LOST TO HIS GREATEST ENEMY

THE PROPOSITION

"Take a look at your bankruptcy clearance, Mrs. Sterling."

Valen tossed an encrypted tablet onto the kitchen island of his penthouse high above the East River. Manhattan stretched out below them, inside, the air was warm and quiet.

Sera didn't touch the tablet right away. She stood near the floor-to-ceiling windows, her blazer lying thrown over the back of a barstool. The blouse underneath had a faint smear along the right cuff where the broken wine glass had grazed her skin, but her posture was straight, her hands shoved deep into her trousers.

"The federal court docket filed eighty-four pages of debt allocations forty minutes ago," Valen said, leaning back against the edge of the counter with a lighter clicking between his fingers. Flame. Snap. Flame. Snap. "Cassius shifted thirty-two shell entities into your maiden name three months back. He forged your power of attorney on the Caribbean accounts. By eight tomorrow morning, the Southern District of New York isn't going to freeze his assets, Sera. They're coming to seize yours."

Sera stepped toward the counter, her thumb dragging across the glowing glass display.

Line after line of dark red numbers filled the screen.

There were secret companies in the Cayman Islands, fake shipping companies, and loans taken out in Sera’s name without any assets to back them up.

The total debt came to forty-two million dollars, and Sera was personally responsible for it.

Cassius hadn't just signed divorce papers but had left her as the sole living guarantor for a collapsing financial empire.

"He set this up before the board meeting in November," she said, her voice flat, not showing any form of surprise.

"He set it up the moment he realized I was draining his offshore reserves," Valen corrected smoothly. He snapped the lighter shut, tossing it onto the counter. "He needed an exit ramp. You were the easiest lock to pick."

Sera turned her head slightly, her gaze locking onto his face. The cheap suits he’d worn while serving as Cassius’s meek assistant were gone, replaced by the dark silhouette of a man who owned the building they were standing in. "And what do you get out of telling me this, Valen? A front-row seat to my deposition?."

"I don't watch depositions, Sera," Valen said, stepping around the island. His dress shoes made no sound on the floor as he closed the distance between them. "I offer solutions. I have a six-month contract sitting on the table in my study. Marry me."

A short, sharp breath escaped her nose. "What the…I just signed divorce papers an hour ago."

“You signed your own death warrant,” Valen said, stopping a few feet away. “Marry me for six months. As my wife, your debt will be protected from the authorities under my family’s legal protection. I’ll pay off the entire forty-two million dollars by tomorrow…And then I’ll take Cassius and Vivienne apart, piece by piece, until they have nothing left. When it’s over, half of Sterling Enterprises’ available money will be placed in a private trust for you.”

“Fifty percent of an empty company isn’t a victory,” Sera said, placing her hands flat on the counter. “Cassius took the company’s patents last Tuesday. He moved the expensive equipment into a secret trust in Zurich. You’re offering me half of a company that barely has anything left.”

"The Zurich accounts were frozen at midnight," Valen replied, his voice dropping slightly, heavy with quiet amusement. "By my private key. The patents were assigned to an anonymous holder three hours before Cassius even woke up today. I don't trade in ghosts, Sera. I own the vault."

Sera tracked his movement as he took another slow step closer. He was too large, looking calm, radiating an imposing, dangerous heat that completely filled the silent spaces of the room. This wasn't the man who spent three years silently handing her coffee cups and holding Cassius's briefcase in elevators.

"You played the submissive servant exceptionally well," she noted, her jaw tight. "Five years of bowing your head to a man with half your intellect. That takes a pathological level of patience."

"Patience is easy when you know the outcome," Valen said softly. "Cassius was busy flexing his father's money while I was taking inventory of his neck size. Every insult he threw across the desk was just another line in his ledger. But watching him hand you those papers tonight?" He paused, his dark eyes sharpening until they looked polished. "That was the only part of the strategy I found genuinely irritating."

"Don't pretend you care about my dignity, Valen."

"I care about what belongs to me," he said flatly. "And Cassius treated a masterpiece like scrap metal."

The arrogant sheer nerve of the statement hit her like a cold splash of water. "I don't belong to Cassius, and I certainly don't belong to a mafia boss playing corporate white knight."

"You belong to whoever gives you the weapon to tear him apart," Valen countered, "You want blood, Sera. You can pretend you just want your clean slate and your mother's stolen jewelry back, but I know what lives behind that cold, untouchable face…you want to see Cassius lose everything until he's crawling through the mud looking for his name."

Her throat tightened, but she didn't step back. The truth of his words hung between them, which felt thick.

Sera’s hand moved faster than thought. Her fingers reached beneath her waistband, sliding the gun from her concealed thigh holster. The steel clicked as she racked the slide, bringing the black barrel up until it pressed directly against the center of Valen’s chest, right over his heart.

"Give me one single reason," Sera whispered, her jaw set, her arm locked like iron, "why I shouldn't put a round through your chest, take that tablet, and handle Cassius myself?"

Valen didn't flinch. He didn't raise his hands. He didn't even drop his head to look down at the gun pressed into his custom Italian jacket.

Instead, a slow, dangerous smirk pulled at the corner of his mouth. He took a full step forward, forcing the barrel of the weapon deeper into his sternum, his eyes burning into hers with a quiet, suffocatiing inttensity.

"Because you need a king to play dark chess, sweetheart."

The rain rattled violently against the penthouse glass behind him.

Sera held his gaze, her index finger resting flat against the side of the trigger guard. Her pulse thrummed steady against her throat, hot and fast, matching the dark, unwavering weight in his eyes.

She lowered the barrel, letting the weapon drop to her side with a sharp click of the safety.

"Get the license ready," she said, looking him straight in the eyes. "We marry at sunrise.”