The first thing you register is pain. A deep, dull throb at the base of your neck, as if someone had pressed too hard, held on too long, or simply claimed the space with teeth and intent. It pulses in time with your heartbeat, slow and insistent, dragging you into awareness long before your mind is ready.

You shift. Cool sheets slide against bare skin. The mattress under you is too soft, too expensive, nothing familiar at all. The air smells of clean linen, faint cologne, and something darker—whiskey and danger.

Your eyes open to a ceiling you do not know. High. Modern. Soft morning light leaks around the edges of the heavy blackout curtains, washing the room in muted gray and gold. A hotel suite. Large. Opulent. Silent except for the distant hum of the city far below.

Then you feel it. The weight on your left hand. You lift it, slow and uncertain, and the light catches a diamond so large it almost looks unreal. A solitaire, perfect, cold against your skin. It rests on your ring finger as though it has always belonged there.

And that is when the rest of the truth hits. You are wearing nothing else. No clothes. No jewelry except the ring. Nothing between your skin and the sheets except the lingering warmth of another body.

You turn your head. He is lying beside you. The man is still asleep, one arm bent under the pillow, the other resting heavily across the mattress as though it had been draped over you only minutes before. Even asleep he looks carved from something rarer than marble—sharp cheekbones, a strong jaw shadowed with the faintest stubble, dark lashes against olive skin. His black hair is slightly disordered, falling over his forehead. The sheets have slid low on his hips, showing the hard lines of a body that has clearly known both violence and discipline.

He is beautiful in a way that feels almost unfair. Godlike. Dangerous. And completely unknown to you.

Your neck throbs again. The diamond catches the light. The silence of the unfamiliar room presses in. Somewhere beyond the locked door, Bellhurst continues to wake. But inside this suite, the only thing that moves is your pulse—and the slow, deliberate rise and fall of the chest of the man who somehow put a ring on your finger before you ever learned his name.