Reviews please :)

Let me know EXACTLY what you think!

I knocked on the door loudly.

I hated Tristan's neighbourhood. It was full of snooty girls with their bouncy blowdries and tiny dogs wearing Prada. And all the boys seemed to sport the same slacks and loafers dress code. I felt distinctly out of place in my denim shorts, converse and bretton striped top.

I banged on the door with the side of my fist.

I knew he was in. His car was parked outside. I held my finger against the door bell letting it ring loudly.

The house he shared with Spencer was gorgeous from the outside, all cream stone and pillars but seemed to be stuck in some strange time warp the minute you walked through the door. There was an almost terrifying amount of dark stained wood panelling. And mallards. Who owned mallards? There was tartan. Different shades of tartan. I hated it.

"Tristan!" I banged on the door again.

The door swung open. He was snarling at me. "You're causing a scene!" he hissed, dragging me in by my elbow.

I shook myself from his grasp. "Hello to you, too."

I looked at him. He reeked of alcohol. Not that I could talk. I'd definitely sobered up following my talk with Steve but still, those without sin always cast the first stone. He was topless, wearing only a pair of boxers. He had messy. I'd seen it firsthand enough times to know when it was sex hair and there was a deep purple bruise just above his left nipple. A bite mark? I couldn't help but laugh when I noticed the bruise in the centre of his forehead. Rubber bullets or not, my shot had caused some damage.

"Look, Lola..." He sighed. "I accept your apology."

I looked up at him. "Erm, thanks?" I walked through to the lounge. "Except I'm not here to apologise."

"But you shot me." he said. "You shot me with an actual gun."

"That's neither here nor there." I looked around the living room. His trousers were on the floor next to the couch. "I'm here to borrow your car." I turned to him. "And when I say borrow, I mean take and not give back, ever."

He looked at me. "Are you mental?" he spat. "You think you can humiliate me, SHOOT ME IN THE HEAD and then take my car?"

I nodded. "Yes."

"There was more than one question."

I nodded again. "I'm aware." I smiled beatifically. "Yes to all of them. Where are the keys?"

"You need to leave."

I laughed. "Not without the car."

"You're not taking my car."

"See, that's where your wrong." I stood up and walked over to one of the huge window that looked out over the park opposite. "Not only am I going to take the car but I'm going to get an apology out of you." I turned back to him.

It was his turn to laugh now. "What do I have to apologise for?"

I continued to smile. "Oh, y'know..." My voice hardened. "Just the lying. And the cheating."

He went pale.

"I don't know what you're talking about." he said. "You need to leave."

"Steve saw you." I said. "Last night."

I had him. His mouth opened and closed silently as he looked for a witty retort that was never going to come.

"You can make this easy for yourself." I told him. "Just tell me why."

He slumped into the chair and ran his fingers through his hair. I thought of the times that I had done the same thing. How many times had his other partner done that?

"Okay." he looked up at me. "Please sit down. I can't do this with you standing over me."

I remained on my feet. I glared at him and set my jaw. "Start talking."

"You don't understand how hard it is to be the only child in a family with a heritage like mine, Lo."

A sob story wasn't the way to go.

"I have so many expectations to live up to. I have a lineage to continue." he sighed. "My father knows the truth but he doesn't accept it. My mother told me to find a nice girl with good genes." He smiled weakly at me like I was supposed to be placated that I was determined to have "good genes." I didn't smile back.

"She told me that if I wanted to keep my inheritance then I just needed to dupe father until he was gone and then I would be free to fo as I wanted.

"So I was just there until you got what you wanted." I folded my arms. "You were using me to trick your father into keeping you in his will. You lied to me for some stupid inheritance?"

"It's not stupid."

"YES IT IS." I exploded. "And not only is it stupid, but it's cruel and hurtful and it makes me want to peel every single piece of skin from your body and feed it to your dogs."

"I wanted to love you." he said. "But it just isn't me. Please don't hate me. I thought if anybody would understand then it would be you."

I glared at him.

"Why? Because of Steve?"

He nodded. I heard a creak from the stairs.

"For the record, Tristan..." I continued to stare down at him. "I don't hate you because of who you love." I turned to look at the fireplace. He always left his keys there. "I hate you because you're too spineless and weak to admit it to your parents because of some stupid inheritance."

I stood up and walked to the grand fireplace. The keys to his Range Rover stared up at me. I picked them up and turned back to him.

"Call him in here." I said. We both knew he was lurking outside.

"Don't..." Tristan murmured. "Please."

"You do it." I told him. "Or I will."

He clenched his jaw and closed his eyes tightly. "Spencer."

His best friend appeared at the door in seconds. He looked at me with a mixture of hatred and sheepishness. Hatred because I had been with the man he loved. Sheepish because so had he.

"I'm taking the car, Spencer." I told him.

"No you're not." Tristan growled. "You're not taking my car. My father bought it for me."

"I'm taking the car, Spencer." I ignored Tristan's outburst. "And here's why..." I stared at him. "Tristan is giving it to me."

"NO I'M NOT."

"He's giving me the car because if he doesn't, I'll send his father the picture that Steve took of him with your dick in his mouth at G-Bar last night." Tristan let out a moan. "But if he wants to keep his car, he will ring his father, here and now, and tell him that he's in love with you and has been for a very, very long time."

Tristan's head snapped up. "What?"

"You heard me." I snapped. "You love him but you care so much about your inheritance that you're not being honest about who you truly are."

"You don't know anything, Lola." Tristan hissed.

"What do you think he should do, Spencer?" I asked, twirling the keys around my finger. "Which way do you want him to go?"

Spencer was staring at me, wide eyed. When Steve had shown me the picture earlier everything had clicked into place. Spencer didn't hate me because of the way I dressed or the way I spoke. He hated me because whilst I was immediately accepted into his family, albeit as a potential vessel to house Tristan's future offspring. He loved Tristan far more than anybody ever would but nobody could know about it.

"Range Rover or boyfriend?" I said, focusing on Tristan. "Range Rover or boyfriend?"

"Don't listen to her."

"Why?" Spencer snapped.

"You know that I love you." Tristan pleaded. "But we just have to wait until my father passes before we can be together."

"It's like Romeo and Juliet." I said. "Except not. At all."

Tristan gave me a withering look but my plan had succeeded.

"And what? I'm just supposed to watch you marry some vacuous little slag? – no offence Lola – Watch you have children and raise them and keep my fingers crossed that your dad doesn't make it past seventy?"

"- I have taken some offence, but I'll let it slide as I know you're angry."

"I love you so much, that I want to shout it from the rooftops." Spencer said. "I don't care about the inheritance. I'd love you even if you had nothing."

"But I want my inheritance so that I can provide a better life for us -"

"- And the mandatory three children that he has to have with his vacuous little slag -"

"-SHUT UP LOLA." Tristan bellowed. "I want to be with you." He told Spencer. "But we have to do it my way."

"Which is...?" I asked.

Tristan sighed and bowed his head. Spencer was staring at him. "Take the car." He looked up at me. "Take the car and hope to God that I never see you again."

I swung the keys off my finger and caught them in midair. "Brilliant." I looked at my watch. "Congratulations on taking all of thirty seconds to make the decision to keep your "love" a secret." I grinned. "I had you down for ten seconds and Steve said fifteen so..."

"Get out." He hissed.

"Gladly." I pushed myself off the fireplace and walked over to Spencer. "You're not an idiot. You know he's never going to tell them about you. If he gets his way, he'll be married and you'll be his tasty little piece on the side." I sighed. "And I can't believe I'm saying this as I think you are a horrible, horrible human being, but nobody should have to watch somebody they love be with another person." I touched his arm. "You need to be somebody's everything."

"I SAID GET OUT." Tristan launched something at me. A shoe maybe? It slammed against the wall. I didn't need telling twice.

"Oh..." I span back around. "I was always going to take the car." I said.

"You and what army?"

I thought about Dunn's words in his letter and smiled.

"Your father seemed quite keen to give me some sort of compensation for telling him what had been happening behind his back." I smiled at Tristan. "It seems that you have a cousin somewhere that your dad thinks will make an excellent heir."

I left quickly as the second shoe came flying towards my head. I ran down the corridor and out through the front door towards the massive car. I hadn't driven since I had passed my driving test three months after my seventeenth birthday. I pulled Prince's card from the back pocket of my shorts and held it up towards the sun as I positioned myself behind the huge steering wheel.

Hereford

My mind skipped to my fathers letter, neatly folded away under my pillow at home.

Be strong.

Be brave.

I had no idea what this Captain Prince wanted but I was going to find out.