Claimed By My Ex's Ruthless Brother

A woman's breathless gasp echoed through the quiet corridor of The Carlyle's top floor. It was muffled by a door left slightly ajar-the unmistakable rhythm of intimate betrayal.

It stopped Giselle mid-step. Her keycard was still in her hand. The Patek Philippe box-cool and heavy, a small, solid weight-turned to ice in her other palm.

That was her fiancé's room. Kenneth's room. And that was not her voice on the other side of the door.

Her smile, the one she'd worn all the way up the elevator, vanished. The air in her lungs crystallized into something sharp and jagged. She had come to surprise him. A thank you, before the chaos of their engagement party tomorrow. The watch nestled inside its velvet cradle was meant to say everything she felt about the life they were about to build together-a life that felt, even minutes ago, as perfect as the timepiece itself. She'd used her own keycard. She'd wanted to see his face.

Now her feet were silent on the thick carpet, pulling her toward the sound. Each step was a small, irreversible death.

The bedroom door was ajar. Just a few inches. An invitation to witness her own undoing.

Through the crack, she saw them.

Kenneth. Her Kenneth. The man she was supposed to marry tomorrow, tangled in an embrace she recognized all too well-but with someone else. Someone whose voice rose in breathless, rhythmic gasps that cut through the stillness of the suite.

The woman had bleached blonde hair fanned across his pillows. Pillows Giselle had chosen. Sheets she had slept in.

Diandra Horne.

Her best friend.

Giselle set the gift box on the console table. Her movements were stiff, robotic-a machine performing the last function of a life that was already over. Each muffled sound from the bedroom struck her like a physical blow, knocking the air from her lungs with methodical precision. She clamped a hand over her own mouth, her knuckles turning white against her skin.

Then she heard Kenneth's voice, rough and strained.

"Once I get the Aethelgard formula from her uncle, it's over. I'll break the engagement."

The nausea that had been rising vanished. Instantly. A cold so absolute it burned away the possibility of tears settled in its place. Her hand trembled as it dug into her purse for her phone. Her fingers were numb, fumbling with the screen.

Camera. Video.

She raised the phone. The lens was a small, unblinking eye. The screen filled with the two of them-the grotesque tableau of their betrayal laid bare in the dim lamplight.

"You promise?" Diandra's voice, dripping with a greed that was suddenly, grotesquely obvious. "And you have to get me that Birkin. The Himalayan one. As a reward."

Giselle's fingernails dug into her own palm. The sharp pain was an anchor. She held the phone steady, recording every word, every ugly expression on the face of the woman she once called sister.

The formula.

The words echoed in her head. Without her biological key, it was worthless. Her uncle had the data, but only she could unlock it. They were fighting over a ghost.

She pulled back. Silently. She backed out of the suite, pulling the door shut until it clicked. Sealing them inside.

Leaning against the cool wall of the hallway, her body slid down to the floor. The Patek Philippe box sat on the table inside, abandoned. She'd left it. She didn't care.

She didn't cry. Her eyes were wide, staring at the floral pattern of the carpet-an intricate design of roses and thorns. Her mind was a roaring blank.

After a moment, or maybe an hour, she pushed herself up. Her limbs felt heavy, disconnected. She walked toward the elevators. Near the elevator bank, she saw a trash can. She took the gift box-the one for Kenneth, the one she'd carried up with such hope-and dropped it inside. The soft thud was the only sound that felt real.

She didn't go home. She walked out into the New York night, hailed a cab, and gave the driver a name she'd only heard in whispers.

The Crimson Lounge.

In a dark corner booth, she ordered a Macallan 18, neat. The first sip was fire. She welcomed it. She ordered another. And another. The alcohol didn't numb the pain-it held it at a distance, sharp and clear, a lens through which she could examine her ruin without falling apart entirely.

A man in a shiny suit slid into her booth. He smelled of stale cigars and bad intentions. "A pretty thing like you shouldn't be drinking alone," he slurred, his hand reaching for her knee.

Another hand, larger and faster, clamped around his wrist. The man froze, his eyes wide with pain.

A tall, broad-shouldered man stood beside their booth. His presence seemed to command the very air around him, bending the dim light and the quiet murmurs of the lounge to his will. Giselle looked up. All she could see was a chiseled jaw and thin, unforgiving lips.

"Get lost," the newcomer said. The words were quiet. An executioner's sentence.

The man in the suit scrambled away, swallowed by the shadows of the bar.

A reckless impulse, born of whiskey and agony, seized Giselle. She reached out, her fingers tangling in the stranger's silk tie, and pulled him down toward her. "Doesn't matter who you are," she murmured, her voice husky and unsteady. "You want to be with me tonight?"

His dark eyes flickered-surprise, then a deep, predatory amusement that spread slowly across his features. He leaned in, his breath warm against her ear. He smelled of sandalwood and something darker, something dangerous. His voice was a low rumble that vibrated through her chest.

"Do you have any idea who I am, future sister-in-law?"

The words didn't register. Only the pleasing timbre of his voice. She tilted her face upward and pressed her lips to his. The kiss was clumsy, fierce, tasting of whiskey and pain. For a moment, he was still. Then his hand came up to cup the back of her head, and he returned the kiss with a deliberate intensity, taking complete control.

He broke away, his eyes boring into hers with an expression she couldn't read. Without a word, he gathered her into his arms as if she weighed nothing at all. He carried her through the hushed lounge and up a private staircase, the world tilting around her.

The last thing she remembered was the clean, woodsy scent of his cologne and the gentle sway of being lifted from the ground into an unknown darkness.