He bought my father's debt. I became the payment. I had twenty-four hours to decide. Marry Cassian Vex for one year, and my father's $50 million debt disappears. My sisters get to keep their college funds. My family survives. Refuse, and he destroys us all. They say Cassian Vex is a man who turns everything he touches to gold. The ruthless billionaire CEO who acquires, dismantles, and profits. But when he walks into my father's office with that contract, I see the truth in his glacier-blue eyes. He didn't come for the money. He didn't come for our crumbling casino empire. He came for me. The contract is deceptively simple: one year as his wife. Live in his penthouse. Smile at his side during charity galas. Play the role of the devoted Mrs. Vex. And three rules that should be easy to follow Don't ask about his past. Don't fall in love. Don't try to leave. I thought I could survive twelve months with a man whose touch is ice and whose heart is stone. I thought I was just a pawn in some cruel billionaire's game. Then I found the photograph hidden in his office. My mother's face. His father's funeral. A secret that connects our families in blood and betrayal. My father's debt was never about gambling. It was about something my mother stole twenty years ago—something Cassian has been hunting ever since. And I'm not his wife. I'm his hostage. His key. His revenge. But here's what he didn't plan for: the way he watches me sleep, like he's afraid I'll vanish. The nightmare that makes him whisper a name in the dark, my name, but different, wrong, like he's confusing me with a ghost. The enemies circling us both, waiting for the moment we show weakness. The monster who bought me is bleeding out from wounds I can't see. And the closer I get to the truth, the more I realize we're both trapped in a game that started long before either of us was born. Now I'm wearing his ring and sharing his bed and uncovering secrets that powerful men have killed to protect. And when I finally discover what he plans to do when our year ends, when I learn the real reason his hand trembles every time he touches my face, I'll have to choose. Run and save myself from the man who owns me. Or stay and save him from the demons he's been fighting alone. Because Cassian Vex taught me that everything has a price. But he never expected I'd be willing to pay it.