The Manhattan Club smelled of old leather, cigar smoke, and exclusion.

Nova walked past the maître d', ignoring his sputtered protest about her denim jeans. She pushed open the door to the private suite.

Two men sat inside.

Roman Knight sat in the shadows. He was darker than she expected. Dark hair, dark suit, eyes like obsidian. He radiated a cold, predatory energy. He was reading something on a tablet.

Silas Montgomery, his best friend, sat opposite him, nursing a whiskey. He looked Nova up and down and smirked.

"I'm Nova Sterling," she said, pulling out a chair and sitting down.

Roman didn't look up. "You're thirty seconds late."

"Security took a while," Nova said, pouring herself a glass of water. "Your biometric scanners are slow."

Silas laughed. "So, you're the charity case? The Sterling reject? Bryce Calloway really did a number on you, huh?"

Nova took a sip of water. "Your intel is decent."

"College dropout. Unemployed. Living off daddy's money," Silas listed off, ticking his fingers. "What makes you think you can sit at this table?"

"General Knight asked me to be here," Nova said calmly. "I didn't ask for this."

Roman finally looked up. His face was sharp, angular, handsome in a cruel way. "My grandfather is senile."

Nova's eyes drifted to the table. Next to Roman's hand was a copy of Automotive Weekly. The cover featured a prototype armored vehicle-the Vanguard.

"The suspension is wrong," Nova said, pointing at the magazine.

Roman followed her gaze. He frowned. "Excuse me?"

"The Vanguard," she said. "Center of gravity is too high. If it takes an IED hit from the side, it'll roll."

Roman's eyes narrowed. "That is a classified prototype. How do you know about the suspension geometry?"

"I follow military tech blogs," she lied smoothly. It was a partial truth. She wrote the technical specs for them under a pseudonym.

Silas burst out laughing. "Oh, wow. She's a pathological liar too! Roman, this is rich."

Roman looked at her with pure disgust. "Do you think lying about military tech impresses me? It's pathetic."

Nova shrugged. "Think what you want."

Roman stood up, buttoning his jacket. "I have no interest in this. Or you. Leave."

Nova didn't move. "The General said you'd say that. That's why your trust fund is frozen."

Roman froze. His hand stopped halfway to his pocket.

"How do you know that?" Silas asked, his smile vanishing.

Nova pulled out her phone. "Because I wrote the freeze protocol."

Roman leaned over the table, invading her space. He smelled of sandalwood and danger. "You are playing a dangerous game, little girl."

Nova looked up at him. She didn't blink. She didn't flinch.

"I brought the decryption key," she said. "And I'm the only one who knows the password."

General Knight's study was a museum of war. Swords on the walls, medals in glass cases.

The General sat behind his desk. Roman stood to the left, pacing like a caged tiger. Nova sat on the right, examining her fingernails.

"Well?" The General barked.

"She's a fraud," Roman spat. "A liar. And she's delusional."

"She told you the truth," the General said, hiding a smile. "You just aren't smart enough to see it."

"She's a Sterling reject!" Roman shouted. "She brings nothing to the table. No equity, no connections."

"She brings genes," the General said, tapping a folder. "The Knight family needs brains. You have money. We need IQ."

Roman scoffed. "Her? She didn't even finish undergrad."

The General couldn't say 'She has three PhDs and is a national asset' because of the clearance levels. He just grunted. "It's an order. Marry her, or I keep the trust frozen and remove you as CEO."

Roman slammed his hands on the desk. "This is blackmail!"

"I agree," Nova said. "This is a stupid idea."

Roman looked at her, surprised.

"I don't want to marry him," Nova said, standing up. "He's arrogant and emotional."

"Nova!" The General warned. "Think about the funding for the... project."

Nova stopped. Her shoulders slumped. The fusion project. It needed billions. The Knight Foundation was the silent backer.

"So you are in it for the money," Roman said, his voice dripping with venom.

Nova turned to him. "Yes. I need the money."

Roman looked at her with a mix of triumph and loathing. "At least you're honest about being a gold digger."

"Compromise," the General said. "A fake engagement. Six months. A trial run. You live together. If you still hate each other after that, I unlock the funds, and you go your separate ways."

Roman calculated. Six months. He could break her in three weeks. He could make her life so miserable she would run back to the gutter she came from.

"Fine," Roman said. "But she'll regret it."

Nova looked at him. Her face was blank. "I just came back from a war zone, Roman. You're just a man in a suit."

"Deal," the General said. "Call the lawyers."

The conference room table was long enough to land a plane on.

Roman sat at one end, flanked by three lawyers in grey suits. They looked at Nova like she was a stain on the upholstery.

The lead lawyer slid a document across the polished wood. It was thick.

"Standard pre-nup," Roman said, spinning a pen. "You can get a lawyer to read it, if you can afford one."

Nova pulled the document toward her. She flipped past the assets section. She flipped past the alimony section. She stopped at the back.

"Clause 45," she said. "Intellectual Property."

"What IP do you have?" Roman sneered. "Recipes?"

Nova picked up a pen. She slashed through the paragraph. "Any invention, code, or patent created by me during the cohabitation period remains my sole property. Knight Industries gets zero percent."

The lawyer chuckled. "Miss Sterling, surely-"

"Clause 82," Nova interrupted, writing in the margins. "I need a dedicated fiber optic line. Unmonitored, with direct access to the exchange. No corporate firewalls."

"What for?" Roman asked, eyes narrowing. "Running a scam?"

"Algorithmic trading," Nova said without looking up. "High-frequency. It's latency-sensitive."

Roman rolled his eyes. "Unbelievable."

Nova scanned the rest of the pages. Her eyes moved vertically, taking in whole paragraphs in seconds. She flipped to the signature page.

She signed her name. It wasn't a cursive loops-and-swirls signature. It was sharp, jagged. A complex glyph.

Roman watched her sign. He frowned. He had seen that style of handwriting before. On a classified briefing document he wasn't supposed to see. A chill traced its way down his spine, a flicker of instinct he had learned not to ignore. He pushed it down. It had to be a coincidence.

He shook his head. Coincidence.

"The contract is active," Roman said, standing up. "Move into the penthouse tonight."

"Put me in the room furthest from yours," Nova said.

"Don't play hard to get," Roman said. "I know you'll be trying to crawl into my bed by Tuesday."

Nova looked him dead in the eye. "Your mattress is memory foam. It's bad for lumbar support. I prefer the floor."

The lawyers choked back laughs. Roman's face turned a dark shade of red.

Nova grabbed her copy of the contract and walked out. At the door, she paused. "I don't cook. I don't clean. I'm here for the trial, not to be your maid."

She closed the door.

Roman stared at her signature. He pulled out his phone and snapped a picture of it.

He texted it to Silas. Cross-reference this signature. Knight Industries internal security database and all federal watchlists. Priority Alpha.