Page 72 of Power Games

"I knew you would. I was thinking about ‘princess,’ for a while. Would have fit, too. But you're not a spoiled, fragile little thing. You're not made of glass. You're not the angel I used to worship, put on a pedestal. You're just...sunshine."

She didn't know what to say, or where to look. His eyes were too intense right now. If she stared into them for too long, she might blurt out something stupid, and then there would be no taking it back.

Thankfully, his phone rang.

"Hi, Knightley. Yep. I'm not home right now. Yeah, LA. I don't know how long I'll be staying. Can I text you an update? All right. See you soon."

He hung up. Vanessa jumped on the change of subject.

"Was that Nathaniel Knightley? Any luck with the investigation?"

He'd been at it for months and hadn't touched anything sensitive yet, from what she knew.

"Yeah, he wants to see me. That means an update."

"Oh, that's great."

He must have heard something in her tone, because he pointed out, "You don't approve."

She hesitated. "I'd be glad to know what happened to Isabella. I'm just worried digging into it could be dangerous for you, that's all."

"It probably is. But I'm doing it anyway."

She knew this was who he was. She wouldn't ask him to stop, however much she wished he would.

"Nate asked how long I'm staying. He prefers to speak in person. I figured we'd talk schedules now."

"I'm clear starting now, for a little while at least. I'll need to record ‘Magnetic’ soon, but for now, we can go back to DC if you want to."

"Perfect. Not that I don't enjoy dude country, but there's plenty to do and—"

His phone cut them again. Charles frowned when he saw the name.

"Kingsley. What's the matter?"

Charles started to walk away, heading to her lounge area.

"How is your TV working?" he asked.

She found the remote and turned it on.

"What channel do you want?"

"The news."

She pressed on a button and she swore out loud.

"Holy shit."

The headline made her feel faint.

In coma. May not recover. Attacked. Related to a previous murder... Serial killer.

The words she heard and read didn't make sense to her. They didn't compute with the rest of the information she had.

"Claudia has been attacked by the person who killed Izzy?" she deduced, eventually. It really didn't make any sense at all to her, because she hadn't doubted that her father had been behind the first murder.

The second wasn't logical. Exuberant and flirty as she was, Claudia wasn't sleeping around the way Izzy had, and she was too smart to get entangled in the same sort of mess.

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