“Are you fucking kidding me?” My voice cracks with rage, echoing against bottles worth more than my self-respect. “You’ve been eye-fucking me for days, making me crazy with these little touches, these looks—”

Caleb’s jaw tightens like he’s physically restraining himself. “Your fiancé arrives in an hour. With his parents. To discuss your wedding.”

The reminder lands like ice water down my spine. Shit. Right. The Harrises. Dinner. My impending matrimonial doom.

“Think, Mikaela,” he continues, voice dropping to that infuriating rumble that does things to my insides. “Think about what you’re doing.”

I laugh, the sound bitter and sharp enough to cut glass. “Oh, NOW you want me to think? Not when you were inside me at the Valemont?”

His face darkens, pupils expanding until his eyes are mostly black. “That was different.”

“How?” I demand, stepping closer despite my better judgment. “How was it different?”

“Because I want to do things to you that would make you scream loud enough for your father to hear three floors up.”

The confession hangs raw between us, sucking all the oxygen from the room. My knees actually wobble.

“But not here,” he continues, each word measured and precise. “Not with them upstairs. Not like this.”

The rejection still stings, even wrapped in the most erotic promise I’ve ever heard. I back away, nodding like I understand, like I’m not dying inside.

“Fine. Have it your way.” I turn on my heel, not trusting myself to say more.

I storm upstairs, fury transforming into rocket fuel. Fine. He wants to play respectable? I’ll show him respectable. I’ll show him exactly what he’s missing while he sits on his moral high horse.

The emerald dress I choose hugs every curve like liquid revenge. Hair, makeup, jewelry – all precision-targeted weapons in my arsenal.

By the time the Harrises arrive, I’ve transformed into a radiant, smiling sociopath – gracious hostess, every inch Gunther Wallace’s perfect daughter.

“Anthony,” I purr, kissing his cheek just long enough to be noticed, letting my perfume linger. “So lovely to see you again.”

His parents beam. My parents beam. Even the fucking chandelier seems to beam. Only Caleb sits stone-faced at the far end of the table, wine glass untouched, looking like he’s attending a funeral rather than a dinner party.

“The appetizers are divine, Mrs. Wallace,” Mrs. Harris gushes, all pearls and plastic surgery. “Almost as exquisite as the Times calling you two ‘the couple of the season!'”

She passes around her phone with the gallery photos. There we are, caught mid-conversation, Anthony’s hand on my arm, both of us looking surprisingly natural together.

“Such natural chemistry!” Mr. Harris adds, nodding approvingly.

I catch Caleb’s eye across the endless mahogany expanse, then deliberately lean into Anthony, laughing at something barely funny. Two can play at emotional warfare.

“We just clicked,” I say, letting my hand rest on Anthony’s arm, my voice honeyed poison. “Some things are just… meant to be.”

The words are aimed like arrows. Caleb’s knuckles go white around his fork. Good. Let him choke on it.

Dinner crawls by in excruciating slow motion.

The mothers discuss floral arrangements. The fathers discuss business strategies.

Anthony keeps finding excuses to touch me – hand on my back, fingers brushing mine as he passes the salt. I let him, encouraging each touch with microexpressions of approval.

“The Harris estate in the Hamptons would be perfect for the rehearsal dinner,” Mrs. Harris declares, already planning my imprisonment. “The gardens in September are simply magical.”

I smile, all teeth. “That sounds wonderful. I’ve always dreamed of getting married in fall.”

Anthony doesn’t need a second invitation. The second I look at him like that, he’s on me—fast and greedy, like he’s been starving and I’m the only thing on the menu.

His mouth crashes into mine, all tongue and teeth and need. His hands are everywhere at once—grabbing my ass, my waist, under my dress—ravenous and uncoordinated but god, it works. There’s nothing careful about it. Nothing soft. He tastes like adrenaline and lust and the kind of poor decisions you never want to take back.

He backs me up, step by clumsy step, until my shoulders hit the edge of the bookshelf. Books rattle on the shelves behind me as he pins me there, his hands sliding under my thighs.

“Fuck,” he breathes against my neck, backing me against the bookshelf. “Are you ready to lose it in your dad’s study? That’s so fucking hot.”

The assumption makes me grin, wicked and sharp. I pull back just enough to meet his eyes.

“Who says I have anything to lose?”

His hands still. “What?”

“Have you seen my hymen certificate? Got documentation of my virgin status?” The tease tastes delicious on my tongue.

“I don’t—what are you—” Anthony’s confusion is comedy gold. Harvard Business School clearly didn’t prepare him for this particular negotiation.

The laugh bubbles up from somewhere dark and satisfied. Not cruel exactly, but close enough to cut. I watch understanding dawn across his pretty face – the perfect Wallace daughter might not be so perfect after all.

His hands haven’t moved from my waist, caught between desire and uncertainty.

“Mikaela…”

“What’s wrong?” I arch against him, savoring his strangled groan. “Isn’t this what you wanted? To fuck the girl your parents picked out for you?”

His eyes darken with something that isn’t quite anger. “You’re not a virgin?”

“Does it matter?” I counter, sliding my hand down his chest. “Wouldn’t you rather have someone who knows what they’re doing?”

Anthony’s face transforms through a fascinating sequence of emotions – confusion, arousal, uncertainty, and finally, something that looks dangerously like calculation.