Chapter 3
Victoria swallowed hard, her manicured fingers digging into the edge of the mahogany. “She’s establishing total dominance before the demand letter lands. Look at her, Arthur. Not a single piece of jewelry. An off-the-rack polyester suit. She’s completely untraceable. She has no public footprint because she operates exclusively in the dark pools.”
I sat there, chewing slowly on another piece of brioche, watching the two of them whisper frantically like a pair of high-strung show poodles terrified of a thunderstorm.
*Dark pools?*
Did they think I was a lifeguard? What was wrong with these people? Was extreme wealth just a progressive neurological condition that rendered you incapable of understanding basic freelance invoices?
“Julian,” Victoria said suddenly, turning her terrifying, laser-focused glare onto her son. “A word. In the corridor. Now.”
Julian didn’t move. Instead, he leaned closer to me, his shoulder pressing against mine. The heat radiating off him was intoxicating, a heavy, solid contrast to the chilly, neurotic atmosphere of the room.
“Anything you have to say to me, Mother,” Julian said, his voice dropping into a cool, authoritative baritone that sent an unexpected shiver straight down my spine, “you can say in front of Clara. She’s not going anywhere.”
Under the table, his hand slid up from my knee, his fingers casually tangling with mine. His palm was warm, calloused from rowing or squash or whatever ridiculous pastimes the hyper-wealthy indulged in, and his grip was possessive—not the calculated touch of a client, but the unyielding grasp of a man claiming his territory.
My breath caught in my throat. I looked down at our joined hands beneath the white linen, my brain short-circuiting for half a second.
*Billable contact,* I reminded myself desperately. *Focus on the balance sheet, Vance. He’s just acting. He’s putting on a show for his mother.*
Except Julian wasn’t looking at his mother anymore.
He was looking down at me, his gaze dark, heavy, and intensely focused. The lazy, teasing smirk he’d worn outside the elevator bank was completely gone, replaced by something raw and hungry that made the air in my lungs feel thin.
“Julian,” Victoria warned, her voice rising an octave. “This is not a game. If the SEC steps in—”
“You brought the SEC up twice now, Mrs. Sterling,” I interrupted, pulling my hand gently—reluctantly—from Julian’s grasp to rest my forearms on the table. If they wanted to play hardball, fine. I had spent four years dealing with predatory landlords and small-claims court filings. I knew how to handle intimidation. “If you want to drag federal regulators into a private dispute over what Julian owes me, go right ahead. But let me remind you of something.”
I leaned forward, dropping my voice into the exact tone I used when a corporate controller tried to shortchange my overtime hours.
“Regulators ask for audits,” I said smoothly. “Audits require discovery. Discovery means every single document, every buried transaction, every offshore holding you’ve tried to hide behind your fancy law firms gets dragged into the blinding light of day. Do you really want an independent investigator tearing through your books, Mrs. Sterling? Because from where I’m sitting, your house of cards wouldn't survive the first thirty pages of an itemized ledger.”
Arthur buried his face in his hands with a muffled groan.
Victoria leaned back as if I had physically slapped her across the face. Her pearls trembled against her collarbone. She looked at me not with disdain, not with snobbery, but with the hollow, gut-wrenching dread of a sovereign ruler facing an invading army at the palace gates.
“The study,” Victoria whispered, her voice shaking so hard the crystal mimosa glass on her coaster vibrated. She pushed her chair back, the carved wooden legs scraping loudly against the herringbone parquet floor. “We are going into the study. Right now.”
She turned to Arthur, her eyes wide and feverish. “Arthur. Get the general counsel on the private line. Bring the settlement files from the safe. All of them.”
Arthur scrambled out of his chair, nearly tripping over the hem of his bespoke trousers, and bolted from the room without another word.
Victoria stood tall, attempting to pull her shattered dignity around her like a torn fur coat, and fixed me with a terrified, imploring gaze.
“Miss Vance,” Victoria said, her throat bobbing as she swallowed. “Please. Bring your terms. Let us see if there is any price—*any* price at all—that can buy this family our survival before three o’clock.”
She turned on her designer heels and marched down the long gallery toward the private library, her footsteps echoing like funeral bells.
I sat there for a long moment, staring at the empty doorway.
Then, I turned slowly to Julian.
“Are your family members always this dramatic when they have to settle an overdue bill?” I asked, genuinely curious. “It’s sixty-four dollars for the dry cleaning, Julian. If she’s really that strapped for cash, I’m willing to waive the toll fees, but the ten grand is non-negotiable.”
Julian stared at me.
For three full seconds, he didn’t breathe. Then, he threw his head back and laughed—a rich, booming, helpless sound that echoed off the vaulted ceiling and sent the terrified footmen scuttling toward the kitchen.
Before I could ask what was so funny, Julian reached out, cupped the back of my neck with his warm, strong hand, and pulled me toward him. His thumb stroked the soft skin just beneath my ear, sending an electric shock through every nerve in my body.
His eyes were blazing with something bright, fierce, and entirely dangerous.
“Clara Vance,” Julian murmured, his breath brushing warm against my lips, so close I could taste the sweet citrus of his champagne. “You are the most terrifying, magnificent creature I have ever met in my life. Come on.”
He stood up, pulling me effortlessly to my feet, his hand sliding down to interlock his fingers firmly with mine.
“Let’s go into the study,” Julian whispered, his thumb pressing into my palm. “And let’s see just how much my mother is willing to pay you to spare her life.”
The Sterling family estate didn’t just whisper old money; it screamed deferred maintenance disguised as heritage.
As Julian steered me down the wide, marble-floored portrait gallery toward the private study, I couldn’t help but calculate the heating bill for the vaulted ceilings. At roughly twenty-four feet high with single-pane arched casement windows that had probably been installed during the Taft administration, they were leaking at least four hundred BTUs an hour per square foot. Total financial insanity.
“You’re doing that math face again,” Julian murmured.
His hand had moved from my fingers to the small of my back. His palm was broad, searingly warm through the thin polyester of my clearance-rack blouse. Every step we took together felt synced, his long stride naturally slowing to match mine.
“That ‘math face’ saves small businesses thirty percent on their operational overhead,” I whispered back, leaning slightly into his shoulder to keep our voices private. “Do you have any idea how much money your family is bleeding on draft prevention alone? You could pay my remaining five-thousand-dollar balance ten times over just by weather-stripping those French doors.”
