3

Alexander

“Round three?”

The blonde’s breath tickles my jaw as she traces patterns across my chest like she’s mapping territory. Her hand slides south, and honestly, my body’s voting yes even though my brain knows better.

The brunette—hair looking like she stuck her finger in an electrical socket—laughs against my thigh, teeth grazing muscle. “Look at him. Still ready to go.”

“My turn,” the blonde purrs, already shifting to straddle me. The brunette crawls up to press her mouth against my wrist, tongue doing things that should probably be illegal in several states.

The sheets are twisted around our legs like silk restraints, morning light cutting through the floor-to-ceiling windows with the brutality of a hangover. There’s a lace bra hanging off the lamp like some kind of depraved Christmas ornament.

“Give me a minute,” I say, catching the blonde’s hips before she can sink down.

“A minute? That’s generous considering the show you put on against the window last night.” Her grin is pure sin as she hovers just out of reach, teasing.

“Don’t push your luck.” I lift her off entirely, ignoring the way my body protests. “Need water.”

“Demanding,” she says, licking lipstick off her thumb. “I’m into it.”

The brunette hooks her leg over my shoulder, trying to drag me back down. “Five minutes, then you wreck me again.”

“Hydration first,” I say, kissing her knee because I’m selfish, not a complete asshole.

I extract myself from the tangle of limbs and silk, stepping over a designer heel and nudging a champagne bottle that rolls under the bed with a hollow rattle. The marble floor is a war zone of foil wrappers and expensive lingerie. Manhattan’s skyline glitters beyond the windows like broken glass.

I pour three fingers of whiskey because water is for quitters, drink, breathe.

“Come back to bed,” the brunette calls, stretching like a cat. “I’m getting cold.”

“You were screaming loud enough to wake the dead an hour ago,” the blonde says, reaching for her cigarettes. “Pretty sure you’re fine.”

“Alexander,” I supply, because she’s going to ask.

“Mmm. Sexy.” She taps out a cigarette, pauses. “This a non-smoking penthouse?”

“Take it to the balcony if you’re desperate.” I set the glass down.

That’s when my phone buzzes. Not just any buzz—Valesquez’s custom ring, the kind that means someone’s either dead or about to be.

“Don’t you dare,” the brunette says, crawling toward the edge of the bed. “Whoever it is can wait their turn.”

“They won’t.” I hit speaker. “Yeah.”

“Tell me you didn’t.” My brother’s voice cuts through the room like a blade. No pleasantries. No warmth. Pure boardroom fury.

The blonde giggles. “Is this Daddy?”

I hit mute. “Not a word.”

The brunette pouts. “Buzzkill.”

Unmute. “Didn’t what?”

“There’s a leak connecting you to the Bratva,” he snaps. “Please tell me you’re not actually this stupid.”

The blonde’s smile dies. The brunette freezes mid-reach. The air in the room shifts from post-sex haze to something that tastes like panic.

“Run that by me again,” I say, even though I heard him perfectly.

“You already know. Michael Orlando’s daughter. Ring any bells?”

The room tilts sideways. The brunette’s eyebrows shoot up. The blonde whistles low. “Oh, honey. You’re fucked.”

I stare at my reflection in the window and see last night—her laugh like broken glass, the way she pulled my hair and bit my lip like she was claiming territory, the reckless hunger in her eyes. “I didn’t know who she was.”

“You should have.” Valesquez doesn’t yell. Doesn’t need to. The disappointment cuts deeper than rage. “This isn’t a game, Alex. If this breaks before the merger—”

“It won’t.”

“Prestige boardroom. Now.” The line goes dead.

Silence stretches like a wire about to snap. The blonde sets her cigarette down with the careful precision of someone defusing a bomb. “That sounded expensive.”

The brunette rolls onto her back, spreads her legs with shameless invitation. “One last ride before you face the music?”

I grab my watch, snap it into place. “Not happening.”

“Is big brother angry?” the blonde tries for playful, lands on terrified.

“He’s not my father.” I button my shirt with mechanical precision. “But yeah. He’s pissed.”

The brunette traces my abs with her toe. “We could help with the stress.”

“You already did.” I step into my pants, tuck everything in, smooth the fabric. “Show yourselves out.”

“Not even a goodbye kiss?” Mock offense, real concern.

“Not today.” I kiss her ankle anyway because I’m selfish, not heartless.

The elevator closes on their nervous laughter. Manhattan spreads below me like a chessboard, all angles and shadows. The lobby receptionist tracks my walk of shame with professional discretion and personal amusement.

Another elevator ride to consequences and chrome.

I push into the boardroom like I own it, which technically I do. On paper. The assembled firing squad turns—PR with her razor-sharp bob, Finance with stress veins pulsing at his temples, Dimitri looking like he’d rather be anywhere else.

By the windows stands my father. Arms folded. Eyes that could make grown men confess to crimes they didn’t commit.

“Alexander.” Not a greeting. A judgment.

I claim a chair, lean back, drape an arm like this is casual. “Morning, sunshine.”

He doesn’t blink. “Nice to see you making time for family business between your recreational activities.”

“Define recreational,” I say.

“Don’t.” Valesquez slides a folder across the mahogany. “Start talking.”

“Private club. Dancing. Drinks. Went upstairs. She was—”

“Skip the pornography,” PR cuts in. “Did you know who she was?”

“No.”

“Do you know now?” Dimitri asks.

“Yeah.”

My father’s palm slams the table hard enough to make the crystal water glasses jump. “Michael Orlando’s daughter. You think this is funny?”

“I don’t think anything yet.”

“Stop being clever,” Valesquez growls. “There are photographs. Timestamps. Security footage of you two in the elevator.”

“From where?”

“Does it matter?” PR’s voice could strip paint. “If this surfaces before we close, we’re managing a full-scale investor panic.”

Finance clears his throat like he’s announcing his own execution. “Compliance called at dawn. They’re hearing ‘chatter.’”

“What kind of chatter?”

“The kind that says you have a death wish,” Dimitri’s smile is sharp enough to cut glass.

“You recognize her now?” PR presses.

“Now I do. Last night she was just—”

“Just what?” My father’s voice could freeze hell. “Entertainment? A conquest? Men in your position cannot afford ignorance.”

“Ignorance would be pretending this stays quiet,” I say. “What’s the play?”

“The play is you learn consequences.” He lifts another folder, taps it like a gavel. “Effective immediately—”

“Hold on,” Valesquez interrupts. “Before we burn everything down: how deep did this go?”

I breathe out slow. “Three hours. Maybe four. Left separately. No numbers exchanged.”

“Did she get yours?” PR asks.

“She didn’t ask.”

“You used the penthouse window,” Dimitri says like he’s reading an arrest report.

“You tracking my sex life now?”

“Street camera caught both of you. Nothing explicit, unfortunately.”

“Enough.” My father’s stare could nail me to the wall. “You’re cut off.”

The words land like a physical blow. Valesquez doesn’t argue. PR goes statue-still. Finance studies his spreadsheet like it holds the secrets of the universe.

“No accounts. No cars. No penthouse. Six months minimum. You prove you’re not a liability, or you return to Tuscany permanently.”

“Exile,” I say, because naming something keeps it from destroying you.

“Education,” he corrects.

“Right before the merger?” PR’s voice cracks. “The optics?”

“Better they see a family discipline its own problem,” my father replies, never breaking eye contact.

I start to speak—something sharp, something that’ll draw blood—but the room feels like a courtroom, and suddenly my tongue’s made of sand. I look at Valesquez. He doesn’t rescue me. Never does when there’s an audience.

“Understood,” I say, because pride’s cheaper than stupidity.

“Start by disappearing,” PR says. “No clubs. No photographers. If you must exist, do it somewhere invisible.”

“Skip the churches,” Dimitri adds. “They have standards.”

“Anything else?” I stand.

“Stay away from Orlando’s daughter,” my father says.

“I’m not suicidal.”

“Debatable,” Valesquez mutters.

I smile like nothing can touch me. Old habit. “We done here?”

“Get out.”

I push back from the table, chair legs scraping like fingernails on stone. On my way out, Dimitri gives me a small, cruel salute. I don’t give him the satisfaction of flinching.

The elevator hums. My reflection in the steel doors shows sharp suit, steady expression, eyes that know the bottom of too many bottles. My phone buzzes—my assistant. I reach for it, then remember. Family account. Dead.

“Fuck,” I tell my reflection.

The lobby again. The receptionist recognizes the look of a man gravity just caught. I flash her a grin that lands like counterfeit currency.

Outside, the city screams its usual symphony—horns, brakes, sirens, humanity. I lean against the granite and breathe like I haven’t since two women and a night I can’t afford turned my life sideways.

My phone lights up. No name. No number. Just a message that smiles without teeth:

It’s only a matter of time.