Aimee’s POV:
I thought my sketches of the Porcelain Prince would stay on napkins, in daydreams, and the no-name little site I sometimes upload them to. But when the Dark Angels walk into our tiny diner, and Cage Knox fixes those impossible eyes on me, I realize I’ve stepped straight into the pages of my own obsession. The air turns cold, my pulse won’t settle, and I can’t tell if this is fate or a beautiful nightmare that’s just about to come true.
Aimee
My eyes fly from my phone display to the napkin on which I’m scrawling my new sketch. Him. The Porcelain Prince. That face that speaks to me on levels that I only understand with my fingertips. I keep scrawling until the pencil’s tip breaks. I lift my hand, my eyes trained on his face. I wish I could have drawn the lines around his eyes better. The Porcelain Prince’s eyes have fascinated the entire world for years now. It looks like he’s wearing eyeliner, but I’m not so sure. Every time I draw him, I have the feeling that what looks like make-up around his eyes is something else…
“Aimee, I need your help with the private group in the back room.” Craig slides an order pad under my nose, snapping me out of my reverie about Cage Knox.
“What?” I straighten my back, not sure I heard him right. “Why me?”
He shrugs. “I asked the same question. Their manager won’t tell. But this is f*cking huge for us, so you’re doing it.”
He spins around, wiping his hands on his apron, his broad back disappearing into the back of our diner, while I try to blink the confusion out of my head. Craig wouldn’t even tell me WHO we were hosting until now, and only had me serving the bodyguards and security staff.
The mysterious guests arrived in a row of black cars, while police sealed the entire block for the event, so I knew this was big. Bigger than usual, but no more than Craig-doing-business-with-cartels big, really, and he never lets me in on those. No reason for any of those guys to ask for me specifically, either.
I swipe the order pad off the counter before I follow Craig to the back, feeling the security team’s hawkish glares denting my back. Anxiety hits, and I can barely hide it. I walk down the aisle smoothing the sides of my hair, then brushing my sweaty hands over my uniform. I’m wearing a short navy-blue dress and an apron, both of which hug my body too tightly, but at least there’s no cleavage, and I’m not exactly the curviest of women anyway. In fact, at twenty-one, I still look like an anorexic teenager, which at least puts me off the radar of the difficult clients—the reason why Craig hired me in the first place, I think. I’m anything but Hooters material, and that means less trouble for him.
I stop in front of the back room door, wiping what might be smudges of black eyeliner from under my eyes with my fingers. I have a feeling my makeup looks like shit. I really wasn’t ready for this, Craig, damn you. There’s muffled talking from inside the back room, men’s voices. Pleasant voices. Somehow familiar. One of them chuckles. The sound of something frying sears through the air, and my eyes fly over to the kitchen. Craig is staring at me, signaling me with his chin to go inside. He usually hides it well, but not today. He’s as anxious about this as I am, his eyes are comically wide with it.
Okay, here goes nothing.
I take a deep breath, turn the knob, and enter without knocking. If they asked for me, then they must expect me.
But after the first step, my heart stops.
Five men, looking as if they’ve just stepped out of the covers of magazines, stare right at me. I marginally register multiple faces around them, but these five stand out like sore thumbs. One has a man bun and a perfectly chiseled face, wearing jeans, boots, and an oversized designer sweater—Diesel. He’s sitting right next to Dante, the dark, mysterious, gentlemanly one, his black turtleneck and fitted suit jacket emphasizing that demeanor. The ones flanking them are unmistakably Zion and Onyx. And all of them are a hundred f*cking percent members of the Dark Angels.
Then there’s the guy in the white linen shirt and ripped jeans. The magnet of the group, at least for me. My bias. I can feel my eyes swelling out of their sockets. Key-shaped earrings dangling from his ears, the shirt clinging to his body, his stare like the caress of a leather whip—Cage Knox, in the f*cking flesh. The Porcelain Prince.
His skin is absolutely flawless even in reality, and there’s no doubt—it’s not the eyeliner that gives the effect of his stare. His eyes really are from another fucking world. Everything is perfect about him, from the shape of his face to his outfit, to his undercut and the ashen strands of hair that fall just right over his forehead. As for the lips… Nope, don’t go there, Aimee Rouge.
I’m standing here with my mouth open while the freaking Dark Angels stare back at me in silence, surrounded by what must be their staff. I’m a deer in the freaking headlights. Trust me, you don’t want the attention of five pop idols and their crew on you at the same time, not while you’re wearing an ill-fitting uniform, your hair is a messy ponytail, and your makeup is barely still holding on.
I clear my throat and step closer to the table, forcing myself to move my attention to their staff. Girls with iPads sit ready to take notes or carry out tasks like well-trained soldiers. From what I’ve heard, they’re used to hours and intensity of work that most people can’t – and don’t even want – to imagine, and they’re clearly efficient as hell.
“H-hello, my n-name is Aimee Rouge, and I’m your server tonight.” Okay, that sounded stupid. They already knew that.
My index finger shakes uncontrollably as it hovers over the pad, so I pull it closer to my chest before anyone can notice.
I can barely type the producers’ requests, and things get even worse when the boys start placing their orders. Cage is the last one, and I can’t get myself to even glance at him. What if he sees how much of a sucker I am for him? No, shit, stop, how could he ever see that, it’s not written on my face. My head is spinning. I’m his server, it’s disrespectful not to look at him. Come on, look at him.
I raise my eyes from the pad, and meet his gaze. That oh so deservedly famous gaze. The air turns cold. I swear the temperature just dropped by several degrees, otherwise why am I shivering? I’m making a complete idiot of myself.
“The McFlint beefsteak for me,” he says. “Medium rare. I hear it’s quite famous.” Did that voice just speak only for me? I’m getting lightheaded. I need to get out of here as soon as possible, and no, nothing about this place is famous. McFlint is just a small town diner. Why in the world are the Dark Angels even here? They shouldn’t be here. They shouldn’t be anywhere near this place.
“I’ll be right back with your orders.” F*ck, that sounded as stupid as everything I said before.
I scurry out like a chicken running from slaughter. As soon as the door falls shut behind me, I slap my back against it and wipe my forehead with the back of my hand. I’m still wondering if I’ve slipped into a parallel universe as I stagger my way to the kitchen.
“Craig, what the actual f*ck?” I blurt out. “Why didn’t you tell me so I could prepare for this?”
“What difference would it have made? How would you have prepared for the f*cking Dark Angels and their entire crew?”
“At least I would have worn something else, not this freaking uniform.” Let’s face it, I look as cheap as the burgers he’s frying, and I smell like them, too.
He holds his palms up.
“In my defense, I didn’t know, okay?”
“You didn’t know it was them?”
“I didn’t know they’d want you! One of their managers, Miss Verona something, called me a few days ago for the reservation; she paid a fat sum in advance to have the whole diner to themselves, and complete secrecy. The rest is history. I didn’t imagine it would be them. And I didn’t imagine she’d walk out of there twenty minutes ago and ask that you serve them, specifically.”
His eyes fly anxiously toward the door that separates the Angels’ back room from the corridor. Craig is clearly as overwhelmed as I am. The place is a dump, even the private back room is makeshift. It used to be a smoking area back in the day when smoking was good for you.
Out of options, I turn to yoga breathing, propping my hands on my hips, begging the universe that it will help calm me down.
“Do you at least have some idea why they made that request?” I need to make at least a little sense of this.
He grabs my shoulders with his big hands, pinning me in place. “The only thing I know, Aimee, is that we have to make the best of this. It’s a huge opportunity for us!” He winks, squeezing my shoulders for reassurance. “And you know what else is huge? That you get to be so close to your crush.”
The blood drains from my head. “My crush?”
“Come, don’t even. You scrawled his face on a dozen napkins.”
“It’s not like that. He’s not my crush.” Sh*t, this is like my parents catching me masturbating.
“Right, of course not.” He drops his hands off me and hurries back to the fryers just as more help enters through the back door—Louise, my best friend and the best amateur cook ever. Craig clearly has no intention of telling her who’s here, big secret and all, so I drop the bomb before she lands in the same situation I did. She goes into shock for a few moments and then beams from ear to ear.
“Are you freaking serious?” she shrieks, but Craig hurries to cover her mouth.
“Shhhhh. We don’t want the press all over this now, do we?”
“Good luck keeping it from them,” she says as she pushes him off and reaches for an apron to tie around her waist. “This entire block is surrounded by black cars and men with sunshades at the wheel. I had to show ID and prove that I worked here for them to let me pass. The press is gonna come asking questions soon enough. This kind of security will draw attention.”
“Then let’s get this over with before they catch wind of it,” Craig says, rubbing his hands together.
It takes three trips carrying two laden trays, one in each hand, for me to bring all orders in, and every time the temperature in the room seems even lower. By the last trip, I don’t have any doubt anymore that it’s not just me. The difference between being inside and outside is obvious. When I walk in there, it’s like walking into a freezer.
I barely dare raise my eyes for fear that the plates, bottles, and glasses will spill all over our guests. If I want to keep things steady, I have to avoid eye contact, but it’s virtually impossible with Cage watching me – I can feel him through all my pores.
By the time I finish bringing everything in, the pressure is unbearable, and the cold, goddamn it, the cold.
All my instincts scream that I have to get out of here, and fast.
As soon as everything’s set on their table I hurry out and head over to the bar, seeking shelter under the counter. I pull my knees up and brace myself, doing the yoga breathing, and praying that it actually works this time. I really need to pull myself together. I’ve been drawing him consistently for months now, putting my obsession out there on fan art sites under a pen name, and now it’s gotten to my brain, and I can’t function normally around him, imagining all sorts of things.
“Aimee.”
I freeze under the counter. It’s his voice. That voice that feels like leather running down your skin. I get up to my feet and look slowly up at him, careful not to lose my shit, but then it hits me. Fuck! The drawing I made of him on the napkin, it’s just under his nose. And he’s seen it. He’s staring down at it right now.
“Forgive me if I scared you,” he says, stepping behind the counter to my side, and staring up at the bottles shelved along the wall. “I didn’t mean to. I suppose I couldn’t resist the intrigue.” He glances at the napkin, and then at me. He smiles, and I swear the entire world tilts, so much that I have to catch myself against the counter. “You draw faces no one is supposed to ever see, Aimee Rouge. This could prove dangerous – especially if you catch the attention of men like me.”
***
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