The city of Riverton moved for Grace Laurent.
Her heels clicked against imported black marble as she entered the towering glass building that housed Elan Mode. The receptionists straightened. Assistants pressed themselves against the walls. The elevator doors parted without her having to lift a finger. The top floor was already waiting.
Grace walked into the boardroom like it belonged to her. Because it did.
"Good morning, Ms. Laurent," came the chorus. Some voices steady. Others strained.
Her long black hair was parted sleekly down the center, falling like a blade over her white silk blouse. Her grey eyes were calm, unblinking, and swept over the table of executives. She took the head seat, crossed her legs, and placed her leather folder down without a sound.
"Let's talk about the Winter campaign," she said.
The room exhaled.
Andre Lennox, her creative director, spoke first. Mid-30s, all-black everything, with cheekbones sharp enough to cut diamonds. "We have six proposals. The mood boards are updated. We leaned more into aspirational this season, the market is shifting."
"Aspiration is boring," Grace interrupted. She flipped through the boards with practiced elegance. "Everyone wants to look like hope. I want someone who looks like danger."
Lana Seo, PR head, tilted her head. "Danger might not resonate across all demographics."
"I'm not interested in all demographics," Grace replied, her voice cool. "I want people to stop when they see the face. I want them to ache."
The room fell quiet again.
Across the table sat Callum Price, the COO. Thirty-four, former finance star, smart mouth. His jaw ticked slightly. Grace noticed.
"Problem, Callum?"
"Just wondering if ache is a measurable KPI," he replied dryly.
A rare smile touched her lips.
"Only if you're looking in the wrong places."
Laughter circled the table, uneasy but real. Callum held her gaze. Beneath the banter, there was always tension. He was brilliant, dangerous in his own right. But he wasn't Silas.
No one was.
As the meeting progressed, Grace remained silent, letting the others speak, watching which words bloomed and which withered. She was a queen among pawns, and her silence carried the weight of a thousand commands.
At noon, she stood.
"Meeting adjourned. Andre, stay."
The others filed out quickly, like air escaping a room that had held its breath too long.
Andre leaned against the window, watching the skyline. "That was brutal."
"That was business."
"You're different today," he said.
Grace didn't reply.
Because she wasn't thinking about the campaign. Or the budget. Or the billion-dollar valuation.
She was thinking about Riverton's annual Aurum Gala that night. And about the person who would be in the city for the first time in years.
That evening, Riverton gleamed like gold. Chandeliers lit like stars. Music played like honey. Grace arrived alone, emerging from a matte black car that matched the storm she wore.
Her emerald gown fit like a second skin. The slit rose high enough to scandalize. Her lips were crimson, her gaze unreadable.
Inside, she was met with applause in glances. People paused to stare. Her name was whispered like a prayer.
Among the sea of admirers stood Eva Lorne, her second-in-command. Mid-20s, chestnut curls, a sharp tongue, and the only person Grace trusted to speak for the brand when she couldn't.
"I had to ask three people to confirm you'd actually show," Eva teased.
"And disappoint this circus? Never."
"You look... lethal."
Grace clinked her glass against Eva's.
"That's the idea."
The ballroom buzzed with laughter and clinking glasses, but Grace Laurent felt the chill of a thousand eyes tracing her every move. Her emerald gown clung to her like a second skin, the slit rising high enough to tease yet conceal, the first time she had allowed herself to wear something so dangerously intimate in public. The heat beneath her composed exterior was unfamiliar, unsettling.
She never let anyone touch her, not really. Admirers circled like moths, but none had ever come close enough to breach the fortress she'd built around herself. She was a queen, untouchable. Including tonight.
Across the ballroom, a set of eyes watched her.
Julian Sterling's dark eyes found her through the sea of guests, a quiet storm of desire and challenge. When he approached, his presence was like a shadow folding itself around her, and Grace could feel the sharp edge of something darker lurking beneath his polished charm.
"You make emerald look dangerous," he murmured, sliding his hand just enough to rest on her waist.
Grace's breath hitched. The contact was electric and foreign, stirring a cold fire that both frightened and intrigued her. She fought the instinct to pull away, masking it with a slow, almost predatory smile.
"And you make flattery sound expensive," she replied, her voice silk threaded with steel.
As they danced, Julian's hand tightened slightly, a reminder that this closeness was not a gift but a game, a test of wills. Grace's heart beat unevenly, the vulnerability clawing at her like a whispered secret she wasn't ready to admit even to herself. Her mind spun through the tangled web of power and control she wielded so effortlessly, suddenly aware of how much risk was hidden in this single moment of touch.
"Do you ever let anyone close?" Julian's breath was warm near her ear, a question that felt less like curiosity and more like a trap.
Grace's eyes, usually so guarded, flickered with something raw, something dangerously human. "Only the ones I don't plan to keep," she said, voice low and venomous.
The music swelled, their bodies moving in a rhythm that was both intoxicating and suffocating. Julian's gaze darkened, sensing the flicker beneath her armor. And yet, Grace held herself like a knife's edge, sharp, precise, deadly.
When the song ended, Julian leaned in, his voice a whisper meant only for her.
"Dinner sometime?"
Her answer was a promise wrapped in a threat: "I don't dine with men who think they can survive me."
And with that, she stepped away with her heart pounding and mind racing, aware more than ever that this first brush of physical closeness had cracked open a door she had spent years sealing shut.
Because for all her control, for all her power, the danger wasn't outside her, it was already inside.