HIDDEN FREQUENCIES

BEAUTIFUL DISTRACTIONS

RIACHARD POV

Two days after the lab incident, I decided the best way to handle stress was simple.

Ignore it.

Preferably in my mansion.

With music playing.

Wine open.

And Lusiana in my bed.

The world could collapse tomorrow.

Novaris could burn.

The chair could wake up again and decide to destroy half the city.

But tonight, I wanted no alarms.

No radiation warnings.

No cracked glass.

No Ethan Blake demanding answers with that deadly calm expression of his.

And absolutely no Lucian Vale standing in my lab looking like a genius until actual danger arrived.

Tonight, I wanted distraction.

Beautiful distraction.

Lusiana laughed against my mouth as I pulled her closer, her fingers sliding into my hair. The bedroom was dim, the city glowing beyond the tall glass windows. The sheets were already ruined, the pillows thrown somewhere near the edge of the bed, and the expensive lamp beside us tilted dangerously to one side.

I should have cared.

I didn’t.

Her lips moved against my jaw, warm and teasing, and for a while, I let myself forget everything.

The chair.

The destroyed chamber.

The repair bills.

The board pressure.

Ethan’s silence.

Ariana Parker’s impossible calm.

I let the night swallow all of it.

Lusiana’s hands pressed against my chest as she looked up at me, eyes bright with amusement.

“You’re distracted.”

I kissed her before she could say anything else.

She smiled into it.

“Richard.”

“I’m not distracted.”

“You are always distracted.” Her nails dragged lightly over my shoulder. “But tonight, you’re thinking.”

“That sounds terrible.”

“It is.”

I lowered my head to her neck.

She laughed softly, then gasped when my teeth grazed her skin.

For a moment, the conversation ended.

Good.

Conversation was exactly what I was trying to avoid.

Outside the bedroom, music continued from the lower floor. Two other women had arrived earlier with Lusiana, friends of hers from some party I barely remembered agreeing to host. They had stayed for wine, laughter, flirting, and chaos.

My mansion was used to chaos.

So was I.

Maybe that was the problem.

Everyone from our old group had changed somehow.

Ethan had become serious.

Ares had become colder.

Aiden had become almost responsible, which was personally offensive.

And me?

I had remained exactly what everyone expected me to be.

Richard.

The playboy.

The rich distraction.

The man who smiled through everything because smiling was easier than admitting something had scared him.

And the lab incident had scared me.

More than I wanted to admit.

Lusiana noticed too much.

She always had.

That was why I liked her.

That was why she was dangerous.

She pushed me onto my back and leaned over me, dark hair falling around her face.

“There,” she said.

I raised an eyebrow.

“There what?”

“You disappeared again.”

“I’m right here.”

“Your body is.”

I groaned.

“Why does every woman suddenly speak like a therapist?”

“Because men like you need therapy.”

“I need wine.”

“You need honesty.”

“Wine is better.”

She laughed and kissed me again.

This time slower.

Deeper.

The kind of kiss that turned thoughts into heat and guilt into something easier to ignore. I held her waist, pulling her closer, letting the warmth of her body press the cold memory of the lab out of my mind.

For a while, it worked.

The night blurred into skin, laughter, whispers, and the kind of reckless pleasure I had always been good at choosing.

I knew how to enjoy beautiful things.

Beautiful women.

Beautiful rooms.

Beautiful lies.

And the most beautiful lie of all was pretending nothing mattered once the bedroom door closed.

But then my phone rang.

Once.

Twice.

Three times.

I ignored it.

Lusiana glanced toward the bedside table.

“Aren’t you going to answer?”

“No.”

“It might be important.”

“Everything is important. That’s why I ignore most of it.”

The phone stopped.

Then started again.

I cursed under my breath.

Lusiana laughed as I reached for it.

The screen showed one word.

LAB.

My mood died instantly.

I answered.

“What?”

The engineer on the other end sounded exhausted.

“Sir, the containment frame replacement cost just doubled.”

I closed my eyes.

Of course it did.

“Why?”

“The resonance blast damaged the lower support system. We’ll need to rebuild the entire chamber base, not just the glass.”

I sat up slowly.

Lusiana watched me from the bed, the sheet pulled loosely around her.

“How much?”

The engineer hesitated.

That was never good.

“Say it.”

“Approximately eighteen million.”

I stared at the ceiling.

Eighteen million.

For glass, metal, and one impossible chair that seemed personally committed to ruining my week.

“Approved.”

“Sir?”

“Approved,” I repeated. “Replace it. Reinforce it. Triple-layer the chamber. Add independent regulator access outside the radiation field. And if anyone suggests using another artificial neural model before I approve it, throw them out of my lab.”

A pause.

“Yes, sir.”

“And send the revised breakdown to me before morning.”

“Yes, sir.”

I ended the call and dropped the phone onto the bed.

For a few seconds, I said nothing.

Lusiana sat up behind me and placed her hands on my shoulders.

“Eighteen million?”

“Apparently.”

“For repairs?”

“For stupidity.”

Her fingers moved slowly against my tense muscles.

“Was it that bad?”

I laughed once.

Short.

Humorless.

“The lab almost exploded.”

Her hands stilled.

“Richard.”

I looked toward the windows.

The city outside was glowing.

Peaceful.

Untouched.

People down there had no idea how close we had come to something much worse than a damaged lab.

“It was supposed to be controlled,” I said.

“Was it?”

“No.”

The word came out sharper than expected.

I rubbed a hand over my face.

“No, it wasn’t.”

For a moment, the room felt too quiet.

I hated quiet.

Quiet made memories louder.

The core glowing white.

The chamber cracking.

Researchers running.

Lucian freezing.

Ethan standing still.

And Ariana Parker walking straight toward the regulator panel like the rest of us were children staring at a fire.

Lusiana moved closer and rested her chin on my shoulder.

“What happened?”

I didn’t answer immediately.

Because the truth sounded ridiculous.

A chair nearly destroyed a lab.

An assistant stopped it.

And none of us understood how.

“A woman saved us,” I said finally.

Lusiana’s brows lifted.

“A woman?”

“Ethan’s assistant.”

She pulled back slightly.

“His assistant?”

“That was everyone’s reaction.”

“What did she do?”

I looked down at my hands.

“She walked into the release field while everyone else was running out.”

Including me.

I hated that part.

I hadn’t run far.

But I had moved back.

Everyone had.

Except Ethan.

Except Ariana.

And Ethan had not stopped her.

Maybe because he trusted her.

Maybe because he was too shocked.

Maybe because deep down, he already knew she was the only person in that room who understood what was happening.

“She stopped it manually,” I said.

Lusiana stared at me.

“How?”

“That is the problem.”

“You don’t know?”

“No one knows.”

“Not even the genius who created the test?”

I laughed darkly.

“Lucian?”

“Yes.”

“He looked like he had seen God and realized God hated his research paper.”

Lusiana tried not to smile.

Failed.

I looked at her.

“You think I’m joking.”

“I think you joke when you’re shaken.”

I said nothing.

She touched my face, turning me toward her.

For once, her expression wasn’t teasing.

It was soft.

Too soft.

I didn’t like soft.

Soft made it harder to pretend.

“You were scared,” she said.

I looked away.

“I was irritated.”

“Richard.”

“I was responsible for that floor.”

“And you were scared.”

My jaw tightened.

The old me would have kissed her until she forgot the question.

The easier me would have smiled and said something charming.

But tonight, the memory of that cracked glass still sat in my chest.

So I told the truth.

“Yes.”

Lusiana’s expression changed.

Not pity.

Not surprise.

Understanding.

That was worse.

“I was scared,” I said again, quieter. “Because for once, money didn’t matter. Protocol didn’t matter. Intelligence didn’t matter. Everyone in that room knew we were seconds away from disaster, and no one knew how to stop it.”

“Except her.”

I nodded.

“Except her.”

Lusiana was silent for a moment.

Then she asked the question no one at Novaris wanted to ask out loud.

“Who is she?”

I looked toward my phone.

Reports were already waiting.

Repair estimates.

Damage scans.

Incident statements.

A clean version of the disaster everyone would pretend was under control.

Ariana Parker would probably be described as an employee who acted quickly during a system malfunction.

Simple.

Safe.

A lie.

“I don’t know,” I said.

And I hated that answer.

Lusiana leaned into me, her arms wrapping around my shoulders from behind.

For once, I let her.

The warmth of her body against my back grounded me.

Reminded me I was not still in that lab.

Not still standing under red lights.

Not still listening to glass split above a chair that should never have been rebuilt.

“You need sleep,” she whispered.

“I need a new lab.”

“You need both.”

“I need a drink.”

“You already had three.”

“Then I need four.”

She laughed softly and kissed my shoulder.

The sound loosened something in me.

Not much.

But enough.

I turned and pulled her back into my arms.

She came easily, smiling against my mouth.

“You’re impossible,” she murmured.

“I’m rich. People forgive more when you’re rich.”

“I don’t.”

“No.” I brushed my lips across hers. “You make me work for it.”

“Someone has to.”

I kissed her again.

Slower this time.

Less like distraction.

More like gratitude.

She had a way of making the world feel less sharp, even when she was cutting straight through me.

The night tried to return to what it had been before the call.

Warm.

Heavy.

Full of wine and skin and the kind of desire that made thinking unnecessary.

But the lab stayed with me.

So did Ariana Parker.

Not in the way Lusiana did.

Never that.

Lusiana was touch.

Heat.

Laughter.

A dangerous woman in my bed who knew exactly when I was lying.

Ariana was something else entirely.

A question.

A warning.

A person standing at the center of a mystery none of us were prepared for.

I held Lusiana closer and closed my eyes.

Tomorrow, I would repair the lab.

I would replace the chamber.

I would sign the bills.

I would tell Ethan the floor would be functional again within a week.

I would pretend everything was manageable.

Because that was what men like us did.

We fixed broken glass and ignored the fact that the real fracture was somewhere deeper.

But one truth refused to leave me.

The chair had nearly destroyed my lab.

Lucian had frozen.

Ethan had noticed.

Ariana had stopped it.

And I had no idea what scared me more.

That she knew how.

Or that Ethan Blake was starting to realize it too.