The Heiress No One Recognized

The misplaced Heiress Gabriell approached her carefully, fingers fidgeting with the cuff of his suit jacket as though he were the uncomfortable one. “Elle,” he said softly. The tenderness in his voice made her stomach turn. Of course he sounded gentle. He always had. It was how he’d gotten his way for years—so calm, so patient, so impossibly kind that she’d never thought to question it. Only now did she realize acting was second nature to him; it was a part of his charm after all. Performance for the people—including her. She didn’t bother answering, instead she stared at the man who’d just shattered more than her heart, and he knew it too. A second later, Mia stepped forward, resting a hand on Gabriell’s shoulder in what seemed to be a practiced gesture. It no longer surprised Miaelle because she always caught her doing it each time she thought Miaelle wasn’t looking. “Gabe,” Mia whispers, voice low and shaky enough to sound vulnerable, “let me handle this.” “Handle this?

The returned Heir Alastair Artair Aarhil sat in his office, staring through the glass walls at the morning sky as streaks of orange bled across the horizon. It was his first day back in the city, and word of his return had already spread. After all, he was the heir to Aarhil Group Corporation. Fortunately for him, very few people actually knew what he looked like beyond his family and closest friends. And hopefully… she would remember him too. The office doors swung open. A broad man stepped inside, standing at least six-foot-one, draped in a black suit that probably cost more than most people’s yearly salaries. He was a sharp contrast to Alastair’s cream slacks and casual long-sleeved Sunspel shirt. “Well, well, well” the man drawled darkly. “Look what the cat finally dragged in.” “Get. Out,” Alastair said, amusement leaking through his thick accent despite the years he’d spent away from home. “Now is that any way to greet your oldest friend, buddy?” Alastair laughed sof

The returned Heir Alastair’s grip tightened on the phone as he stared at the woman in the obsidian dress run down the pathway. It was her. The same woman who, seconds ago, had collided straight into him — breath ragged, eyes wide with something he hadn’t had time to name before she’d wrenched herself free and bolted, leaving him standing there like a fool, achingly aware of a scent he couldn’t place and a face he already knew he wouldn’t forget. He hadn’t caught her name. He didn’t need to. He’d watched what happened to her inside the ballroom not an hour before that — Keller’s hand over Mia Beaumont’s, the whispers rippling through the crowd, the tears she refused to let fall in front of a room full of people who thrived on exactly that kind of spectacle. He’d stood there longer than he should have, fists clenched at his sides, wondering what it would take to walk over and put a stop to it himself. In the end he’d told himself he only wanted air. He hadn’t expected the air to

The misplaced Heiress Miaelle sat at the table, disoriented, the room swimming faintly at its edges. The night kept replaying itself in fragments — Gabriell’s hand covering Mia’s, the flash of cameras, the humiliation and the whispers she could still hear if she let herself listen. Up until when somewhere in the middle of all that noise, a stranger had appeared out of the dangerous downpour and offered her a way out, and she’d taken it without asking a single question. He never asked where she wanted to go, and honestly, she wouldn’t have known how to answer. Home wasn’t an option — not the wretched apartment she’d shared with Gabriell, and certainly not the world she’d spent years hiding from everyone but her own family. So when she woke to find herself at The Eyrie penthouse, it should have terrified her to death. It didn’t, though. Not really. It was in fact one of maybe a dozen addresses in the city built purely for people who didn’t want to be seen wanting anything. Small

The misplaced Heiress Rain tapped steadily against the window when Miaelle first stirred, the sound wrapping around her before her eyes even opened. For a moment she didn’t try to place herself. The sheets were impossibly soft, softer than anything she owned, and her body felt too heavy and too warm to argue with. “Where am I?” she murmured to no one, then let her eyes fall shut again and drifted back under. When she woke the second time, the storm still hadn’t let up, but her mind had cleared enough to start reaching for answers. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d slept that deeply — and slowly, in pieces, the night came back to her in bits. The banquet. The rain. A man. A devastatingly handsome man, if she was being honest with herself, though she had no business noticing that when she had a fiancé waiting somewhere in the city for her. A soft knock interrupted the thought. She tugged the covers higher. “Come in.” He stepped through the doorway looking, infuriatingly,