BLOODLINE BARGAINS WITH THE MAFIA

Hangover, Heir, and Hysteria

Reign:

The leather couch is cold under my limp body, but I don’t really give a f**k at this point. The room smells like last night’s excess: expensive whiskey, faint cigars, and something else—perfume from some blonde with a boob job that I can't remember the face of. My body aches like a bad decision got stuck under my skin, a dull pulse between the blood in my head and the hangover rattling my skull.

I’m sprawled across the cushions, shirt half unbuttoned, tie in a knot around my wrist like some drunk fashion statement. I’ve got a pillow under my head, though it’s doing more to scratch my cheek than comfort me. I’m unconscious in every sense, except that my "ego" is fully awake.

And then—water. Cold, sharp, immediate. It splashes across my face, soaking the hair plastered to my forehead and the shirt barely clung to my chest.

“Father,” I croak, swallowing against the dryness in my throat, “if this is about the bloody party—”

“It’s not,” Holt says, and his voice cuts through the morning fog like a scalpel. “Get up.”

I groan, blinking against the sting of reality. “Up where? There’s literally no reason to move from this couch. I’m basically a fixture.”

He doesn’t smile. Never does. Never should. “Get the hell up and make yourself presentable. You look like a damn fool.”

I lift one eye, squinting at him. He looks like he’s ready to have me taken apart and polished into compliance. Which… is not entirely incorrect.

“I’ll be presentable when I feel like it,” I mutter, rolling over so I can hide my face from him. But Holt Sinclair isn’t budging. He never does.

“Today,” he says simply. “We’re going to meet a Windsor this afternoon.”

I almost choke. Sit up faster than my hangover wants me to allow. “A Windsor? Which one?”

“Eleanor,” he replies.

The name slices through me like a private joke I haven’t heard yet. Ellie Windsor. The only girl in San Monclair who hasn’t begged for a night with me, hasn’t flirted with me to be the headline in those goddamn tabloids, hasn’t tried to catch me with manipulated smiles or carefully applied rouge.

I sit forward, rubbing my face, trying to wake up my brain from the haze of whiskey and adrenaline. “Huh.” My voice comes out slow, amused. “Interesting. She hasn’t tried to seduce me? You mean she’s… untamed?”

“Don’t underestimate her,” Holt says, and I laugh. Of course, my old man always wants to add a layer of caution to every game he sets me up for. “She’s a Windsor. She just as venomous as she beautiful. And you,” he adds, leaning close, “will marry her. Or at least… make her accept it.”

The words feel heavy, like I’ve been handed a puzzle I’m not sure I care to solve—but that I will. My grin stretches across my face, cocky and predatory. “Marry her? Father, you’re cruel.”

“The marriage isn’t optional. And I don’t ask you to do things you’re not capable of.”

I stretch, letting a loud yawn rip through the tension. “I’m capable, alright,” I tell him, voice low and teasing, almost as if I’m challenging him to object. “And bored. I like a challenge.”

Holt folds his arms. “Do not treat this as a game. The Windsors are not playthings. You do not toy with her or with me.”

I grin wider. Oh, I will. But not out of disrespect. Out of curiosity. There’s something about this girl I want to unwrap like a present. She’s probably icy, probably smart, probably sharp enough to cut me if I’m careless. Perfect.

“I’ll keep my hands and charm under control,” I lie smoothly. “Mostly.”

Holt doesn’t smile. I should feel fear, but I don’t. There’s an excitement pulsing in my veins instead, a thrill I haven’t felt since last season’s gala when that heiress fainted from fear—and lust, apparently—just seeing me walk in.

“Dinner,” Holt says, finally, “is this evening. at 8, sharp. You’ll wear a suit. She will notice if you don't. Do NOT embarrass me.”

I sit back, tilting my head, imagining the scene: the Windsor girl in perfect posture, perfectly composed, perfectly beautiful. She’ll look at me like I’m a riddle she’s not supposed to solve—and I love the idea of the challenge already.

I lean forward, elbows on knees, smirking. “Venomous, huh? I like it. Venomous girls are fun. They think they’re in control. And I—” I tap my chest, “am the best teacher of control there is.”

Holt doesn’t react. He just watches me. Like always, like he knows this is a performance, but he also knows I’ll pull it off in my own way.

I stand then, unbuttoning my drenched shirt with lazy precision, shrugging out of it. The tie dangles like a noose around my arm; I shrug it off, too. For now, I feel the room pulse with possibility—the danger of a girl who hasn’t bent to me yet, the thrill of her future resistance.

I imagine her now: silk and diamonds, poised and sharp, cold dark eyes that will try to burn me before I even speak. I already want to break that mask. Not because I need her to surrender to me—but because I like that she might try.

I run a hand through my hair, tousling it just so. My reflection in the floor-to-ceiling mirror across the room looks like someone the city should fear. Disheveled, hungover, but alive. Dangerous. Playful. Charming.

Today, I think, I’ll meet this Windsor girl. And she’s going to be fun. Oh yes, she’ll be fun.

Because I’ve never liked a game I couldn’t twist, a prize I couldn’t earn, or a girl who thinks she’s untouchable.

And Ellie Windsor? Untouchable only means ripe for the taking.