Chapter Three

JADE

The obsidian glass doors of the Neil Tower penthouse suite slammed shut behind me with a heavy, pressurized thud, cutting off the muted roar of the city fifty floors below.

My father didn't even bother turning around from the floor to ceiling windows overlooking the skyline. He stood with a crystal tumbler of scotch resting lightly in his grip, looking like a king evaluating an empire he had built on broken bones and hostile takeovers.

"You're twenty minutes late, Jade," Julian Neil said, his voice smooth, deep, and devoid of any paternal warmth.

"I was busy," I growled, stepping into the dim, minimalist room. My knuckles were still raw and grease-stained from the garage, my leather jacket smelling of high octane fuel and damp night air. I tossed my car keys onto the glass coffee table, where they landed with a loud, metallic clatter. "Tell me Vance was joking. Tell me you didn't actually sell my life to Marcus O’Connell."

My father took a slow sip of his drink before finally turning to face me. His grey eyes were identical to mine, sharp, unforgiving, and cold enough to freeze water.

"Vance does not joke. Neither do I," he said evenly. "The papers were drawn up this evening. O’Connell Enterprises gains access to our deep water shipping lanes in the north, and we absorb their international logistics network. It is a multi billiondollar unification that cements our family at the top of the food chain for the next half century."

"I don't give a damn about your shipping lanes!" I snapped, closing the distance between us until I was staring him down. "I am not your fucking bargaining chip, Dad! You want a merger? Trade a factory. Sell off an asset. You don't get to hand me over to some sheltered, fragile little puppet just because Marcus O’Connell wants a noble title for his daughter!"

Julian’s expression didn't even flicker. He simply raised his glass again. "You speak of freedom as if you earned it, Jade. Everything you wear, every car you smash into a wall on those dirty underground tracks, every high-stakes debt you run up—it is funded by my name. By this family."

"Then take the money!" I shouted, the rage boiling over in my chest. "Cut me off! I’ll race for cash, I’ll manage the garage, I’ll live in the dirt before I let you force me into a ring with a girl who probably gets vapor lock if her morning latte is two degrees too cold!"

Julian set his glass down on the marble bar with a soft clink. He reached into his breast pocket, pulled out a fountain pen, and slid a single piece of thick, bond paper across the counter toward me.

"That is the agreement," my father said softly. "Sign it, or leave."

I glared at the paper. "Leave? You think I won't?"

"If you walk out that door without signing," my father continued, his tone dangerously light, "your accounts are terminated instantly. The deeds to your garage and every vehicle registered under your name are transferred back to the core conglomerate. Vance will repossess your fleet before sunrise. Furthermore, I will personally see to it that every racing circuit in this region is blacklisted from accepting your entries."

My breath hitched in my throat. I stared at him, my heart hammering against my ribs like a caged beast. "You're bluffing."

"Try me," he replied. "You have played the wild, untouchable prince for seven years, Jade. I tolerated your rebellion because it kept you off the corporate board’s radar while you were young. But play time is over. You are twenty three. You will take an O’Connell bride, you will sit at the head of the consolidated board, and you will present a picture of absolute, unbreakable strength to the public."

"She’s an O’Connell," I spat out, my teeth grinding together. "Her father tried to ruin us three years ago during the tech buyout!"

"Which makes her the ultimate trophy," Julian said coldly. "Marcus O’Connell sacrificed his only daughter to keep his board from executing a margin call. He handed her to us on a silver platter. You will take her, you will wear the ring, and you will break whatever little pride she has left so the O’Connells know who truly owns them."

A dark, suffocating weight settled over my chest. I looked down at the contract on the marble bar. Madison O’Connell.

I could picture her clearly a delicate, porcelain doll raised in cotton wool, probably terrified of the dark, conditioned to smile for cameras and obey every order handed down by her elitist parents. She was probably sitting in her gilded bedroom right now, crying into her silk sheets over the fact that she had to marry a man with grease on his hands and scars on his knuckles.

She wants a fake corporate fairytale? I thought, my jaw clenching as a vicious, reckless anger took root in my mind. Fine. I’ll give her the wedding. But I will make her life absolute hell from the second she steps onto my floor.

I grabbed the fountain pen, stabbed the nib onto the paper, and scrawled my signature across the line so hard the heavy paper nearly tore.

I shoved the pen back at my father, my eyes burning with dark promise. "I'll marry your little heiress. But don't expect me to play house."