CHAPTER 6
MALCOLM
I adjust the silver cufflink on my left wrist, staring at my reflection in the floor-to-ceiling window of the living room.
The glass turns into a mirror against the dark Chicago skyline.
I am wearing a black tuxedo, cut and tailored by a man in Milan who has my exact measurements on file.
It is the uniform of my class. It is the armor I wear when I am required to stand in a room full of politicians, corporate thieves, and my own blood relatives, and pretend we are not all predators looking for an exposed throat.
"Preston Vance arrived at the Field Museum ten minutes ago," Grant says, stepping out of the private elevator. He is wearing a dark suit, holding a tablet with the evening’s security logistics. "He has his usual detail. Simon arrived shortly after, accompanied by his new fiancée."
I don't look away from the window. "What is the media presence?"
"Heavy. The mayor's attendance guaranteed local news, but there are three society photographers stationed near the main entrance." Grant taps the screen. "We have the SUV waiting downstairs. The route is clear."
"Good." I drop my hand from my cuff.
"Sir." Grant hesitates. It is a rare thing for him to pause. "Are you entirely certain about this operational strategy? Walking her through the front door of a highly publicized event is a declaration of war. Preston will not take the humiliation lightly."
"I am counting on it," I say flatly.
My father operates on the assumption that I am a blunt instrument. He believes I exist solely to clean the blood off the Vance family name. Tonight, I am going to remind him that the instrument has a mind of its own, and it is currently pointed at his favorite son.
A soft rustle of fabric sounds from the hallway.
Grant immediately steps back, lowering the tablet and averting his eyes to the floor, giving her absolute privacy.
I turn around.
The air in my lungs simply stops.
Audrey stops at the edge of the living room.
She is wearing a dress made of dark, liquid emerald silk.
It drapes over her curves with a dangerous kind of elegance, leaving her shoulders and collarbone completely bare.
A high slit up the left thigh reveals the sharp line of her leg and a pair of black stilettos.
Her hair is swept up, exposing the long, pale column of her neck.
She looks like a weapon. A very expensive, very lethal weapon.
My chest tightens, a physical ache blooming right behind my ribs. I interpret it as satisfaction—the plan is coming together, the aesthetic is perfect—but the lie is thin, even to me.
"I feel like an imposter," Audrey says, breaking the silence.
Her voice is tight. She runs her hands down the silk of the skirt, her fingers trembling slightly.
"This dress costs more than the first car I ever bought.
The makeup artist your team sent over contoured my face so aggressively I think I have new cheekbones. "
"You look exactly as you are supposed to look," I say, forcing my voice to remain even.
I walk over to the bar cart, pour two fingers of Macallan into a crystal glass, and walk back to her. I hold it out.
She looks at the amber liquid, then up at me. "Is this a prop, or are you trying to sedate me?"
"I am trying to steady your hands," I reply.
She takes the glass. Her fingers brush mine, and her skin is freezing again. She takes a swallow, wincing slightly at the burn, but the color immediately returns to her cheeks.
"Better?" I ask.
"Marginally." She hands the glass back to me. "I spent the last two hours trying to figure out how to walk in these shoes without breaking an ankle. If I trip on the red carpet and ruin your dramatic entrance, I apologize in advance."
"You won't trip." I set the glass down on a side table. "You are going to hold my arm. You are going to look at the cameras, and you are going to smile like you have a secret that none of them can afford to buy."
She bites the inside of her cheek. The vintage diamond on her left hand catches the light from the chandelier above us.
"Simon is going to be there," she whispers. The sarcasm drops away, leaving the raw, unpolished fear beneath it.
"Yes."
"He’s going to have her with him. The receptionist." Her throat works as she swallows. "What if I freeze, Malcolm? What if he looks at me and I just... remember everything he took?"
I step closer to her. The scent of her perfume—something floral, cut with a sharp note of citrus—fills the space between us.
"You are not going to freeze," I say, keeping my voice low, anchoring her to the sound of it. "Because you are not the same woman he locked out of that office. That woman was a civilian. Tonight, you are a Vance."
She looks up at me, her eyes wide, searching my face for a lie.
I don't tell her the rest of it. I don't tell her about the cold, violent satisfaction that washed over me at four in the morning when I walked past her bedroom and saw that the deadbolt wasn't engaged. She left the door unlocked. She made a choice to trust the devil over the empty apartment.
"Ready?" I ask, offering her my arm.
Audrey takes a deep breath. The tremble in her fingers stops. She slips her hand through the crook of my elbow, her bare skin warm against the fine wool of my tuxedo jacket.
"Let's go ruin a wedding," she says.
The ride to the Field Museum takes less than fifteen minutes. The privacy partition in the SUV is raised, sealing us in the quiet, climate-controlled back seat. Audrey spends the first ten minutes staring out the tinted window, her thumb rhythmically twisting the diamond ring on her finger.
I watch the movement. The metal scraping against her skin.
I reach across the leather seat and cover her hand with mine, stopping the frantic motion.
She flinches slightly, her eyes snapping to mine.
"Stop fidgeting," I murmur, keeping my hand over hers. "You are the one holding the knife tonight. Act like it."
"I'm just reviewing the timeline in my head," she lies, though she doesn't pull her hand away. The heat of her palm seeps into mine. "We walk in. We let the photographers take pictures. We mingle near the open bar. We wait for the gossip to reach your father."
"Correct."
"And when Simon approaches us?"
"He won't approach us immediately," I tell her, sliding my hand away so I don't cross a line I can't walk back from. "Simon is a coward. He will wait until he thinks he has an advantage. He will try to catch you alone."
Audrey frowns. "You said you wouldn't leave my side."
"I won't. But he will try. And when he realizes he can't, he will panic. Panic leads to mistakes."
The SUV slows down, pulling into the VIP drop-off lane in front of the museum. The massive neoclassical columns of the building are illuminated by floodlights. Even through the tinted glass, I can see the crowd of photographers, reporters, and Chicago’s elite bottlenecking near the grand staircase.
Grant opens my door. The cold night air rushes into the car, carrying the sound of overlapping voices and camera shutters.
I step out, buttoning my jacket with one hand, and turn back to offer Audrey my hand.
She takes it. She steps out of the SUV, the emerald silk pooling around her legs.
The moment her stilettos hit the pavement, the atmosphere shifts. A photographer from a local society magazine lowers his camera, does a double-take, and then violently nudges the reporter next to him.
Click. Click. Click.
The flashes start. Brilliant, blinding bursts of white light.
I place my hand on the small of Audrey’s back. Her skin is exposed right above the dip of the dress. The contact sends a sharp jolt of electricity straight up my arm, but I keep my grip firm, guiding her forward.
"Chin up," I murmur, my lips barely moving. "Smile, Audrey."
She does. It is a terrifyingly perfect smile. It doesn't reach her eyes, but the cameras won't catch that. They will only catch the sharp curve of her lips, the impossible elegance of the dress, and the massive vintage diamond sitting on her left hand.
We walk up the marble steps. The crowd parts for us.
People in my world know exactly who I am. They know I do not attend charity galas. They know I do not walk red carpets. And they certainly know I do not bring dates.
The whispers start before we even reach the coat check.
"Is that Malcolm Vance?"
"Who is she?"
"Look at the ring."
I keep my hand anchored on her lower back, steering her through the grand entrance and into the main hall of the museum.
The space is cavernous, dominated by the massive, skeletal remains of a Tyrannosaurus rex standing in the center of the room.
Tables draped in white linen surround the exhibit, and a string quartet plays softly from a raised balcony.
The room is packed with hundreds of people, the air thick with the smell of expensive champagne and calculated ambition.
"They're staring," Audrey whispers, keeping her smile fixed as we accept two flutes of champagne from a passing waiter.
"Let them stare," I reply, scanning the perimeter of the room. I catalog the exits, the security personnel, and the faces of the board members I recognize.
"I feel like a piece of meat in a shark tank."
"You are not the meat," I remind her, taking a sip of the dry champagne. "You are the bait."
I spot him near the east wing of the hall.
Preston Vance. My father is standing in a circle of city councilmen, holding a glass of scotch, projecting the image of the benevolent patriarch. He is sixty-five, silver-haired, and wears his arrogance like a second skin.
I guide Audrey subtly toward the center of the room, ensuring we are in his direct line of sight.
It takes exactly four minutes.
A woman in a silver gown whispers something to a man next to my father. The man turns, looks across the room, and then leans in to speak to Preston.
My father stops talking. He turns his head slowly.
His eyes lock onto me. Then, they drop to the woman standing by my side.
Even from fifty feet away, I can see the exact moment his brain processes the information. He recognizes Audrey. He recognizes the woman his youngest son discarded a month ago. And then, his gaze drops to her left hand, where she is holding the champagne flute.
The vintage diamond. The family heirloom he spent a decade trying to acquire.
Preston’s face turns the color of ash.
A dark, vicious surge of triumph floods my veins. I don't smile. I just raise my glass to him in a silent, mocking toast.
"He saw us," Audrey murmurs, her body tensing against my side. She didn't look directly at him, but she felt the shift in the room's gravity.
"He did."
"Where is Simon?" she asks, her voice dropping to a nervous whisper.
I scan the crowd again. I don't have to look hard.
Simon is standing near the bar on the opposite side of the room. He is wearing a white dinner jacket, looking every bit the spoiled, entitled prince he believes himself to be. Next to him is a blonde woman in a pale pink dress, clinging to his arm. The receptionist.
Simon is laughing at something the bartender said. He turns his head to scan the room, the casual, arrogant smile plastered on his face.
His eyes sweep past us, stop, and snap back.
The glass of bourbon in his hand tilts dangerously, spilling a few drops onto the marble floor.
Simon stares at Audrey. He stares at the emerald dress. He stares at her hair, her posture, the effortless, devastating beauty that he threw away because he thought she was too ordinary for his new life.
And then, he looks at me.
His older brother. The man who cleans up his messes. The man who is currently standing with his hand resting possessively on the bare skin of his ex-fiancée’s back.
Simon looks like he has just been shot.
"Malcolm," Audrey breathes, her voice shaking. She sees him. I can feel the sudden, erratic spike in her pulse where my thumb rests against her spine. "He's looking right at us."
"I know."
"He looks furious."
"He looks terrified," I correct her.
Simon takes a step forward, his jaw tight, completely ignoring the blonde woman next to him. He looks like he wants to march across the room and demand an explanation. He looks like he wants to reclaim what he realizes he lost.
A cold, irrational possessiveness snaps inside me.
This was supposed to be a performance. A calculated, strategic maneuver to destabilize my family’s power structure. But as I watch Simon stare at the woman standing next to me, the strategy vanishes, replaced by a violent, territorial instinct that I have never felt in my entire life.
He doesn't get to look at her. He doesn't get to want her back.
I turn my body slightly, blocking Simon’s line of sight.
Audrey looks up at me, confused by the sudden movement. Her eyes are wide, the golden flecks in her irises catching the light of the chandeliers. Her lips are parted slightly, stained a deep, dark red by the makeup artist.
"Malcolm?" she whispers.
"Transparency, Audrey," I murmur, my voice dropping to a rough, quiet register that only she can hear.
I don't give her time to process the words. I lower my head and press my lips to the soft, sensitive skin just beneath her jaw.
It is a public claim. It is a deliberate, visual weapon aimed directly at my brother across the room.
But the moment my mouth touches her skin, the weapon misfires.
She tastes like champagne and heat. She lets out a tiny, involuntary gasp, her fingers gripping the lapel of my tuxedo jacket to steady herself. The sound vibrates directly against my lips, sending a shockwave of pure, unadulterated desire straight to my core.
My hand slides from her lower back to her waist, pulling her flush against my chest. The silk of her dress is nothing against the heavy wool of my suit. I can feel the frantic beating of her heart.
I meant to brush my lips against her jaw for a second. Just long enough for the cameras to catch it. Just long enough to break Simon’s mind.
Instead, I linger. I drag my mouth slowly across her skin, inhaling the scent of her, feeling the exact moment her body stops fighting the contact and melts into me.
When I finally pull back, the noise of the gala seems muffled.
Audrey is staring at me, her chest rising and falling rapidly. The sarcasm is completely gone from her face. The fear of Simon is gone. There is only a dazed, chaotic awareness in her eyes, mirroring the exact sensation currently tearing through my chest.
I look over her shoulder.
Simon is standing frozen by the bar, his face pale, his hands clenched into fists at his sides. He looks completely, utterly destroyed.
I won. The trap worked flawlessly.
But as I look back down at Audrey, her fingers still clutching my jacket, I realize the terrifying truth I managed to avoid for the last twenty-four hours.
I didn't just set a trap for my brother.
I stepped right into it with her, and I have absolutely no intention of ever walking out.