Vivian Hartley's POV

My fiancé butt-dialed me in the middle of sex.

With my best friend.

I almost cried. Happy tears.

"Silas, stop. What if Vivian finds out?"

That was Natalie. Soft, breathless, sweet as candy.

"Vivian?" Silas Blackwell laughed. "She's too boring to notice anything."

I pressed the phone to my ear and tried not to grin.

I was alone at a bar, nursing a club soda. My engagement party was in twelve hours. For two months, I'd been hunting for a way out of this marriage. I had found nothing.

Now this.

"Promise me you won't touch her after the wedding," Natalie whispered.

"Please. Have you seen her face? I'd rather kiss a wall."

Natalie giggled. "You're so bad."

I knew that giggle. Twelve years of sleepovers. She had never sounded that happy at my birthday.

I hit record.

Then the giggling stopped. A pause. Some rustling.

"Silas," Natalie whispered. "Your phone. The call is still on."

It was a terrible whisper. I heard every word.

Silence. Then Silas laughed, low and nasty. "Oh, is it?"

I didn't breathe.

"Hey, Vivian. You there?"

I said nothing.

"Good. Listen up. You might learn something."

And then Natalie started to moan.

Loud. Really loud. "Oh, Silas! Yes! Right there!"

It was the worst acting I'd ever heard. Natalie got cast as a tree in every school play. Now I knew why.

"Hear that, Viv?" Silas said, out of breath. "That's what a real woman sounds like."

"Silas, that's so mean," Natalie said, giggling. "Poor Vivian."

They wanted me to cry. They were going to be so disappointed.

I laughed out loud. The bartender took a step back.

"Thanks, guys," I whispered.

They were trying to hurt me. Instead, they were handing me evidence. More every second. It was like my opponent gave me the controller and left to get a snack.

I let it run until they hung up. I saved the file in three places. Then I made myself think.

A recording wasn't enough. Our fathers would say "boys will be boys" and move the wedding up. I needed something bigger.

Someone bigger.

That's when I saw him.

He sat at the far end of the bar, half in shadow. His jacket was on the stool next to him. His sleeves were rolled up. Dark prayer beads circled one wrist.

Nobody talked to him. Nobody even looked at him. Everyone stayed about six feet away.

For two weeks, I'd been stalking the Blackwell family tree like it owed me money. There were exactly three photos of this guy online. In one of them, he was standing next to Cyrus Blackwell, and Cyrus looked like he'd just been called to the principal's office.

I had no idea what he was to Silas. A cousin? A half-brother? The family secret nobody brought up at Thanksgiving? All I knew was that in every photo, everyone stood up straighter when he was around.

The smart move was to research him properly first. But the party was in twelve hours. Smart was off the table.

I slid off my stool and walked over.

"Anyone sitting here?"

He didn't look up. "Yes."

I looked at the empty stool. "Imaginary friend?"

"Someone who's about to leave." Now he looked up. Dark eyes, steady, completely unimpressed. There was something about his brow that felt weirdly familiar, and I shoved the thought away. "You."

I sat down anyway.

I knew what he was seeing: plain face, boring hair, blazer from the clearance rack. Zero threat. That was the whole idea. Guys' eyes usually slid right off me.

His didn't.

"I need a favor," I said.

"No."

"You haven't heard it."

"I've heard a hundred versions. The answer's no."

"It's not that kind of favor. It's a bad decision, and it's going to be a short one." I nodded at the beads. "Do those work?"

"Not for you."

"Shame. I'm about to need a lot of forgiveness."

I touched one bead with my fingertip. He went very still.

"One night," I said. "No names, no follow-up. You'll never see me again."

"I don't do that."

"Neither do I. Let's be bad at it together."

He stared at me for a long moment. A muscle in his jaw twitched.

"You've been drinking."

"Club soda. I can say the alphabet backward, walk a straight line, or read you a legal contract. Your call." I held his gaze. "I'm not drunk, and I'm not asking twice."

"Why me?"

"Because you look like a guy who's never been talked into anything."

"So what makes you think you can talk me into this?"

I leaned in until my mouth was right next to his ear.

"I'm not going to talk."

I don't really wear perfume. Just a blend I made myself, so faint most people never notice it. He noticed. He went totally still, leaned closer, and breathed in like he'd just remembered something he'd lost years ago.

Then he stood, grabbed his jacket, and told the two guys at the end of the bar, "Don't wait up."

They stared at him with their mouths hanging open.

He didn't touch me in the elevator. He didn't have to. The mirrored walls gave me a dozen copies of us, me small and plain and stubborn, him tall and silent, and every single one made my heart pound harder.

"You can still say no," I said, mostly to hear myself say it.

"Was that a question?"

"An offer."

"Sounded like a dare."

The door shut behind us. In the dark, his hand slid to the back of my neck, and he stopped an inch from my mouth.

"Last chance."

"I know exactly what I'm doing."

I did not. But I'd decided something back at that bar: if my life was going to get traded like property tomorrow, then tonight was mine. I pulled him down.

I told myself it was strategy. Around minute forty, I stopped telling myself anything.

At one point he froze, one hand braced by my head, and looked down at me like a piece had just slid out of place. "You've never—"

"Don't," I said. "Don't you dare stop now."

He didn't.

...

My alarm went off at 10:04.

I slapped it silent without opening my eyes. Everything ached. When I tried to sit up, I sucked a breath through my teeth.

An arm slid around my waist and hauled me back against a very warm, very solid chest.

"Not yet." His voice was rough with sleep, right against my hair.

"I have somewhere to be."

"So do I." His mouth brushed my shoulder. "It can wait."

It was, honestly, a really convincing argument. His hand was already drifting lower, and for one dangerous second, I forgot what day it was.

Then I remembered.

I caught his wrist and wriggled free. "Sorry, big guy. Engagement party."

I got dressed fast with my back to him, then dug out my wallet, fanned every bill I had, and dropped the whole stack on the nightstand. I turned around with the laziest smile I could manage.

"Thanks for last night, handsome. Don't worry, I'll book you again."

He just stared at me. I couldn't tell if he was mad or amused. I didn't stick around to find out.

I didn't look back, either. Every heist movie ever made says the same thing: never admire your own getaway.

The engagement banquet was in the ballroom of the Lumin Grand Hotel. When I slipped into the bride's dressing room at 11:20, the makeup artist was already tapping her watch.

I made it about three steps.

A hand swung at my face. I caught the wrist without thinking and held on.

"I've got an engagement party in less than an hour," I said calmly. "Are you sure you want to leave me with a swollen face before the makeup artist gets started?"

Thomas Hartley's face went red. "Where the hell have you been? You didn't answer your phone!"

"I'm here now."

"If anything goes wrong today, anything—" He leaned in and dropped his voice so the staff couldn't hear. "Every box in my study goes in the trash. Your mother's things. All of it."

Those boxes were the only thing I had left of my mom, and he knew it. That was the whole reason I'd said yes to this circus.

"Perfectly clear." I let go of his wrist and smiled. "Did Silas show up?"

That shut him up. He looked away for half a second, and that was all the answer I needed.

"So the groom is missing."

"His phone is off. The Blackwells have people looking."

"Let me get this straight. Silas disappears on the morning of our engagement, and I'm the one getting yelled at?" I spread my hands. "What am I supposed to do, get engaged to an empty chair?"

His jaw tightened. "Go get your makeup done. And don't embarrass this family."

I almost laughed. Silas slept with my best friend, and somehow I was the embarrassing one.

Then the door flew open. A staff member rushed in. "Mr. Hartley! Quentin Blackwell just arrived!"

Thomas went stiff. He grabbed my arm. "Come on. And behave."

"Who's Quentin Blackwell?"

"Silas's uncle." He looked at me like I'd asked who the president was. "The one man in this city you don't mess with. So behave."

In the hallway, people were crowding toward the entrance, whispering. "Is that really him? I heard he just got back to Lumin City."

The doors at the end swung open, and a man walked in.

Black suit. Broad shoulders. Cold, dark eyes.

My pulse was doing something I strongly objected to.

Silas's uncle.

Great. Fantastic. Really excellent work, Vivian.