CHAPTER 2: FIRST IMPRESSIONS, FIRST SPARKS.

Noah’s POV

There’s a rule in personal security: Never live where you work. Boundaries keep you sane. Boundaries keep you alive.

But there’s another rule, too. The client comes first.

And Adrian Vale? He didn’t give a damn about my boundaries.

I arrived at his penthouse the next morning with two duffel bags, a loaded sidearm, and the kind of exhaustion that settled deep in your bones and never quite left. Lucien’s people had already arranged clearance with the building’s laughable security team. No one stopped me. No one checked my ID. I made a mental note to rip that protocol apart later.

For now, I had one job: move in, lock down, and keep Adrian Vale breathing.

The penthouse looked different in daylight, less like a lair, more like a museum exhibit for someone with too much money and too little warmth. White marble, black leather, glass everywhere. Clean lines. Cold spaces. Not a picture frame in sight.

And there he was, sprawled across a sectional sofa like he belonged to the furniture. Barefoot again, slouching in tailored slacks and a shirt too soft and expensive for morning wear. A coffee cup dangled from his fingers. His eyes slid to me, slow and unimpressed.

“You’re moving in?”

“Standard protocol for high-risk clients.”

He arched a brow. “So dramatic. You don’t think this is overkill?”

“You’ve had three attempts on your life in a month. Overkill would’ve been me bringing a team and a panic room.”

He hummed, somewhere between amusement and apathy. “How tedious.”

I set my bags down without asking where I’d be sleeping. I already knew: wherever gave me the best vantage point between him and potential threats. I wasn’t here for comfort. I wasn’t here for small talk.

But Adrian? Adrian seemed determined to make this difficult.

“You’re very stiff,” he said, sipping his coffee with infuriating leisure. “Is that a military thing or just your personality?”

I didn’t answer. Didn’t rise to the bait. Men like Adrian thrived on reactions. I’d learned long ago how to starve them of that.

“Do you do this with all your clients?” he asked. “The glaring. The brooding silence. I imagine some of them pay extra for it.”

“Do you provoke all your bodyguards, or am I special?”

That earned me a real smile. Sharp. Slow. Dangerous. “Oh, you’re very special, Noah.”

There it was again. My name in his mouth sounded like something filthy. Like a dare.

Adrian Vale was used to control. I could see it in the way he lounged, the way he measured space and silence like a chessboard he already owned. Men fell over themselves to please him. To impress him. I wasn’t here for that.

And somehow, I suspected that only intrigued him more.

The first hours passed in a cold kind of truce. I walked the perimeter, checked exits, cameras, sightlines. Adrian watched me like I was a curiosity to be dissected.

“You don’t trust my security system?” he asked when he caught me studying the panel by the terrace doors.

“Your system is fine. Your people are shit.”

He laughed, low and lazy. “You’re blunt. I like that.”

I didn’t care what he liked. What I cared about was the long, unobstructed windows that framed half the penthouse, the angles that left him exposed, the cameras pointed outward but never inward. Whoever set this up assumed the threat would come from the street. They hadn’t considered someone might already be inside.

“You need to take this seriously,” I said.

“Oh, I am.” Adrian leaned against the glass, letting the sun catch the edges of his too-pretty face. “I take very few things seriously these days, Mr. Cross. You might even be one of them.”

“Don’t.”

“Don’t what?”

“Flirt with me.”

He smiled, slow and unapologetic. “Who says I’m flirting?”

“You’re testing me.”

His gaze flicked down my body and back up, lazy as a caress. “Maybe I’m doing both.”

I should’ve walked away. I should’ve reminded myself that men like Adrian Vale played games because it made them feel powerful. But something in me — something tired, something reckless — stayed rooted.

“You don’t scare me,” he said, stepping closer. His scent hit me then: something expensive, something dark. “You want to scare me. You want to keep me in line. But you don’t frighten me, Noah. Not even a little.”

“Good,” I said quietly. “Fear makes people sloppy.”

He tilted his head. “And what does attraction make them?”

A beat passed. Heat curled low in my stomach, unwelcome and undeniable.

“Dead,” I said.

For a moment, we just stood there. Breathing. Watching. Caught in something neither of us wanted to name.

Then, because Adrian Vale never did know when to stop, he smiled again and brushed past me, deliberately close, deliberately warm, and wandered into the open space of his living room.

“I hope you brought enough suits,” he called over his shoulder. “You’ll need them. I have a charity gala this week. Public appearances to maintain, threats or not.”

I followed, slower, my senses twitching in every direction. The sun had dipped lower, turning the glass walls into mirrors against the city’s dying light. Adrian moved through them like something made of smoke and arrogance.

“You’re going to get bored,” he said, sinking onto the sofa. “There’s only so long you can pretend this job isn’t tedious.”

“I’m never bored when someone’s trying to kill my client.”

He laughed. “Always so serious, Noah.”

I watched him lift his coffee again, fingers pale against the black ceramic. Watched the lazy sprawl of his body, the half-mocking curve of his mouth. And maybe I let my gaze linger too long on the hollow of his throat, the faint shadow beneath his jaw.

“You’ll loosen up eventually,” he said. “They all do.”

“No,” I said. “They don’t.”

But even as I said it, something prickled at the back of my neck. Not instinct. Not attraction. Something colder. Sharper.

Movement.

Across the street. High window.

I stepped forward without thinking, scanning the skyline. Glass reflected glass, too many angles, too many shadows. I knew what I was looking for. I’d seen it before, a flicker of light where there shouldn’t be one.

And then I saw it.

Red. Small. Focused.

The unmistakable dot of a sniper’s laser sight hovering, steady, unblinking, over the center of Adrian’s chest.

“Down!”

But I was already moving, already closing the space between us as the world slowed to a heartbeat’s drag of fear. Adrian’s eyes widened, his mouth opening, a question, a curse, I’d never know.

All I knew was the red dot tracking his heart.

And the window waiting to shatter.