The night air was a sharp, biting reminder that I was alive. As I slipped through the back gate of the Silas estate, the mud ruined my silk shoes, but I didn't care. Every step away from that house felt like shedding a layer of lead. I wasn't just walking into the dark; I was walking toward the only man who had ever seen my talent as a weapon rather than a charity case.

 In my past life, I had been so brainwashed by the "loyalty" my father preached that I viewed Mister Joe as a predator trying to lure me away from my family duties. I had ignored his letters, blocked his calls, and eventually, he had stopped asking. I had chosen a cage of gold over a throne of diamonds.

 I flagged a taxi at the edge of the district, my breath hitching as I gave the address to the Vanguard Tower. It was a sleek, glass needle piercing the city's skyline, a monument to the jewelry empire that rivaled-and often crushed-my father's stagnant business.

 When I stepped into the lobby, the silence was heavy and expensive. The marble floors reflected the dim night-lights, and the security guard didn't even ask for my ID; he simply gestured toward the private elevator. Mister Joe had clearly cleared the way.

 The elevator ascended in a stomach-turning rush. When the doors slid open, I found myself in a penthouse studio that smelled of ozone, expensive tobacco, and something metallic-the scent of raw ore and soldering tools.

 Near the floor-to-ceiling window, a figure stood with his back to me. He had a shock of stark white hair that caught the moonlight, his silhouette draped in a perfectly tailored charcoal suit.

 "Mister Joe," I said, my voice sounding smaller than I intended in the vast room.

 The man turned slowly. He had kind, wrinkled eyes and a smile that reached all the way to his temples. He looked like the grandfather I never had. "Oh, dear child," he chuckled, his voice raspy and warm. "You've mistaken me for the help. I've been with the firm forty years, but I'm just the gatekeeper."

 My brow furrowed. "Then... who?"

 The old man stepped aside, gesturing toward a shadow draped over a velvet armchair in the corner of the room. "The boss is waiting for you."

 Out of the darkness, a man stood up.

 In my first life, because I had only ever communicated with the firm through formal letters and the elderly secretary, I had built a mental image of 'Mister Joe' as a fossil-a man as old and dusty as the gems he traded.

 I was wrong. Dead wrong.

 The man who stepped into the light couldn't have been a day over thirty-five. He was a masterpiece of masculine precision. His hair was a deep, midnight black, swept back with a deliberate carelessness that made him look like he had just stepped off a runway-or a battlefield. But it was his eyes that stopped my heart. They were a piercing, crystalline green, the color of high-grade emeralds found deep in the earth.

 He was breathtakingly handsome, with a jawline sharp enough to cut the very diamonds he sold. I stood there, paralyzed, my mind screaming at my past self: How? How could you have turned this man down for a life of scraping for scraps at your father's table? He didn't look like a businessman. He looked like a king who had found his lost crown.

 He walked toward me, his movements fluid and predatory, the clicking of his Italian leather shoes the only sound in the room. He stopped just inches away, radiating a heat that made the dampness of my rain-soaked dress feel suddenly heavy.

 I swallowed hard, trying to reclaim my composure. I was supposed to be a cold-blooded strategist now. I wasn't supposed to be a girl blushing at a handsome face. I forced my arm up, extending my hand for a professional, clinical handshake.

 "Hello, Mr. Joe," I said, my voice finally finding its edge. "Nice to meet you, I'm Elara Silas I called earlier, I'm here to sign." What am I saying. 

 He didn't take my hand. He didn't even look at it.

 Instead, he took one more step, closing the distance until I could smell the sandalwood and dark chocolate on his skin. Before I could breathe, he reached out and pulled me into a tight, crushing hug.

 It wasn't a hug of a stranger or a business partner. It was the hug of someone who had been holding their breath for a decade and had finally found oxygen. His arms were like iron bands around me, his face buried in the crook of my neck. I felt him shudder-a deep, visceral tremor that vibrated through my own chest.

 "Elara," he whispered, his voice a low, jagged rasp. 

 "You have no idea how long I've waited for you to walk through that door."

 I froze. The professional greeting died in my throat. This wasn't the reaction of a man seeing a talented designer for the first time. This was the reaction of a man who had lost something precious and had finally, miraculously, found it again.

"I was thinking to come get you myself" he added 

I ignored him.

"Where are the specs for the autumn line?"

He didn't answer. Instead, he walked toward me, his movements slow and deliberate. He didn't stop until he was standing directly in my path, forcing me to look up. The air between us felt thick, charged with the kind of static that precedes a lightning strike.

"In this room, there is no Vanguard and there are no specs," he whispered. He reached out, his fingers grazing the edge of my drafting stool. "And there is no Mr Joe. That name was for the letters. For the world."

I felt my breath hitch. "Then who am I speaking to?"

He stepped closer, invading my personal space until I was backed against the edge of the heavy oak table. He leaned down, his face inches from mine, the heat of him radiating through my thin blouse.

"Call me Orion," he murmured.

The name felt like a secret, something ancient and powerful.

"Orion," I repeated, the syllables tasting like silk on my tongue.

He smiled then, a slow, predatory curve of his lips that wasn't meant for a business partner. He reached out and tucked a stray strand of hair behind my ear, his fingers lingering on the sensitive skin of my neck. I should have pulled away. I should have reminded him of the contract, the hotel, and the professional boundaries I had spent all night rehearsing.

But I was paralyzed by the look in his eyes-a mixture of desperate longing and a dark, possessive hunger.

"You have a habit of looking for an exit, Elara," Orion said, his voice dropping to a husky velvet. "But you need to understand something. I didn't spend three years tracking your designs and waiting for you to realize your family was a nest of vipers just to let you sit in a hotel room alone."

"I'm here for the jewelry, Orion. Not for... this," I gestured vaguely between us, my heart hammering against my ribs.

"Are you?" He leaned in even closer, his breath warm against my ear, sending a violent shiver down my spine. "Because the way your pulse is jumping against my thumb tells a different story."

He was right. My body was betraying me, reacting to him in a way it never had to John Grant or any man in my past life. It was as if my soul recognized him, even if my mind was still catching up.

"Your father's men have been circling the block since dawn," Orion whispered, his breath a warm ghost against my skin. "He's terrified, Elara. He doesn't know you're here to sign a contract?"

I stiffened, the mention of my father bringing back the cold, sharp clarity of my mission. He didn't love me, but he certainly valued the profit my hands could create. "What did you tell them?"

Orion pulled back just enough to look me in the eye, his expression turning lethal. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, velvet box. He flipped it open to reveal a ring-not a diamond, but a black opal that looked like a trapped, swirling galaxy.

"I told his lead security that I don't discuss my private acquisitions with trespassers," Orion said, his voice dropping to a gravelly low as he took my hand. He slid the ring onto my middle finger. It fit perfectly, the weight of it feeling like a promise. 

"That's for the best they don't find out"

I looked at the ring, the dark stones catching the light, then back at him. "You're using me to drive him into a panic. You want him to think I've defected before I've even designed a single piece."

"I'm giving you the one thing he never did: a choice with teeth," he corrected, his hand sliding to the small of my back, pulling me firmly against him until I could feel the steady, powerful thrum of his heart. "Stay the night at the penthouse, Elara. Not as a guest, and not as a daughter seeking shelter. Stay as the secret weapon they never saw coming. Let them sit in that silent house and wonder which one of their sins finally pushed you into my arms."

I looked at the ring on my finger-the black opal pulsing with trapped light-and then back at the man who had just claimed me as his own. The heat of his body was a physical weight, a stark contrast to the hollow coldness I had lived with for twenty-three years.

"Why, Orion?" I asked, my voice barely a whisper, yet it felt like it filled the entire studio. "Why are you doing all of this for me? You've built an entire fortress around a woman you've barely spoken to until tonight." This didn't happen in my past life.

I felt the familiar, bitter venom of my past life rising in my throat. In that life, no one had fought for me. No one had even looked at me unless they needed a blood sample or a signature. I had been a ghost long before I died on that table. Even if I hadn't accepted his offer back then, I couldn't understand this-this intensity, this desperation to keep me close.

A dark thought took root. Was this just another trap? Was Orion just a more sophisticated predator than my father? Perhaps I was simply a beautiful tool he could use to dismantle the Silas empire, a weapon he would polish until the job was done, only to dump me in the trash once my family was in ruins.

I looked up at him, my eyes narrowing, hardening into the flint-like gaze of a woman who had already been murdered once. If he's going to use me, I thought, my heart turning to ice, then I might as well use him, too. We'll see who is left standing when the smoke clears.

Whatever he and my family had is good, which is that they don't get along.

"Is this just revenge for you?" I challenged my hand flat against his chest to keep the distance. "Am I just the easiest way for you to twist the knife in my father's back?"

Orion's expression didn't shift into anger. Instead, a look of profound, agonizing recognition crossed his face. He leaned in, his forehead resting against mine, his breath hitching as if he were in physical pain. His hands moved from my shoulders to the back of my neck, his fingers tangling in my hair with a possessive, trembling grip.

"You think I'm playing a game of business," he rasped, his green eyes swirling with a storm of emotions I couldn't yet name. "You think I'm looking for a profit."

He pulled me even closer, until there wasn't a breath of air between us, his voice dropping to a level that made the very floor beneath my feet feel unstable.

"Elara, I didn't spend years hoping to get you just to find out you were gone," he whispered, his lips brushing against mine with every word. "I didn't spend my life watching you through a glass window, unable to break the locks, only to let you doubt me now."

The air left my lungs. My heart stopped.

"What are you saying?" I gasped, my hands gripping his silk sleeves for support. What's happening?.

He looked at me with a gaze so raw, so filled with the haunting weight of a thousand memories, that it shattered every defense I had spent the night building.

"You're not the only one who lived in the past," he whispered.