SLOANE'S POV

The contract was eighty-seven pages of pure evil.

I sat cross-legged on the cold bathroom floor, my back against the marble stall divider, the document spread across my lap like a dead animal. The other candidates were in the lounge, sipping cucumber water and practicing their "genuine listening faces." I'd been in here for forty minutes.

Page thirty-four. Clause 12b. Voluntary withdrawal or disqualification due to gross misconduct shall require full reimbursement of the fifty-thousand-dollar advancement bonus within fourteen calendar days.

Full reimbursement.

I read it again. Then a third time.

"Nope," I whispered. "Still says I'm fucked."

The stall door rattled. Someone jiggled the handle. "Occupied?" a voice trilled.

"Explosive diarrhea," I called back. "Super contagious. Probably airborne."

The footsteps retreated. I returned to my doom-scrolling.

Even if I accessed the fifty thousand—which I couldn't until "contractual obligations were fulfilled"—I'd already spent four hundred of my own nonexistent money on the credit card payment that kept my phone alive. My bank account currently contained nineteen dollars and a dream. If I tanked this on purpose and got flagged for "gross misconduct," I'd owe a billionaire fifty grand I didn't have.

I'd be sued. Garnished. Probably thrown into some kind of fancy debtor's prison with chandeliers and artisanal bread.

The only escape hatch was peaceful elimination. Make Declan Vance reject me organically. Convince him I was a disaster. A turn-off. A woman so fundamentally wrong for his weird, specific, vanilla-syrup-obsessed soul that he'd boot me out with a handshake and no penalty clause.

Problem: I was apparently his dream girl on paper.

Solution: I needed to become his nightmare in person.

And for that, I needed intel.

---

The employee corridor was empty. My ballet flats—already violating Mrs. Whitmore's "heels at all times"

decree—made no sound on the linoleum. I'd memorized the guard rotation by now. Ramirez patrolled the east wing from two to two-thirty. The security office was empty during shift change.

I rounded the corner near the vending machine and stopped.

There he was.

Dane.

He was leaning against the wall, phone in hand, still in that stupid security uniform—navy polo, badge clipped to his belt, boots polished to a shine. His sleeves were pushed up again. Forearms on display. Jaw sharp enough to cut glass.

My stomach did something annoying. A flutter. A squeeze. I told it to shut up.

"Hey." I grabbed his arm and yanked.

"What the—" He stumbled, phone clattering to the floor, as I dragged him sideways into the supply closet.

The door swung shut. Darkness swallowed us both.

The closet was approximately the size of a coffin. Shelves pressed into my spine. Something sharp—a mop handle? a broom?—dug into my hip. And Dane was everywhere. Chest against my shoulder. Breath stirring the hair at my temple. His body heat bleeding through my blazer like a fever.

"Sloane." His voice was a low rumble in the dark. "What are you doing?"

"Shut up." I fumbled for the light cord, yanked it. A bare bulb flickered on above us, casting everything in jaundice yellow. "I need information."

He looked down at me. The angle was absurd—him towering, me wedged between his chest and a shelf of industrial cleaning products. His face was half-shadow, half-light, all cheekbones and dark eyes and that mouth that used to trace constellations down my spine.

I ignored all of that.

"The CEO," I said. "You work here. You've seen him. You know what he hates."

One eyebrow lifted. "Do I."

"Don't be coy. You're security. Security hears things. Gossip. Complaints. The kind of stuff the assistants whisper about when they think no one's listening." I poked his chest. Hard. "I need the landmines. The dealbreakers. What makes a billionaire look at a woman and think absolutely not."

The corner of his mouth twitched. "Why?"

"None of your business."

"You dragged me into a broom closet."

"A supply closet. Much more dignified."

"Sloane." He said my name the way you'd talk to a child who'd just explained their plan to build a rocketship out of cardboard. "What are you trying to do?"

I weighed my options. Lie? Half-truth? Full honesty with a man who'd already proven himself a first-class deceiver?

"Fine." I crossed my arms—well, tried to, but my elbow hit his ribs and his hand came up instinctively to steady my waist. His palm settled just above my hip. Warm. Broad. I ignored it with heroic effort. "I want him to eliminate me. Peacefully. No penalty clause."

His thumb moved. A single stroke against the fabric of my blazer. "You want to fail."

"I want to fail strategically. If I withdraw, I owe the money back. If I misbehave badly enough to get booted for misconduct, I owe the money back. But if he just... doesn't like me?" I shrugged. "That's chemistry. No penalty. I walk away with fifty grand and no lawsuit."

The silence stretched.

Then Dane laughed. Low and rough and completely unexpected, the sound vibrating through his chest and into my hand—which was still pressed against his sternum, I realized, because I hadn't moved it after poking him. My palm was flat against his heartbeat.

"You're serious," he said.

"Deadly."

"You want me to give you insider information. On my boss. So you can sabotage your candidacy."

"Five hundred dollars," I said.

His laughter stopped. "What?"

"Five hundred. Cash. PayPal. Venmo. Whatever you want." I tilted my chin up, meeting his eyes. "You're a security guard, Dane. You're not exactly rolling in it. The watch is fake, right? The shirt's a rental. You probably eat ramen six nights a week."

His jaw tightened. Something flickered behind his eyes—amusement? irritation? I couldn't tell.

"Five hundred dollars," he repeated, "to betray my employer."

"It's not betrayal. It's... consulting. I'm paying for your expertise." I patted his chest. "Come on, big guy. You owe me. Consider it partial restitution for two years of emotional damages."

"Oh, I owe you." His voice had dropped. The hand on my waist tightened, just barely. "Is that what we're calling it."

"The information, Dane. What does he hate?"

He studied my face for a long moment. The bulb hummed above us. Somewhere in the distance, a door opened and closed. His eyes traced the line of my jaw, the curve of my throat, the pulse point that was absolutely, definitely, one-hundred-percent not racing.

"Flat shoes," he said finally.

I blinked. "What?"

"Declan Vance. He hates women in flat shoes. Thinks they look lazy. Unfeminine. A woman who shows up in ballet flats might as well spit in his face." He leaned closer, his breath ghosting over my ear. "And he hates a mouthy woman. If you talk back—if you sass him, challenge him, push back even a little—he'll drop you faster than a bad stock. Silence is everything."

My heart was pounding. This was gold. Pure, actionable, five-hundred-dollar gold.

"What else?"

"One more thing." His lips were at my ear now, voice a low rumble that I felt in my molars. "Coffee. He's a purist. Black only. No sugar. No cream. No flavored syrups. And if you ever—ever—put cinnamon near his coffee, he'll have you escorted from the building."

Cinnamon.

Cinnamon.

The word detonated in my brain like a firework. Cinnamon in black coffee. The exact concoction I used to make Dane when his stomach was acting up—bitter coffee, enough cinnamon to choke a horse, the special brew that made him gag and curse and chase me around the kitchen threatening revenge. I'd called it my

"go-away juice." He'd called it "culinary terrorism."

And Declan Vance hated it.

"Got it," I breathed. "Flat shoes. Sass. Cinnamon coffee."

"Guaranteed elimination."

I grinned up at him, all teeth and triumph. "You're a lifesaver, Dane. A lying, cheating, secretly-employed lifesaver." I slapped his chest—friendly this time, no poke. "Five hundred. I'll transfer it as soon as I'm booted."

"Can't wait."

I reached for the door handle, then paused. Glanced back over my shoulder. "Hey. Why are you helping me?

Really?"

His expression was unreadable. "Maybe I want to see you fail."

"Ouch."

"Maybe I want to see you try." His mouth curved. "You've always been entertaining when you're scheming."

I didn't know what to do with that. So I did what I always did—I turned it into a joke. "Enjoy the show, then.

Try not to cry when I'm free of this circus and fifty grand richer."

The door opened. I slipped out.

His voice followed me into the corridor: "Good luck, Sloane."

I didn't look back. But I could feel him smiling.

---

The assessment room was a stage, literally. Black curtains. A single spotlight. A long mahogany table where three judges sat like a panel of disapproving owls—Ms. Kruger in the center, Hayes fidgeting at her left, and some stone-faced woman I didn't recognize at her right.

"Final practical examination," Kruger announced. "You will each prepare and present afternoon coffee for

Mr. Vance. This assesses your attention to detail, your composure under pressure, and your understanding of his personal preferences."

A cart of supplies waited at the edge of the room. Coffee beans. Grinders. French presses. Pour-over setups. A galaxy of syrups and creamers arranged in crystal decanters.

Tinsley went first. She floated to the cart in her Valentino heels, selected a single-origin Ethiopian roast, and spent fifteen minutes crafting the perfect pour-over. Golden ratio. Precise temperature. A porcelain cup pre- warmed with steam. She presented it with a whisper-soft voice and a curtsy so deep her forehead nearly touched her knees.

"Lovely," Kruger murmured.

The second candidate—Miranda, a willowy blonde with a trust fund and zero personality—offered an espresso with a heart-shaped dollop of foam. "Caffeine is the heart's language," she simpered. Hayes wrote something on his tablet.

Then it was my turn.

I stood.

I walked to the cart.

And I committed culinary terrorism.

Instant coffee. The cheapest shit on the table—I ignored the French press entirely and reached for the pre- ground foil packet someone had left half-hidden behind the artisanal beans. Two scoops into a chipped mug.

Boiling water splashed in with all the grace of a gas station dispenser. No sugar. No cream. And then—with the flourish of a conductor leading an orchestra—I grabbed the cinnamon shaker and dumped.

And dumped.

And dumped.

The powder billowed up in a brown cloud. It crusted the rim of the mug. It freckled the saucer. The coffee beneath it was a swampy, gritty, apocalyptic mess.

I walked to the judges' table. My ballet flats made no sound on the stage—flat shoes, just like he said, the cheapest, ugliest, most aggressively unsexy flats I owned, scuffed at the toe and frayed at the heel.

I slammed the mug down. Coffee sloshed onto the tablecloth—a brown, gritty stain spreading across white linen.

"Coffee," I announced. "Drink it."

Hayes flinched.

Kruger's face turned to stone.

The third judge looked like she'd swallowed a wasp.

"Ms. Beckett," Kruger began, her voice arctic. "This is highly—"

She stopped. Her hand flew to her ear—a subtle gesture, but I caught it. The earpiece. The tiny flesh-colored bud all three judges were wearing. Someone was speaking to them. Someone watching from behind the one- way glass.

Hayes's eyes went wide. His mouth opened. Closed. Opened again. His hand trembled as it reached for the scoring paddle.

"Ten," he croaked.

The room went silent.

"Excuse me?" I said.

"Ten out of ten." Hayes's voice cracked on every word. He looked like a man who'd just been ordered to defuse a bomb with a butter knife. "Mr. Vance says... Mr. Vance says this coffee has unparalleled soul. He says it reminds him of... of home." He swallowed. "Ms. Beckett passes with full marks."

My stomach hit the floor.

"No," I whispered. "No, that's not—the cinnamon—the flats—"

"Perfect score," Kruger said, her voice tight with something between confusion and fury. "Congratulations,

Ms. Beckett. You advance to the final round."

I spun around.

The room was a blur of black curtains and shocked faces and Tinsley's mouth hanging open like a carp. Past the stage. Past the judging table. At the back of the room, near the service entrance, where the shadows gathered thickest.

He was there.

Leaning against the doorframe. Arms crossed. Black uniform blending into the dark. The same fake security badge. The same infuriating jaw.

Dane was looking directly at me.

And he was smiling. Not a nice smile. Not a friendly smile. The smile of a man watching an elaborate prank pay out in dividends. The smile of a man who'd just watched a mouse sprint gleefully into a trap and pause to thank the cheese.

His lips moved. Two words. Silent.

You're welcome.

My vision went red.

My fists clenched.

And somewhere in my chest, underneath the fury and the humiliation and the sudden, dawning horror of what I'd just done, a tiny, traitorous voice whispered: You just walked right into his hands. Again.

SLOANE'S POV

The VIP lounge was supposed to be locked.

I knew this because I'd tried the door twice already during my previous reconnaissance missions—once while searching for a bathroom that wasn't swarming with Tinsley clones, once while hunting for an electrical outlet to charge my dying phone. Both times, the heavy oak door had been sealed tighter than a nun's habit.

Tonight it swung open at the lightest touch.

I should have recognized the trap. I should have smelled the bait. But fury had stripped away every survival instinct I possessed, leaving only the pure, incandescent rage of a woman who'd just realized she'd been played for a fool.

"Dane!"

He was standing by the floor-to-ceiling windows, Manhattan glittering behind him like a ransom note written in diamonds. Still in that stupid security uniform. Still with the sleeves rolled up. He turned at the sound of my voice, and his expression was the worst thing I'd ever seen—calm. Expectant. Like he'd been waiting for me.

Like he'd left the door open on purpose.

"You son of a bitch." I crossed the room in six strides, my scuffed flats slapping against the marble. "You lying, scheming, five-hundred-dollar—"

I grabbed his collar.

Fisted both hands in the cheap polyester of his uniform shirt and yanked him toward me. He didn't resist.

Didn't flinch. His body followed my momentum with a fluid ease that made my stomach drop, and suddenly we were chest to chest, his face inches from mine, his breath warm against my lips.

"The flat shoes." I shook him. "The sass. The cinnamon coffee. You told me he hated those things. You told me I'd be eliminated."

"I told you Declan Vance hated them." His voice was infuriatingly level. "Turns out he doesn't."

"Bullshit. You're a security guard. You don't know what the CEO likes."

"Maybe I pay attention."

"Maybe you're a fucking liar."

His hands found my waist. Just rested there, palms flat against my hipbones, fingers curving around the swell of my ass like they belonged there. Like they'd never left. The heat of him bled through my blazer, through my blouse, branding my skin.

"I didn't lie," he murmured. "The CEO genuinely loves your coffee. And the flats. And the attitude." His mouth curved—that infuriating half-smile, the one that used to make me weak in the knees before I knew what a garbage human he was. "Turns out Declan Vance has a thing for feral women who insult him in broom closets."

My hand came up to slap him.

His caught my wrist mid-air.

The motion was liquid, practiced, his fingers wrapping around the delicate bones of my forearm and squeezing—not hard, but firm. A warning. A promise. He used the grip to pull me closer, and suddenly my back was against the leather sofa and he was looming over me, one knee pressed between my thighs, his body a wall of heat and muscle and barely contained tension.

"Let go of me."

"No."

"Dane—"

"You want to know why I gave you that information?" His voice dropped, the playfulness evaporating.

Something darker moved behind his eyes. Something hungry. "You want the truth?"

"I want my hand back."

"You stormed into a supply closet and offered me five hundred dollars to betray my employer." His grip tightened on my wrist. "Five hundred dollars. Like I was a waiter you were tipping. Like I was some stranger you could bribe into doing your dirty work."

"You are a stranger. You're a stranger who spent two years lying to me, who kissed another woman in broad daylight, who—"

"She was my sister."

The words hit me like a freight train.

My mouth opened. Closed. Opened again. No sound came out.

"Camille. My half-sister. She tracked me down in Brooklyn to tell me our father was dying." His jaw was steel. His eyes were a storm. "I didn't chase after you because I was standing in the rain, Sloane, trying to process the fact that the man who abandoned my mother before I was born was suddenly relevant to my life.

By the time I looked up, you were gone. You blocked my number. You blocked my email. You vanished."

"You—" My voice cracked. "The Chanel woman. The town car. She was so... rich."

"She is rich. She's a Vance."

"And you—"

"I am too."

The room tilted.

"Declan Vance," he said, slowly, like he was explaining gravity to a toddler, "is not some faceless billionaire.

It's me. It's always been me. The questionnaire. The checklist. The Mario Kart scores and the vanilla syrup and the goddamn strawberry allergy." His free hand came up, cupping my jaw, his thumb dragging across my lower lip. "I wrote every question. I designed every test. I've been searching for you since the day you disappeared."

"You're a mechanic," I whispered. "You're a broke mechanic with a mustard stain on your jacket."

"I'm a billionaire who spent two years pretending to be broke because I wanted someone to love me for something other than my bank account." His mouth was at my ear now, his breath hot and ragged. "And you did. You loved me when I was nothing. And then you left."

"Because you cheated."

"Because you saw what you expected to see." His teeth grazed my earlobe. "Because you've always been so sure that you're disposable, Sloane. So ready to believe that anyone would trade you in for a better model."

"Fuck you."

"Is that what you want?"

His hips pressed forward. The ridge of his cock, already hard, ground against my belly through the thin fabric of his uniform pants. My traitorous body arched into him before my brain could intervene—muscle memory, two years of muscle memory, every nerve ending lighting up because this is Dane, this is his body, this is the way he smells and the way he groans and the way he fits.

"Tell me to stop," he said. "Tell me you don't want this, and I'll let you walk out that door. I'll let you go. I'll withdraw your application myself. No penalty. No lawsuit. You can have the fifty thousand and your freedom and you never have to see me again."

I should have said it.

The word was right there. Stop. Leave. No.

"What do you want, Sloane?"

His hand slid from my jaw to my throat. Not choking. Just resting there, his palm against my pulse, feeling the hammer of my heartbeat, the truth my mouth wouldn't speak.

My hips rolled forward. Involuntary. Desperate. Fucking pathetic.

He felt it. Of course he felt it.

"That's what I thought."

The kiss was not gentle.

It was teeth and tongue and fury, two years of absence and one month of betrayal and the raw, animal need to reclaim something that had been torn away. He bit my lower lip. I bit his back. His hands fisted in my blazer and ripped—buttons scattering, silk tearing, the sound obscene in the quiet room.

"My blazer—"

"I'll buy you a hundred blazers."

"That's not the—"

"Shut up, Sloane." His mouth moved to my throat, sucking hard enough to leave a mark. "Just shut up and let me fuck you."

The word hit me low in the belly. He'd never talked like that before. The old Dane was sweet, playful, murmuring compliments and stupid jokes even when he was inside me. This Dane was something else. This

Dane was a man who'd spent a month thinking he'd lost me forever and wasn't going to waste a single second now that he had me back.

My blouse joined the blazer on the floor.

My bra went next, his fingers fumbling with the clasp for exactly half a second before he gave up and yanked it down, baring my breasts to the cool air. His mouth found my nipple, hot and wet and demanding, and I arched off the sofa with a sound that was half-moan, half-curse.

"You're still so responsive," he muttered against my skin. "Still so fucking wet for me. I can smell you."

"Asshole."

"Tell me you didn't think about this. Every night for a month. Your hand between your legs, pretending it was mine."

I hated him. I hated that he was right.

His fingers found the button of my pants. Popped it. Dragged the zipper down. His hand slid inside, cupping me through the soaked cotton of my underwear, his middle finger pressing against my clit with the exact pressure he knew I needed.

"God—"

"Say my name."

"Dane—"

"Again."

He pushed the underwear aside and sank two fingers into me, curling them forward, hitting that spot inside me that made my vision white out. My back bowed. My nails raked down his chest, catching on the cheap polyester, probably leaving scratches on the skin beneath.

"Look at you." His thumb circled my clit while his fingers pumped. "So tight. So ready. You've been walking around this building for days, passing me in hallways, pretending you didn't want to climb me like a tree."

"I didn't—"

"You dragged me into a supply closet." His fingers curled again, and I sobbed. "You touched my chest. You smelled my cologne. You think I didn't notice the way your pupils dilated every time you looked at me?"

"Fuck you."

"We're getting there."

He withdrew his fingers, and the emptiness was a physical ache. I watched him bring them to his mouth, watched his tongue slide between them, tasting me with an expression of pure, male satisfaction.

"Still the best thing I've ever tasted," he said.

Then he was shoving his pants down, and his cock sprang free—thick and flushed and already leaking at the tip. He didn't bother with his shirt. Didn't bother with foreplay. He just grabbed my hips, positioned himself at my entrance, and pushed.

One hard, merciless thrust.

I screamed.

Not from pain—from fullness, from recognition, from the overwhelming rightness of his body inside mine after so long. My inner walls clenched around him, and he groaned, his forehead dropping to my shoulder, his breath hot and ragged against my collarbone.

"Fuck," he hissed. "Fuck, Sloane, you feel—"

He didn't finish the sentence. He started moving instead.

Hard. Fast. Punishing. Each thrust drove me deeper into the leather cushions, my legs wrapped around his waist, my heels digging into his lower back. The sofa creaked beneath us. The windows rattled. Somewhere in the building, I was supposed to be preparing for a final gala, competing for the hand of a mysterious billionaire, and instead I was getting railed by my ex-boyfriend in a VIP lounge while the city watched through floor-to-ceiling glass.

"Say you're mine." His hand fisted in my hair, yanking my head back. "Say it."

"I hate you."

"Say it anyway."

His cock hit deep, grinding against my cervix, and the pleasure-pain ripped another scream from my throat.

He was everywhere—his scent in my nostrils, his sweat on my skin, his voice in my ear chanting my name like a prayer or a curse.

"I'm—Dane, I'm close—"

"I know." His rhythm stuttered. "I can feel you. You're squeezing me so fucking tight. Come for me. Come on my cock, Sloane. Now."

The orgasm hit like an earthquake.

My vision went white. My hearing went static. Every muscle in my body clenched and released and clenched again, waves of pleasure radiating outward from my core until I couldn't tell where I ended and he began. He followed me over the edge with a guttural roar, spilling inside me, his hips jerking with the force of his release.

We lay there for a long moment. Panting. Sweating. Tangled together on a leather sofa that probably cost more than my entire childhood home.

Then reality crashed back in.

I shoved him off me. He rolled onto his back, chest heaving, eyes half-lidded with satisfaction. The asshole looked smug.

"That was—" he started.

"Mistake." I scrambled upright, hunting for my clothes. "A huge mistake. A catastrophic, possibly alcohol- induced—I wasn't even drinking, what the fuck is wrong with me—"

"Sloane."

"No. No talking. We're not doing the post-coital cuddle. We're not doing the 'let's talk about our feelings' thing." I found my blazer—torn. My blouse—missing three buttons. My underwear—god, where was my underwear? "You lied to me. For years. About everything. And I just—" I gestured at the sofa, at his naked body, at the evidence of our mutual stupidity smeared across my thighs. "This doesn't change anything."

"It changes everything."

"It changes nothing." I yanked my pants on. No underwear. Fine. Whatever. "I'm going to that final gala. I'm going to win this thing. And I'm going to do it without you."

"Sloane, the gala is—"

I checked my phone.

Twenty-three minutes.

Twenty-three minutes until the Final Gala began. Twenty-three minutes to get from this lounge to the penthouse ballroom, to find a new outfit, to fix my hair, to scrub the smell of sex off my skin. If I was late, if I missed the event, the penalty clause kicked in.

Fifty thousand dollars.

I grabbed my shoes and ran.

---

DECLAN'S POV

The door slammed shut behind her.

Declan lay motionless on the leather sofa, listening to her footsteps retreat down the corridor, the frantic slap of her bare feet against marble because she'd forgotten to put her shoes on. The sound faded. The silence rushed in.

He smiled.

His phone was already in his hand. Hayes answered on the first ring.

"Sir?"

"Have my tuxedo sent to the dressing room. The Tom Ford. And alert Ms. Kruger that the selection ceremony will proceed as scheduled."

"Of course, sir. And Ms. Beckett?"

Declan's smile widened. He could still taste her on his lips.

"Leave her to me."

SLOANE'S POV

The elevator doors opened onto a world I didn't belong in.

Champagne flutes glittered on silver trays. A string quartet played something mournful and expensive.

Women drifted past in gowns that cost more than my entire existence—silk and sequins and diamonds dripping from earlobes and throats and wrists. The penthouse ballroom was a cathedral of old money, its ceiling a dome of glass revealing the Manhattan skyline, its floors polished to a mirror shine.

I had twenty-three minutes. I'd used nineteen of them.

My blazer was torn. My blouse was missing three buttons—I'd done a frantic safety-pin job in the service stairwell that barely held the fabric together. My hair was a disaster, half-fallen from its clip, and there was a mark on my throat. A bruise blooming just above my collarbone. His mouth. His goddamn mouth.

I yanked a strand of hair forward to cover it.

No underwear. No shoes. My bare feet were freezing against the marble.

"Ms. Beckett."

Ms. Kruger materialized beside me like a disapproving ghost. Her charcoal suit was immaculate. Her ice-blue eyes swept over my appearance—the torn blazer, the safety pins, the bare feet—and something twitched in her jaw.

"You're late."

"Traffic."

"There is no traffic between the fourth floor and the penthouse."

"Stair traffic. Very congested. People everywhere." I smoothed my blazer, which only made the tear worse.

"I'm here now. Where do I stand?"

Her nostrils flared. "With the other candidates. The selection ceremony begins in four minutes. I suggest you make yourself presentable."

She handed me a pair of heels. Black satin. Stilettos. Probably worth eight hundred dollars. I stepped into them like they were life rafts.

The candidates were arranged in a semicircle near the grand staircase. Tinsley stood at the front, draped in

Valentino, her platinum hair cascading in waves that required professional lighting. Miranda hovered nearby, willowy and vacant. A dozen other women I'd barely registered during training fanned out around them, all of them coiffed and perfumed and polished to a lethal sheen.

I slunk into position at the back.

Tinsley's eyes found me. Her lip curled. "Did you get mauled by a wild animal on your way up?"

"Something like that."

"You smell like sex."

"And you smell like desperation, but I was being polite."

Her mouth snapped shut. Miranda gasped. I stared straight ahead, my heart pounding so hard I could feel it in my temples.

The string quartet fell silent.

"Ladies and gentlemen." A voice boomed from hidden speakers—the emcee, somewhere near the stage.

"Esteemed guests, honored candidates. Tonight, the search for the perfect partner reaches its culmination."

A spotlight hit the staircase. The crowd turned as one.

"Please welcome the CEO of Vance Industries. A man whose vision has reshaped global markets. A man whose personal fortune exceeds the GDP of several small nations. A man who tonight will select his future wife."

My stomach clenched. Something about the emcee's voice, the dramatic pause, the way the room held its breath—

"Mr. Declan Vance."

The spotlight swung upward.

And the world stopped.

He descended the staircase like a god condescending to visit mortals. Black three-piece suit. Tom Ford, maybe. Something custom. The jacket hugged shoulders that were broader than I'd ever seen them, and the vest beneath emphasized a waist that tapered in a way that made my mouth go dry despite everything. His dark hair was swept back. His jaw was sharp enough to draw blood.

But it was his eyes that did it.

That cold, knowing, infuriatingly familiar gaze.

Dane.

Not Dane. Declan. Declan Vance.

The mechanic. The liar. The man who'd lived in a basement apartment with a hot plate and a mattress on the floor. The man who'd burned grilled cheese three nights a week because he couldn't figure out the stove. The man who'd just been inside me, whose sweat was still drying on my skin, whose bite mark was currently hidden beneath my hair.

He reached the bottom of the staircase. The crowd parted like the Red Sea. Men in bespoke suits bowed their heads. Women in couture gowns curtsied so deep their foreheads nearly touched their knees. He acknowledged none of them. His eyes swept the room once, lazily, and then—

They landed on me.

The impact was physical. A punch to the sternum. A bucket of ice water down my spine.

I couldn't move. Couldn't breathe. My brain was doing something frantic and useless, trying to reconcile the images that were colliding like cars on a highway. Dane in his grease-stained band tee, laughing at the dinosaur I'd sewn onto his sleeve. Declan Vance in a three-piece suit, descending a staircase while billionaires bowed. Dane inside me, growling my name, his hand fisting in my hair. Declan Vance, the man I was supposed to be competing to marry.

The same man.

The same fucking man.

The recognition hit me in waves. Each one worse than the last.

He'd made the questionnaire. He'd set the requirements. The coffee. The Mario Kart scores. The vanilla syrup. Every single detail that had made me think the universe was finally, finally giving me a break—it was him. It had always been him. He'd been hunting me before I even knew I was prey.

And I'd walked right into his building. Submitted his application. Accepted his money.

Fucked him on his sofa.

"Son of a bitch," I whispered.

Tinsley heard me. She shot me a look—confusion, contempt, something else—but I didn't care. I was watching Declan work the room. Watching him dismiss a tech mogul with a single nod. Watching him bypass a cluster of socialites without a glance. He was moving through the crowd toward the candidates' semicircle.

Toward me.

The string quartet started playing again. Some waltz. The candidates around me were vibrating with tension, adjusting their gowns and their smiles and their posture. Tinsley had her game face on—lips parted, eyes dewy, the expression of a woman who'd practiced looking adoring in the mirror. Miranda was doing something with her hands that might have been a nervous tic or might have been a mating ritual.

I just stood there. Barefoot in borrowed heels. Safety pins glinting at my chest. His come still drying on my thighs.

He stopped in front of Tinsley.

She inhaled, ready to speak. He looked at her for approximately half a second, then moved on. Her face collapsed. Miranda didn't even get eye contact. He passed three more candidates without slowing, and the whispers started—what is he doing, who is he looking for, is he actually sniffing the air—

He was.

The bastard was actually tilting his head, inhaling, like a wolf tracking a scent.

My scent.

He found me at the back of the semicircle. The crowd's whispers swelled and then died. Every pair of eyes in the ballroom was suddenly fixed on us.

Up close, the suit was even more devastating. Charcoal threads woven with something that caught the light— silk, maybe, or actual spun gold. His tie was black, knotted with mathematical precision. His cufflinks were obsidian. His shoes were Oxfords that had never touched a sidewalk.

But his mouth—his mouth was the same. The curve of it. The cruelty of it. The way it tilted up at the corner, just slightly, as he looked down at me.

"Sloane."

He said my name like a secret. Like a threat. Like a promise.

The candidates stirred. Tinsley's mouth fell open. Miranda actually gasped. Someone whispered, "He knows her name," and someone else hissed back, "She's nobody, look at her outfit."

Declan didn't look at them. His eyes never left my face. They traced the bruise on my throat, half-hidden by my hair. They lingered on my lips, which were still swollen from his teeth. They took in the safety pins and the torn blazer and the borrowed heels with an expression that was equal parts amusement and ownership.

"You're trembling," he murmured. So quiet. Just for me.

"Fuck you."

The words came out before I could stop them. A reflex. A curse. A declaration of war delivered in a whisper.

His smile widened. It was the smile from the supply closet. The smile from the VIP lounge. The smile of a man who'd watched a mouse sprint gleefully into a trap and pause to thank the cheese.

"I remember a time," he said, his voice dropping to a register that vibrated in my molars, "about half an hour ago. You weren't this cold then."

The room tilted.

My hand came up—to slap him, to push him, to do something—and stopped halfway. Not because I'd regained control. Because his fingers caught mine. Just the tips. Light. Barely a touch. And yet my whole arm went still, locked in place by the electricity of his skin.

"Don't make a scene," he said. Still quiet. Still just for me. "The penalty clause for public disruption is very specific. Fifty thousand dollars. Immediate repayment. No extensions."

My blood went cold.

He knew. Of course he knew. He'd written the contract. He'd designed every clause, every trapdoor, every impossible choice. And I'd signed it. I'd signed it because I needed the money, because I thought I was outsmarting some faceless billionaire, because I never imagined—

"The dinosaur," I choked out. "The questionnaire. The coffee. You—"

"Me." His thumb stroked the inside of my wrist. The exact spot he'd touched in the corridor downstairs. The exact same pressure. The exact same devastating gentleness. "It was always me."

"Camille is your sister."

"Half-sister. Yes."

"You let me believe—"

"I let you believe a lot of things." His hand tightened on mine. Not painful. Inescapable. "I let you believe I was a mechanic. I let you believe I was a valet. I let you believe you were competing for the affection of a stranger." He leaned closer. His breath ghosted over my ear. "And now, Sloane, I'm going to let you believe one more thing."

"What?"

"That you have any choice at all."

He released my hand. Stepped back. Raised his voice so it carried across the silent ballroom.

"Ladies and gentlemen. The selection is complete."

Gasps. Murmurs. Tinsley's face went white, then red, then white again.

"This woman." Declan gestured at me, and the gesture was casual, almost lazy, but his eyes were burning.

"Sloane Beckett. She is my choice. She will be my wife."