I woke up to the sound of my own heartbeat pounding in my temples.
The morning light sliced through the curtains like a knife, and I groaned, rolling over and pressing my face into the pillow.
I’d drunk too much.
Way too much.
But what else was I supposed to do when every rich, polished woman at that gala looked at me like I was something stuck to the bottom of their designer heels? They’d smile with their perfect teeth and ask where I’d gone to school, what my family did, and how I’d met Lorenzo. And I’d give them vague answers, watching their eyes narrow as they tried to place me.
I didn’t belong there.
I’d known it the second I walked in.
But then I’d found Jenny. She couldn’t have been more than twenty-four, long red hair framing her face, her laugh ringing out above the careful, practiced voices. Her husband was in his early thirties, some tech guy, and she spent the night rolling her eyes at the men who kept reaching for her, brushing her arm like she was a prize on display.
We’d ended up in a corner by the dessert table, passing glasses of champagne back and forth, whispering jokes about everyone in the room.
“Did you see Mrs. Harrington’s dress? She looks like a lampshade.”
“Mr. Vance has been hitting on the same waitress for an hour. She’s going to mace him.”
“Your husband keeps staring at you like he’s about to ravish you in the corner.”
That last one had made me choke on my champagne.
I glanced across the room and found Lorenzo watching me. His eyes were dark, steady, almost hungry. For a moment, something flickered there—pride, maybe, or a kind of need, like he wanted me to see him just as much as I wanted to disappear. I wondered what he was thinking as he watched me, what storm was brewing behind that careful mask he wore here.
It was so difficult from the way he’d looked at me when he asked to prove himself.
“Two weeks. Fourteen days. Fourteen nights. Let me show you who I am. Let me earn the right to know you.”
I’d agreed because I had nothing to lose.
That was the truth, wasn’t it?
I had no money. No family. No future except the one he’d handed me on a silver platter. And sure, the marriage was fake—the contract said no sex, no expectations—but we’d already broken that rule.
But wanting someone and falling for someone were two different things. I knew that. I’d learned that lesson with my ex, and I’d learned it even harder with every man who’d come before him.
Love wasn’t real.
Not for me.
I was broken in ways that made love impossible. Daddy issues so deep I’d need a therapist for a decade. Trust issues so ingrained I couldn’t even trust myself.
So when Lorenzo had asked for a week, I’d said yes because it didn’t matter.
He could show me who he was.
He could buy me fancy dresses and expensive gifts.
But he would never have my heart.
Because I wasn’t sure I had one left to give.
The knock on my door an hour later, as I lay there face down under my pillow, made me jump.
“Good morning,” Lorenzo said, his voice low.
