# Chapter 1: The Proposition

Isabella Moretti stood at the edge of the Grandview Hotel ballroom, champagne flute in hand, watching her target.

Damien Blackwell.

Even across the crowded room, he commanded attention. Six-foot-three of tailored perfection in a black Tom Ford suit, dark hair styled with calculated precision, jaw sharp enough to cut glass. He stood surrounded by Manhattan's elite—politicians, business moguls, socialites desperate for his attention—yet somehow remained untouchable. Isolated by his own power.

Three years. Three years of planning, preparing, transforming herself into someone who could move in his world undetected. Three years since the day she'd found her father's body in his study, an empty pill bottle on the desk beside the bankruptcy papers stamped with Blackwell Industries' logo.

Her hand tightened on the champagne flute until her knuckles went white.

"You're staring," a voice murmured beside her.

Isabella didn't flinch. She'd expected Sophia Chen, the event coordinator and her entry point into tonight's charity gala. "I'm observing."

"Observing Damien Blackwell?" Sophia laughed softly. "Join the club. Half the women here are doing the same thing. The other half are pretending not to."

"I'm not interested in him romantically." The lie came smoothly, rehearsed a thousand times. Isabella took a measured sip of champagne, her expression carefully neutral. She'd learned to control every micro-expression, every tell. The girl who'd sobbed over her father's casket was gone. In her place stood Aria Laurent—art consultant, European educated, mysterious enough to be intriguing but respectable enough to be trusted.

"Of course not," Sophia said, clearly not believing her. "No one's interested in a billionaire under forty who looks like he walked off a magazine cover."

*A billionaire whose family destroys lives without consequence*, Isabella thought. *Whose father drove mine to suicide and never lost a night's sleep over it.*

"I heard he's looking for a wife," Isabella said casually, swirling her champagne. This was the opening she'd been engineering for months. "Something about his grandfather's will?"

Sophia leaned in conspiratorially. "Not just looking—desperate. The old man put a marriage clause in the inheritance. Damien has to be married within six months or control of Blackwell Industries goes to his cousin Marcus. And from what I hear, Marcus is even worse than Damien."

"How medieval." Isabella kept her tone light, amused. Inside, her heart hammered. This was it—the vulnerability she'd been waiting for. The crack in his armor.

"Medieval but effective. Victor Blackwell—that's Damien's father—is furious. Apparently, the old man didn't trust either of his grandsons to build legacies without being 'settled.'" Sophia made air quotes. "Which is hilarious considering Victor's on his third wife."

Isabella had studied the entire Blackwell family tree. Victor Blackwell, sixty-two, cold as winter steel. Two sons: Damien, thirty-one, and Christopher, twenty-eight. Old money mixed with new ambition, a business empire built on corporate acquisitions—hostile takeovers dressed up as mergers. They identified struggling companies, swooped in like vultures, stripped them for parts, and walked away richer while families like hers drowned in the wreckage.

"Five months left," Sophia continued. "The gossip blogs are having a field day. Every eligible woman in New York is throwing herself at him."

"And yet he's still single."

"Damien Blackwell doesn't do romance. He does contracts." Sophia's phone buzzed. "Oh, damn. Catering crisis. I'll catch you later?"

Isabella nodded, watching Sophia disappear into the crowd. Alone again, she allowed herself one moment—just one—to feel the weight of what she was about to do.

She'd been seventeen when her world ended. Seventeen when she'd heard her mother's screams from downstairs. Seventeen when she'd run to her father's study and seen him slumped over his desk, still warm but already gone. The bankruptcy papers. The foreclosure notices. The Blackwell Industries letterhead on every document.

Her mother had never recovered. The stroke came six months later, leaving her partially paralyzed and requiring round-the-clock care that drained what little insurance money remained. Isabella had dropped out of Columbia, worked three jobs, and spent every spare moment researching the Blackwells. Learning their world. Planning her revenge.

Then came the inheritance from her maternal grandmother—enough to reinvent herself completely. Aria Laurent was born. New identity, new history, new purpose.

And now, Damien Blackwell needed a wife.

Isabella drained her champagne and set the glass on a passing waiter's tray. She'd positioned herself perfectly over the past six months—attending the right events, befriending the right people, becoming a fixture in his peripheral vision without ever directly approaching him. Tonight, that changed.

She moved through the ballroom with practiced grace, her emerald silk gown—Valentino, purchased specifically for this moment—flowing like water. She'd chosen green deliberately. It complemented her dark hair, made her hazel eyes appear more striking, and according to color psychology, conveyed ambition and sophistication.

Damien was extricating himself from a conversation with Senator Reynolds, his expression politely distant but unmistakably bored. Isabella timed her approach perfectly, intersecting his path just as he turned toward the bar.

Their collision was controlled, calculated. Her shoulder brushed his arm. She stumbled slightly—not enough to seem clumsy, just enough to warrant his attention.

"Excuse me—" she began.

His hand caught her elbow, steadying her. The touch sent an unexpected jolt through her system. She'd prepared for many things, but not the physical reaction to actually being this close to him.

"My fault," Damien said, his voice deep and smooth as aged whiskey. "I wasn't watching where I was going."

Up close, he was even more devastating. Dark eyes that seemed to catalog everything in seconds. A mouth that probably smiled rarely but devastatingly. The faint scent of his cologne—something expensive and understated, cedar and bergamot.

Isabella met his gaze directly. Most women probably looked away, played coy. She didn't. "No harm done."

His hand remained on her elbow a moment longer than necessary. "I don't think we've met."

"Aria Laurent." She extended her hand. "Art consultant. I've been working with the Hastings Gallery on their new acquisition."

His handshake was firm, controlled. "Damien Blackwell."

"I know." She smiled slightly. "Your family donated the west wing of this museum. There's a plaque."

"My grandfather's donation," he corrected. "I just write the checks to maintain it."

"How modest."

Something flickered in his eyes—amusement, maybe. Or suspicion. "Modesty and I aren't well acquainted, Ms. Laurent. I prefer honesty."

"Then honestly, Mr. Blackwell, I'm relieved you caught me before I embarrassed myself completely. These heels are beautiful but treacherous." She glanced down at her Louboutins.

"Beauty often is." His gaze traveled from her shoes back to her face, assessing. "Are you enjoying the gala?"

"It's lovely. Though I find these events are more about being seen than seeing anything meaningful."

"Cynical."

"Realistic." Isabella tilted her head. "Don't tell me you actually enjoy these things."

"I enjoy what they accomplish. The charity receives funding, businesses make connections, and everyone goes home feeling philanthropic." His expression remained neutral, but she caught the edge of disdain in his voice. "But no, I don't particularly enjoy small talk and overpriced wine."

"At least you're honest."

"I told you—I prefer it."

They stood there for a moment, the noise of the gala fading into background static. Isabella was acutely aware of every calculation, every micro-expression, every word. This was the moment. Either he'd dismiss her as another socialite, or she'd intrigue him enough to warrant further investigation.

"Well," she said finally, "I should let you get back to your evening. Thank you for the save."

She turned to leave—another calculated move. Never chase. Make them pursue.

"Ms. Laurent."

Isabella looked back, one eyebrow raised in question.

"The Hastings Gallery," Damien said. "They're showcasing that Rothko acquisition next month, aren't they?"

"You follow modern art?"

"I follow valuable investments." He paused. "Are you attending the private viewing?"

"I'm organizing it."

"Then I'll see you there." It wasn't a question. He nodded once, a gesture of dismissal that somehow felt like an invitation, and walked toward the bar.

Isabella watched him go, her heart racing beneath her composed exterior. First contact: successful. She'd registered on his radar without seeming too eager, established credibility, and created a reason for their paths to cross again.

She moved toward the exit, needing air, needing space to process the encounter. But as she reached the lobby, her phone buzzed.

Unknown number.

She almost ignored it, but something made her answer. "Hello?"

"Isabella Moretti." The voice was male, older, cultured. "Or should I say, Aria Laurent?"

Her blood turned to ice. "Who is this?"

"Someone who knows exactly what you're planning." A pause. "And someone who can help you get what you want. Meet me at the address I'm about to send you. Tomorrow, 10 AM. Come alone."

The line went dead.

Isabella stared at her phone, adrenaline spiking through her veins. Someone knew. After three years of careful planning, someone knew who she really was.

The question was: was this a threat or an opportunity?

Her phone buzzed again. An address in Brooklyn. No name.

Isabella deleted the message, her mind already racing through possibilities and contingencies. Nothing had gone wrong. Yet. But her carefully constructed plan had just developed its first complication.

She glanced back toward the ballroom, where Damien Blackwell moved through the crowd like a shark through water—powerful, dangerous, utterly unaware that his destruction had just begun.

"Three years," she whispered to herself. "I've waited three years. I'm not stopping now."

Whatever tomorrow brought, she would handle it. She'd survived losing everything once. She could survive anything.

Even the unsettling realization that when Damien Blackwell had touched her arm, for just a moment, she'd forgotten to hate him.

That couldn't happen again.