Chapter 2
MAX
T he hotel ballroom glitters beneath a thousand points of golden light.
Crystal chandeliers hang from the vaulted ceiling like frozen waterfalls, scattering warm light across polished marble floors and people wearing expensive designer clothing.
A string quartet plays near the far wall, their music floating through the room like a tinkling mist.
At first glance, the event looks respectable, elegant, and very exclusive. The sort of gathering the city’s elite attend so they can congratulate themselves on being wealthy. The illusion is intentional.
The event agenda calls tonight's gathering the Luxury Sugar Babies Auction. It’s a discreet matching arrangement for wealthy men and beautiful women.
The organizers are careful with their language.
They use words like companionship, mentorship, and mutually beneficial relationships.
They don’t mention things like mistress, or sex, or ownership.
But everyone in the room knows exactly what type of transactions are involved.
Including the women.
I swallow a sigh and wonder if I’ve paid too high a price for loyalty. Undercover work sucks. Not because it's dangerous. Danger is easy. It’s honest.
A man trying to kill you with his fists or a bullet is straightforward. What you see is what you get, and you can react accordingly. Everything is out in the open.
Business take-downs are tedious. Your enemies smile while plotting betrayal. They shake your hand while calculating what your corpse will be worth. They spend years building trust so they can destroy it in a single moment.
Which is exactly why I'm standing by the bar on the fringe of this glitzy gathering with a glass of eighteen-year-old whiskey in my hand in my hand, and a fake name on my business card.
I take a slow sip of my drink and scan the crowd.
The women wear cocktail dresses and discreet silver number tags pinned near their shoulders.
The men wear expensive watches and wedding rings.
Many of those wedding rings cost less than what that husband will spend on his opening bid.
The vows he made to his wife are worth even less than the jewelry.
Servers circulate with silver trays stacked with fancy canapés and champagne. Men who laugh too loudly and for too long exchange business cards while ogling the women who are smiling broadly and pretending to find the men funny and interesting.
Most people assume undercover work is exciting. Most people are wrong.
Mostly it's patience. Months, sometimes years, of planning and waiting for the right moment. That perfect moment when all the pieces you’ve put into play comes together in one beautiful pattern that makes it all worth the long, tedious time of pretending to be someone else.
Tonight, I'm Max Volkov, cryptocurrency specialist and financial consultant. I’m the man who helps wealthy clients hide money in places governments can't easily reach.
The identity has taken three years to build.
Three years of lies, while I carefully cultivated relationships with men I would normally enjoy burying in shallow graves.
Across the room, Gerald Mercer throws his head back and laughs. The sound makes my jaw tighten. Mercer is exactly the kind of man I despise. The kind who smiles while destroying lives and who sees loyalty as a weakness.
The kind who betrayed the Pakhan of the Kedrov family almost a decade ago and thought he'd got away with it. He didn’t.
As tedious as tonight is, it’s a necessary step in a very long game. Mercer is finally introducing me to the accountant he uses for several shell companies we've been tracking. I need this meeting, this one conversation, this one finance man.
And then all I need is one point of access into his database for the entire house of cards to tumble down.
I should focus on that, but my attention drifts toward the women mingling through the crowd.
There are perhaps thirty of them. They are different heights, have different body types, and wear different hair colors and styles.
But they are all beautiful, poised, and exquisitely dressed, with that damn number pinned discreetly near her shoulder.
A fucking number.
The organizers call it anonymity. I call it objectifying.
A waiter passes by, breaking my line of sight. I take another sip of whiskey, and when I look up again, I see her across the room.
At first, I don’t register the significance. She’s just a movement near the entrance. A flash of midnight-blue fabric. Just another woman stepping into the ballroom. But something about her catches my attention immediately.
Maybe it's because she doesn't move like the others. The experienced women know how to work the room. They smile and flirt, gliding through conversations with practiced ease.
This woman pauses just inside the doorway and fidgets. Only for a second.
But I notice. I notice everything about her.
Her fingers tighten around the strap of her clutch as her gaze sweeps the room. She’s uneasy and trying to not look overwhelmed.
It’s not performance nervousness she’s exhibiting. It’s true nerves.
The realization hits me unexpectedly hard, and I can’t tear my eyes away from her.
A server offers her champagne, which she accepts it with a grateful smile. She takes a small sip before continuing into the room.
My gaze follows her while my mind catalogues every detail about her.
The dark hair that falls in soft waves around her shoulders.
The blue dress that clings just enough to highlight her delicious curves.
Then she steps further into the room, and when the light hits her beautiful face, I stop breathing. The music disappears and the voices fade into the background. I know her.
I’ve never met her, but I know her.
Two years ago, her picture hung in a cramped office at the back of a repair shop. The smell of motor oil and grease hung in the air. Blood soaked through my shirt as the wound’s pain made my vision blurry.
I’d been in the wrong place at the wrong time and got caught up in someone else’s brawl. A stray knife caught my ribs, and I barely got away before the cops showed up. My undercover persona couldn’t risk having to answer questions, or worse, get arrested.
Barely hanging on to consciousness, I stumbled through a side door, seeking shelter. I remember expecting questions. Instead, a mechanic named Ben Noble took one look at me and got to work. There was no panic, no judgement, no police.
Just an expertly filled first-aid kit and a stubborn refusal to let me die.
After sticking me back together, the man spent hours taking care of me while pretending not to notice the gun in my jacket.
I owe him my life.
And while I recovered in that office, my gaze locked on the photographs pinned to a corkboard above his desk. One picture in particular.
It was of a teenage girl laughing at the camera while Ben stood beside her. His arm wrapped protectively around her shoulders.
"My sister," he said. The pride in his voice had been unmistakable. "I've been raising her since she was thirteen."
Sydney.
I remember her name both because I’ve always wanted to visit Australia, but also because of the way Ben said it. Like she was the most important thing in his world.
She’s even further into the room now, and the resemblance to the picture is unmistakable. The same green eyes. The same sunny smile, although tonight’s is more fragile than the one in the picture. She’s an older version of the girl from the photograph.
Sydney Noble.
What the hell is she doing here?
A knot forms in my stomach when I see the number pinned to her dress.
Twenty-three.
Tonight, she doesn’t have a name. She’s reduced to a number.
My jaw clenches.
Ben spent years sacrificing everything for her.
During those hours in the back of that repair shop, he told me about losing his dad.
About becoming the guardian of his teen-aged sister so she didn’t get lost in the system.
Instead of becoming a doctor, as he’d planned, the man worked seventy-hour weeks turning wrenches because he loved her that much.
And now she's standing in a ballroom where rich men shop for mistresses. Watching her move through the crowd, I mentally shake my head at how profoundly wrong this is. She doesn't belong here. Not because she's too good for it, but because she's desperate enough for it.
I’ve built my life around reading micro-expressions and signals. I know desperation when I see it. My gaze narrows.
Why the fuck is she here?
Then I see Victor Lang approaching her, and my mood instantly darkens. Lang is wealthy, powerful, and respected. On paper.
The reality is uglier. I've heard enough stories about women who leave his penthouse with expensive jewelry and haunted eyes to believe that at least some of them must be true. These women sign non-disclosure agreements, disappear from public view, and never press charges.
Watching him approach Sydney is like watching a predator selecting a target. My hand tightens on the glass in my hand.
Sydney smiles politely as he approaches, but her eyes are wary.
Lang says something, and she laughs nervously. As his hand settles against her lower back, her shoulders immediately tighten. It’s a tiny reaction most people wouldn’t notice.
I do.
A pulse beats heavily behind my eyes.
Lang leans closer. Too close.
Sydney shifts her weight to create distance, but Lang follows.
The bastard crowds her, testing her boundaries to see what she’ll allow him to get away with.
Rage unexpectedly but swiftly warms my chest. I haven't felt this protective in years. Not since I had to step in to shield my half-brother, Alex. Not since family.
But Sydney Noble is definitely not family, and I shouldn’t feel like this toward her. I can’t afford it. Not tonight.
Not while I am undercover.
Not while everything I’ve worked so hard for is finally coming together.
Clenching my hand into a fist, I force myself to look away from her. She chose to come here tonight. She allowed that number to be pinned to her dress.
This is not my problem.
But then I remember a mechanic standing over me with blood on his hands, refusing to let me die and my gaze snaps back to her. Maybe I can’t look away because debt means something to me. Or maybe it's because of something else entirely. Something far more dangerous.
Before I think about what I’m doing, I’ve set down my glass, the crystal clicking softly against the bar, and I’m walking across the room.
The crowd parts naturally, the way people always move when they see me coming. Maybe it’s my height. Maybe it’s my tattoos.
Doesn’t matter tonight as long as they get the fuck out of the way.
By the time I reach them, Sydney’s gaze darts around for an escape route. She’s looking at the other women, silently begging for help, but they angle their bodies so they don’t have to notice her.
Lang is looking pleased with himself.
Neither notices me until I stop beside them. "Victor," I say, in a tone dripping with ice.
Lang turns, and annoyance flashes across his face. "Max."
I look at Sydney. Up close, she's even more beautiful than the photograph suggested she’d grow into, but far more exhausted. There's a sadness in her eyes that wasn't there two years ago. Something has happened to her. Something bad that I don’t know about. Yet.
But I will find out.
Her gaze lifts to mine, and for a moment she simply stares. I understand why. Most people react that way. Years of Bratva violence have marked me, even if they’re not visible ones. Sydney's eyes widen slightly and then she quickly looks away.
Interesting.
Lang notices and his hand on her lower back pulls her closer to him. "Now is not the time for business. I’m having a conversation with this lovely woman."
I smile with absolutely no warmth. "Not anymore."
The ballroom noise continues around us, while people pretend to ignore the tense situation playing out in their midst. They’re smart enough to pretend they don’t care. Or maybe they actually don’t.
Lang's eyes narrow. "She isn't yours."
Not yet. The words almost leave my mouth. Instead, I say, "Actually, she is."
Lang frowns.
Sydney blinks.
I take her hand and pull her to my side. The contact sends an unexpected jolt through me.
Sidney startles, either from the jolt or from the stranger claiming her.
Her skin is cool and soft. Holding her hand unfurls something dangerous inside me. "Number twenty-three is with me."
The auction hasn't started. I haven't officially bid. None of that matters as I stare into Lang's eyes and see him running the calculations before he realizes he can’t afford the confrontation. Not here.
Not with me.
A pulse beats in Sydney’s throat, but she remains silent.
Lang's artificial smile returns, but it is fragile now. "Then I'll see you both later." He walks away.
The second he's gone, Sydney exhales. "Thank you," she says. Her voice is softer than I expected.
I reluctantly release her hand. "You looked uncomfortable."
A shadow crosses her face. "Is it that obvious?"
"To me."
Her laugh is nervous and brittle. "I guess I'm not very good at this."
She's not. And that's exactly why she shouldn't be here. "What brought you to this place, Sydney?" The question slips out before I can stop it.
Her eyes narrow, suspiciously. "You know my name?"
Damn. I should have been more careful. Years undercover and I make a rookie mistake because of a photograph on a garage wall. "Your number profile."
She seems to accept it. "I need the money," she says quietly.
The answer hits harder than it should. Need.
Not Want. Ben’s voice echoes in my memory.
“She's all I've got, Max. I'd do anything for that girl.” I look at Sydney, standing alone in a ballroom full of predators, wearing a number.
And suddenly I know exactly what's going to happen.
The realization settles over me with absolute certainty.
It doesn’t matter that the auction hasn't started yet. Or that my target hasn't made an introduction to his accountant. Or that I’m in the middle of a multi-year mission.
None of it matters.
Because when the bidding begins tonight, there is only one outcome. No one else is buying her.
Not Lang.
Not any man in this room.
Sydney Noble walked into this auction looking for the highest bidder.
And that man will be me.
From the corner of my eye, I see Gerald Mercer gesture to me. I look up and nod to show I’ll join him momentarily.
With a slight bow to Sydney, I walk away to put the next part of my mission into play.
She doesn’t know it yet, but she now belongs to me.