Chapter 1: The debt

Elizabeth Stone shuddered. She wrapped her arms around herself and stared out the back window of the sleek black sedan as it wound along the darkened streets of Montreal. People strolled down the block, hands in their pockets, chins neatly tucked to their chests to shield their faces from the biting wind. Men held phones to their ears; women struggled with their shopping bags. It seemed like a regular evening. An ordinary night.

But it wasn't ordinary. It couldn't be.

Because Elizabeth's world had stopped turning.

The men who'd knocked on her door this morning had a message for her, and it had not been a kind one.

She inhaled deeply and glanced at her simple purple dress and the delicate strappy heels on her feet. It seemed important for her to look nice—not just respectable, but sophisticated, noble—because the favor she was to ask was anything but.

And she could think of no one else to ask but him, her boss. God. Just thinking of humiliating herself like this in front of him made her stomach churn.

Nervously, she pulled on the necklace strand draped around her neck and tried focusing on the city again. The necklace was smooth under her fingers, genuine and old; it was a family heirloom passed down to her by her mother, which was also given to her by her own mother. It was the only thing Elizabeth had been able to salvage from her mother's belongings.

Her brother had lost it all.

Bet by bet, he'd lost the cars, the antiques, the family house, and everything left by their parents.

Elizabeth had watched with a combination of helplessness and rage. She'd threatened and pleaded with her brother, all to no avail.

There was no stopping him. No stopping the gambling, the drugs, or the partying.

There was nothing left now.

Nothing but her.

And she could not turn a blind eye to those men—to the threat they posed. To the threat they had briefly delivered. No matter how much she frowned upon what her brother did, and no matter how many times she'd promised never again to speak to him and cut him out of her life. She couldn't; he was her brother. Her only family.

When their parents died, he had taken over the family fintech company as the first child and was once considered a shrewd and ambitious businessman, but when he'd lost his wife and daughter to an auto crash, he lost himself. Then came the drinking, the incessant partying until he ran the company into bankruptcy. It saddened her to think what he'd become.

Elizabeth didn't know how much he owed. She'd rather not know. All she knew was the deal she'd struck with those two terrifying men this morning. She had a month to come up with two hundred thousand dollars, during which they would leave him alone.

In her wildest dreams, Elizabeth had never imagined coming up with that amount of money in such little time. But while she couldn't, Henri Gagnon could.

The little hairs on her arms pricked to attention at the thought of him. Her boss was a taciturn, devastatingly handsome man. While Elizabeth had only been his assistant for a year—his third of three assistants, because it seemed one alone couldn't handle the daunting task of having him as boss—in that length of time, she had seen enough of him to agree to the nickname given to him as "the shark of Montreal."

He was bold, ruthless, and grandiose. Single-handedly, he'd spotted, bought, and straightened troubled companies; she had taken the position of his assistant a year ago. He inspired respect and admiration among peers and fear among his enemies. Judging by the overwhelming number of phone calls he received from the female population of Montreal, Elizabeth could tell they adored him. And in Elizabeth herself, the man inspired things she dared not consider.

Every morning when she stepped into his office, he would study her with that dark, compelling gaze and disturb every inch and atom of her body with the hot intimacy in his eyes. She would always try to act professionally, to look away when his stare became inappropriately long. But his eyes had a way of undressing her, of speaking in silence, and of igniting images of her and him and skin and sweat in her mind. Yet tonight she was on her way to him for one purpose only, and she reminded herself that her visit to his lair at such a late hour might not be welcome.

With his assistants he was always the firm, taciturn boss, but Henri Gagnon was reputed to have a hot temper, one she might witness tonight for the very first time.

Her stomach tightened when the car pulled into the ample driveway of one of the "City of Saints'" most luxurious apartment buildings, situated on the trafficked Sunnyside Avenue. A uniformed valet opened the door.

She muttered a quick "thank you" and stepped out of the car, walking into the luxurious apartment building with an eerie calm that belies every one of the roiling emotions inside her.

She made no eye contact with the people around the area but instead focused all of her attention on the polished bronze doors at the far end of the lobby.

"Mr. Gagnon is expecting you."

An elevator attendant waited for her. He slipped a card into the top slot inside the confined elevator space and lit the top F before stepping out with a bow. "Good evening, madam."

The doors closed, and Elizabeth stared at her blurry reflection. Her heart didn't just beat; it slammed against her ribs. She was stepping into the lion's den, and she wasn't sure she would come out with her heart intact.

Oh, God, please let him help me. I'll do anything. Anything…