The Billionaire’s Hidden Heirs

AVIRA’S POV "Wear the green one," Alessia said, holding it up against me like I hadn't already tried it on twice. "It makes you look like you belong somewhere." "I don't know if I belong at a Vale Foundation gala," I said. "I make dresses. I don't usually get invited to rooms full of people who buy them." "You're my sister. That's invitation enough." She smoothed the fabric over my shoulders, and for a second I let myself believe it, that she wanted me there because she wanted me there. Alessia has always been better than me at wanting things. She just usually wants them for herself. The Farrow Hotel ballroom was the kind of beautiful that makes you nervous. Low chandeliers, a quartet nobody was really listening to, servers moving through the crowd like they'd rehearsed it. I found a corner near the windows and made myself small, the way I do at parties that aren't mine. Alessia didn't make herself small. I watched her work the room for a while, laughing at the right moments, her hand landing on the right forearms, until she ended up deep in conversation with a man near the bar. His back was to me, dark suit, broad shoulders, the kind of stillness that made everyone around him look too loud by comparison. She was talking fast, the way she does when she wants something. I didn't think much of it. Alessia is always talking business with someone. She found me twenty minutes later with two glasses of champagne and a folded card. "Do me a favor," she said, pressing the card into my palm. "Take this up to twelve-oh-four. A donor's waiting, old money, hates crowds. Just drop it off and come straight back." "Why me?" "Because you're the only person here I trust not to try to marry him." She laughed, and I laughed too, and I took the elevator up with the card in one hand and a glass of champagne in the other. Somewhere between the lobby and the twelfth floor the numbers on the card blurred, one drink too many and a hallway that curved wrong twice before I found a door standing open at the end of it. 1402, not 1204. I knocked anyway, because the door was already ajar, and a voice from inside said, "You're early," like it was expecting someone else entirely. I stepped in. The suite was lit only by the skyline, no lamps on, and a man stood at the window with his jacket off and his tie hanging loose, like he'd been trying to talk himself out of something all night. He turned around. For one long second neither of us said anything. "You're not who I was expecting," he said finally. "I have a card for twelve-oh-four." I held it up. "Wrong room, I think." "You are in the wrong room." He didn't reach for his phone, didn't call anyone down, just watched me with an expression somewhere between amused and tired and said, "Why do you look like you're about to apologize for existing?" Nobody had ever asked me that before. "Bad habit," I said. "Comes from being the less interesting sister." "I doubt that's true." "You don't know my that." "No," he said. "I don't know you either." I should have left. I've thought about that moment more times than I'll admit, the exact second I could have turned around and gone back down to deliver a card to a stranger who was never going to matter to me. Instead I stayed, because the lights stayed off and the city outside the window did all the work of lighting the room, and because for the first time all night I didn't feel like I was performing for anyone. We didn't trade names. It felt like naming things would turn the night back into something transactional, and neither of us wanted that. So we talked instead, about nothing that mattered and everything that did, and somewhere between one glass and the last, the vast space between us disappeared completely and he gave me an unsettling look. I had had known him for barely an hour. That was what made the way he was looking at me so unsettling. “You always look at strangers like that?” I asked, trying to hide my nervousness. “Only the interesting ones.” I laughed softly, shaking my head. “You don’t even know me.” “I know.” He moved closer, then stopped, leaving just enough space between us for me to decide what happened next. I didn’t move away which was quite the opposite of what I’d do on a normal day. His eyes dropped briefly to my lips before returning to my eyes. The silence stretched. “This is probably a terrible idea,” I whispered. “Probably.” Neither of us moved. Then, almost impulsively, we leaned toward each other. Our lips met. It was brief, unexpected, and somehow enough to make the entire room disappear for a moment. When we separated, we stared at each other, both looking slightly stunned by what we’d just done. I touched my lips, almost incredulous. “We literally just met.” His smile was slow. “I noticed.” Immediately he pressed his lips to mine with an intense hunger, kissing me deeply and letting out a low grunt each time we parted to catch our breath. A warm sensation arose in my stomach as his fingertips glided along a line on my skin. He slowly and steadily began indulging in my breasts, descending to my wet and eager p***y. A soft moan slipped from my lips as I murmured, "Uhhh," savoring the bliss of the moment. In the following moment, I felt his presence within me accompanied by his moans. Moving in a repetitive motion in and out from slow to fast I felt I was getting to the c****x and my hands wandered around his body Fuckkk how can someone be so perfectly made? I surrendered to the influence of alcohol and the allure of pleasure. I somehow lost consciousness but remained aware, if that makes any sense. I woke before sunrise to an empty half of the bed and no name for the man who'd been in it. I got dressed in the dark, found my shoes by the door, and let myself out, and it wasn't until I was in the elevator that I remembered the card still sitting in my clutch. Room 1204. A donor I never delivered anything to. I didn't call Alessia that night. I let myself have it a little longer, whatever it was, before I had to turn it into a story for someone else.