The Mayor's Dirty Little Secret

INCITING INCIDENT

Vanessa arrives in Minnesota with two goals. The first is to disappear long enough to stay alive. The second is to find the man she believes is running a major drug trafficking operation, the same network that has been trying to silence her since she began investigating them back in New York. She is a reporter without a newsroom, working off a lead that brought her to this city, and she is doing it entirely alone because everyone she trusted has either pulled away or warned her to stop. She checks into a modest motel and begins watching her target, a man connected to the trafficking ring who has been spotted in the city.

One evening she tracks him to a hotel bar and positions herself nearby to observe. What she does not know is that another person in that room is doing the exact same thing. When the situation becomes tense and it becomes clear that the gang members are beginning to notice her, a stranger steps in beside her. He pulls her close, speaks quietly, and in seconds they are performing the role of a couple out for a casual evening together. They kiss, they laugh, they sell it well enough that the suspicion fades. Neither of them knows who the other is, but the ease with which they fall into the act is unsettling in the best way. His name is Xavier, though she does not learn that yet.

What neither of them realizes is that the gang had already flagged them both as potential threats. To test whether they were genuinely a couple or simply working together, someone slipped a drug into their drinks. By the time they move upstairs, neither of them is in full control of their actions. They spend the night together, and the chemistry between them is undeniable even through the haze of what was done to them without their consent.

Vanessa wakes up alone. Xavier has left a note explaining what happened, that the drug was a test, that the gang watched to see if they would behave like a real couple, and that having passed the test the men have cleared out of the hotel. He tells her she is safe to leave. Vanessa is furious. She lost her targets and lost an entire night she cannot fully account for. She gathers herself and heads back to her motel, but trouble finds her before she can settle. Men connected to the gang show up and she is forced to run. In the chaos she collides with a police officer and is taken into custody under suspicion of being intoxicated.

At the station, no one believes her and no one comes to help. The officers are dismissive and aggressive, and when one of them shoves her toward a cell door she loses her footing. Before she hits the ground, someone catches her. She looks up and finds herself face to face with the stranger from the bar. He is the Mayor of Minnesota, his name is Xavier Reyes, and he has just decided that she is exactly who he needs.