Devil’s Heiress

2 *BEAUTIFUL DISASTER*

The screaming had stopped five minutes ago, but Nico Moretti continued methodically breaking Marcus Chen's fingers, one by one. The man hung unconscious in his chair, blood pooling on the concrete floor of Inferno's back room.

"Boss," Leo DeLuca shifted uncomfortably by the door. "He's out."

"Then wake him up." Nico's voice was conversational, like he was discussing the weather instead of torture. He wiped blood from his knuckles with a monogrammed handkerchief. "I'm not done."

Leo splashed water on Marcus's face. The man came to with a gasp, immediately whimpering when he saw Nico approaching with a pair of pliers.

"Please—I told you where the money is—"

"You told me where half of it is." Nico gripped the pliers. "I want to know about the other three hundred thousand."

What followed wasn't pretty. By the time Marcus finally broke completely, sobbing out the location of a safety deposit box in Queens, he was missing three fingernails and most of his dignity.

"Clean this up," Nico told Leo, straightening his tie. "And make sure he gets to a hospital. Eventually."

He emerged from the back room into Inferno's main floor, the pounding bass and flashing lights a stark contrast to the quiet brutality he'd just dispensed. The crowd instinctively parted as he moved toward the VIP section, some primitive part of their brains recognizing apex predator.

He was almost to his usual table when something small and furious came flying backward through the crowd like a human projectile.

The impact knocked the breath from his lungs. Arms flailed, expensive fabric tore, and suddenly he was tangled up with a woman who smelled like designer perfume and pure chaos. She looked up at him with the biggest green eyes he'd ever seen, mascara smeared, dress torn, and instead of fear or apology, she burst into laughter.

Not nervous laughter. Pure, delighted, slightly unhinged laughter.

"Holy s**t!" she gasped, still giggling as she poked his chest. "Are you made of concrete? I feel like I just ran into a sexy brick wall!"

Most people who collided with Nico Moretti literally or figuratively ended up regretting it. This woman was treating him like a particularly interesting carnival ride.

"Are you drunk?" he asked, because it was the only explanation for her complete lack of survival instinct.

"Getting there!" She grinned up at him, and he could see dried tears on her cheeks, a slight bruise on one side of her face. "Sorry for using you as a human shield. Some grabby finance bro back there couldn't understand that 'no' is a complete sentence."

She gestured toward the crowd where his security was already dealing with some suit who was loudly complaining about "uptight bitches who need to be taught a lesson."

"Happens," he said, surprising himself by engaging.

"Does it though?" She tilted her head, studying him with unsettling intensity. "You don't look like someone who has problems with grabby assholes. You look like you ARE the grabby asshole other people have problems with."

Leo coughed behind him, clearly shocked by her audacity. Nico found himself fighting a smile.

"What makes you say that?"

"Well, for starters, this entire club is giving you a twenty-foot radius like you're radioactive." She counted on her fingers. "Also, you smell like expensive cologne and recent violence, your knuckles are bloody, and everyone here looks like they're trying not to piss themselves when you walk by."

She grabbed his wrist and examined his knuckles with professional interest. "Very recent. Still wet. Someone had a truly awful night." She looked back up at him with a grin that was equal parts impressed and insane. "Please tell me it was Finance Bro."

"Different asshole."

"Even better! I love a man with a diversified asshole-punishment portfolio." She released his hand and swayed slightly. "You're either a mob boss, a serial killer, or really committed to method acting."

"What's your guess?"

"Mob boss. Serial killers don't usually wear suits that cost more than most people's cars." She studied his face. "Also, you've got that whole 'I own this place and everyone in it' vibe going on."

"Smart girl."

"Smart enough to know I should probably run screaming." She grinned wickedly. "But it's been that kind of day. The kind where you wake up as Manhattan royalty and go to bed as sidewalk trash."

"Rough day?"

"The roughest. Found out my sister's been f*****g my fiancé, lost my inheritance, got disowned by my mother, slapped by said cheating fiancé, thrown out of his building by security guards, and publicly humiliated in front of half of the Upper East Side." She ticked off disasters on her fingers. "So naturally, I decided to get blackout drunk and make terrible decisions with dangerous men."

"And here I am."

"Here you are." She looked him up and down appreciatively. "Definitely dangerous. Jury's still out on terrible decision, but I'm optimistic."

Against every instinct screaming at him to walk away, Nico found himself intrigued. "What did you have in mind?"

"Drinking contest. Winner takes all."

"What's all?"

Her smile turned wicked. "Guess we'll find out."

They commandeered the bar, her hand somehow finding his arm for balance. She moved like liquid mercury—all grace and barely contained chaos.

"I'm Evelyn, by the way. Former heiress, current disaster." She signaled the bartender with imperial authority. "Your most expensive vodka. The whole bottle."

"Nico. Current king of poor impulse control."

"A king! Even better." The vodka arrived and she poured two shots with surgeon-steady hands. "So King Nico, what's your kingdom? And please tell me it involves morally questionable activities and dangerous men in expensive suits."

"Something like that."

"Mysterious and evasive. My favorite combination." She raised her shot glass. "To mysterious kings and fallen princesses. May we both get exactly what we deserve."

They drank. She didn't even flinch.

Four shots in, she asked, "Do you ever feel like you're living in a prison made of other people's expectations?"

"Every day."

"Right? Like you're performing in a play you never auditioned for, wearing a costume that doesn't fit." She swayed but her eyes remained laser-focused. "I spent twenty-five years being the perfect daughter. Perfect grades, perfect manners, perfect fiancé. And you know what it got me?"

"Enlighten me."

"Absolutely f*****g nothing." She poured another round. "But you know what's funny? The moment I stopped trying to be perfect—the moment I embraced being the villain they always said I was—that's when I started feeling like myself."

"And who are you?"

"Someone who's about to make catastrophically poor choices with a beautiful, dangerous man."

Eight shots in, the space between them had somehow disappeared. She was pressed against his side, her hand on his thigh, her eyes bright with alcohol and something wilder.

"I think," she said, her voice husky, "that we should get out of here before I do something really stupid."

"Like what?"

"Like this."

She rose on her tiptoes and kissed him, and it wasn't gentle or tentative. It was desperate and hungry, tasting of vodka and mutual destruction. Her hands fisted in his shirt, pulling him down to her, and he found himself responding with an intensity that surprised him.

When they broke apart, both breathing hard, her eyes were full of something wild and desperate and completely irresistible.

"Your place or mine?" she whispered against his lips.

"Mine," he said, already knowing this was going to end badly for both of them.

"Perfect," she breathed. "I love a good disaster."