The curtains parted as Olivia Grey graced the marble floor like a goddess tossed into Olympus. Beneath the glittering chandeliers of Manhattan's most exclusive fundraiser, were billionaires circled like hawks, and there was Olivia, in her borrowed designer gown and painted confidence, she felt every inch of the imposters. She was a model hired for the night, just eye candy for a cause too rich for her understanding.
She moved with poise after having rehearsed from a hundred mirror sessions. The sharp heels of her shoes against the marbled elegance of the Grand Ballroom, her skin glittering under the lights but nothing gleamed quite as dangerously as the people in that room. On display was a vintage emerald necklace worth more than the apartment she was about to get evicted from. And for one night, she wore it like she belonged. It wasn't supposed to be anything more than a job. Walk, show the necklace, smile, get paid, go home. That was the deal. But in a room where fate loved to gamble, deals meant nothing.
Then there was a man standing by the bar in a midnight-black tuxedo, his hands wrapped around a crystal tumbler half-filled with bourbon, with the stillness of someone who didn't chase power, because power chased him, Alexander Sinclair, CEO of Sinclair Enterprises, a billionaire. His name alone could shake up markets.
A man whose wealth made politicians lean forward. He was rumored to have driven two senators into retirement.
Their eyes locked across the room and for a second, the room seemed to hush. Her pulse kicked. Olivia couldn't tell if it was fear or fascination. Maybe both, but certainly not butterflies. Something heavier, something inevitable.
Then the music shifted, she turned with practiced elegance and walked the length of the room as she had been instructed. Applause scattered around her like confetti, cameras flashed, as the MC announced the necklace's opening bid.
He watched her like a man reading a coded message, one only he could decipher. She broke the gaze and stepped off the stage, retreating to the privacy behind the runway. After the auction ended, her heart was still thudding in her chest as she unclipped the necklace and handed it back to the jeweler's assistant with warm hands.
The event coordinator, Lillian, with a too-bright smile while handing her a glass of champagne "You just made history, sweetie. Half a million for that piece."
Barely tasting her wine, Olivia lowers her glass of wine from her lips, "Glad I could help the rich spend their guilt."
Lillian giggled, "Some of us would kill for the kind of attention you just got out there."
"Attention doesn't pay the rent." Olivia responded.
Lillian leaned in, "Sometimes it does, when it comes from the right man."
The words hadn't even left her mouth when someone walked in. This time, the air changed with it. There came Alexander Sinclair, standing in the wings like he owned the shadows.
Olivia stiffened as their eyes met again, this time in a closer view. She felt her spine stretch and her breath hitch. He didn't smile nor offer a hand.
"You wear ambition better than diamonds," he said. She turned to find him closer than she expected, her heart skipped. He had lines of experience etched into his face, the kind that didn't come from age, but from conquest. He oozed control.
He wasn't flirting, it was observation. He had seen through the makeup, the posture, the pretense, and straight into the struggling model he had seen walk the stage.
"And you wear arrogance like a watch," Olivia replied calmly.
He chuckled once, deep and short. "I like a sharp tongue. Keeps the wolves honest."
"I'm not here for conversation."
He tilted his head. "No. You're here because you're clever. You saw the room, you felt the power, and you realized you're not afraid of it."
Olivia raised an eyebrow. "Should I be?"
"Only if you want to survive it." "Alexander Sinclair," he said, offering no hand. He expected her to know the name.
"I know," Olivia replied, slightly lifting her chin.
"And you seem too clever to be doing this forever," he observed, eyes flicking over her in a way that was neither predatory nor harmless.
He stepped closer, close enough that the scent of expensive cologne wrapped around her like tension, something deep, warm, smoky.
And in what seemed like a command and not an invitation, Alexander said "Come to dinner with me." as he sipped his drink.
She should've walked away. Every instinct screamed that this were the kind of men that make women like her disappear into penthouses without exits. But Olivia, burdened with rent worries, broken dreams, and no hope for the future, took a deep breath and responded, "Where to?" she asked, her voice barely steady.
He smiled and responded, "Somewhere you'll never forget."
Dinner was on the rooftop of his private hotel in Tribeca where no guests were usually allowed. The wind was cold, with an apocalyptic view. The world looked so small from here. They didn't talk about business, they talk about love, power, Olivia was intrigued by his demeanor.
Alexander watched her like a man studying a rare artifact discovered after decades of extinction, like a chessboard. He asked questions that made her reveal more than she wanted, about her failed auditions, her bartending side gigs, her mother who used to be a housekeeper in penthouses like his own.
And when dessert was served, so was the side dish; 'the offer'
"Ever think about upgrading your life, Olivia?" he popped the question. "I'm not asking for a fling, I'm asking for a future."
She laughed, "You just met me."
"I never said I was offering love. I'm simply offering the next twenty years of your life without borrowing or begging."
A flash of vulnerability crossed her face, but she masked it with a sip of wine. "And what do you want in return for such good deed?"
He leaned in, his voice velvet. "An ally, a beautiful complication, a distraction."
She thought of the broken image of herself which she manages to admire when she looks in her cracked bathroom mirror, her hundred- and thirty-five-dollar checking account, the eviction notice sitting pretty in her mail.
"I'll think about it," she said.
He stood, buttoned his suit. "No, you won't. You will say yes, because you're the kind of girl who is smart to know when she's at the edge of something bigger."
Two weeks later, there, Olivia, in the Sinclair estate elegantly dressed in a tailored white blouse, flanked by staff who now called her "Miss Grey" and offered her champagne at breakfast. She was no longer the model in distress modeling jewelries; she was about to marry the man who owned them.
Meanwhile, upstairs, in a penthouse not far from the gala, was a younger man in a room who had never left before noon, He stared at a monitor replaying footage from the fund raiser, specifically, the way Olivia looked at Alexander. Sharp jaw, colder eyes, and a scowl carved from betrayal, he slammed the laptop shut, his voice low and venomous, "She has no idea what she's getting into."
Liam Sinclair, the man whose name hadn't yet been mentioned, whose presence she would soon feel like a shadow wrapped in fire.