The contract.
After long hours of driving, Valerie woke up wrapped in a blanket…clean, soft, and smelling of cedar. Her body had been washed and wounds treated.
This wasn't the brothel.
The room was wide, glass walls revealing a glittering city outside. The lights of tall buildings shimmered like stars. A marble floor beneath her bare feet. Everywhere was silent and beautiful.
And then, the sound of footsteps approached the door accompanied by a gentle knock.
She turned, fear struck her heart. A lot of things flash through her mind. "Is it Madame Claire or…"
"Can I come in?" a male voice cuts her off as the door opens gently.
A young handsome man in his 30s stood there…tall, tailored in black, every inch of him screaming power. His face was unreadable, his lips pressed in a straight line, but it was the eyes that struck her. Piercing. Almost... Magnificent.
"Wh... who are you?" she whispered hiding behind the curtains.
He didn't answer right away.
Instead, he walked to the window, looking out at the skyline before turning to face her as he stretched out a warming hand.
"Valerie Sinclair," he said almost in a way to confirm.
"Daughter of the man accused of stealing one hundred million dollars from the Lincoln Corporation."
Her Jaw dropped, She leaped towards the bed frightened.
"You were taken to Madame Claire's house of debt. You tried to run. Again." His voice didn't mock, but it didn't comfort either.
"Who are you?" she asked again, this time her voice trembling.
He took a single step towards the vanity mirror adjusting his button exposing the upper part of his chest to the collarbone.
"My name is Alexander," he said. "And I'm here to give you a way out." he smiled.
She stared at him. "What kind of way out?"
He snapped at his guards who immediately rushed in with a suitcase that contained different files and paperworks.
He pulled a document and laid it on the desk in front of her.
"Marry me for one year...and I will hand over the killer of your father to you. Red-handed," he said.
The words didn't register at first.
Valerie's eyes glanced through the paper as she picked it up. It contained printed names of both parties, Legal terms and Conditions. Her heart pounded. "Why? Why me?"
Alexander's jaw tightened. "Because the woman who ruined your father… Madame Claire is the same woman I intend to destroy. But I need you for that."
Valerie staggered backward. "You... are you one of them? THE LINCOLNS?"
A muscle in his cheek jumped. "Not quite. Not anymore."
"You want me to marry you to get back at Claire, how?" she questioned.
He stood there staring at her but didn't utter a word.
"I don't even know you!" Valerie flipped the paper on the desk and drew a chair from the Vanity.
"I know you," he said softly.
She froze.
He took another step, stopping just in front of her. "You were just eighteen then. You always sat by the fountain at the edge of Sinclair Square, sunflower earrings were your favorite and you hummed when you were nervous. You had dreams before the world decided to bury them."
Her lips parted, breath caught.
She looked up into his eyes—deep, dark, and uncomfortably familiar.
"Julian...?" she whispered.
His silence was the answer.
Valerie's knees nearly gave out. "You—you disappeared. I waited. I thought you were—"
"Dead?" he finished. "No. Just reborn."
She shook her head, backing away. "No, this is insane. It can't be true." She argued.
"What happened to you, how did you crosspath with Madame Claire that made you think if I pretend—to marry you—then you can seek revenge?"
"No. It has a lot to do with you as much as it has to do with me . I want you to survive," he said. "And this contract is your only ticket out."
She turned away, hands trembling, her eyes calculating and confused.
"I don't trust you." She replied.
"You don't have to. Just sign the contract."
Her eyes welled with tears. "And if I don't?"
He looked at her, emotions flashing in his gaze—something close to guilt. "Then you go back. To the brothel. To Catherine. To Madame Claire."
Valerie clenched the blanket around her.
Freedom was an illusion but right now her safety is a transaction.
She walked slowly to the table and picked up the pen.
Her fingers gripped the pen, and the ink touched the paper.
Then…her hand froze. She liftedher face towards him. "Why now, Julian?" she said with curiosity in her voice.
He didn't answer.
******
The pen trembled in her hand.
Valerie stared at the paper, the ink already smeared from where her fingers had touched it. Her eyes stung with unshed tears, her body tense with everything unspoken. She didn't want this life. She didn't want contracts and secrets and powerful strangers who whispered like ghosts from her past.
But more than anything, she didn't want to go back.
Alexander—or Julian, as her heart still whispered—stood like a statue on the other side of the room, watching and waiting like his entire life depends on this. He hadn't moved since she froze.
The silence in the room was so thick, it choked her.
"I don't know if I can do this," she said, her voice barely audible.
"You can," he replied.
Valerie looked up at him. His eyes weren't cruel or cold. But they held something far more questioning, something like expectation. Like he'd already decided who she was supposed to be or more like a pawn in a game she hadn't agreed to play.
"How do I know you're not lying to me?" she asked.
He sighed, moving slowly towards her. "Because I'm putting my life on the line just by being near you."
Her breath increased.
"This isn't just revenge," he continued. "It's survival. For both of us." he concluded with the look of sincerity.
"On one condition." She managed to find her voice. "There is one person I need to find, my grandmother, she has been placed in nursing care ever since we got separated." She concluded with teary eyes.
After a few minutes of thinking, Alexander agreed with a nod. "That would be taken care of."
Valerie's fingers tightened around the pen with a heart full of vengeance. She thought of Catherine's wicked smirk. The whip marks on her back. The nights she cried silently into her pillow so the other girls wouldn't hear. The day she watched her father lowered into the ground with nothing but shame written across his name.
And finally Madame Claire, who has ruined her family and felt untouchable.
Valerie looked back at the contract. Just her signature would change everything.
And her freedom, if it even existed, would be rewritten.
She pressed the pen to the line. Wrote her name. Slowly, carefully. Valerie Sinclair.
The moment she dotted the "i," something shifted in the room.
Julian—no, Alexander—nodded once.
"You've just become the most dangerous woman in the city," he said.
Valerie wasn't sure if she should be proud or scared.
Maybe both.
Alexander picked up the contract letter and smiled, tucking it back into the leather, and handed it over to one of his boys.
The silence that followed was heavy, aching.
Then his phone buzzed. A message from a known source popped up. He reads it, his face darkening.
"What is it?" she asked. A sudden fear gripped her heart.
"They knew you had escaped," turning the phone that contained a message and her picture. "But don't worry, you're safe here until I figure out what to do next. No one will find you." he assured as he stood up to take a leave.
"Get well Miss Sinclair… here you're the queen." he smiled brushing her rough blonde hair towards her face and left.
Valerie's body felt an atom of relief mixed with a tiny freedom.
*****
The next morning, she woke up in a different suite. Alexander had come back later that night to pick her up for a safer location. This place feels like heaven, somewhere Valerie cannot even imagine going to not to talk of staying at the VIP home suite COLUMBUS PLAZA, Chicago.
A soft robe was folded beside her bed. A breakfast tray waited on a polished cart, fresh strawberries, toast, and eggs that smelled like home. She hadn't had a hot meal in months. Everything feels like a dream, maybe a trance.
She stood at the front curtain exposing her half-naked body to sunlight shining from the glass window. The view of the ocean helped her calm her brain. Her reflection is shown directly in the mirror.
Blonde hair in wild curls. A faded bruise near her collarbone. Eyes tired but burning with quiet defiance. Her plastered knees struggling to recover from the pain she went through.
She didn't recognize herself.
There was a knock.
Before she could speak, the door opened and two young damsels stepped in—tall, poised, dressed in charcoal gray lady suit with a clipboard and some bags filled with luxurious items.
"Good morning, Miss Sinclair," one of the ladies said. "I'm Celeste, Mr. Alexander's assistant. And here is Vivian, my assistant. We are both here to prepare you for a change of appearance."
"A change of appearance?" Valerie blinked in awe, her eyes flickering.
Celeste gave a cool smile. "You are his fiancée now. You need to look gorgeous and presentable, even your own enemies will be shocked at your transformation." She smiled.
Valerie's heart filled with amusement as she was treated like a queen. She had a hot bath with rose petals in a jacuzzi, her body and hair were scrubbed thoroughly.
The next hour passed in a blur. Hair. Makeup. A tailored red dress that hugged her body and made her look nothing like the girl who had climbed out of a brothel tunnel just days ago.
She didn't know what to expect from this new life but she was in it now. And this is way better than a brothel.
She took a final glance at herself in the mirror. She couldn't find any trace of mark on her face. For the first time in months, she smiled again.
"You look gorgeous," Celeste agreed. "Mr Alex will be waiting at the restaurant— he doesn't like his time being wasted."
The car that picked her up was sleek and black. The city moved like a film reel fast, glittering remarkably. She had slept all through the journey from Holland last night about approximately 292 miles away from her pain, a smile lightened her mood.
They pulled into a grand building—gold pillars, guards rushing to get the doors. Valerie felt her breath disappear.
He stepped out first, offered his hand to help her out. Valerie took it.
Another guard collected her purse and they all walked into the hall.