The scent of Casablanca lilies was supposed to signify purity and new beginnings. To me, they now smelled like a funeral.
I stood before the floor-to-ceiling gilded mirror in the bridal suite of the Grand Pierre Hotel, a vision in three layers of hand-stitched French lace. My diamond tiara nestled in my dark tresses, catching the light and refracting shards of brilliance across the cream-colored walls. Outside those double mahogany doors, five hundred of the city's most influential figures were waiting to witness the union of the year. My family's architectural legacy was merging with the Miller shipping fortune. It was a merger of power, beauty, and tradition.
Or so the press releases said.
"Have you seen the guest list for the after-party, Evie? It's a literal Who's Who of the East Coast," my cousin, Sarah, had chirped only an hour ago before slipping out to "check on the champagne."
I reached for my bouquet on the vanity, my gloved fingers trembling slightly. It wasn't nerves. It was a cold, sinking intuition that had been gnawing at my gut since the rehearsal dinner. Mark Miller, my fiancé of two years, had been distant. His smiles were too practiced, his touches too brief. I had told myself it was just the stress of the merger, but as I stood there in the silence, I knew I was lying to myself.
A muffled sound broke the stillness of the suite. It wasn't coming from the hallway where the hum of the string quartet lived. It was coming from the private lounge just behind the heavy velvet curtains of my dressing area.
It was a laugh. Low, throaty, and unmistakably Sarah's.
"Mark, stop," Sarah giggled, the sound followed by the unmistakable rustle of heavy fabric. "The ceremony starts in twenty minutes. If your 'blushing bride' walks in, we're dead."
"Evelyn is probably busy admiring herself in the mirror," Mark's voice replied, dripping with a casual cruelty that made my blood turn to ice. "You know how she is. Everything has to be a perfect image. She doesn't have a passionate bone in her body. God, I can't wait for this day to be over so I can have the Miller trust and you in the same bed without the sneaking around."
"Poor Evie," Sarah purred. "Marrying a man who's only in love with her father's blueprints and her cousin's..."
The rest of the sentence was drowned out by a wet, rhythmic sound that made me want to claw my own skin off.
The world tilted. The white lace felt like a shroud. The man I had supported through two corporate scandals, the man I had stayed up with until dawn helping him rehearse board presentations, was currently deconstructing my dignity twenty feet away. And my cousin, the girl I had grown up with, the girl I had made my Maid of Honor, was his accomplice.
I didn't cry. The Vances didn't do "hysterical." My father had raised me to be a pillar of the firm, a woman of steel and structure. I looked at the heavy crystal vase of lilies on the vanity. For a fleeting second, I imagined smashing it over Mark's head. But no. That was too messy. That would make me the "scorned woman" in tomorrow's headlines.
If I called off the wedding now, my father's heart, already weakened by a recent stroke, wouldn't survive the scandal. The Miller merger was the only thing keeping Vance Architects afloat after the market dip. If I walked out, the Millers would pull their funding, and my family would be humiliated.
I needed a husband. I didn't need Mark, but I needed a body in that tuxedo. I needed a shield.
I grabbed my train, hoisting the heavy silk over my arm with a violent tug. I didn't glance toward the curtains. I didn't give them the satisfaction of a confrontation. Instead, I slipped out of the suite's service entrance and into the long, quiet VIP corridor.
My heart was hammering against my ribs like a trapped bird. My mind raced. Think, Evelyn. Think. I needed a man who was handsome enough to pass as a secret lover, someone imposing enough to make Mark look like a boy, and someone desperate or crazy enough to sign a marriage license in the next ten minutes.
The hallway was mostly empty, save for a tall figure standing by the window at the far end, shadowed by the afternoon sun.
He was leaning against the wall, a phone pressed to his ear. Even from a distance, the man radiated a terrifying kind of stillness. He wore a charcoal-grey suit that cost more than my wedding dress, and his silhouette was all sharp angles and broad shoulders.
"I don't care about the board's opinion," the man said, his voice a deep, resonant baritone that sent a shiver down my spine. "The old man's will is clear. I have a wife by midnight, or the shares go to my uncle. Find someone. Buy someone. I don't care if she's a waitress or a socialite, as long as her background is clean and she can sign her name."
I stopped in my tracks.
A wife by midnight.
It was a sign. Or a very well-dressed miracle.
I marched down the hallway, the heels of my designer pumps clicking like a countdown on the marble floor. As I approached, the man turned.
He was devastating. His hair was a dark, controlled mess, and his eyes were the color of a stormy Atlantic, cold, grey, and incredibly intelligent. He looked at me, his gaze traveling from my diamond tiara down to my crumpled white train, then back to my face. He didn't look surprised. He looked like a hunter who had just seen a very interesting deer walk into his clearing.
He lowered his phone. "I'll call you back," he muttered, his eyes never leaving mine.
"You need a wife," I said, my voice remarkably steady despite the fact that my world had ended five minutes ago. "I need a husband. And I need him in exactly eight minutes."
The man straightened up, towering over me. He had to be at least six-foot-three. The air around him smelled of expensive sandalwood and cold ambition. "You're the Vance girl," he stated. It wasn't a question. "The one supposed to marry the Miller heir today."
"Plans changed," I snapped. I stepped closer, stepping into his personal space, refusing to be intimidated by the sheer wall of his chest. "Mark Miller is currently occupied with my cousin. I have five hundred guests, a dying father, and a reputation to protect. You need a 'clean' wife to secure your shares. I am the daughter of Vance Architects. My background is spotless, my education is Ivy League, and I am very, very angry."
A slow, dangerous smile quirked the corner of the man's mouth. He tucked his phone into his pocket. "And why should I choose you over a paid stranger?"
"Because a paid stranger will be found out," I whispered, my eyes flashing. "But if you walk into that chapel with me, everyone will believe we've been having a secret affair for months. They'll think I'm the one who dumped the Miller heir at the altar for a bigger fish. It saves my dignity, and it gives you a wife that your board can't find a single flaw in."
The man looked at me for a long beat. He seemed to be weighing the pros and cons of my soul in real-time. He reached out, his thumb grazing the line of my jaw, a gesture that was shockingly intimate for two people who hadn't yet exchanged names.
"I'm Silas Vane," he said.
My breath hitched. Silas Vane. The "Vulture of Wall Street." The man who had turned a failing tech firm into a global empire by the age of thirty. He was richer than the Millers by a factor of ten, and twice as ruthless.
"Evelyn Vance," I replied.
"Well, Evelyn," Silas said, checking his Patek Philippe watch. "We have six minutes to find a notary and four minutes to get you to the altar. I hope you're ready for the fallout, because once I put a ring on your finger, I don't let go until I've gotten what I want."
"Good," I said, my heart hardening into a diamond. "Because I'm never letting go of the man who helps me ruin Mark Miller's life."
Silas offered his arm, his expression shifting from a cold businessman to a protective lover so seamlessly it was chilling. "Then let's go give them a show."
As we walked toward the notary's office in the hotel's business center, I didn't look back at the bridal suite. I didn't think about the white lilies or the betrayal. I only thought about the look on Mark's face when he would see me walking down the aisle toward a king instead of a coward.
The flash marriage was about to begin, and the city would never be the same.