Inside, the air was thick, suffocating. It smelled of expensive ebony wood, stale whiskey, and the metallic tang of a man losing control. Her fingers tightened around the strap of her clutch until her knuckles turned white. She shouldn't be here. She should be anywhere but here. But the memory of Robert Sullivan's frantic ultimatum-"Get him to sign the release on your mother's trust, Sienna, or the bank seizes the estate by morning"-acted like a lead weight chained to her ankle, dragging her into the room. It wasn't about saving the Sullivans; it was about the only leverage she had left: the Kensington legacy locked away in a frozen account that only a Vanderbilt signature could release.
The only light came from the city bleeding in through the floor-to-ceiling windows. Manhattan was a grid of electric veins below, indifferent to what was about to happen sixty floors up.
On the oversized leather sofa, a man sat with his head in his hands. His tie was loosened, the silk hanging like a noose around his neck. Even in the shadows, Julian Vanderbilt radiated a dangerous kind of energy, like a coiled spring pressed to its breaking point.
Sienna took a breath. It hitched in her throat.
"Mr. Vanderbilt?"
The sound of her voice was the trigger.
Julian's head snapped up. His eyes were bloodshot, pupils blown wide, swimming in a haze of something that wasn't just alcohol. He moved faster than a man in his state should have been able to. Before Sienna could process the shift in the air, he was across the room.
He didn't speak. He slammed her against the cold wall.
The impact knocked the air from her lungs. His hand matted in her hair, tilting her head back, exposing the column of her throat. His palm was scorching hot against her skin, a feverish contrast to the air-conditioned chill of the suite.
"Who sent you?" His voice was a low growl, vibrating against her chest. "Which one of them sent you?"
"I-"
He didn't let her finish. He crushed his mouth to hers.
It wasn't a kiss. It was a collision. It tasted of scotch and fury. Sienna tried to shove him back, her hands pressing against the solid wall of his chest, but it was like trying to hold back a landslide. The drugs in his system had stripped away his civilized veneer, leaving only raw, primal instinct. He was seeking oblivion, and she was the nearest exit.
The sound of her zipper tearing tore through the silence.
Panic flared in her gut, sharp and cold. But beneath the panic, the training kicked in-the muscle memory she kept buried under oversized sweaters and a meek persona. She could incapacitate him. A strike to the throat, a thumb to the eye. She could end this in three seconds.
But she couldn't. Not if she wanted to keep the Ghost buried. Not if she wanted to survive the Sullivans.
She went limp. It was a tactical surrender.
They stumbled toward the bed, a tangle of limbs and heavy breathing. When they fell onto the velvet duvet, the world tilted. Pain, sharp and sudden, spiked through her, followed by a strange, terrifying friction. She bit her lip to keep from crying out, tasting copper. She wasn't a person to him right now; she was a vessel for his demons.
Hours later, the storm broke.
Julian collapsed into a heavy, drug-induced coma, his breathing deepening into a rhythmic rasp.
Sienna lay there for a moment, staring at the ceiling. Her body ached, a dull, throbbing reminder of the violation. She slowly untangled herself from the sheets, her movements silent, precise. She stood up, her legs trembling slightly, but her face was a mask of absolute zero.
She walked to the nightstand.
There, sitting next to a crystal tumbler, was his watch. A Patek Philippe. Complicated. Worth more than the house she grew up in.
She reached into her small bag and pulled out a crumpled bill. One hundred dollars. It was all the cash she had on her.
She lifted the heavy watch and slid the bill underneath it.
It was petty. It was dangerous. It was perfect.
She walked to the massive glass doors leading to the terrace. Locked from the outside. She could hear the heavy tread of the private security detail in the hallway. There was no walking out the front door.
Sienna's eyes shifted. The vulnerability vanished.
She opened her bag again and pulled out a coil of high-tensile wire and a compact, carbon-fiber micro-descender. She slipped on a pair of sheer, friction-resistant gloves that looked like evening wear but were designed for tactical rappelling. She secured the wire to the reinforced railing of the balcony, testing the tension with a sharp tug. The wind whipped her hair across her face, biting and cold.
She didn't look down.
She stepped over the railing and dropped into the void.
For three seconds, she was a blur, the descender humming a low frequency as it managed the friction heat that would have otherwise stripped the skin from her palms. She braked hard, swinging toward a window on the fifty-fifth floor she knew was unlatched due to a blind spot she had jammed in the security grid earlier. She hit the sill with a soft thud, rolled inside, and vanished into the darkness of the empty office.
By the time the sun hit the spire of the Empire State Building, Sienna was gone.
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