much you owe the Diallo family.” That’s right, kid. I know where you live. Carter tipped his head to the boy who was now visibly trembling. “Enjoy the pool here. It’s no Ritz but the water is nice and warm.”
He opened the door.
“Don’t hang around this place too long, Trey,” Carter said.
Then he closed the door behind him and headed down the stairs to the rental Benz he’d left in the nearby parking lot.
* * *
On the way to the airport in the car, he read the email Kingsley sent him about his brother’s latest mess. And damn, it was a big one.
He sent Kingsley a quick message:
Not sure this is something I can handle but I’ll have some ideas by the time I get there.
At the airport, he quickly made his way through the line and to his first-class seat. Ignoring the woman dressed in head-to-toe Balmain trying to get his attention with idle chatter, he scoured his brain for solutions his brother and the rest of the family could work with.
When the woman angled her immense cleavage toward him, he got an idea, reached for his phone and sent Kingsley a message.
This looks beyond my scope. If I fix this the way I want, things might backfire and blow back on the business. A buddy of mine used a firm in Cali for something similar a while back. The work was good and discreet. Here is the info to consider.
He sent the name of the firm plus his contact there just in time for the final warning from the flight attendant. He gave her his most charming smile and sat back to be a good boy.
“That’s a gorgeous watch you’re wearing.” The woman reactivated her flirtation and stroked her long fingers along the armrest. A breath of air from the wake of her hand gave the unpleasant illusion that she’d touched him.
But he kept his hand right where it was.
“Thanks,” he said. “It was a gift.”
She raised a thoughtful eyebrow, obviously reevaluating him. The Tom Ford suit. Meticulous manicure. And of course, the Vacheron Constantin watch.
A faint smile twitched the corner of his mouth. He imagined that in her mind, he just went from rich boyfriend, husband or Mile High Club prospect to kept man. Or boy toy. It didn’t matter what she thought, though. He wasn’t interested