Chapter 13 #2
“And the language skills.” She meets my eyes. “What about you? Besides the obvious luxury empire inheritance.”
I lean back slightly. “You mean the notoriety I spent most of my twenties trying to escape.”
“Is that why you bought the club?”
“Partly. I wanted to prove I could build something independently.” I take a sip of wine, studying her face in the candlelight. “What I didn’t expect was to care so much about protecting it.”
“Or the people who trust you with their privacy.”
“Exactly.” The relief she still understands me hits deep. “Most people see The Sanctuary and assume it’s all about wealth and excess. But privacy—real privacy—is something money usually can’t buy.”
“And someone violated that.”
“Someone I trusted.” The betrayal still stings. “Eddie’s been with the club since before I owned it. I thought loyalty came with tenure. Obviously, I was wrong.”
“Loyalty has to be earned, not assumed.” She sets down her fork. “In the CIA, we learned that people’s motivations change. What drives someone one year might be completely different the next.”
“What drove you to leave?”
The question hangs between us. She’s quiet for a long moment, fingers tracing the stem of her wine glass.
“I got tired of becoming other people,” she says finally. “Every assignment required a new identity, a new personality. After a while, I wasn’t sure which parts of me were real anymore.”
“And now?”
“Now I get to be myself while still doing work that matters.” She glances around the kitchen, taking in the details—the appliances, the artwork, the view. “This is very you.”
“How can you tell? You barely know me.” I’m tossing her words back at her, if anything as a tease, because I don’t buy it. The intensity we shared over our weekend together doesn’t happen without getting to know the important parts.
“I know more than you think.” Her eyes return to mine.
“Your art—you prefer modern pieces that make you think. They feed the image you cultivate; traditional works risk conveying age. The kitchen setup—you entertain, but intimately, not for show. The books I glimpsed in your living room—history, philosophy, some fiction. You’re more substantive than your reputation suggests. ”
“What else do you see?”
“You’re lonely.” The words are soft but direct. “All this success, this enterprise you’re building, your bed is likely often filled, but I’m guessing you eat breakfast alone most mornings.”
The accuracy of her observation stuns. “And you?” The idea of her bed being filled regularly delivers a surge of undeserved jealousy.
“Lonely? Usually. But it’s my choice.”
“Is it?”
She considers this, taking another sip of wine. “Absolutely. The CIA practically demands it. I knew what I was getting into. I welcomed the independence. Honing my compartmentalization skills.”
“What changed?”
“I met someone who made me remember what connection felt like.” Her gaze doesn’t waver. “Don’t read into that. You’ve been honest with me, so I’m being honest with you. I spent two years convincing myself the career was worth it.”
“But it wasn’t.”
“A friend suggested there might be a better situation. I became disenchanted with the leadership within the CIA. I still value my independence—highly. I don’t need to be with anyone.
Lonely implies something’s wrong with me, and that’s not the case.
I’m happy. But I might have taken the compartmentalization to an unhealthy level. ”
I reach across the table, covering her hand with mine.
“Brie.” Her name feels different now, more real than the alias Sophie, a lovely name, but I prefer the honest version. “What happens when this investigation is over?”
“I don’t know.” Her fingers turn under mine, palm to palm. “I’ve never mixed personal and professional before.”
“And I’ve never invited a woman into this condo before. In fact, I’ve never felt like this about another woman.”
“Like what?”
“Like I’d risk everything just to get to know you better.” The confession surprises me with its intensity—and the truth of it.
“Get to know me?” Her lips curve into a smile, like she’s doubting my veracity.
“I won’t pretend I’ve been celibate. But no one was you. The way you taste, the way your breath breaks when—”
“I get the point.”
“Do you?”
“I’m the first woman who walked away.”
“Don’t do that,” I say, tightening my grip on her hand while fighting the urge to pull her onto my lap or no, to tug her like a caveman back to my bedroom.
“Don’t what?”
“Minimize what I’m saying. Compartmentalizing is another word for constructing walls. Don’t do that.”
Outside the windows, signs of life abound with golden lights turning on and off, but here in this kitchen, with candles flickering between us and her hand in mine, everything else fades into oblivion. The crystal glasses catch the candlelight the way she once caught me—unexpectedly, irrevocably.
“Stay tonight,” I say—not as an invitation but as a plea.
“Adrien—”
“Not for sex. Though I won’t pretend I don’t want that.” I stroke my thumb across her knuckles. “Stay because I want to wake up knowing you’re safe. Stay because I’ve spent years wondering what it would be like to wake with you in my bed, to have breakfast with you again.”
She’s quiet for a long moment, studying our joined hands.
“One night,” she says finally. “Perhaps one night is all it will take for you to see that we’re different now, and we can’t recreate a holiday from years ago.” I narrow my eyes, pointedly doubting her words—another wall. “If I stay, tomorrow we’re back to being professional.”
“Deal.” I lift her hand to my lips, pressing a soft kiss to her palm. “Though I reserve the right to cook you breakfast.”
“You can cook?”
“I can make coffee and toast without burning down the kitchen.”
Her laugh is the most beautiful sound in what has been a very long day.
“Then I guess I’ll stay.”
“Excellent. Before we head upstairs, there’s something I want to show you. Something happening at the club tonight that I think you’ll appreciate.”
“At The Sanctuary?”
She’s tentative, but the event tonight is special, and I want her to see it—to understand the club’s value.
Within twenty minutes, the waiting driver delivers us to The Sanctuary, and I lead her past our doorman to the event space.
Tonight, for this performance, there’s a small round elevated stage, a stool with a warm wash of light over Miley Cyrus.
Seventy-five seats are arranged in a semicircle around her.
She’s been doing these intimate shows for a while now, but this is her first at The Sanctuary.
We arrive mid-set, and the room is held in the hush only a voice like hers can command.
As she sings about being good and gold, I lean against the painted black wall, gesturing for Brie to lean against me.
“It’s a sold-out event, but I thought you’d like to hear some of it.”
“She’s different than I remember,” Brie says.
“She’s in a different era.” I lift Brie’s hair from her shoulders and place a kiss on the slope of her neck. “I prefer this one.”
The singer’s voice fills the space, soft but threaded with smoke. Each lyric floats like confession, quiet and raw—about slipping away from each other, about how time slides us into new versions of ourselves.
The sound isn’t polished or performative—it’s intimate, like she’s baring something too private for microphones.
While the younger Cyrus is enchanting, what’s captivating is observing Brie, watching the songs find her, watching the way her pulse flutters beneath the hollow of her throat as Miley sings about the world cutting and leaving scars.
For a moment, The Sanctuary feels weightless. No secrets. No investigations. Just the echo of a woman’s voice and the reminder that beauty, at its truest, is unguarded.
When the last chord fades, Brie exhales, slow and deliberate, as though waking from a dream.
“Come,” I say, applause echoing off the walls, a sign that in seconds the lights will flicker on and I’ll risk being caught in a vortex of members. “There’s another part of the club you should see.”
But as we exit the velvet-dark room, Miley announces one last song, and the echo of the song follows through the passage—faint, longing, dangerous as a promise.
“That was amazing. Do you offer shows like that often?”
“When possible. It’s a challenge though…our members are all VIPs.”
“A sold-out show means some were denied access,” she says, understanding.
“Exactly.”
With a nod to Tiffany, our concierge, the door to the performance salon opens.
Tiffany doesn’t approach; she barely acknowledges us.
I should possibly ask if she needs something, if she’s in the hallway waiting to shuttle a member to a suite, or if there’s an issue I should attend to, but she bows her head and presses her hand to her ear, likely receiving a communication, so I trust that if she needs me, she’ll find me, and I escort Brie into our most sensual room.
The lighting here is different—amber and shadow, deliberate in its obscurity. Where the performance space demanded focus, this room invites exploration. Low music pulses through hidden speakers, not loud enough to overwhelm conversation but insistent enough to set a rhythm in the blood.
The space is arranged in layers. A central platform showcases a dancer moving with liquid grace, her movements somewhere between ballet and seduction.
Around the periphery, curved banquettes in deep burgundy velvet create intimate alcoves, some occupied by couples leaning close, others empty and waiting.
Brie stills beside me.
“This is…” she starts, then stops.
“The part you expected?” I finish.
A couple moves past us toward one of the shadowed corners, the woman’s laughter soft and intimate. On the platform, the dancer executes a turn that’s both athletic and sensual, her body a study in controlled abandon.
“It’s more elegant than I imagined,” Brie admits. Her voice has dropped lower, matching the room’s energy. “I thought it would be…”