Chapter 1 1

The shears made a crisp, satisfying snip as they severed the stem.

Alessandra Winters held the sprig of Belladonna up to the filtered light of the Victorian conservatory. It was poisonous, deadly if ingested, yet beautiful in its deceit. Just like the Winters family name.

Through her noise-canceling headphones, the monotone voice of a financial news anchor detailed the morning's market crash. Liquidity crisis. Winters Trust under investigation. The words meant nothing to the plants, but they meant everything to the delicate ecosystem of her survival. She didn't react. Her pulse remained steady, a flat line in a chaotic world.

The glass door to the conservatory slammed open. The vibration traveled through the floor tiles before the sound registered.

Alessandra didn't flinch. She kept the shears hovering over a particularly stubborn branch of nightshade.

Mrs. Winters marched in. Her heels clicked against the stone like gunshots. She looked at her daughter-really looked at her-with the same disdain she reserved for a withered orchid.

"Take those ridiculous things off," her mother snapped, though Alessandra couldn't hear the words, she read the violent movement of her lips.

Alessandra lowered the shears. She slid the headphones down to her neck. The silence of the greenhouse was replaced by the angry, ragged breathing of a woman losing her grip on high society.

"Your grandfather is waiting," Mrs. Winters said, stepping forward and snatching the shears from Alessandra's hand. The metal blades clattered onto the potting table. "Stop pretending you're deaf. We all know you're just broken."

Alessandra slowly peeled off her gardening gloves. Her hands were pale, the veins visible beneath the skin like a roadmap of a place she'd never left. She raised her right hand.

Good morning, Mother, she signed. The movements were fluid, sarcastic in their exaggerated grace.

Mrs. Winters' face flushed a blotchy red. She hated the sign language. She hated that it required her to pay attention. "Silas is in the study. Now."

Alessandra didn't argue. She walked past her mother, smelling the cloying scent of Chanel No. 5 trying to mask the scent of gin.

The walk to the study felt like a funeral procession. The Winters estate was a mausoleum of dark wood and darker secrets. When she entered Silas Winters' study, the air temperature seemed to drop ten degrees.

Silas sat behind a desk that cost more than most people earned in a lifetime. He didn't look up. He slid a thick document across the polished mahogany. The friction of paper on wood was a hiss.

"The Trust is in the red," Silas said. His voice was gravel grinding on glass. "The audit from '09 is resurfacing. We need liquidity, and we need a shield."

Alessandra stood still. She knew this. She knew the ledger of illegal wire transfers from that year by heart. She'd memorized it when she was twelve, right before the silence took her. That knowledge was her only currency, but she felt as powerless now as she did then, unaware of the legal authority she secretly held.

"Florian Mercado," Silas announced.

The name landed in the room like a grenade. The tech mogul. The shark of Silicon Valley. New money, ruthless, and currently looking for a way to legitimize his empire with old-world connections.

"He wants the physical black ledger and its encryption keys," Silas continued, his eyes finally lifting to meet hers. They were cold, dead things. "We are giving him a merger. You are the collateral."

Alessandra's stomach tightened. A physical knot formed beneath her ribs. She reached into the pocket of her apron and pulled out her tablet. Her thumbs flew across the screen.

A mechanical, genderless voice filled the room. "I am a person. Not a liquid asset."

Silas let out a short, dry laugh. It sounded like dry leaves crumbling. "You are whatever I say you are."

He leaned forward, his elbows resting on the document. "If you refuse, the payments to the care facility stop today. Your nurse... what was her name? Martha? She'll be on the street by noon."

Alessandra's fingers froze over the glass screen. Martha. The only person who had held her when she cried, before the silence took over. The only person who knew she wasn't stupid, just terrified.

The threat wasn't a bluff. Silas Winters didn't bluff; he executed.

Alessandra looked at the document. Transfer of Assets. Her name was listed under liabilities.

She lowered her eyes. The fight drained out of her, replaced by a cold, heavy stone in her chest. She tapped the screen one last time.

"Deal."

Thirty miles away, in the glass-and-steel spire of the Mercado Group headquarters, Florian Mercado stood looking out over the San Francisco skyline.

"They agreed?" Florian asked, not turning around.

Arthur Mercado, his grandfather and the only man Florian respected, sat on the white leather sofa. "Silas is desperate. He's handing over the girl and the keys."

Florian adjusted his cufflink. "The girl. The public one, I assume? The one always in the society pages?" He wasn't asking about a potential partner, but about the piece on the board. He'd crossed paths with Chloe Gutierrez, a sharp-witted executive from a rival firm, and knew ambition when he saw it. If the Winters had any sense, they'd put their most competent player forward.

He had seen Chloe Winters in magazines. Sharp, ambitious, loud. A strategist. A worthy opponent, perhaps even a useful partner for a merger. She was the only Winters who seemed to have a pulse.

Arthur hesitated. Just for a fraction of a second. "He said the Winters daughter."

Florian turned. His eyes were dark, intelligent, and predatory. He didn't like ambiguity. "Fine. As long as I get the ledger. That family is a sinking ship, and I'm just buying the wreckage for parts."

"And the marriage?" Arthur asked.

"It's a transaction," Florian said, walking back to his desk. He pressed the intercom button. "Get legal to draft the papers. I want the acquisition completed by Friday."

He looked at his reflection in the darkened monitor of his computer. He looked like a man who had won.

"Once I have what I need," Florian said, his voice devoid of emotion, "I'll liquidate the asset. I don't have time for a wife."