Aida woke up to the sharp, chemical sting of bleach and rubbing alcohol burning her nostrils. She opened her eyes, blinking against the harsh fluorescent lights, and realized she was lying on a stiff mattress in a sterile, white hospital room.

Emmet was sitting in a plastic chair next to her bed. When he saw her eyes open, his shoulders dropped, and he let out a long, ragged exhale of relief.

Aida reached up. Her fingers brushed against a thick, tight square of gauze taped over her forehead. A dull, throbbing ache pulsed behind her eyes. "What happened?" she rasped, her throat dry.

Before Emmet could answer, the heavy wooden door of the private suite swung open. Brendan Walls walked in. He was wearing a fresh, perfectly tailored navy suit, looking as though he hadn't spent the night standing in the freezing rain.

Brendan's cold eyes swept over Emmet. The sheer, oppressive weight of his presence instantly sucked the oxygen out of the room.

Emmet stood up, his jaw tight with resentment. He looked at Aida. She gave him a tiny, almost imperceptible nod. Emmet swallowed his anger and walked out, pulling the door shut behind him.

Brendan walked over to the side of the bed. He didn't ask how she was feeling. He reached into his jacket pocket, pulled out a black leather folder, and tossed it onto the white blanket covering Aida's legs.

Aida frowned. She picked up the folder and opened it. Inside was the five-million-dollar investment contract. On the last page, Brendan's bold, aggressive signature was already scrawled in black ink.

Brendan reached into his pocket again. He pulled out a heavy key fob with a silver Porsche crest and dropped it directly onto the open contract. The metal hit the paper with a sharp smack.

"Compensation," Brendan said, his voice completely devoid of emotion. "For the fright you experienced last night."

Aida stared at the keys and the signature. A cold, cynical realization settled in her stomach. This wasn't an apology. This was hush money. A classic capitalist transaction to buy her silence regarding the violent car crash.

She didn't hesitate. She reached over to the bedside table, grabbed a plastic pen, and signed her name next to his with quick, sharp strokes.

Brendan watched her hand move. A dark, complicated flicker of annoyance flashed in his eyes as she accepted the blood money so easily.

Aida threw the covers off her legs and swung her feet over the edge of the bed. "I need to get back. The company needs this money wired today."

Brendan reached out. His large hand clamped down hard on her shoulder, pinning her to the mattress. "You are staying here for another two days for observation. The doctors confirmed a mild concussion. You are a liability to yourself right now."

Aida reached up and shoved his hand off her shoulder. Her eyes were ice cold. "The transaction is complete, Mr. Walls. NovaTech can't wait forty-eight hours. If I drop dead from a brain bleed, use the five million to pay for my funeral. I don't need your fake concern."

Brendan's jaw clenched. The muscles in his neck tightened, but he didn't reach for her again. He turned around and walked out of the room without another word.

An hour later, after aggressively signing a stack of Against Medical Advice discharge waivers and ignoring the furious protests of the nursing staff, Aida walked out of the hospital, and took a cab straight back to the NovaTech building.

She pushed open the glass door of her office, dropped her bag on the floor, and immediately sat down at her desk. She began typing furiously, processing the incoming funds and clearing the backlog of panicked emails from her vendors.

Hours passed. The sun set, plunging the city into darkness. Outside her glass walls, the open-plan office was completely empty. The silence in the building was absolute.

Aida rubbed the back of her stiff neck. Her head throbbed. She pushed her chair back and stood up, intending to walk down the hall to the breakroom for a cup of coffee.

She stepped out of her office. Suddenly, the heavy, echoing thud of a man's footsteps sounded from the dark end of the hallway.

Aida froze. Her heart skipped a beat. She turned her head, peering into the shadows.

A tall, broad figure stepped out of the gloom. It was Grayson Lott. His face was covered in dark purple bruises, and his bottom lip was split, but his eyes were wide and manic.

Aida's stomach plummeted. A cold sweat broke out across her back. She instinctively took a step backward.

"Your billionaire bodyguard isn't here tonight, Aida," Grayson sneered, his voice dripping with malice. "Did you really think Walls could just lock me away? My father's legal team had the precinct commander personally sign my bail papers three hours ago. And now, we are going to settle our accounts."

He walked forward, his steps slow and deliberate. He forced Aida to back up until the back of her thighs hit the edge of her wooden desk. She was trapped.

Aida slid her right hand behind her back. Her fingers frantically felt across the smooth surface of the desk until they brushed against the cold metal handle of a heavy steel paper knife. She gripped it tight.

Grayson placed both his hands flat on the desk, caging her in. He leaned in close, burying his face in the space between her neck and shoulder, inhaling deeply.

"You are going to come have a drink with me right now," Grayson whispered, his breath hot and sour against her skin. "Or I make one phone call, and my venture capital network-which just so happens to own the majority debt of your largest creditor-calls in your loans by tomorrow morning. Your servers get seized before lunch. Your choice."

Aida walked slightly behind Grayson as they descended a narrow, concrete staircase into a windowless basement in the Meatpacking District. There was no sign outside.

The heavy steel door opened, and a wall of deafening heavy metal music slammed into Aida's chest. The air inside the private underground club was thick, hazy, and reeked of stale beer and the sharp, skunky odor of marijuana.

Grayson grabbed Aida by the elbow, his fingers digging into her skin, and shoved her down a dark hallway. He pushed her into a dimly lit VIP room at the very back and reached behind him, turning the deadbolt with a loud, metallic click.

Aida sat down on the extreme edge of the black leather sofa. She clutched her small purse to her chest like a shield, her knees pressed tightly together, every muscle in her body coiled tight with defensive tension.

Grayson walked over to a small, mirrored bar cart in the corner. He turned his back to her, picking up a crystal decanter of whiskey and two heavy tumblers.

In the dark shadow cast by his body, Grayson slipped his hand into his jacket pocket. He pulled out a small, chalky white pill and dropped it into the glass on the left.

The pill hit the amber liquid and dissolved instantly, fizzing for a split second before vanishing completely, leaving the whiskey looking perfectly normal.

Grayson turned around. He walked back to the sofa and held the tainted glass out to Aida.

Aida stared at the glass. She shook her head. "I am here to discuss the licensing issue. I don't drink when I work."

Grayson's bruised face darkened. He slammed the glass down onto the glass coffee table so hard the liquid sloshed over the rim. He reached into his pocket, pulled out his phone, and tapped the screen. "Fine. I'll call the commissioner right now. NovaTech is dead."

Aida's jaw clenched so hard her teeth ached. The five million dollars would be useless if the city shut them down. She reached out with a trembling hand and picked up the glass of whiskey.

She tilted her head back and swallowed the liquor in one long gulp. The alcohol burned a fiery trail down her throat, settling like a hot coal in her stomach.

Grayson smiled. He sat down heavily next to her, leaning back against the leather, and started rambling about market shares and regulatory boards-meaningless corporate garbage.

Five minutes later, a strange, unnatural heat began to bloom in the pit of Aida's stomach. It wasn't the burn of alcohol; it was a heavy, suffocating warmth that rapidly spread outward to her fingertips.

Aida blinked. The edges of the coffee table began to blur. She looked at Grayson, and his face seemed to stretch and warp, doubling into two overlapping images.

Her arms and legs suddenly felt like they were filled with wet sand. A terrifying, paralyzing realization hit her brain like a physical punch.

I've been drugged.

Pure, unadulterated terror seized her throat. The smell of the whiskey and the heavy feeling in her limbs violently ripped open a locked door in her mind. Fragments of a nightmare from six years ago-a dark room, a heavy body holding her down, the metallic smell of blood-exploded behind her eyes.

Aida shot up from the sofa. Her legs wobbled violently, and she swayed, her hip crashing into the edge of the table.

Grayson reached out to grab her waist. "Whoa, take it easy-"

Aida let out a guttural sound of panic and shoved him away with both hands.

"I... I need to use the restroom," she slurred, her tongue feeling thick and numb. She stumbled away from him, her legs dragging, and threw herself at the heavy wooden door of the en-suite bathroom.

She crashed into the bathroom, slammed the door shut, and slapped her hand against the lock, twisting it until it clicked. She slid down the door, her back hitting the cold tiles, gasping for air.

The drug was hitting her hard now. Her eyelids felt like they were made of lead. The dark edges of unconsciousness were pulling at her brain, threatening to drag her under.

Aida forced her eyes open. She looked up at the glass vanity mirror above the sink. Her reflection was pale, terrified, and fading. Her eyes hardened into a look of pure, savage desperation.

She forced herself to stand up. She grabbed the heavy, solid brass soap dispenser sitting on the marble counter. With both hands, she swung it as hard as she could and smashed it directly into the center of the mirror.

The glass shattered with a loud crash, large, jagged shards raining down into the porcelain sink.

Aida reached into the sink. Her hands were shaking so violently she could barely control her fingers. She picked up a long, wicked-looking shard of glass.

She squeezed her eyes shut, bit down hard on her bottom lip, and dragged the sharp edge of the glass deep across the soft, pale skin of her inner thigh.

Warm blood instantly welled up from the cut, soaking into the fabric of her skirt, running down her leg in a thick, dark line.

The agonizing, searing pain ripped through her nervous system like a bolt of lightning. It sliced straight through the chemical fog in her brain, shocking her back into a state of hyper-aware, agonizing clarity.

Outside the bathroom, Grayson began to pound his fists against the wooden door, shouting vile, filthy threats that vibrated through the wood against her back.

Aida slid down the vibrating door, her legs giving out completely. She hit the cold tile floor hard. The blood from her thigh pooled beneath her, sticky and warm against the porcelain.

Her hands were slick with her own blood. She dug into her purse, her fingers fumbling blindly until they closed around the cold metal of her phone. The bright glare of the screen stabbed at her dilated pupils.

Her vision swam violently, the bright app icons on the screen dancing and blurring together into smeared streaks of color. She swiped a trembling thumb across the glass, missing the swipe bar twice before her bloody fingerprint finally unlocked it. She desperately wanted to call Emmet, but her numb, uncoordinated fingers slipped and tapped the wrong name on her favorites list: Chloe Faulkner.

The call connected. The loud, thumping bass of a nightclub and Chloe's bright, drunken laughter blasted through the tiny speaker.

"Chloe..." Aida gasped, her voice a thin, desperate wheeze, her tongue feeling like lead in her mouth. "Vault... Meatpacking... help..."

The laughter on the other end stopped instantly. "Aida? What's wrong? You sound—"

"Room four. Call 911. Drugged," Aida choked out, her vision darkening at the edges, and immediately hit the red end-call button.

Behind her, Grayson's pounding turned into heavy, rhythmic thuds. He was kicking the door. The wooden frame groaned, and dust fell from the ceiling hinges.

Aida stared at the phone screen. Her thumb hovered over Emmet's name. But Emmet was a lawyer. He couldn't stop a monster kicking down a door. Her thumb dragged down the screen and pressed the name she hated most.

Brendan Walls.

The phone rang exactly once before the line clicked open.

"What is it?" Brendan's voice was low, flat, and annoyed.

Aida's chest heaved. The pain in her leg was excruciating, but the drug was pulling her back down into the dark. "Grayson Lott," she whispered into the microphone, her voice breaking. "Help me."

There was a fraction of a second of dead silence on the line. Then, the horrific, violent sound of a heavy chair crashing to the floor echoed through the speaker.

"Aida!" Brendan roared, the cold facade completely shattered. His voice was raw with panic. "Where are you? Tell me where you are!"

Before Aida could open her mouth, Grayson let out a furious scream from the hallway.

A massive, deafening crack split the air. The center of the solid wood door splintered inward. The toe of Grayson's expensive leather shoe smashed through the wood, leaving a jagged hole.

Aida flinched violently. Her bloody fingers slipped, and the phone dropped from her hand, clattering onto the hard tile floor.

From the phone's speaker, Brendan's voice screamed, "Aida! Talk to me! Aida!"

Grayson pulled his foot back and peered through the splintered hole. He saw Aida sitting in the pool of blood, her skirt ruined. A sick, euphoric grin stretched across his face.

He took two steps back. He ran forward and drove his heel directly into the brass lock mechanism.

The metal lock sheared off with a sharp snap. The door flew open, the heavy wood slamming violently against the tiled wall and bouncing back.

Grayson stood in the doorway, his chest heaving, staring down at the blood.

Aida dragged herself backward until her shoulders hit the base of the toilet. She gripped the bloody glass shard in her right hand and held it up, pointing the jagged tip directly at Grayson's knee.

Grayson laughed. He stepped into the bathroom, raised his foot, and kicked her wrist with brutal force.

The glass flew out of her hand, slicing a deep gash across her knuckles as it went. Aida let out a sharp cry of pain, clutching her bleeding hand to her chest.

Grayson bent down. He grabbed a fistful of her dark hair and yanked upward, dragging her off the floor.

The sudden movement, combined with the blood loss and the drugs, was too much. The room spun violently. The edges of Aida's vision turned black. Her muscles went completely slack.

Just as her consciousness finally snapped, a massive, explosive crash echoed from the front of the club. It sounded like an earthquake tearing through a reinforced concrete wall—followed by the screech of metal and the shriek of collapsing cinder blocks. The entire basement shook, and a cloud of dust and debris billowed down the hallway.

Through the ringing in her ears, Aida heard the unmistakable roar of a heavy engine and the crunch of tires on broken masonry. Then came the thunder of boots—dozens of them—pounding through the wreckage toward the VIP corridor.

Grayson froze, his grip on her hair loosening for a split second. That hesitation was all it took. The last thing Aida saw before the darkness swallowed her was the splintered doorframe of the VIP room exploding inward under the weight of a black-armored shoulder.