Page 28 of Mr. Wicked

“What article?” Holden mocked. “You’re kidding, right?”

“If you don’t mind, Holden, I would like to take over from here,” Laura said. Her voice was as crisp and firm as her appearance. With Holden’s approval, she started, “Your partners decided to hire me after two very serious and very alarming scenarios occurred while you were in Saint-Tropez.”

“Alarming?” I repeated, eyeing the woman, who I believed was the queen of exaggeration. “I was on a yacht. In Europe. What the hell could have happened? I was off the grid—”

“This happened,” Easton said. He was holding a remote, and within a few seconds, the TV began to play a video.

One that I hadn’t seen, but I remembered the moment quite fondly. It was when I’d just finished chatting with Freddy and was standing on the top deck with a scotch and a cigar, toasting to bachelorhood.

“I didn’t post that,” I told the group once the video cut off and the room turned silent. “I don’t know who did. It wasn’t any of the women. They weren’t allowed to have their phones on the boat and they all signed NDAs.”

“We know you didn’t post it. Whether it was one of the women or not, it doesn’t matter, because it doesn’t change the outcome,” Laura said. “What matters is that someone took that footage and sent it to Celebrity Alert, and that video you just saw and some pictures of you were released to their entire subscriber list, along with an adjoining article that appeared on their app and website, having the potential to reach”—she glanced down at the tablet in front of her—“over eighty-five million people.”

I couldn’t fucking believe what I was hearing.

Who would have the balls to take that footage and send it in?

Why would Celebrity Alert—a site that focused on actual celebrities—give two fucks about me?

“What was the article even about?” I asked her. “And why would anyone care what the hell I was doing? And that I was toasting to bachelorhood on a yacht—”

“The reason they care, Grayson, is because you’re now the cofounder of the largest dating app in the world and the inventor of the marriage arm—something you adamantly dismissed and basically dissed in your toast.” Holden’s voice wasn’t raised, but I could see the steam coming off the top of his head. “This international launch has made Hooked one of the top twenty-five tech companies in the world.” He leaned forward in his chair. “In. The. World.” He repeated and enunciated each word as though I hadn’t heard him previously. “That means all eyes are on us.”

“That still doesn’t answer my question.” I looked at each of their faces, hoping I would get something, anything, that would clue me in as to why they were currently holding a meeting about me. What I did in my personal time—whether it went on the internet or not—was my fucking business. “Why do my extracurricular activities interest them?”

Laura held up her hand, claiming the stage, and said, “What the video and pictures don’t show are any other male companions who joined you on the yacht. Your partners have informed me that there were three other gentlemen with you on the trip. But what this alert insinuates and what the article emphasizes is that you were alone with six women.”

I laughed.

The editing that had been done to that footage and the conversation we were currently having and the looks I was getting from the people around this table were fucking hilarious. “You all know I was there with Freddy and Royston and—”

“It makes no difference what we know,” Holden said, cutting me off for the umpteenth time. “It matters what they know. They being the entire world. And what they see is you on a yacht having an orgy with six women.”

Maybe I should have read some of the texts that Holden and Easton had sent over the last week.

Maybe I should have returned their calls.

Nah, fuck that, I wouldn’t have changed a thing.

This was absurd—on every level.

“So ...” I exhaled. “What’s the big deal? Maybe I was having an orgy.” I smiled to make their blood boil just a tad bit more. “Maybe I didn’t touch any of them. But what I do in my spare time has nothing to do with Hooked.”

“Except it does,” Easton barked back, the tips of his fingers white as he squeezed his hands together. “When you’re the CMO of a top twenty-five tech firm that invented a dating app and, ironically, the division you founded was the marriage arm, what you do in your spare time reflects directly onto Hooked.” He glanced at Drake and then Holden before he fixed his stare on me. “While you were out gallivanting in France with half a dozen women, shit was exploding here. There are ramifications to your actions, and the quicker you realize and acknowledge that, the quicker we’ll be on the other side of this.”

I wasn’t sorry for what I’d done. I hadn’t done a fucking thing wrong.

I was sorry that my best friends were here, while I was in France, and they had to clean up my so-called mess.

That wasn’t fair to them.

But to understand how deep this went, what my actions had caused, I needed to know more.

I looked at Laura, the ringleader, who seemed to have all the data. “And what are those ramifications, exactly?”

“We’ll get to that in a minute,” she responded. “First, I need to address the other part of this PR crisis.”

My eyebrows shot up. “There’s more?”

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