Arrogant Read online

  Copyright © 2018 by Drea Blackery.

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher, except in the case of brief quotation embodied in critical reviews and certain noncommercial uses permitted by the copyright law.

  Resemblance to actual persons, things, living or dead, locales or events is entirely coincidental.

  ARROGANT

  Cover Image: Shutterstock

  Cover Designer: Ivory Publishing

  Copy Editing and Formatting: Ivory Publishing

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Copyright

  Table of Contents

  Preface

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Epilogue

  Coming Soon

  (Blurb) Untamed – New York Heirs Series Book #1.5

  About the Author

  Heirs of New York.

  Manhattan Royals.

  Trust Fund Nobility.

  Whatever the tabloids call it, they’re all referring to the same thing: The new generation of playboys and party girls from old money, all richer, more beautiful, and more arrogant than the last.

  And the richest, most beautiful, and most arrogant of them all is Ryland Wyatt, CEO and heir to billions in real estate fortune.

  Our paths first crossed ten years ago, in a seaside town on the coast of California. The town was large enough to have a social hierarchy, and small enough for everyone to know who belonged where.

  Ryland had been at the very top with his father’s behemoth of a business empire.

  And I, being a loner despite my dad’s money, was at the very bottom.

  We didn’t know each other then—the drama came ten years later in the city of New York, along with all the lies and secrets that Ryland had kept since our time in San Juan.

  I thought that I’d escaped him by staying out of his radar back then.

  I should have known that darkness followed Ryland wherever he went, like he was a horseman of the apocalypse.

  And like Death, he came into my life and destroyed everything in his path, leaving nothing intact. The last thing he shattered was my heart.

  This is our story.

  Ten years ago

  “It’s the same shit , same people, week after fucking week.” Theo sneered at the crowd below like they personally offended him. “How the hell are these idiots not sick of it?”

  The JBL speakers surrounding the pool pumped bass music so loud that vibrations shot through the balcony tiles and up my bare feet. LED lights, the kind you used in actual clubs, not the cheap shit from BestBuy, strobed through my rock glass on the balustrade.

  Which reminded me—it was time for my fourth refill of the night.

  “It's a small town,” I said in a bored tone, picking the glass up and swirling the remaining whiskey around. “It’s not like they have anything else to do other than attend your lame ass party.”

  “Fuck you too.” Theo took a deep drag from his blunt, then flicked the ashes at the wild crowd below.

  He had a look of irritated boredom on his face, the exact same one I wore on mine. The only reason I still put up with these weekly parties was to maintain the status quo in this town.

  My friends and I ran the high school with our own rules, treating the students and even the teachers like they were our subjects—and the key to that was the social game.

  Every week like clockwork, Theo would throw his Friday party at his future stepfather’s mansion.

  And every week like clockwork, all the high-schoolers in San Juan would beg to come.

  An invitation meant serious street-cred, up until the next party rolled around a week later and the new list of names came up to determine who was in our good books, and who was worth shit.

  It was pathetic.

  At least Theo knew how to throw a decent party, with free flow booze, weed, and enough sex to make even a Playboy bunny blush.

  The Beckett mansion wasn’t half-bad either. The three-story house looked like it was plucked straight from the streets of Beverly Hills and slapped into the town of San Juan, CA where jackshit happened. Around the back was my favorite feature—a full-sized pool featuring naked statues spewing water from their tits.

  Sounds trashy, but that was nothing compared to what we got up to at the parties. The pool itself probably held more DNA than a sperm bank, but Horace Beckett let his girlfriend's son get away with anything as long as she kept him busy in bed.

  We took full advantage of that. The Beckett mansion saw more naked chicks than a beach in Tenerife, and we contributed to that number.

  Substantially.

  On cue, feminine moans and sounds of slapping skin drifted out from our fuckpad behind us.

  When I'd strode through the room earlier to get to the balcony, Gabriel had been slouched on the sofa watching the football game while a topless redhead knelt between his legs and sucked him off like a popsicle. The bastard looked like he didn't have a care in the world.

  Cam, on the other hand, had not one, but three girls with him on the chaise, and he’d been pounding into one and while finger-fucking the other two.

  It was more weird than impressive, but either way it was completely in character for Cam. That competitive son-of-a-bitch needed to one-up everyone at everything.

  I swirled the last bit of amber liquid in my glass. “I need another drink.”

  “And I need a new piece of pussy,” Theo clipped as he took another drag on his blunt. “We've already fucked all the ones worth fucking.”

  I gave him a mocking smile. “Ennui? At the ripe old age of eighteen?”

  “Piss off. You're sick of this place too, don't act like you're not.” Theo exhaled a cloud of smoke and flicked his blunt into the partying crowd without bothering to put it out first. “Everyone here is trash.”

  “Not everyone.”

  My eyes went automatically to the mansion's bedroom wing, which sat at an L to the balcony.

  Third floor, first window from the left.

  Her light was on, but as usual, her windows were shut tight like she couldn't stand the club music and screaming from the pool.

  Alecia Grace Beckett, Horace's elder daughter and Theo's future step-sister was pretty girl with a good amount of dark hair and above-average legs, but that’s all she had going for her. She was boring as hell, and always with a book.

  And I liked girls who opened their legs, not their books.

  But what really pissed me off about Allie Beckett was that she refused to play our game.

  Yeah.

  She actually dared to stay out of it.

  Beckett Construction was at its peak, which put Horace Beckett in the same income bracket as Gabriel's family. That meant that Allie could have everything she wanted, whenever she wanted.

&nb
sp; She could even be the damned queen bee, ruling our high school and our town right alongside me and my friends.

  But she didn’t want to.

  She just kept to herself, like she was better than the rest of us.

  I threw back the last mouthful of liquor and slammed the glass on the balustrade.

  Better my ass—she was an outcast, simple as that. Nothing more than a stray.

  An alley cat.

  Even her younger sister Karin played her part in the social game. There was just no excuse for Allie Beckett not to.

  The only reason I’d left her alone so far was that if we fucked with her, we’d lose our free rein of the Beckett Mansion, and our parties.

  I had a thousand and one ways I could make Allie dance, and not one that I could make a reality.

  That. Sucked. Balls.

  I narrowed my eyes at her windows, as if I could stare through them, right into her proud gray eyes.

  Sudden shrieks came from the pool below, jerking my attention back.

  A group of screaming girls had pretended to lose their bikinis in the water. It was obviously for show, since they knew Theo and I were watching from our spot on the balcony. That just made their performance all the more pathetic.

  Allie Beckett would never do shit like that.

  She probably didn't even own a bikini.

  And just for that, I'd place these girls one step above her.

  Beside me, Theo's eyes took on a gleam as he stared down at the crowd. I knew that look, and what he was going to do.

  It was his favorite pastime after all—and the only reason he still bothered to show up at these parties.

  “Listen up,” he barked at the crowd.

  The laughter and music tapered, and two hundred pairs of eyes looked up at him, waiting for his cue.

  Theo pulled out a money clip from his back pocket and peeled out some bills from the stack of hundred dollar notes.

  Then he held them up in one hand.

  “Five hundred bucks tonight,” he announced, looking like the most bored showman that ever existed. “You bastards know what to do.”

  The people right below us dispersed like clockwork to form a space.

  At the same time, I saw white curtains fluttering at the corner of my eye.

  She was watching.

  “Hold it,” I drawled.

  Theo and the crowd looked at me in question.

  I took out my own arsenal—a checkbook, because I wasn’t going to stand around counting out ten bills like an idiot.

  “I'm doubling the prize money.” I eyed the crowd with a cold smirk. “A thousand bucks to the last one standing at the end of the night.”

  The crowd erupted in cheers and screams at my announcement.

  “Prick. Just had to one-up me, didn't you,” Theo grinned, oblivious to my real motive.

  Below us, two guys I recognized as juniors from our high school took off their shirts and stepped into the makeshift ring as the first contenders of the night.

  Dumb move, since the prize went to the last person still conscious. The kids in this town really gave each other a run for their money.

  I counted exactly five beats.

  Then I idly turned my head to the right, as if I was just taking a casual look around.

  Her windows were shut again, and this time, the lights were off.

  I scoffed, snapping my head back to the fight.

  Allie Beckett could hide all she wanted, but my prize money meant that the crowd would be fired up tonight. The cheers and screams were already escalating as the two guys started to beat the shit out of each other.

  Good luck getting to sleep with that, Allie cat.

  “What if we told them to kill each other?” I mused.

  Theo angled his head, looking down at the crowd dispassionately. “We'll have to up the cash, but for the right price, eventually someone will do it.”

  Damn straight. We could make them do anything we wanted without even lifting a finger.

  I didn’t get it. It was just money.

  Paper.

  Why the hell did people get so worked up over it?

  The party raged on below us, the ruckus louder now with the addition of the fight.

  The first guy finally dropped out when both his eyes were swollen shut, and another contender stepped up to take his place in the makeshift ring that was now dotted with blood and sweat.

  I stared down at the frenzied crowd, watching the scene below with a familiar detachment.

  Was anyone here actually enjoying this? Even Theo looked vaguely disappointed, like it wasn't as entertaining as he'd expected.

  And me?

  I felt like shit.

  I wasn't usually in such a piss-poor mood, but today was an exception.

  Because earlier, I’d closed my first contract.

  It was an undervalued property in SoCal that was slated to be highly profitable after development. After five months of negotiations and coming down on them like Thor with his hammer, I’d finally twisted Caldwell Realty’s arm hard enough that they signed it to us at below market value.

  It was my first milestone in decades of milestones to come, and my father—along with all the company directors—had been watching.

  I thought I did pretty impressive work, though I didn't know what I’d expected from the old man.

  Acknowledgement?

  Pride?

  I sure as hell hadn't expected disgust.

  But according to Thomas Wyatt Jr., Caldwell Realty could have been bullied to sell even lower. I'd secured us several million in future profit, but none of that mattered.

  All because I hadn't made more.

  It was beyond fucked up.

  I picked up my glass again, before realizing that it was empty.

  Dammit.

  I settled for glowering at the fight below instead.

  More times than I could count, I'd thought about just ditching everything and disappearing somewhere no one knew my last name.

  But as much as I hated this bullshit, I also knew I couldn't live without the perks that came with being a Wyatt.

  Status. Power. Popularity.

  All the things I couldn't let go of.

  All the things Allie Beckett could, apparently.

  Just another reason to hate that girl.

  “What up, party people!” Gabriel suddenly burst out from behind us, hollering at the crowd.

  The partiers raised a sea of red cups to him and cheered like he was the freaking Pope.

  Slinging his arms over Theo's and my necks, Gabriel grinned at the fight below, now on its third round. “Sweet. How much for tonight?”

  Theo raised his brow at Gabriel's arm but didn't comment on it. “One K from Ryland.”

  Gabriel let out a whistle as he tossed his hair off his forehead. “Hold onto the money for me, I'm going in after this dude.”

  I frowned. “Why, you short on cash again?”

  “Nah, just bored.”

  Bullshit, but I didn't press.

  We all had our demons.

  “Skip tonight's fight,” Theo said cryptically. “Something's going down later and trust me, you won't wanna miss the show.”

  I smirked. “What’s more interesting than watching Gabe get the shit beaten out of him?”

  “Dude, I can take you on any day.”

  “You protect your face too much, jackass, your body’s wide open. Kinda like your asshole.”

  Gabriel merely grinned and flipped me off, which meant he was still in a good mood from his recent blowjob.

  Theo pushed off the balustrade and jerked his chin towards the French doors. “Let's talk inside. All this screaming's pissing me off.”

  Back in the fuck pad, Cam was done, and the three girls he’d been screwing were draped over the chaise like used laundry. The guy himself looked smug as hell as he helped himself to a beer at the mini-bar.

  Theo snapped his fingers. “Out.”

  The girls blinked. “You mean us?
” one asked in a high pitched voice.

  “No, the Queen of fucking England.” Theo threw them an irritated look. “Just get the hell out.”

  The three girls filed out of the room, making their unhappiness known with calls of “asshole”—under their breaths, because they still wanted to be invited back.

  Like I said. Pathetic.

  “What's this about, man?” Cam pried the cap off his beer bottle and took a swig. “We were just getting pumped for round two.”

  Theo folded his arms and half-sat against the pool table. “Remember that shit we talked about at the pier? It's happening tonight.”

  We all froze at that, except Theo who was now smiling like a psycho.

  Two weeks ago, he’d come to us with a problem.

  Estelle, his mum, had gambled her money away to nothing, and she needed more, fast.

  It hadn't taken us long to come up with a solution that rode on Horace's obsession with her. It was more dangerous than feasible, but hey, at least it was entertaining.

  Never underestimate what a bunch of drunk high school seniors could do when they had too much time and money on their hands.

  Besides, if Estelle pulled it off, we all stood to gain from it. It'd be a win-win for everyone.

  Everyone except Horace Beckett.

  “So she's gonna do it?” Gabriel grinned slowly. “Damn Theo, your mum's one crazy bitch. Hot, but crazy.”

  No kidding. It was no wonder Theo was a little fucked up too.

  Then again, we all were.

  Gabriel quizzed him for details while Cam gave me a disinterested shrug and nursed his booze. I lounged on the sofa and eyed my friends.

  Frankly, I hadn't expected Estelle to take us up on the idea. It had started out as some bullshit talk between the four of us, and now it was actually happening.

  My lips curved slowly.

  Finally, something interesting.

  The minutes passed as we waited for some kind of signal that told us that shit was going down. Outside, the party—and the fight—raged on. It didn’t matter that we weren't even watching. We had given our instructions, and they would follow. That was how it worked.

  Feeling restless, I got up to fix another drink when suddenly—

  BANG!

  The crowd outside fell silent, as if the script had changed and they didn't know how to act anymore.