Zariel had sent her boss a proposal to marry her, and he had just opened it. "Please tell me that says Marcus," she whispered, pointing at the name on her screen. "Look properly, Maya. People have survived worse spelling mistakes." Maya leaned across the desk, her hair clip scraping the glass partition. She read the address, then stopped chewing her gum. "That says Kaelen Sterling. There isn't a generous way to read it." Zariel clicked the message again, although opening it for the fourth time could hardly change the recipient. The subject line filled the screen: CONFIDENTIAL CONTRACT MARRIAGE PROPOSAL. Below it sat the attachment she had spent half the morning improving. Public appearances, payment terms, physical boundaries, everything a wealthy client needed to rent a convincing spouse. "I was changing his calendar," she said. "Marcus needed the revised template, the agency server was down, and I had both windows open." "On your work computer?" Maya glanced toward the executive corridor. "You run a fake dating business beside his meeting schedule?" "I run it after work. Today was an exception." "Today might be your last day at work." Zariel reached for the recall option. Her fingers slipped on the mouse, she tried again, and the blue read indicator remained beside Kaelen's name. Maya caught her wrist before she could click anything else. "He has it, Zari. Sending another message won't make him forget the first." "Maybe he thinks someone is testing the mail filter." "Does the document have our company watermark on it?" Zariel lowered her hand. She could still see the pale lettering behind the clauses, a small shortcut that now looked remarkably like evidence. "The client needs a husband by Friday," she said. "If we lose that booking, the bank takes Brenda's house. I couldn't wait for Marcus to fix the server." Maya's teasing expression faded. "How much time does she have?" "Until the end of the week. I've got three hundred dollars, and the bank doesn't accept good intentions." Across the floor, someone laughed over a ringing telephone. Zariel wanted to turn around and ask them how they could possibly find anything funny. She had worked for Kaelen for a year, learning his schedule, anticipating his demands, keeping his days running without being noticed. He had dismissed a senior vice president over a careless presentation last Tuesday. She had delivered a marriage business to his inbox. An alert covered the message before she could decide whether to apologize. Executive Suite 1A. Emergency meeting. Attendance required immediately. Maya let go of her wrist and took the files off the edge of the desk. "Straighten your jacket," she said. "And don't tell him the server story before he asks. You'll talk yourself into a second disaster." Zariel pulled her curls back into their loosened bun. "If I don't come back, delete my browser history." "Come back and do it yourself," Maya said quietly. Her badge shook against the scanner outside his office. She steadied it with both hands, waited for the light to turn green, and entered. Kaelen sat behind his desk with her document facedown beside his tablet. He didn't look up. The city stretched behind him, bright enough that she could see her reflection in the glass, a woman clutching a tablet to keep her hands occupied. "You wanted the merger schedule?" she asked. "I have the changes." He finished reading whatever was on his screen, set the tablet down, and looked at her. His blue eyes moved from her untidy hair to the tablet pressed against her chest. Zariel lowered it before he could tell her to. "Take a seat, Miss Thorne. The schedule can wait." She sat opposite him, her knees tucked together, and placed the tablet across her lap. His suit had no creases, his desk no clutter, and her mistake was the only paper between them. "About the message," she began, "I was checking whether an unusual attachment would get through our internal filters." Kaelen rested a finger on the printout. "A marriage proposal is an unusual choice for a security test." "The subject matter wasn't the point. It was the attachment." "Then explain why the proposed fee is five hundred thousand dollars." She pressed her lips together. She could hear herself inventing excuses and knew how those excuses sounded to a man who signed off on investigations. "I sent it to the wrong person," she said. "It belongs to a private business. I'll remove the files from this computer." "You prepared it yourself?" His finger stayed on the page. "Most of it. My partner handles the bookings." "And you handle the terms." He waited until she nodded. "The boundaries are unusually specific." "People get careless when they think payment buys everything." His gaze held hers, and Zariel regretted the answer without regretting what it meant. She had coached enough frightened clients to know why those clauses mattered. "I understand this creates a problem with my employment," she said. "The work is separate. I haven't used company information, and nobody at my agency has access to your files." "I have not asked about your employment yet." That last word kept her in the chair. She glanced at the office door, then back at the document, wondering whether she would leave with an escort. "Mr. Sterling, the proposal wasn't intended for you." "I gathered that from the recipient you meant to choose." He turned the paper over and slid it across the desk. Zariel recognized the clauses she had checked that morning, including the penalties she had tightened at Marcus's request. At the bottom, beneath the space reserved for the client, black ink cut across the page. She leaned closer, certain she was reading it incorrectly. Kaelen's signature was familiar from a hundred documents, and this one matched every stroke. "You signed it?" she asked, forgetting to lower her voice. He watched her across the desk, leaving the proposal within her reach. "I need a wife, Miss Thorne. You have just offered me one."

"You cannot order a wife through your assistant's inbox." Zariel pushed the contract back toward him. "Even if your assistant made a terrible mistake." Kaelen stopped the page with two fingers. "You sell this service. Explain why I cannot purchase it." "Because you are my boss, and this was a template." "A well prepared template. The asset terms are clear, the penalties are substantial, and neither party has to pretend this is a love match in private." Zariel looked at the signature again. She had imagined dismissal, humiliation, perhaps a lawyer asking unpleasant questions. She had not prepared for him to become a client. "The original customer needs a temporary spouse because of his family's trustees," she said. "You don't strike me as a man who takes orders from relatives." Kaelen settled back in his chair. "My uncle Harrison sits on the board. He would disagree with you." "Let him disagree. You own the company, don't you?" "I lead it. There is a difference, particularly while a merger depends on other people signing their names." He spoke without the usual impatience he reserved for questions from his staff. That made her listen, although she kept her hands clear of the document. "Harrison has persuaded several investors that my private life makes me unreliable. Yesterday he made their position plain. They want a married man leading the company." "Someone to smile beside you while they inspect the accounts?" "Someone they believe I intend to build a life with." "Those are very different jobs, Mr. Sterling. One ends when the cameras leave." "Your proposed agreement lasts a year. That is sufficient." She rubbed a thumb along the edge of her tablet. Her agency matched people with partners who could survive demanding families and suspicious friends. A board overseeing a huge merger would be harder to fool, especially when one party was its chief executive. "You realize what happens if this gets out?" she asked. "They won't praise the quality of my clauses." "It will remain private. You are experienced, and I have the resources to keep our information secure." "You sound very sure about something we haven't even started." "I do not intend to start unprepared." He glanced at her contract. "Your premium fee is five hundred thousand dollars, with expenses paid separately." The figure had sounded sensible when she wrote it for a stranger. Spoken across her employer's desk, it made her grip the tablet so tightly that its edge hurt her palm. She had priced the work to cover difficult clients, last minute demands, and the people her agency employed to keep a performance convincing. She had not priced a year of sitting outside this office while everybody watched her differently. That expense had never appeared in Marcus's calculations. "That fee goes through the agency," she said. "It isn't a purchase price for me." "I know how your agency works. I also know you have three hundred dollars in your personal account." She stopped moving. His office suddenly felt smaller, the chair too close to the desk. "Why do you know that?" Her voice had sharpened. "I reviewed your finances before signing. Your aunt's property is at risk, and the medical debts have not been cleared." Zariel stood halfway out of her seat, then sat back down. Leaving would not erase what he knew. She wanted to ask who had given him permission and already knew how little that question would accomplish. "Those are my family's problems," she said. "They aren't part of my employee file." "They are part of the decision you have to make." "You investigated Brenda too?" She hated bringing her aunt's name into the office. "I established what was owed. I also found that Marcus has been taking money from several of the smaller agency accounts." For a moment she couldn't answer. Marcus had sent her complaints about late payments, server repairs, clients who needed more time. She had accepted them because doing everything herself was impossible. "You are saying my partner has been stealing?" she asked. "I am saying you should examine your accounts. You have been working to meet expenses that are not all what you believe them to be." Anger came before the hurt could settle. She had stretched groceries, postponed bills, and told Brenda that things were improving. All the while Marcus had handled the money. Kaelen let her absorb it, then reached for the contract. "My legal team has instructions to clear the bank debt and your family's remaining liabilities. The funds will be transferred by midnight." "You have already instructed them?" She looked at his signature. "Yes. When the year is complete and the merger finalized, I will establish a trust for the international expansion of your agency." She knew the value of that offer, not as a number on a screen but as an end to calls from the bank. Brenda could stay in the house. Zariel could keep the business she had built instead of watching it disappear behind Marcus's excuses. "And what do you want in return?" she asked. Kaelen stood, fastening his jacket. "You will appear beside me as my wife. You will attend the necessary events, protect the agreement, and give the board no reason to question us." "I'll still be working here?" She glanced at her tablet. "Your responsibilities continue. So does your obligation to discretion." "You make a year sound like another appointment on your calendar." "It has a beginning and an end. That should reassure you." She looked down at the boundary clauses, knowing they had been written to protect people in exactly this position. Yet he had already examined her life and arranged the payment before she had finished understanding the offer. "Where would I live?" she asked, although his expression warned her. "My penthouse. Your apartment is unsuitable for the attention this will attract." He stepped away from the desk, ending the discussion with the same certainty he used to close meetings. "Your belongings will be packed tonight, Miss Thorne. By morning, you will be living with me."

At nine that evening, a stranger put Zariel's favorite sweater into a plastic crate as though it belonged to someone who had died. "Careful with the books," she said, catching a paperback before it slid beneath a stack of shoes. "They bend if you put them in like that." The guard changed its position without speaking. His colleague was already closing another crate, and between them her bedroom was emptying faster than she could decide what to keep beside her. She took the blanket off her bed and folded it against her chest. Moving had once meant cardboard boxes borrowed from a shop. Tonight there were two men in suits and an armored vehicle waiting below. "You can leave those clothes," Kaelen said from the doorway. He had removed his jacket and rolled up his sleeves. In her narrow hall, beside the peeling wallpaper, he looked as inconvenient as a grand piano someone had delivered to the wrong address. "They are mine," Zariel said. "Being unfashionable doesn't make them disposable." "There is a wardrobe waiting at the penthouse. Everything has been fitted to your measurements." She glanced at him over the blanket. "You arrange a lot of things before telling people." "Your clothes must suit the occasions you will attend." "My blanket won't be attending your board meetings. It's coming." She pushed it into her duffel and added her hair products. Kaelen looked from the bottles to her loose curls, then checked his watch. "Five minutes. Photographers are beginning to gather near this area." "Already?" She turned toward the bedroom window, keeping away from the glass. "Which is why the vehicle is armored. Finish packing." She gathered the remaining things she could carry herself. The guards would manage the crates, but she wanted her bag in her own hands. Her sweater caught on the zip, she freed it carefully, then looked around the room. The mattress was bare. A pale square on the wall showed where she had kept her small shelves. She had complained about this apartment for years, the cramped bathroom, the draft, the neighbour's television. Now she wanted another evening in it. She checked the empty shelves one last time, making sure none of the books had been left behind. Everything she wanted was packed, and that made leaving harder rather than easier. Kaelen waited in the hall while she checked the duffel. He offered no farewell to the place and no explanation to make leaving easier. Twenty minutes later she was sitting beside him in the back of the vehicle, watching her street retreat through tinted glass. He opened his laptop before they reached the corner. She put the duffel at her feet and took out her personal phone, leaving the company device in her bag. Her family's account loaded slowly enough to make her check the connection. Then the balance appeared, followed by the status beneath it. Paid in full. Account closed. No outstanding amount. Zariel touched the screen as if it might vanish. She opened the details, checked the name, and read them again. The house debt was gone, along with the bills she had stopped opening without a calculator beside her. Brenda would not have to pack her own bedroom. The bank would no longer decide whether she could stay in the home where Zariel had grown up. "Has the transfer cleared?" Kaelen asked without looking up. "Yes." Zariel lowered the phone, then raised it again because she wanted one more look. "It's all there." "The confirmation should be saved with your records." "Thank you," she said, the words rougher than she expected. "For Brenda. Whatever else happens, you've kept her in her house." "The payment is an advance. I expect you to deliver the service agreed." She put her phone away. Gratitude was harder to hold when he insisted on presenting it as a receipt, but the relief remained. "Tomorrow your behaviour must withstand scrutiny," he continued. "Julian is already examining my schedule." "Your stepbrother?" Zariel pictured the man who attended events only to find fault with Kaelen. "Does he have nothing else to run?" "He runs a rival business. He would prefer to run mine." "And an engagement gives him a new place to look." "He favours leaks and sabotage. If he traces this to your agency, he can damage the merger and challenge my position." Zariel shifted toward him. This part she understood better than the silence between them, clients terrified of somebody finding the seam in a story. "Then stop calling me Miss Thorne when we're in public." Kaelen's fingers paused over the keyboard. "You object to your name?" "I object to sounding like your appointment reminder. Lovers use first names." "You will have to adjust more than a form of address." "So will you. I've trained people to play spouses for much nastier families than a room full of investors. They have to know their partner, and the partner has to cooperate." He closed his laptop. Without its light between them, she could see him watching her instead of the numbers. "In private, you remain Miss Thorne. In public, you will be Zariel Sterling." She disliked how easily he assigned both versions of her. Still, she would need him to believe she could do this, and she could. Her clients paid her to solve exactly such problems. The car entered the Monolith's underground garage. Men with earpieces waited near the elevator, and cameras followed their path across the polished concrete. Kaelen stepped out first. Zariel took her duffel and followed, refusing to leave it for another guard. He walked straight to the private elevator without offering his hand. Inside, she watched the floor numbers climb. Her reflection still had the same curls, the same tired eyes, the same bag held close to her knees. Kaelen stood beside her, facing the doors. Somewhere above them was the home he had arranged for a woman whose life he could now describe down to her bank balance. The elevator stopped, and he turned toward her before the doors opened. "There are rules you need to understand before you go any further."