Chapter 1 1. Overdosing on Sacarsm

MAYA

As I sprinted down the marble hallway, the clicking of my heels sounded like a countdown to a disaster I wasn't prepared for. Every step brought me closer to a sudden, glaring realization that my mother really should have swallowed me in a blowjob.

Or, at the very least, I should have put up less of a fight in the race to be born. Seriously, why did I swim so hard? Was the prize really this?

I was sprinting in four-inch heels that had seen better days, my ankles about to give in because my father has the dramatic capacity of a soap opera queen. Apparently, he can't handle a single crisis without dragging me into the middle to make it my problem too.

Between my burning lungs and the bird's nest currently masquerading as my hairstyle, I looked less like a corporate heiress and more like I'd just escaped a kidnapping.

And judging by the frantic tone of my father's nineteenth voicemail, getting kidnapped might actually have been a better way to spend my Tuesday.

"Maya, please. Just get to the office. It's an emergency."

I could barely make out the words through his sobbing. I wondered which soulmate he wanted me to pay off this time.

Was it the twenty-two-year-old yoga instructor who thought he still had a trust fund worth raiding? Or the cocktail waitress who finally realized his credit cards were made of plastic and lies?

I knew the truth, even if he didn't. The Sullivan Fortune was currently a house of cards held together by my sheer will and a few remaining pieces of my mother's jewelry that he hadn't gambled away yet.

I reached the heavy mahogany doors of his office, nearly collapsing against the wood. I tried to claw back enough oxygen to actually yell at him, but my lungs were screaming.

Marcus, my father's secretary, was standing by the door. He'd been my father's right-hand man for a decade.

Today, he looked like he was waiting for a funeral to start.

"Good god, Marcus. What did he have you doing all night?" I panted. I leaned in, pointing a judgmental finger at the mess on my head. "And don't even look at my hair. I got into a fight with the wind, and the wind won."

Marcus didn't laugh. He didn't even crack a smile.

"Just give me the rating," I pressed, my voice dropping. "On a scale of getting drunk and gambling to flee the country, how much of a disaster am I walking into?"

Marcus swallowed hard, his gaze shifting to the mahogany doors. "Just go in, Miss Sullivan," he whispered.

He pulled the doors open, the hinges groaning as they ushered me into the room.

"He's finally knocked up some woman, right?" I sighed. I didn't wait for a reply. I didn't have the luxury of time, not with a date with Liam in an hour.

I wasn't about to let my father's latest mid-life crisis ruin my evening. Liam was the only normal thing in my life, sturdy, predictable, and safe.

I stepped inside, my voice already loaded and ready to fire.

"Dad! If I'm here because you've managed to create a secret sibling, I'm changing my name and moving to a different continent. I am not babysitting a mistake born in a blur of cheap tequila and a cocktail waitress's hunt for a paycheck."

He was standing in the far corner by the floor-to-ceiling window, looking out at the city like he was waiting for a meteor to hit. His shoulders were hunched. His hands were shoved so deep in his pockets he looked like he was trying to hide from his own skin.

"Dad?" I panted, wiping a stray dark hair from my damp forehead.

He didn't turn around.

Puzzled, I let my eyes wander away from my father's trembling back. I scanned the room, expecting to see a sobbing girl with a baby bump. Instead, my eyes landed on the man sitting in my father's oversized leather chair. The chair my father usually used to look important while doing absolutely nothing.

Our eyes met, and for a second, I forgot how to breathe.

He was unfairly handsome with dark hair, deep, cold blue eyes, and a sharp jawline. He didn't look like a mid-life crisis. He looked like the man you call when you want to end one.

"This will do."

He nodded slowly, snapping me out of my trance. His blue eyes raked over me, from my messy hair down to my flushed face, ending at my scuffed heels. He trailed back up, lingering on the curves I usually tried to hide under my blazer, looking as if he were checking the ripeness of a piece of fruit.

I blinked rapidly. Excuse me? My mouth, which usually had a mind of its own, suddenly felt very dry. I felt a desperate urge to button my blazer all the way to my chin.

A dark glint of satisfaction sparked in his eyes. "She looks better in person," he spoke again, his tone smooth and terrifyingly possessive.

The sheer audacity of him ogling me was the fuel I needed. Sarcasm is a hell of a drug, and I was currently overdosing as my common sense packed its bags and left the building.

I let out a sharp, mocking scoff. "Oh, I get it now." I leaned in slightly, my eyes trailing over his expensive black suit with disdain. "Honestly, I didn't realize Dad had finally run out of girls half his age and moved on to whatever you are. A high-end trophy husband?"

"Maya stop," my father's voice cracked from the corner. He sounded like he was choking. "Please, just be quiet."

I didn't even look at him. I was too busy staring down the man in the chair.

He didn't blink, but his blue eyes grew dark and hard. He was still studying my body as if he were deciding if I was worth his time, and the look on his face made my stomach churn.

I didn't stop to think.

I let a slow, sly smirk spread across my face as I began to clap. "I have to hand it to you, Dad really outdid himself this time."

I placed a finger under my chin, leaning forward until I was invading his personal space the way he had invaded mine. "So, you're here to see your new step-daughter. Do you like what you see, Daddy?"

"Maya Sullivan! Shut your mouth right now!" My father's voice went an octave higher, pure panic vibrating through the room.

The man's Adam's apple bobbed as he swallowed. His gaze dropped to my lips for a fraction of a second too long, but he didn't flinch. Instead, he leaned back slowly, a dark, dangerous heat flickering in his eyes that pinned me to the spot.

I snapped back to an upright position and crossed my arms, my survival instinct manifesting as a massive, relentless bitch.

"Because if there isn't a secret sibling, why the hell am I here?" I tilted my head. "I hope you got the money upfront for fucking him, because my father's cheques have a habit of bouncing higher than your ego."

"Maya, for the love of God!" my father hissed. I heard his footsteps shuffling closer, but I held up a hand to silence him. I wasn't done.

"Why do you look so scared, Dad? He's threatening you, isn't he? You know people don't really care about this anymore." I made a dismissive motion with my fingers, pointing back and forth between the two of them. "Keep your head up high, Dad. It's the twenty-first century. No one cares about who you're fucking or if you're bisexual."

"Don't speak to him like that," my father strained to say, his voice thin and panicked. "Do you have any idea who this is? This is-"

I turned back to the unnamed man, leveling a finger at his chest. "And you? You will not threaten my father. You're just the latest in a long line of Dad's expensive mistakes."

"Maya!" my father shrieked.

His legs finally gave out. He fell to his knees with a heavy thud.

I rolled my eyes. God, how dramatic could he be? He was acting like I'd just insulted a god instead of a high-maintenance boy toy in a well-tailored suit.

I had seen my father, Arthur Sullivan, drunk. I had seen him crying over lost bets. I had seen him begging mistress number four not to leave him.

But this? This was nothing compared to how broken he had looked the night he sat me down and told me my mother was never coming home.

The unnamed man didn't flinch. He didn't laugh.

Instead, he leaned forward, resting his elbows on my father's desk and lacing his fingers together. The movement was slow, deliberate, and terrifyingly calm.

Up close, his eyes weren't just blue, they were the color of the ocean right before a storm. And they were fixed entirely on my mouth.

"Your father isn't being threatened, Maya," he said. His voice dropped to a cold, steady tone that made my heart skip. "He's paying back what he owes."

He paused, his gaze lingering on my lips as if he were memorizing them.

"And you should watch what you say. That mouth of yours is going to start a fire you aren't ready to put out."

"What he owes?" I let out a frustrated sigh, looking at my father as he trembled on the floor. "Dad? Really? What did you do this time? Is he the reason Marcus looks like he's about to have a heart attack?"

I turned back to the man in the chair, my lip curling. "So how much does he owe you? Enough to keep on affording Botox for your face?"

The man in the chair let out a soft, dry sound. He wasn't angry. He looked fascinated.

"Botox?" he repeated. The corner of his mouth tugged upward. He looked at me as if my temper was the most entertaining thing he'd seen today.

It was a warning, but it was also a challenge.

"Maya, please," my father pleaded. He was still on his knees, his forehead practically pressed to the floor. "Don't talk to Mr. Blackwood like that."

"Mr. Blackwood?" I snickered, but the name caught in my throat like a jagged pill.

My hand flew to my mouth. My heart was suddenly hammering a frantic rhythm against my chest.

Blackwood? As in Silas Blackwood? The CEO of Blackwood Holdings. The man who bought entire companies just to tear them apart.

The floor felt like it had turned into water.

I'd seen his face on the covers of every major business magazine, usually under headlines about Hostile Takeovers. But seeing him in person was different because he had a presence that the camera couldn't quite contain.

Oh, I'm doomed. Did I just insult a man who could buy my father's company and everything we owned with a snap of his fingers?

I let out a tiny, pathetic squeak as my brain tried to restart. I looked at him, my eyes wide and my mouth hanging open.

He stood up, towering over the desk and seemingly swallowing all the remaining air in the room. He walked around the mahogany edge with the slow grace of someone who never had to hurry because the world waited for him.

He stopped right in front of me. Standing this close, the subtle scent of his cologne and the sharp, clean scent of his aftershave was the only thing I could focus on. I had to tilt my head back just to keep his gaze, my bravado feeling thinner by the second.

I chuckled nervously, the sound dying in my throat. "Mr. Blackwood." I cleared my throat, lifting a single finger to try and regain some ground. "Listen, this is clearly just a misunderstanding regarding-"

"Five hundred million dollars," he cut me off.

His tone was steady and controlled, yet it felt like a warning directed straight at me.

"Did I really just exchange five hundred million dollars for a chatterbox who doesn't know how or when to shut the fuck up?"