The worst part of being dumped wasn't the heartbreak. It was the humiliation.
Sofia Alvarez stared at the champagne flute in her hand, its golden fizz mocking her as her ex-boyfriend laughed three tables over. He looked perfectly at home in his new life—an arm draped casually around his coworker, his shiny new "promotion," and not a single ounce of guilt in his smug smile.
Three years together, gone with a shrug and a two-sentence breakup text: It's not you. It's timing. And her father's the VP.
Merry Christmas, indeed.
She lifted her chin, ignoring the sting behind her eyes. The luxury resort sparkled around her—Miami heat wrapped in holiday glamour. Palm trees glittered with fairy lights, the ocean shimmered beneath a bruised twilight sky, and music drifted from the ballroom where the city's elite mingled. Everyone looked like they belonged. Except her.
She was just the collateral damage. The girl who'd been replaced.
"Smile, querida," her best friend Hazel whispered from the other side of the table, nudging her knee under the white linen cloth. "Don't give him the satisfaction of seeing you broken."
"I'm not broken," Sofia said tightly, though her throat ached with the lie. "I'm fine."
Hazel's eyes softened, pitying, and Sofia hated it. She didn't want pity. She wanted her life back.
She wanted to stop being the girl who lost.
Her gaze wandered past the poolside torches and caught on someone she hadn't noticed before. A man stood apart from the crowd near the bar, tall and sculpted like shadows had carved him. Black suit. Crisp white shirt. No tie. His presence was a paradox—still and watchful, yet every inch of him radiated danger.
Even from across the terrace, she felt it—the weight of his gaze.
It pinned her in place, stole the air from her lungs.
Dominic Varga. She'd heard whispers about him. A trillionaire investor with too much money, too much power, and rumors darker than midnight clinging to his name. Sin in a tailored suit. A man who didn't just walk into a room—he owned it.
And now he was looking at her.
Sofia's pulse stumbled.
Behind her, her ex's laughter rang louder, sharper, scraping over her pride. She caught his fiancée's smirk—the woman who had stolen everything Sofia thought was hers—and something inside her snapped.
Before logic could intervene, before Hazel could stop her, Sofia rose to her feet. Her heels clicked against the stone as she crossed the terrace, every step fueled by humiliation and rage and the need to rewrite her own story, just for one night.
She reached him. Up close, Nico Varga was even more devastating. Chiseled features. Eyes the color of dangerous seas. And the kind of calm that belonged to predators right before they struck.
He looked at her like she'd just walked into his trap.
Sofia's lips curved, even though her heart raced.
"Darling," she said loudly enough for her ex to hear. She slipped her hand through Nico's arm as though she'd done it a hundred times. "Sorry I'm late."
The entire terrace froze. Her ex's laughter faltered. Hazel's gasp carried across the table.
And Nico…Nico smiled.
Slow. Sinful. Promising ruin.
"Ah," he murmured, his voice smooth as velvet and just as dangerous. "There you are, querida." His arm shifted, pulling her closer, his palm resting firmly against the small of her back as though claiming what was his.
Sofia's breath caught.
She'd expected him to pull away, to correct her, to laugh in her face. But he didn't. He played along.
And in that moment, with the world watching and her ex finally silent, Sofia realized two things:
One—she had no idea what she'd just started.
And two—nothing about this man was a game.