Chapter 108: Opening the can of worms

Gideon’s pov

I noticed the change in Malachi’s posture immediately.

The lazy, insolent slouch vanished, replaced by a rigid tension in his spine. He lowered his legs from my desk and sat upright while keeping his usual smirk on his face.

"What’s going on?" I asked, leaning forward. The call with Tatiana wasn’t supposed to last this long.

"Tatiana," Malachi replied, his eyes still fixed on his phone. "She says she knows one of Felix Kingsley’s secrets."

My brow furrowed. "And what could that possibly be?"

Our hatred for Kingsley wasn’t exactly a secret. Hell, the business world already saw us constantly cripple his dealings over and over. The man was like a wriggling worm.

No matter the parts of him that we seemed to cut off, he always managed to wriggle away.

Disgusting.

It also didn’t help that we knew very little about his family. The slimy bastard had way too many enemies and seemed to have made sure to keep his family life next to nonexistent. All we knew after digging several times was that he had an adopted son.

Malachi tapped the screen, putting her on speaker. Her shrill and insistent voice immediately filled the room.

"I won’t tell you over the phone. I want to see you, Gideon. Please?" she whined. "You’ve blocked me everywhere, and the gatekeeper at your house won’t even let me in!"

"Then say what it is," Roman snapped, annoyance scrawled all over his face.

"I’m not stupid," she scoffed. "I know this is the one thing that will make you want to see me again. If I tell you now, I’ll lose my trump card, and you’ll just throw me away like a used napkin."

"End the call, Malachi," I commanded; my patience was already worn thin. "I have no time for games."

"Wait!" she shrieked, her voice rising in panic.

"Jacob Kingsley isn’t the only child Felix Kingsley has! Okay? It even looks like the actual heir to the Kingsley company is a whole different person. The person isn’t on the social media page of the company; they don’t have any online presence that I can find!"

The three of us glanced at one another. Jacob Kingsley’s smug, arrogant face was plastered all over Kingsley & Co.’s marketing materials. He had been our target, the weak link we planned to exploit. But this... this was a complication we hadn’t anticipated.

Malachi ended the call, his brows raised so high up on his forehead, almost disappearing in his curls. "This is some bullshit, right?" he muttered, running a hand through his hair.

"It’s worth looking into." I pulled out my own phone, scrolled to a contact, and hit dial. "It’s worth knowing if our target is the wrong one."

"Are we really going to waste more time?" Roman grumbled, kicking at the foot of my desk, the black stud in his ears glinting in the light. "I know you’re about to call the PI, and that’s great and all. The PI can research to confirm, but we should hear what Tatiana has to say about that bastard, shouldn’t we? I don’t think she would be talking out of her ass."

"He has a point," Malachi conceded. "And if she is, she’ll pay for lying."

I nodded, ending the call to my PI before it could connect. I found Tatiana’s number and called her back. She answered on the first ring.

"Will you see me now, Giddy?" she purred. "Please? I only went to that company because of you."

"Be at the mansion by six pm tonight."

She squealed excitedly. "I’ll be there!"

Later that evening, a few minutes past six pm, Tatiana sashayed into the game room. She was dressed to kill in a skin-tight, emerald green dress that left little to the imagination.

The three of us were gathered around the pool table, the clack of balls resounding in the air. I gripped my pool stick, watching Malachi play, hitting several balls into their holes.

"Score!" Kai beamed excitedly. "Get ready to give up beer for six months, G. I’m about to win."

"Don’t count your eggs before they’re hatched, Kai," I muttered, crouching to position my stick. "Your big brother’s about to teach you a lesson."

"Yeah, yeah, Kai, don’t let him win again," Ro taunted. "Why does he always whoop our asses?"

"Hey boys," Tatiana rasped, shrugged off her coat, letting it fall to the floor, and made a beeline for me.

Her hand reached out, intending to trail down my chest. I fixed her with a glare so cold it could freeze fire, and she whined, pulling her hands back.

Good, no one touched me without my permission.

I can count how many times a certain amber-eyed woman has.

I ignored the voice in my head and hit, while Tatiana turned her attention to my brothers, her pout transforming into a seductive pucker.

"Oh, come on, boys," she cooed, running a finger along the edge of the pool table. "Don’t be like that. I miss when all four of us used to have fun together." She shot Kai a suggestive look.

"I’m down for a repeat tonight. I can take all three of you, yeah? What do you say?"

Kai leaned on his cue stick, a wicked grin spreading across his face. "Desperate much? Sorry, Tash. The ride’s closed."

"Don’t be like that, Kai," she pouted, turning to Roman. "Ro, baby. I know you miss me."

Roman didn’t even look at her. He simply lined up his shot. "I’m taken."

Tatiana’s face twisted. "Taken? By who? That little housekeeper tramp? That’s who you’re all hung up on? That’s pathetic. She’s probably fucking the gardener, too."

A low, furious growl rumbled in Roman’s chest. He slowly straightened up, turning his head to pin her with a look of pure menace. "Your neck is looking pretty easy to snap right now."

Tatiana flinched, the color draining from her face. She looked from Roman’s murderous expression to my blank face and then the mocking grin on Kai’s lips.

"What the hell is wrong with you guys?" she whispered. "You’re all... you’re like bipolar maniacs. Since when were you like this?"

I cut through her tantrum. "Who is his heir, Tatiana?"

She flinched again, shrinking back, then let out a dramatic sigh. "He has a daughter, okay? Some pompous girl named Harper Kingsley."