The Fiance He Never Knew

The Cost of Control

Cassian point of view

The door closed behind Lyra, and the tension left the room. I let out a breath I hadn't realized I was holding. The silence of the penthouse came rushing back in, heavy and absolute.

I walked back to the desk. Her signature was still wet on the contract. Lyra Hayes. Neat and determined, even when her hand was shaking. She was cornered, and she fought back, but she signed.

It was done. The merger was secured. My grandfather couldn't stop me now.

I picked up the signed page and felt a grim kind of satisfaction. I had won. I always win.

But why didn't it feel like a victory?

I put the contract in the vault behind the painting. I went back to the crystal decanter and poured another measure of Scotch. I needed the burn. That woman was like a fire under ice. Even three years later, she still managed to break through my control.

Why her? I asked myself the question I refused to answer.

I told myself I chose Lyra because of logic. She was an architect, smart, and professional. She was also desperate. Desperation is predictable. She needed the money, so she wouldn't get sentimental. She wouldn't try to pull the true love trick when the six months were up.

But the truth was darker. I chose her because I knew she wouldn't forgive me. I wanted this arrangement to hurt. I wanted it to be ugly, painful business. It made the guilt I refused to feel a little easier to manage. I paid her off three years ago to correct an error. Now, I was paying her again to correct an inconvenience. Both were strictly business.

I looked at the black velvet box where the ring was now lying empty. The ring. That giant diamond. It wasn't for Lyra. It was for Elijah Vance. It told the world: I am serious. I am committed. I am controlled.

The ring had cost me a fortune, but the price I was paying Lyra was higher. Seven figures. Enough to save her firm and keep her away from me forever once this was over. It was my way of keeping the mistake of our one night contained.

I walked through the empty living room. The floor-to-ceiling windows showed the city in all its glory. It was my empire. Yet, when I looked at it, all I saw was the reflection of that tiny, angry woman I had just trapped.

I went to the service console and checked the security log.

23:45: Ms. Lyra Hayes and Personnel (Chloe Davis) checked in. Personnel assigned to the adjacent lower suite.

Personnel. Her friend. The "executive assistant." I had to keep a clean line. I hated the idea of that woman, Chloe, running around my building. She was an unknown variable. I had to make sure she understood the distance.

The whole arrangement felt messy. Lyra's desperation, her fiery eyes, the sudden presence of an extra person in my perfectly sterilized life—it was all unwelcome complication.

I walked into my bedroom. It was huge, dark, and silent. I hadn't slept well in months. The merger required absolute focus, but every night my brain went back to the problem of control. Lyra Hayes was a problem I thought I had solved. Now, she was back, two hundred feet away, wearing my ring.

I stripped off my shirt and walked into the bathroom. I stared into the mirror. I needed to look rested, powerful, and in love in four hours. The press would analyze every expression on my face, looking for weakness.

I thought about the script I gave Lyra: True Love, Absolute Privacy.

Tomorrow, I will have to touch her. I would have to look at her and lie to the world about feeling things I hadn't felt since I was a child. I would have to pretend I was protective and possessive.

Possessive. The word tasted sour.

She was mine for six months. A contract. Nothing more. But the thought of another man looking at that ring, looking at her, felt... wrong. She was my property now.

My temporary property, legally binding. It was the only way I could think about it. If I thought about the three years, the anger, the brief fire between us, I would lose focus.

I had to be cruel to be kind. I was saving her from herself. I was giving her the security she was so clearly desperate for. She owed me six months of performance.

I ran in the cold water. I splashed it on my face.

Cassian Vance. You are in control. She is just a signature on a document.

I looked at the clock: 3:50 AM. I had a long day of lying ahead of me. I wouldn't sleep, but I didn't need to. I would go to the gym, get a new burst of focus, and be ready for the world.

And I would be ready for Lyra. The woman I paid a fortune to pretend to love, and the only person in the world who could ruin everything I had built.