Chapter 1 The Assignment

The morning air bit at Sienna Blake's cheeks as she stepped out of her Brooklyn apartment, balancing a steaming travel mug in one hand and a folder tucked beneath her arm. The city never really slept, but at 6:30 a.m., it was at least groggy-just like her. She wove through the thin stream of early commuters, her heels tapping purposefully against the concrete.

By the time she reached the New York Daily Pulse's towering glass building in Midtown, her mind had already shifted into work mode. Another exposé. Another scandal to unearth. It was her rhythm. Her pulse. What kept her heart beating after everything else in life had lost its glow.

"Sienna." Her editor, Gary Monroe, called to her the moment she stepped onto the twenty-third floor.

He was standing outside his office like a man who had news too hot to hold. His salt-and-pepper hair looked more pepper than usual, and his shirt sleeves were already rolled to the elbows-a clear sign that this day would be anything but ordinary.

She followed him in, sipping her coffee with practiced calm, though her stomach fluttered in anticipation.

"This better be good," she said, dropping into the leather chair across from his desk. "I just finished with the Portwell piece. I'm due a break."

Gary grinned, but there was no humor in it. "You're not getting a break. You're getting promoted."

She raised an eyebrow. "Promoted?"

"To hell, maybe. Depends on how you handle this one." He slid a thick, sealed envelope across the desk. Her name was scrawled in bold marker across the front. "You're not going to like it. But you're the only one I trust with it."

Sienna peeled it open and flipped through the printed photos and typed notes. The name Senator Lawrence Roth popped off the page like a curse.

"Roth?" she breathed.

Gary leaned back, watching her reaction carefully. "Someone's been whispering about offshore accounts, funneling campaign funds, even... ties to an escort ring."

Sienna's blood ran cold. Roth wasn't just a senator-he was a rising star in Washington. A war hero turned political darling, wrapped in patriotic charisma and family values. The media adored him. The public worshipped him. And she... she had once believed in him too.

"But no one's cracked it," Gary continued. "Not yet. It's smoke without the fire. But where there's smoke..."

"There's an inferno," she muttered.

Her reporter's instinct stirred. She flipped through another sheet, catching sight of a redacted name and a blurry surveillance shot-Roth entering a black car late at night, not alone. The woman's face was turned away.

Sienna's jaw tightened. "How solid is this?"

"Shaky, but worth looking into. You'll need to go deep, Sienna. Deep enough that you might not like what you find. You ready for that?"

She didn't answer immediately. Her fingers tapped against the envelope. Her father had supported Roth since the man's first campaign. Her late brother had served under Roth's command. The Roth family was a personal name in her household-and an untouchable one.

But journalism didn't bend to loyalty. It bowed only to truth.

"I'll do it," she said at last, standing.

Gary nodded, as if he had expected nothing less. "You'll need cover. I'll reassign you officially to a fluff column-some lifestyle piece about powerful men and the women behind them. Use that angle to get close."

Sienna smirked. "You want me to write about sugar daddies?"

"I want you to take down a fraud in a thousand-dollar suit," he said firmly. "However you get there is up to you."

She stepped out of his office with the envelope clutched tightly in her hand. The newsroom buzzed around her, but the world suddenly felt quieter, like it had narrowed to a single point.

Sienna POV

As she walked back to her desk, she couldn't shake the feeling that this assignment would be the one to change everything. It wasn't just another story. This was legacy. This was danger. This was the line between award-winning journalism and political suicide.

Her fingers hovered over her keyboard, then moved with purpose. She began researching Roth's past campaign donors, his speeches, his meetings, and his private investments. Each thread was thin, almost translucent, but she knew how to follow the faintest trails.

The more she dug, the more she noticed things that didn't add up. A trip to Monaco that never made the official schedule. Campaign donations rerouted through LLCs with no discernible business activity. Associates who suddenly disappeared from the spotlight.

And then there was the whisper. The elusive name in the folder: Julian Cross.

A billionaire investor with murky dealings overseas and a habit of appearing in political donation logs and sex scandal rumors alike. If Roth was the angelic face of the Senate, Julian Cross was the devil behind the curtain.

Sienna exhaled slowly.

She would have to get close. Not just to Roth-but to Cross. And that, she knew, would be a game played with masks, charm, and calculated seduction. The kind of proximity that blurred lines and cost people their lives.

Still, the fire in her gut burned bright.

"Let's dance," she whispered, as she began typing her first email request for an interview-one that would land her face to face with the most dangerous man in New York.