Chapter 2

I knew Damien Cross before he became the youngest self-made billionaire on Forbes' list.

Three years ago, I was a first-year resident at St. Catherine's Hospital. He was a nameless patient who'd been pulled from a car wreck at 3 a.m.—no ID, no emergency contact, no one looking for him.

He had a shattered femur, four broken ribs, and a collapsed lung. I stayed with him through a seven-hour surgery and sat by his bed for two nights when the attending doctors said he might not wake up.

He woke up on the third day, looked at me with those gunmetal gray eyes, and said, "You look worse than I do."

I'd laughed. It was the first genuine laugh I'd had in months.

During his recovery, we talked. He told me he was building a tech company from nothing. I told him I was building a medical career despite my family's insistence that I was wasting my time.

"They want me to work at the family company and marry whoever's useful," I'd said, changing his bandages.

"And what do you want?" he'd asked.

No one had ever asked me that before.

When he was discharged, he gave me his card—black, minimalist, with only a phone number. "If you ever need anything," he said. "Anything at all."

I never called. I didn't want to be someone who relied on a man to solve her problems. I wanted to prove I could survive on my own merits.

But standing in that ballroom, watching my grandmother's ring on my sister's finger, I realized something. Surviving wasn't the same as living. And I was done merely surviving.

Now, Damien walked into the Kensington Hotel like he owned it. Given his net worth, he probably could.

He was taller than I remembered—6'2" with a lean, predatory build that his tailored black suit only emphasized. His dark hair was pushed back from a face that belonged on the cover of a magazine, all sharp angles and controlled intensity.

But it was his eyes that stopped people cold. Gray, calculating, and absolutely devoid of warmth—until they landed on me.

Something shifted in his expression. A flicker of concern, quickly masked.

"Serena." His voice carried across the lobby. He closed the distance between us in four strides and lifted my chin with one finger, studying my face. "Who made you look like this?"

"Like what?"

"Like you're about to set something on fire."

Despite everything, I almost smiled. "Would you help me if I did?"

"I'd hand you the match." He dropped his hand and looked toward the ballroom. The noise of the party filtered through the gilded doors. "Tell me what happened."

I gave him the short version. Engagement party. Sister on fiancé's lap. Family applauding. Grandmother's stolen ring.

Damien's jaw tightened with each sentence. When I finished, he was quiet for a long moment.

"What do you need from me, Serena? Say it plainly."

I looked up at him. "I need a husband. A real one on paper, a fake one in practice. Someone powerful enough to make my family choke on their champagne."

He stared at me, and I braced myself for rejection.

Instead, he pulled a folded document from his inner jacket pocket and held it out to me.

"I had this drafted six months ago," he said. "A marriage contract. I was waiting for you to call."

I blinked. "Six months ago? Why?"

His expression was unreadable. "Because I always knew they'd eventually push you to the edge. And I wanted to be the one standing there when they did."

Before I could respond, the ballroom doors swung open. Megan stood in the doorway, champagne in hand, clearly looking for more entertainment.

Her smile vanished the instant she saw Damien.

"Wait—" she breathed. "Is that Damien Cross?"