OREN POV
The silence of the Maybach was usually my sanctuary, but today it felt like an extension of the boardroom. I leaned my head against the cool leather of the headrest, my eyes closed.
Most people saw the name Valentino and thought of the Forbes 100, the skyscraper in Mayfair, or the shipping lanes that moved a decent percentage of the world's GDP. To me, it was just a cage of high-end tailoring and endless expectations. At twenty-six, I had already learned that "life" was just a series of strategic moves. Emotions were a variable I didn't include in my equations. They were messy. They were a liability.
The car slowed as we reached the Vane estate, and I felt that familiar, cold knot of irritation. My father had stayed for the disaster; I was just the cleanup crew, sent to show that the Valentinos were still interested in the merger despite whatever insult the Vanes had managed to hurl at dinner.
I stepped out of the car, and the rain immediately set to work destroying my tuxedo. I adjusted my cuffs, my face a mask of bored stone. I was late, I was drenched, and I was singularly unimpressed by the gothic grandeur of the Vane driveway.
I hadn't even made it three steps when the world collided with me.
The impact was jarring. I'm not a small man, but the sheer, frantic momentum of whatever hit me nearly sent me back into the mud. My hands moved on instinct—not out of kindness, but out of a reflexive need to stabilize the situation.
That was when I felt her.
She didn't feel like a person. She felt like a bird that had been crushed in a fist. Through the soaked, freezing silk, I felt the sharp, terrifying protrusion of a ribcage, the narrowness of shoulders that seemed too weak to carry the weight of the water, let alone a name like Vane. She was all bone and trembling, a collection of glass shards held together by a sapphire dress.
A sob broke from her—a jagged, ugly sound that vibrated right through my chest. Then, she was gone. She wrenched herself away with an animalistic desperation and vanished into the gray sheets of rain.
I stood there, the freezing water soaking into my hair, staring at the empty space where she had been. My shoulder throbbed where she'd hit me, but the real ache was the lingering sensation of those brittle bones.
I turned and walked toward the house, my expression settling into its usual mask of bored indifference. I didn't want to be here. I had spent the last six hours untangling a hostile takeover, and the last thing I wanted was to play nice with the Vanes.
The front doors were wide open, a rectangle of hollow, golden light spilling onto the wet stone.I stepped inside, the sudden heat of the house pressing against my damp skin.
I flicked a stray droplet of rain off my sleeve and looked up.
Eleanor Vane stood in the center of the hall, her blood-red velvet gown looking like a fresh wound against the white stone.
To the rest of the world—to the readers of Tatler and the desperate social climbers of London—Eleanor Vane was the ultimate blueprint. She was the "Iron Matriarch," a woman of clinical, surgical grace who had spent thirty years turning the Vane name into a synonym for untouchable excellence. She was the person who dictated what was fashionable, what was acceptable, and who was worthy of a seat at the table. In my father's circles, she was respected because she was cold. She operated on a frequency of pure logic and zero empathy, a trait we usually admired in a business partner.
But tonight, the blueprint was shredded.
The woman standing before me was a stranger to the public image. Her breathing was jagged, her hair—usually pinned back with the precision of a military operation—had a few frantic strands clinging to her neck. Her eyes weren't just cold; they were manic, vibrating with a dark, simmering energy that made the air in the foyer feel toxic.
She looked like a queen who had just watched her throne catch fire, and she didn't know whether to save the crown or let the palace burn.
She didn't even notice me at first. She was staring at a drop of water on the marble floor.
"Mrs. Vane," I said, my voice flat, cutting through the heavy silence.
She snapped her head toward me, her eyes wild for a fraction of a second before that famous mask slammed back into place. It was a fascinating performance—the way she stitched her features back together in real-time.
"Oren. You... you've arrived," she said, her voice brittle. "I'm afraid the evening has concluded prematurely. Your parents... they've already departed."
"So I gathered," I replied, flicking a stray droplet of rain from my sleeve. I didn't care about the dinner, but the memory of the impact on the drive was a cold weight in my chest. "I nearly leveled one of your guests on the drive. Or perhaps a servant? She was in quite a hurry to leave."
Eleanor's jaw tightened. She smoothed a hand over her velvet hip, a gesture that was far too restless for a woman of her standing. "Just a... a disgruntled kitchen maid, Oren. Nothing to concern yourself with. The help can be so temperamental when the weather turns."
She was lying. The girl hadn't been wearing a uniform; she'd been wearing silk that cost more than a maid's yearly salary. And she hadn't looked disgruntled. She had felt—even in that brief, violent second—utterly destroyed.
"A maid in sapphire silk?" I asked, my voice dropping.
I watched her closely. In the boardroom, when a CEO lies like that, it's a sign of weakness. In this house, it felt like a cover-up for something much darker.
"You must have seen the reflections in the rain, Oren," Eleanor said, her tone sharpening into a warning. "It's a wretched night. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have matters to attend to."
"Of course," I said, my expression unchanging.
I turned and walked back out into the rain. I had no interest in the Vanes' secrets, and I had no interest in a girl who was too weak to stand her ground. But as I stepped back into the Maybach, I looked at my hands. I could still feel the phantom sensation of those ribs—sharp, narrow, and shivering.
The Vanes weren't just wealthy; they were clinical. Most families at the top of the food chain dealt in steel or software, but the Vanes dealt in life and death. Vane International Healthcare was a Rank 13 juggernaut that held the patents on half the world's most essential medications. If you were sick, you paid a Vane. If you wanted to stay young, you paid a Vane. They were the chemists to the Forbes 100, and Eleanor Vane ran that empire with the same cold, sterile precision she used to run her household.
The city lights were a fractured, neon blur through the sheets of rain. I didn't look away from the window, even as the screen of my tablet glowed with the cold, hard data of the Vane family tree.
"The Vane trio," I muttered, the words barely audible over the hum of the tires.
Everyone knew Leo Vane. The heir apparent. He was currently in Singapore closing a pharmaceutical distribution deal that would likely move the Vane needle another few billion. Then there was Seraphina, the crown jewel of the London social scene. She was the face of their philanthropic foundations, a woman whose every smile was curated for maximum brand impact.
But then there was the third. Alessia.
She was a ghost in the Vane records. While her siblings were photographed at every gala from Monaco to Milan, Alessia was a footnote. A list of academic honors, a scholarship to a top-tier medical faculty, and almost nothing else. No social media. No public scandals. Just a trail of "absent" markings at major family events and a series of prestigious GPA rankings that felt more like a prison record than an achievement.
"Michael," I said, my voice cutting through the quiet.
"Sir?"
"Why isn't she ever in the photos?" I asked, scrolling through a digital archive of the last three Vane Christmas galas. "Leo is there. Seraphina is practically the center of the frame. But the youngest daughter is always... missing."
"Rumor among the staff circles is that she's 'unsteady,' sir," Michael replied, his voice cautious. "Delicate. They say Eleanor keeps her under a strict regimen to focus on her research. The Vanes aren't fond of distractions."
Delicate.
I thought about the way her ribs had felt against my palms. That wasn't 'delicate.' That was starving. That was someone who was being hollowed out from the inside. And the sob she had let out—it wasn't the sound of an 'unsteady' girl. It was the sound of someone who had finally reached their breaking point.
I looked back out at the dark, rain-slicked shoulder of the road. We were miles from the estate now, moving toward the heart of the city.
"She was a medical student," I noted, more to myself than to Michael. "If she's half as smart as Eleanor claims, she wouldn't run without a destination. She has a life outside that mausoleum. Find out where."
"I'm already on it, Mr. Valentino. I've reached out to our contacts in the university security office."
I leaned back into the shadows of the car, my fingers idly tracing the line of my jaw. I was cold-hearted—that was the reputation I had built and maintained with surgical precision. I didn't care about the plight of a 'difficult' billionaire's daughter. My father wanted a merger, and I wanted a clean deal.
But the Vanes were selling us a miracle of pharmaceutical stability while their own house was bleeding. If Alessia Vane was the 'future' of their medical empire, then the Valentino investment was built on a foundation of glass.
"Slow down," I commanded as we approached a dark bus stop near the edge of Kensington.
A lone figure was huddled under the small glass overhang, but it wasn't her. Just a man in a trench coat waiting for a ride that would never come in this weather.
I felt a sharp, uncharacteristic prick of irritation. Why was I looking? She wasn't my responsibility. She was a Vane problem.
"Sir, I have something," Michael said, his tone shifting. "It seems Alessia Vane doesn't spend all her time at the university. She has a private lease on a lab space in a warehouse district near the docks. It's held under a shell company, but the signature on the original lease is hers."
My eyes narrowed. "A secret lab? Eleanor Vane doesn't allow her children to have secrets. Especially not secrets that involve independent research."
"It appears she's been funding it herself through her academic grants and prize money," Michael added. "It's a modest setup, sir. Nothing compared to the Vane International facilities."
I tapped my fingers against the leather armrest. A secret lab. A hidden life.
I thought about the collision again—the feeling of her bones, the jagged sob, and the way Eleanor had lied about her being a "disgruntled maid."
Eleanor Vane was the queen of optics. To her, everything was about the strength of the brand. But tonight, I'd seen a girl who was physically and emotionally wasting away, running into a storm to get away from the very woman who was supposed to protect her.
The Vanes weren't a dynasty; they were a house of cards held together by Eleanor's iron grip and a lot of expensive PR. And Alessia Vane was the card that was about to fall.
"Sir? Should I set a course for the warehouse?" Michael asked.
"No," I said, my voice dropping into a low, dangerous register. "Not yet. Let the ghost have her sanctuary for now."
I leaned back into the shadows of the car, a cold, predatory smile tugging at the corner of my mouth. I didn't care about the girl's well-being. I wasn't a hero, and I certainly wasn't a saint. But I was a Valentino. And Valentinos didn't just merge with companies; we consumed them.
My father wanted a partnership. He wanted to sit at the table with the Vanes and share the spoils of the pharmaceutical world. But I saw a better opportunity.
If the Vane family was this fractured—if their "brilliant" youngest daughter was running through the mud in five-figure silk just to escape them—then they were vulnerable. They were bleeding. And in my world, when you smell blood, you don't offer a hand. You take the whole empire.
"Tell my father I'll be late for the debrief," I commanded, staring out at the rain-slicked road. "And Michael?"
"Yes, Mr. Valentino?"
"Keep a close watch on that lab. I want to know who goes in and who comes out. If Alessia Vane is the 'future' of their medical empire, I want to be the one who owns that future."
I looked down at the mud splattered on my boots. The Vanes thought they were untouchable at Rank 13. They thought they could lie to a Valentino and get away with it.
I looked down at the mud splattered on my boots. The Vanes thought they were untouchable at Rank 13. They thought they could lie to a Valentino and get away with it.
"Things are about to get very interesting," I whispered to the empty car.
It was high time the Vanes learned what happened when you tried to play at the top of the food chain. I wasn't going to help her. I was going to use her to topple her family and bring the Vane International Group to its knees.
Under my foot. Exactly where they belonged.