The Carlisle Hotel's rooftop bar was exactly the kind of place I never would have been able to afford on my own, but desperation had driven me to seek refuge in familiar luxury. After three hours of wandering Manhattan streets with my suitcases, dodging reporters and trying to figure out where homeless heiresses went to regroup, I'd remembered that the Carlisle had always been Eleanor's favorite spot for "discrete conversations."
Ironic that I'd end up here after she'd thrown me out like yesterday's garbage.
I sat in a corner booth nursing a glass of wine that cost more than most people spent on groceries, my laptop open on the table as I searched for apartments I couldn't afford and jobs I was overqualified for. The October evening had settled over Manhattan like a designer dress—elegant, expensive, and completely out of my reach now.
My phone had been buzzing nonstop with calls from reporters, gossip bloggers, and society acquaintances who suddenly wanted to know the "real story" behind my broken engagement. I'd finally turned it to silent and shoved it into my purse, but I could still feel it vibrating like an angry wasp.
The wine was going to my head—I'd barely eaten anything today—but I didn't care. For the first time in my adult life, I had nowhere to be, no one to please, no image to maintain. It was terrifying and oddly liberating at the same time.
"Another glass of the Château Margaux, miss?"
I looked up at the server, a polished young man who probably made more in tips here than I was going to make in my new life, whatever that turned out to be.
"Actually," I said, making a decision I'd probably regret, "make it a whiskey. Something expensive."
His eyebrows rose slightly, but he maintained his professional smile. "Any particular preference?"
"Whatever you'd serve to someone who just lost everything and wants to forget it for a few hours."
"I'll bring you something special," he said with genuine sympathy, and I realized I must look as broken as I felt.
While I waited for my drink, I scrolled through the news articles that had already started appearing online. "MANHATTAN HEIRESS ENGAGEMENT ENDS IN SCANDAL." "WINTERS-MORRISON ALLIANCE IN JEOPARDY AFTER BROKEN ENGAGEMENT." "SOCIETY PRINCESS DUMPS BILLIONAIRE HEIR—BUT WHY?"
They were all wrong, of course. I hadn't dumped anyone. I'd been discarded like a broken toy that was no longer useful to the children who'd grown bored with it.
"That's quite a collection of misrepresentations."
The voice was deep, smooth, with the kind of confidence that came from owning everything around you. I looked up from my laptop to find a man standing beside my table, and for a moment, I forgot how to breathe.
He was tall—probably six-three—with dark hair that looked like he'd run his fingers through it and striking blue eyes that seemed to see everything. His face was all sharp angles and classical features, the kind of bone structure that belonged on ancient Greek statues. He wore a perfectly tailored charcoal suit that probably cost more than my entire wardrobe, but he wore it with the casual ease of someone who'd never had to think about money.
There was something magnetic about him, an energy that made every cell in my body suddenly wake up and pay attention. Even in my current state—heartbroken, homeless, and half-drunk—I could feel the pull of his presence like gravity.
"I'm sorry?" I managed, closing my laptop reflexively.
"The articles," he said, gesturing toward my screen with a slight smile that didn't quite reach his eyes. "They're painting you as the villain in this particular tragedy, when anyone with half a brain can see you're obviously the victim."
I stared at him, trying to process the fact that this incredibly attractive stranger had been reading my laptop screen over my shoulder. "And you know this how?"
"Because villains don't sit alone in hotel bars looking like their world just ended," he said matter-of-factly. "They're usually celebrating."
"Maybe I'm just a very good actress."
His smile became more genuine, transforming his entire face. "Are you?"
"Not good enough, apparently," I said before I could stop myself. "Otherwise I might have noticed that my fiancé was in love with someone else."
The words hung in the air between us, more honest than I'd intended to be with a complete stranger. But there was something about his presence that made me want to tell the truth, as if he could see through any lies I might try to tell anyway.
"May I?" He gestured to the empty seat across from me.
I should have said no. I should have told him I wanted to be alone, that I wasn't in the mood for company, that I was having the worst day of my life and wasn't fit for civilized conversation.
Instead, I heard myself saying, "Sure."
He slid into the booth with fluid grace, his movements controlled and precise. Up close, he was even more devastating—those blue eyes held depths I couldn't read, and there was something about the way he looked at me that made me feel like he was seeing past all my carefully constructed facades to something real underneath.
"Alexander Kane," he said, extending his hand across the table.
Alexander Kane. The name hit me like a lightning bolt. Kane Industries was one of the largest conglomerates in the world, with holdings in everything from technology to real estate to defense contracts. If Charles Winters was wealthy, Alexander Kane was wealthy beyond comprehension.
And he was young—maybe early thirties—which meant he hadn't inherited his position. He'd earned it.
"Scarlett Winters," I replied, taking his hand. The moment our skin touched, I felt something electric shoot up my arm, and from the way his eyes sharpened, I knew he'd felt it too.
"I know," he said simply, not releasing my hand immediately. "I was at your engagement party last night."
I blinked in surprise. "You were?"
"Briefly. Business associates of your father's dragged me along." His thumb brushed across my knuckles before he finally let go, and I had to resist the urge to shiver. "You looked beautiful. And completely miserable."
The observation was so accurate it made my chest tighten. "You could tell?"
"I'm good at reading people. It's a useful skill in my line of work." The server arrived with my whiskey—something amber and expensive-looking in a crystal glass. Alexander glanced at it and then at me. "Rough day?"
I let out a laugh that sounded more like a sob. "You could say that. Let's see... this morning I discovered my fiancé's been having an affair with my step-sister for two years. This afternoon, my family decided they preferred the affair partner and threw me out of the house with fifty thousand dollars and a suggestion that I 'figure something out.'" I picked up the whiskey and took a sip, letting it burn down my throat. "So yes, rough day covers it."
Alexander's expression darkened, something dangerous flickering in those blue eyes. "They threw you out?"
"Apparently I was never really family anyway. Just a useful tool that outlived its purpose." The whiskey was making me honest in a way that probably wasn't wise, but I was beyond caring. "Twenty-eight years of believing I belonged somewhere, and it turns out I was just the understudy waiting to be replaced."
"I'm sorry," he said, and there was genuine sympathy in his voice. "That's unconscionably cruel."
"Yes, well, apparently cruelty runs in the family. Though I suppose I shouldn't say 'family' anymore, since I've been officially excommunicated."
Alexander leaned back in his seat, studying me with an intensity that should have made me uncomfortable but somehow didn't. "What will you do now?"
"Honestly? I have no idea." I gestured at my laptop. "I've been looking at apartments I can't afford and jobs I'm wildly overqualified for. Turns out a master's degree in art history and seven years of being a professional socialite don't translate to many marketable skills."
"You're more marketable than you think."
Something in his tone made me look up sharply. "What do you mean?"
Alexander signaled the server for his own drink—something dark and neat—before answering. "You've spent years navigating Manhattan's highest social circles. You understand how power works, how families like the Winters and Morrisons operate. You know their weaknesses, their secrets, their pressure points."
The way he said it made something cold settle in my stomach. "You sound like you're recruiting me for corporate espionage."
"In a way, I am."
I stared at him, not sure if I'd heard correctly. "I'm sorry?"
"I have a proposition for you, Scarlett Winters." His drink arrived, and he took a sip before continuing. "But first, let me ask you something. How badly do you want to make them pay for what they did to you?"
The question hit me like a physical blow. Because the answer was immediate and absolute: more than I wanted to breathe.
"Very badly," I admitted.
"Good." Alexander's smile was sharp, predatory, and absolutely beautiful. "Because I can help you do exactly that."
My heart started racing. "What kind of help?"
"The kind that turns victims into victors." He leaned forward, his blue eyes locked on mine. "I'm in the middle of a rather complicated business situation that requires someone with your particular background and skills. Someone who understands how Manhattan's elite operate from the inside."
"What kind of business situation?"
"The kind that involves taking down some very powerful people who think they're untouchable." His voice was quiet, controlled, but there was steel underneath it. "People like the ones who just destroyed your life."
I felt like I was standing on the edge of a cliff, about to jump into something I didn't understand. "Why would you want to help me?"
"Because we have common enemies," he said simply. "And because you have something I need."
"Which is?"
"Intimate knowledge of how the Winters and Morrison families operate. Their business practices, their personal weaknesses, their dirty secrets." His eyes never left mine. "You've been inside their world for years. You know where the bodies are buried."
The metaphor made me shiver, but not with fear. With anticipation.
"And what do I get out of this arrangement?"
"Revenge," he said matter-of-factly. "Complete, total, and perfectly legal revenge. Plus enough money to never have to worry about apartment hunting again."
I took another sip of whiskey, trying to process what he was offering. "This sounds too good to be true."
"The best opportunities usually do."
"What's the catch?"
Alexander's smile turned mysterious. "The catch is that once you say yes, there's no going back. You'll be entering a world where the stakes are higher than anything you've experienced, where one wrong move could destroy everything you're trying to build."
"As opposed to my current situation, where I have nothing left to destroy?"
"Exactly."
I looked around the elegant bar, at the city lights twinkling beyond the windows, at the life of luxury and privilege that had been ripped away from me in a single morning. Then I looked back at Alexander Kane—this mysterious, powerful man who'd appeared out of nowhere with an offer that sounded like something from a movie.
"If I say yes," I said slowly, "what happens next?"
"Next, you come work for me. I have several projects that could benefit from your expertise, and I think you'll find the work... satisfying."
"Work for you doing what?"
"Helping me acquire certain assets that have been difficult to obtain through conventional means." His voice was smooth, professional, but there was something underneath it that made my pulse quicken. "Starting with a complete hostile takeover of Morrison Holdings."
My breath caught. Blake's family company. The empire that had been built on the foundation of our arranged relationship, that would have made him one of the most powerful men in Manhattan.
"You want to destroy Blake's family?"
"I want to acquire their assets," Alexander corrected. "What happens to the family in the process is simply collateral damage."
The cold way he said it should have frightened me. Instead, it made something dark and satisfied unfurl in my chest.
"And the Winters family?"
"Will also find themselves facing some unexpected challenges in the near future." His smile was sharp as a blade. "But I'll need your help to make sure those challenges hit them where it hurts most."
I stared at him, this beautiful, dangerous man who was offering me everything I wanted wrapped up in a package I didn't fully understand.
"Why?" I asked finally. "Why help me? You don't even know me."
For the first time since he'd sat down, Alexander's composure slipped slightly. Something flickered across his face—pain, maybe, or old anger—before his mask slid back into place.
"Let's just say I have my own reasons for wanting to see certain Manhattan families brought down a few pegs," he said carefully. "And you're the perfect person to help me do it."
There was more to his story—I could see it in his eyes, hear it in the careful way he chose his words. But for now, it didn't matter. What mattered was the offer on the table and the choice I had to make.
I could walk away. Take my fifty thousand dollars and try to build a small, safe life somewhere far from Manhattan and the people who'd destroyed me. I could get a job, find a modest apartment, maybe eventually move on and find someone who actually loved me.
Or I could take Alexander Kane's hand and dive headfirst into whatever dark, complicated world he was offering.
I thought about Blake's face when he'd told Victoria he loved her. About Eleanor's cold dismissal of eighteen years of what I'd thought was family. About Victoria's tears that had been more about getting caught than about hurting me.
I thought about how it felt to be expendable, interchangeable, useful only as long as I served other people's purposes.
Then I looked at Alexander Kane, who was watching me with those intense blue eyes, waiting for my answer.
"When do we start?" I said.
His smile was blinding. "Right now."
As he signaled for the check and began explaining what would happen next, I felt something I hadn't experienced in years: the thrill of taking control of my own destiny.
I had no idea who Alexander Kane really was or what I was getting myself into.
But for the first time since I'd overheard Blake and Victoria's confession, I felt like I could breathe again.