Our Bratty Queen

This brat needs to be tamed.

I’m the bad twin, the loud one, the one dancing on the tables while my critics condemn me. My family rarely knows where I am, much less what kind of trouble I’m starting, which has left me a lonely shell that I fill with my antics.

My sister is my polar opposite in every way. Quiet and in the shadows—she has everyone convinced she’s the good twin, but I know better.

So, when she is kidnapped, my parents hire a security team—three hot guys who don’t find my antics cute in the slightest—and suddenly, I want to be the good twin.

I want their attention.

I want their discipline.

I want to be under their control.

A billionaire hired us to secure and protect his twenty-two-year-old daughter, who is the identical twin of a high-profile kidnapping. As it turns out, our charge—the social media influencer herself—was the intended victim. We’re hundreds of miles away in a secluded cabin that is off the grid, which means our princess has no access to her phone, the internet, or her legion of social media followers.

She’s bored, she’s bratty, and she’s begging to be put over our knees and spanked.

Unfortunately, she’s also everything our domineering hearts crave—the one woman who speaks to our primal need to tame her into the perfect little submissive. If this security detail only lasted a few days, we could ignore her antics and control our needs—but as the days spread into weeks and she ups the ante to include endangering herself, we can no longer avoid what is in front of us.

She's ours to punish, ours to claim, ours to tame.

For the first time in months, I’m home and hiding from my ravenous fans. After years of endless scrutiny my career places upon me, I’m in desperate need of a couple of days away from the constant on-mode I have to don in front of the cameras. 

I told my legion of faithful followers that I was taking a couple of spa days and promised to update them as soon as I could with all the goodies I’m pampered with while at this ultra-reclusive locale. They love when I gush about celebrity swag.

The truth is, I’m not at a luxury spa or an ultra-reclusive locale. I’m hiding in my apartment on the backside of my father’s massive multi-million dollar estate. 

My father is rich. 

Not Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos rich, but I’m sure they attend the same parties. Last I checked, Daddy Dearest squeaked into the top four hundred of Forbes’ richest men in America—somewhere in the two to three billion dollar range.

Yay for him.

Walter Krushner never remarried after his wife—my mother—died in a tragic car accident, but he’s had plenty of women keeping his hotel beds warm. 

Or, at least, that’s what I assume. 

Honestly, I wouldn’t know since I’m never home. Even though I think he’s a self-centered prick, I also believe he loved my mother and was truly heartbroken when she died that dreary fall evening ten years ago. I was twelve when she left us. Slick roads plus a drunk driver equals a hollow shell of a man going through the motions of being a human being. He was successful before she died, but her absence left a hole that he filled with corporate takeovers and billion-dollar mergers versus the care and welfare of his daughters.

Yep–daughters. Plural. 

There’s two of us, although I can’t tell you what Leti is up to these days. It’s been months since I’ve talked to her. Weeks since we’ve exchanged a text message. I guess since I’m home, I should call her. We could order lunch and hang out at the pool or some other sisterly activity we rarely do. 

It’s weird how that didn’t occur to me until just now.

I guess, in some ways, I’m not much better than our Daddy Dearest. 

Out of sight, out of mind.

By fourteen, I was modeling full time, and by sixteen, I had my own million-dollar enterprise growing as a social media influencer. I haven’t been around to watch him conduct his days disconnected from his flesh and blood, or to witness my sister put her life on hold to be there for him if and when he finally pulls his head out of his ass.

My phone rings and disrupts the music streaming into my AirPods, which annoys me because I told my assistants I was unreachable this weekend.

I glance down at the screen and note the caller ID.

Speak of the absentee devil.

“Where are you?” My father’s voice is sharp and to the point. I’m half surprised he knows my phone number, much less cares where I am.

“Hello, Walter.”

“Epi, I’m in no mood for your attitude. Where are you?”

But I thought attitude-filled banter was how we showed affection in this family. 

I sigh, “Not too far away. Why?”

“I need you to come home. Now.” 

It's only then that I notice my father’s tone is off. “Why? What’s going on?”

He exhales a heavy sigh, and I think I hear true weariness in his voice. “I think someone has kidnapped your sister.”

I sit up with a start, knocking my iPhone off my lounge chair to the pool deck below. “What do you mean, you think?”

“I received a call and a demand for ransom. I haven’t seen her in a while so I have no idea if this is real or not.”

“Have you called the police?”

“Of course, I’ve called the fucking police! I’m not a complete moron. Where are you?” he barks.

I roll my eyes and pick up my phone from the ground. “At the pool—no more than two hundred yards from the house.”

He blows out a sigh of relief. “Thank god you’re safe. Come to my office.”

“I’m on my way.” I hang up my phone, only then digesting what he said.

Wait—Leti’s been kidnapped? 

Why?

How?

She doesn’t go anywhere.

She doesn’t do anything!

And outside of our father’s money, she doesn’t have anything. 

Quiet as a church mouse—sweet, innocent, perfect little Leti isn’t the type to cause anyone to pay her any attention. So, how the hell did she get herself kidnapped?

My heart beats faster as the reality of what my father has said spikes my fight-or-flight responses. I slip on a pair of shorts and my trainers, tuck my phone into my pocket, and jog to the back door of the house. 

My sister and I are not close—despite the fact that we are identical twins. 

Don’t get me wrong. I love my sister in a distant relative—the type you only see on major holidays—kind of way. We grew apart over the last eight years and, honestly, we have nothing in common.

I toured the country and then the world, modeling. 

She, for all I know, sat in her room and did homework. 

I became a brand spokesman for a cosmetics and athletic wear company before branding my own makeup and clothing lines. 

She graduated high school early and went to a local university so she could continue to live at home. I still don’t know what her degree is in—business, probably—but I know she works for one of our father’s many companies. Doing what? I have no idea. 

She’s my polar opposite in so many ways, but that doesn’t mean I don’t love her.

I definitely don’t want to see her hurt.

This doesn’t make any sense. Who the hell would want to kidnap Leti? 

Unless this is about our father’s money? Maybe this is retaliation for a business deal gone bad? Could this be revenge for one of the hostile takeovers Walter has executed over the years?

I run up the back stairs and through the kitchen—ignoring the house staff—then around the stairwell, through the foyer, and into a large group of people. 

No, not people.

Men.

Large men.

Massive men wearing suits and earpieces and—are those bulges in their jackets?

It’s only when they turn their eyes on me that I remember I’m wearing a bikini top and very short shorts. I’m used to walking around near naked on a catwalk, bar top, dance floor, yacht deck and, of course, on stage, but for some reason—and maybe it’s the way these men’s eyes flash wide then harden when they turn to face me—I feel underdressed.

I search each one of their handsome faces—seven in total—and realize how serious this situation is.

One man’s jaw tightens as we lock gazes. 

His eyes are shrewd. 

His expression is dismissive. 

Which, in any other situation, would piss me off. I hate being underestimated.

“Epiphany Krushner?” One man steps forward to acknowledge me. He looks to be about twenty years older than the rest of the pack, but no less handsome—a silver fox, some would say—and oozing with authority.

“Who are you?” I look him up and down, something I do on autopilot now as part of my online persona.

“I’m Victor Townsend, owner of Townsend Security Agency. These men are members of my team.”

I give everyone another cursory glance and stand tall despite my lack of clothing because I refuse to be cowered by any man. “Where’s my father?”

“He’s in his office with the FBI and his lawyers.”

“Wait. What? How long ago—”

At that moment, my father walks out of his office. He looks like hammered shit—like he hasn’t slept in days—and I notice the gray stubble peppering his normally clean shaven cheeks. “When did you get a phone call asking for ransom?”

“Let’s go into the library.” My father grips my upper arm like he used to do when I was a kid and escorts me across the foyer into the giant library he had built for my mother twenty years ago. 

I don’t think I’ve been in this room since she died.

I pull my arm out of his grasp and turn around with my hands on my hips. “How long have you known Leti is missing?”

“Six hours.”

“Six hours?” I glance at the men who followed us in here—their massive bulk dwarfing my mother’s library with its floor-to-ceiling windows—and then back to my father. “You called the FBI, your lawyers, and a private security team before you called me?”

“What were you going to contribute to the situation?” My father huffs and runs his fingers through his thinning hair.

Honestly, I’m too shocked at first to speak. Yeah, I’m hardly ever here, but I’m no less present than he is, so that was a tad harsh, especially in front of an audience. I clench my fists at my sides, angry, hot tears building up behind my eyeballs. “Well, if I have nothing to contribute, then why did you bother calling me at all?”

Mr. Townsend steps forward again, his hand outstretched between us like a referee. “I asked him to call you, Ms. Krushner. We believe you’re in danger.”

“What?” I shake my head. “Why?”

“We found your sister’s phone tossed in the bushes a few blocks from here. When the kidnappers called to demand a ransom, they used your name.”

All the color drains from my face, which is not a good look for me. “I don’t understand.”

“You are identical twins, yes?”

“Yeah, but nobody who knows me would ever think we’re the same…” I trail off as realization hits, and spin on my father. “You thought I was the one kidnapped? That’s why you didn’t call me.”

My father lowers his voice. “I didn’t have your phone number. You changed it six months ago and apparently didn’t think your father needed your new one.”

Wow. Our family dysfunction is on full display right now.

“Then I called Leti for your number, but obviously she couldn’t answer her phone. For the last six hours, I’ve been missing two daughters.”

I don’t know what to say to that. 

Do I feel guilty for making this harder on him than necessary because I didn’t make it a point to give him my new number? A little. 

But while I didn’t offer, he didn’t ask either.

The hot-as-fuck man with the shrewd eyes and the dismissive attitude speaks up. “Your five million followers—do they know you have a twin sister?”

“It’s five point three million, thank you very much. And no, why would they?”

He effectively ignores my snark and continues. “So, it is reasonable to assume one of your followers could have seen Leti and mistaken her for you?”

I scoff. “My followers love me. We’re talking about Swiffy fan base style loyalty. None of them would hurt me, and they certainly wouldn’t call my father for ransom. Besides, sixty-eight percent of my fan base is teenage girls under the age of fifteen.”

“And the other thirty-two percent?” He barely arches an eyebrow, his expression blank, which annoys the shit out of me. 

“Why are you talking to me?” I huff, cocking my hip out and waving a dismissive hand in his direction.

One man coughs into his hand to smother a laugh, pissing me off more. The others continue to stare at me, stone-faced, like a group of natural-born killers.

Mr. Townsend speaks again. “Ms. Krushner, I would like you to meet Lee, the head of your security detail.”

I glance at Mr. Townsend and then at Mr. Grumpy McHottie before turning to my father. “No. Absolutely not.”

“Pip, be reasonable. Your sister is missing. I don’t have the strength to worry about you, too.” My father hasn’t called me Pip in years. Not since my mother died. 

The weakness in his voice knocks me down a few pegs. 

“What aren’t you telling me?”

Mr. Townsend speaks again. “The money requested for your sister—”

“Or you, as the case may be,” Lee chimes in.

“—is significant, and the timeline given is unreasonable. It doesn’t seem like the kidnappers are interested in a ransom. If we couple that with the probability they think they have you right now, that points to an overzealous fan who has zero intentions of releasing Leti. Ever.”

All the feisty energy leaks out of me, and I sag into my mother’s old reading chair in the corner of the room. Dear god, if anything happens to Leti because somebody is obsessed with me, I’ll never forgive myself. She’s spent her entire life avoiding trouble while I’ve run straight into it, guns blazing. 

The gun, in this case, is my big fat mouth.