“You do. They’re special here,” he says, mimicking me, and it makes me laugh.
The balcony door opens and closes, the party breathing in pulses behind us. A musician steps out to smoke, sees us, and goes to the far end. Laughter spills and fades. The quartet starts a new song. I blow warmth into the cold air, turning it white for a moment. I’m in silk, gooseflesh rising on my arms, and his jacket looks warmer than I’m willing to admit I want.
“Tell me about yourself,” Teo asks. “Do you always steal strangers’ drinks, or is that tonight’s trick?”
“Only when the stranger looks like he came to close a deal that requires a spine and a coat that fits,” I say. “And when his mouth looks like it forgot how to smile.”
“It will remember,” he says. His mouth moves, and mine forgets what to say.
I step closer so I can hear him without leaning, so the silk of my dress almost brushes his trousers. The lantern above us burns low. The city lights paint his face in slices, gold on cheekbone, shadow at jaw, a streak along the bridge of his nose. Treacle and honey are too easy. There’s something thick and slow and warm pooling inside me, an invitation that feels dangerous and gentle at once.
“If we stay here, someone will take our picture,” he says.
“We can go inside,” I whisper.
“If we go inside, someone will introduce me,” he points out.
“You could tell me your name,” I say, and don’t like how my voice catches.
“I did,” he says, the syllables level and unyielding.
I know better than to push. I also know better than to let a night like this end where it began, all sparkle and no story. I’m ambitious enough to chase a runway across three continents and stubborn enough to stand still when something worth having stands in front of me.
“Come with me,” I say. “There’s a hotel across the street with a lobby bar that pours drinks like they mean it.”
“I am working,” he says, his eyes dark.
“You can work from a chair,” I counter. “You can work from a couch.”
He tips his head. “You like winning,” he says.
“I like choosing.”
The wind lifts and settles. He takes a breath that I feel more than hear. He looks past me through the glass at the crowd. His eyes flick from the donors near the dais to the double doors and then back to me. He’s counting, or measuring, or telling time without a watch. The room inside calls him. The city outside pulls me. We stand between.
He shifts his stance, and I feel the decision before he makes it. He’s going to hand me the glass and the night and walk back intowork. He’s going to step away and make himself smaller again, a man with no name tag and a suit that saysdo not ask. Yes, no. I pick the petals one by one in my mind
I am not ready to let that happen. I lean toward him, the city lights painting his face in gold and shadow, and say, “Don’t leave yet.”
4
MATTEO
Milan, Five years earlier
A breath held before a storm can feel like silence. It is not. It is a thousand small signals stacking until the first gust takes them apart. Milan gives me those signals the moment I step out of the car.
I am here to correct a humiliation, not a number. The fashion house calls it sponsorship. Benedetti calls it tribute. Our account calls it a debt of respect left unpaid. The brand took Russo’s money to keep its floor clean and its clientele friendly, then let Benedetti use the same floor to make us the joke. You can buy safety once. You cannot sell it twice.
The building is all glass and limestone, a temple to reflection. Beneath it runs the real trade—commissions, contracts, favors paid in whispers. My man in finance sent the trail—donor lists, private invitations, the “gala sponsorship” that opened the door Benedetti later slammed in our face. The insult was public, and that matters.
At ten, I meet the CFO. We sit in a side office with mannequins frozen behind glass. He speaks in polished English that sounds like an apology wrapped in manners. I place a single envelope on the table. Inside are the donation ledgers that prove he sold access twice—once to us, once to Benedetti.
He scans the first page, and his lips thin. “This is business,” he says.
“This is a face,” I answer. “And face is business.”
I tap the space with one finger, the line that waits for his name. He glances up briefly, measuring, then back to the page. His signature lands where it should, beneath the clause that closes Benedetti’s account. He will survive. Smart men usually do.
