Bianca Vance grabbed the neckline of my emerald service dress in the middle of the Starlight Foundation gala, ripped it off my shoulder, and hissed, 'That's what you get for bumping into me, trash.' She thought she'd just humiliated a waitress in front of the city's richest families.

The elevator ride up to the top floor of the Sterling Tower was silent, save for the hum of the high-speed hydraulic cables.

The penthouse smelled of white lilies, fresh linen, and the faint metallic tang of rain coming off the East River. It was a fortress of glass, steel, and dark marble—the place where Adrien and I had built our lives away from the glaring cameras of the media and the toxic politics of the old-money elite.

I stepped out onto the heated hardwood floor, sliding Adrien’s heavy coat off my shoulders and laying it across the back of the white leather sofa.

The torn emerald dress looked even worse under the bright, clear lights of the apartment. The silk was frayed where Bianca’s acrylic nails had dug into the weave, leaving a long, jagged tear down to my ribs.

Adrien walked in behind me, tossing his jacket onto a chair and immediately unbuttoning his cuffs. He didn't speak. He walked straight to the mahogany bar, poured two fingers of neat amber scotch into a heavy crystal glass, and handed it to me.

I took a small sip. The liquid burned pleasantly down my throat, washing away the bitter taste of stale champagne and cheap perfume from the ballroom.

"You're angry," I said softly, watching his broad back as he leaned against the counter, his knuckles white against the dark wood.

"I am furious," Adrien replied without turning around. His voice was low, vibrating with a repressed energy that would have terrified anyone else. "I am furious that you put yourself in that room. I am furious that Damian laid his eyes on you in that uniform. And I am beyond furious that that pathetic, worthless girl put her hands on you."

I set the glass down on the glass table and walked across the room until I stood directly behind him. I wrapped my arms around his waist, resting my cheek against the middle of his back, feeling the heavy, rapid thumping of his heart.

"Adrien," I murmured. "Look at me."

He turned slowly within my hold, his dark eyes brooding, filled with a mixture of guilt and fierce protection.

"I am Ana Petrova Sterling," I reminded him, looking up into his face. "I was raised by a father who controlled shipping lanes from St. Petersburg to Rotterdam. Do you really think Bianca Vance pulling on a piece of silk broke me?"

"It’s not about whether you broke, Ana," Adrien said, his hand rising to gently trace the jawline that Bianca’s words had tried to dishonor. His thumb brushed over my cheekbone with delicate reverence. "It’s about the fact that I promised to protect you from the mud of this city. And tonight, you had to stand in it while I walked through the door like a theatrical savior."

"You weren't late," I insisted softly. "You walked in at the exact second the trap closed. If you had arrived ten minutes earlier, Damian wouldn't have signed the second authorization sheet. He would have slipped the folder back into his jacket and played the innocent cousin. We needed him caught with his hands in the vault."

Adrien closed his eyes, leaning his head down until his lips touched the sensitive spot where my neck met my shoulder—right above the torn seam of the dress.

"I hated seeing her touch you," he growled quietly against my skin. "I wanted to break Marcus Vance’s empire into pieces right there on the floor."

"And you will," I whispered, reaching up to run my fingers through his dark, thick hair. "Tomorrow morning. Miriam Cross has already drafted the asset forfeiture papers for the Vance Media Group. By noon, we control fifty-one percent of their board."

Adrien pulled back slightly, a dark, dangerous smile breaking through his grim expression. "You're merciless, Mrs. Sterling."

"I was trained by the best," I replied with a small wink.

The quiet of the penthouse was interrupted by the sharp, rhythmic buzz of an encrypted satellite phone resting on the marble desk near the window.

Adrien sighed, his hands sliding down to rest on my hips before he stepped away to pick up the call.

"Speak," Adrien answered, his voice instantly dropping back into its corporate steel tone.

I picked up my scotch glass and walked over to the floor-to-ceiling windows, looking out over the twinkling grid of Manhattan below. The city looked clean from up here, a grid of light and order, hiding the filth and greed that churned through its private clubs and ballroom corners.

"I see," Adrien said into the phone. His eyes met mine across the room. "Where is he now?"

A pause.

"Keep him in the federal holding facility in Lower Manhattan. No bail applications until Monday morning. Instruct Judge Miller that any attempt to post bond for Damian Sterling will be met with an immediate federal injunction regarding foreign money laundering."

He hung up the phone and walked back over to me.

"That was Miriam," Adrien said. "Damian’s lawyers are already trying to claim that he was framed by an internal rogue employee. They're trying to throw his secretary under the bus."

"Expected," I said, taking another sip. "And Viktor Volkov?"

"Volkov’s private jet left Teterboro Airport forty minutes ago," Adrien revealed, his expression darkening. "He knew the raid was happening. The moment Damian was cuffed, Volkov cut his communications and fled back to international waters."

I narrowed my eyes. Viktor Volkov was the real shadow behind this entire mess. Damian was just a greedy, foolish puppet who wanted to live like a king on borrowed money. Volkov was the architect—a man who bought up debts, corrupted family legacies, and used weak men like Damian to bleed ancient corporations dry from the inside out.

"Volkov left his money behind," I noted. "The thirty million from the escrow account is frozen in the federal bridge account."

"Yes," Adrien agreed. "But Volkov doesn't care about thirty million, Ana. He cares about the Sterling Innovations defense patents. That’s what he was really after. Damian wasn't just stealing cash—he was preparing to transfer the blue-prints for our satellite navigation systems to Volkov’s firm in Cyprus."

A cold shudder went down my spine. The satellite navigation system was the crown jewel of Sterling Innovations—a government-contracted technology that Adrien had spent five years developing. If Volkov had gotten his hands on it, it wouldn't just mean the fall of Sterling Innovations; it would mean a national security crisis.

"Does Volkov have the codes?" I asked softly.