Isidora sat in the back of the Lincoln Navigator parked outside The Pierre hotel.

She stared into the sun visor mirror. Her fingers were numb as she applied the third layer of dark, cakey foundation to her cheeks.

She glued the fake freckles back onto her nose. She shoved the heavy, black-rimmed glasses onto her face.

The breathtaking woman from the hotel room was gone. The ugly, pathetic Wyatt heiress was back.

She pulled the collar of her Victorian-style dress higher. The fabric scratched her skin, but it was necessary to hide the dark, violent bruises the stranger had sucked into her neck last night.

Isidora pushed the car door open and stepped onto the red carpet.

Camera flashes exploded in her face. From the corner of her eye, she saw a group of socialites pointing at her.

"Look at her," one of them whispered loudly. "She looks like a moldy nun. How is Kevin Garrison marrying that?"

Isidora kept her head down. She let the insults bounce off her armor. She walked into the grand ballroom, her eyes fixed on the marble floor.

Her father, Arsenio Wyatt, marched up to her. He didn't say hello. He grabbed her arm, his fingers digging into her flesh.

"Keep your mouth shut tonight," Arsenio hissed in her ear. "If you ruin this trust fund merger with the Garrisons, I will make you regret being born."

Isidora nodded slowly, pulling her arm free.

She scanned the room, looking for Kevin. She needed to know if he had the nerve to bring Chantelle to their official engagement dinner.

Suddenly, the loud chatter in the ballroom died. The live orchestra stopped playing mid-note.

Hyman Garrison, Kevin's father and the current chairman, was practically sprinting toward the grand entrance. Sweat dripped down his forehead.

Heavy, deliberate footsteps echoed across the marble floor. Each step sounded like a gavel striking wood.

The crowd of Wall Street elites parted like the Red Sea. They pressed themselves against the tables, terrified to block the path.

Hyman grabbed the microphone, his hands shaking visibly.

"Ladies and gentlemen," Hyman stammered. "Please welcome the true head of the Garrison family, returning from Los Angeles... Mr. Cedrick Garrison."

The name sent a physical shockwave through the room. People gasped. Cedrick was the exiled billionaire, the ruthless hedge fund predator who ate companies for breakfast.

Isidora slowly lifted her head. She pushed her ugly glasses up the bridge of her nose and looked toward the entrance.

The moment her eyes landed on the man surrounded by bodyguards, the blood drained from her face.

Her heart slammed against her ribs so hard she thought they would crack.

The razor-sharp jawline. The cold, dead eyes. The terrifying, suffocating aura of power.

It was him. The man from the hotel room. The man she had left a thousand dollars for on the nightstand.

Isidora couldn't breathe. Her lungs refused to expand. She took a frantic step backward, trying to hide behind a tall floral arrangement.

Her heel caught the edge of a socialite's silk gown.

"Watch it, you freak!" the woman shrieked, shoving Isidora hard in the chest.

Isidora stumbled backward. Her hip crashed into the corner of the champagne tower table.

Several crystal glasses tipped over, shattering against the marble floor. The sharp sound echoed like a gunshot in the dead-silent ballroom.

Cedrick stopped walking.

His head snapped toward the corner. His cold, predatory gaze locked onto the source of the noise.

Isidora immediately dropped her chin to her chest. She let her messy hair fall forward, praying the thick glasses and the ugly makeup would work.

Cedrick's eyes swept over her disastrous outfit. A flicker of deep disgust crossed his face. He began to turn his head away.

But then, a draft from the open ballroom doors swept through the room.

It carried a scent.

Cedrick's nostrils flared. His entire body went rigid.

It was a faint trace of iris. A scent that inexplicably smoothed the jagged edges of his chronic insomnia for a fleeting second. It was an anomaly that irritated his hyper-vigilant instincts. Why would this pathetic, heavily made-up creature carry a scent that demanded his attention?

Cedrick didn't walk toward the main table. He pivoted on his heel and walked straight toward the dark corner.

The crowd held their breath. Isidora's fingers dug into the fabric of her skirt. Her palms were sweating.

Cedrick stopped less than two feet away from her. His massive frame blocked out the light.

Hyman rushed over, laughing nervously. "Cedrick, please excuse the mess. This is Kevin's fiancée, Isidora Wyatt."

Cedrick's eyes darkened at the word fiancée.

He looked down at her. His gaze slowly dragged from her fake freckles down to the high collar of her dress.

Right at the edge of the collar, the thick layers of concealer were caked unevenly, a desperate attempt to hide her own natural pallor.

Cedrick let out a low, dark chuckle that made the hair on the back of Isidora's neck stand up.

He leaned in, his lips inches from her ear.

"Miss Wyatt," Cedrick whispered, his voice dripping with lethal intent. "The perfume you chose smells as good as the woman in the hotel room last night."

Isidora's fingernails bit so hard into her palms that the skin nearly broke. The physical pain was the only thing keeping her from collapsing under Cedrick's suffocating presence.

Isidora's breath hitched for a fraction of a second, but she instantly forced her racing heart to steady. She met his suffocating gaze, her eyes completely devoid of the terror he expected.

"It is a cheap, off-the-shelf brand, Mr. Garrison," Isidora replied, her voice eerily calm and laced with a subtle defiance. "I apologize if it offends your refined senses."

Cedrick stared down at her cakey, hideous face. His dark eyes narrowed, dissecting her lie. The scent wasn't just familiar; it was seared into his memory from a single, chaotic night. The same perfume that had clung to the skin of the woman in his hotel room. And now, this creature, his nephew's fiancée, was wearing it. He opened his mouth to tear her apart.

Before he could speak, the side doors of the ballroom burst open.

Kevin marched in. His face was flushed red with anger. He had just received a text that Chantelle was throwing a tantrum outside the hotel lobby.

Kevin ignored Isidora completely. He walked straight to his father, Hyman.

"Dad, I have an urgent email from the London office. I need to step out for twenty minutes," Kevin lied through his teeth.

Cedrick slowly turned his head. He looked at his nephew like he was looking at a cockroach.

"What email is more important than your own engagement party?" Cedrick's voice cut through the room like a blade. "Or is the stray cat you keep on the side meowing too loudly outside?"

Kevin's face drained of color. He opened his mouth, but no words came out. He didn't dare talk back to the man who held the family's purse strings.

Instead, Kevin shot a vicious, hateful glare at Isidora, silently blaming her for his humiliation.

While the crowd's attention shifted to the tension between the uncle and nephew, Isidora took a step back.

She needed to get out of Cedrick's line of sight. Now.

She turned and walked quickly down the side corridor. She pushed open the heavy walnut doors at the end of the hall and slipped into the VIP cloakroom.

The room was pitch black, smelling strongly of mothballs and expensive damp wool.

Isidora leaned her back against the door, pressing her hand to her chest. Her heart was beating so fast it hurt.

Before she could even take a full breath, the brass handle behind her turned.

A massive force shoved the door open, pushing Isidora forward.

Cedrick slipped into the dark room. He reached behind him and pushed the lock. The metal clicked with a terrifying finality.

Isidora scrambled backward, but her spine hit the wall of heavy winter coats.

Cedrick didn't hesitate. He stepped into her space, his large hands grabbing both of her wrists and pinning them against the wall above her head.

He pressed his body against hers. His knee forced its way between her thighs, completely trapping her.

Isidora gasped, her chest heaving against his hard chest.

Cedrick lowered his head. His nose brushed against the skin of her neck. He inhaled deeply, like a predator catching the scent of blood.

"A cheap, off-the-shelf brand?" Cedrick's voice was a rough, vibrating growl against her collarbone. "You wore this exact scent in my hotel room. Do you take me for a fucking idiot, Miss Wyatt?"

Isidora's body went rigid. She turned her face away. "Please show some respect. I am Kevin's fiancée!"

The word triggered something violent inside him.

"Fiancée?" Cedrick sneered, his voice dripping with contempt. His rough thumb pressed hard against her jawline, gripping her chin with bruising force. "Was sleeping with me part of the plan? Did you think one night in my bed was your audition, and when you didn't get a callback, you settled for my fool of a nephew?"

Isidora sucked in a sharp breath. She shoved her hands against his chest, trying to push him away. "This is none of your business!"

Cedrick's hand shot up, his fingers tightening their grip. He forced her to look at him.

"You reek of hidden agendas," Cedrick said, his eyes burning with a dark, calculating rage. "You play the frightened mouse, but you crawled into my bed without an invitation. Now you're set to marry into my family. Don't you dare tell me this is a coincidence."

He was certain of it. This hideous woman had seduced him, played him for a fool, and was now using this pathetic engagement to claw her way into the Garrison fortune. He believed her ugly makeup and dowdy clothes were her true self, the same self he had inexplicably taken to his bed. The memory was a brand of shame on his pride.

Isidora let out a cold, mocking laugh. The fear vanished, replaced by pure defiance.

"You think too highly of your family's allure, Mr. Garrison," Isidora whispered, her eyes locking onto his without a shred of fear. "I am merely surviving a business arrangement. If I had any actual power in this game, I wouldn't be standing in a dark closet being threatened by a tyrant."

Cedrick's pupils dilated. The insult hit his ego like a sledgehammer.

A dark, dangerous heat radiated from his body. He lowered his head, his mouth crashing down toward hers. He needed to punish her for the insult, for the deception. He needed to taste the lie on her lips and remind her—and himself—of the night she had so clearly forgotten, a night he now saw as the first move in her disgusting, calculated game.

Just as his lips brushed against hers, heavy footsteps pounded down the hallway outside.

"Isidora! Where the hell are you hiding, you ugly bitch?!" Kevin's voice screamed through the wood.

The door handle rattled violently.

Isidora stopped breathing. Her eyes widened in absolute terror. She pressed her hands flat against Cedrick's chest, silently begging him to stop.

Cedrick paused. He looked at the rattling door handle, then down at Isidora's trembling lips.

A cruel, twisted smile spread across his face. Instead of stepping back, Cedrick pressed his hips harder against hers.

Kevin kicked the heavy walnut door. The wood groaned under his expensive leather shoe.

"Useless freak," Kevin muttered loudly outside. His footsteps finally echoed down the hallway as he walked away to answer his ringing phone.

Inside the dark cloakroom, Isidora shoved Cedrick's chest with all her strength.

This time, he let her push him.

Her fingers shook violently as she fumbled to button the collar of her dress that had twisted in his grip.

"Psychopath," Isidora hissed under her breath.

She didn't wait for his reaction. She grabbed the door handle, unlocked it, and practically ran out into the brightly lit corridor.

Cedrick remained standing in the dark. He slowly raised his hand, his thumb rubbing the lingering scent of iris off his skin. His eyes were pitch black, calculating and lethal. He adjusted his cuffs and stepped out of the room.

Isidora power-walked toward the side lounge, trying to calm her racing pulse.

As she turned the corner, she froze.

Chantelle, wearing a scandalous red silk dress, was standing in the middle of the lounge. Two security guards were trying to block her from entering the main ballroom.

A crowd of socialites had already gathered, their eyes wide with gossip.

Kevin pushed through the crowd. He shoved one of the guards hard in the chest and wrapped his arms protectively around Chantelle.

Chantelle buried her face in Kevin's chest. She pointed a manicured finger directly at Isidora, who had just walked in.

"Kevin, she threatened me!" Chantelle sobbed loudly. "She sent me a text saying if I didn't leave you, she would hire someone to throw acid on my face!"

It was a blatant, ridiculous lie. But the crowd gasped. Whispers of "vicious" and "psycho" rippled through the socialites.

Kevin's face twisted into pure rage. He let go of Chantelle and marched straight toward Isidora.

He raised his hand high, fully intending to slap her across the face in front of everyone.

Isidora didn't flinch. She didn't blink. She stared directly into Kevin's eyes with a look so cold and dead that Kevin's hand froze mid-air.

"You disgusting, ugly bitch," Kevin spat, lowering his hand but raising his voice. "You think your cheap threats will make Chantelle leave? Look at yourself! You look like a rotting corpse. If it wasn't for the trust fund, the thought of touching you would make me vomit!"

The socialites laughed out loud. The humiliation was absolute.

Isidora looked past Kevin. Her father, Arsenio, was standing at the back of the crowd. He didn't step forward to defend his daughter. He just looked at her with deep disgust, his eyes filled with absolute fury. He was violently embarrassed that her inability to control the situation was publicly jeopardizing the Wyatt-Garrison merger and threatening millions in corporate assets.

Isidora stood alone under the chandelier. Her spine was perfectly straight. Behind her thick glasses, there were no tears.

She slowly slipped her hand into her clutch purse. Her thumb found the home button of her phone. She unlocked it blindly.

Just as she was about to press the screen, a cold, mocking laugh echoed from the marble pillars.

Cedrick stepped out of the shadows. He had one hand in his pocket. The sheer weight of his presence instantly silenced the laughing crowd.

He walked slowly toward Kevin. His eyes flicked to Chantelle, stripping her down to nothing with a single look.

"Since when do the men of the Garrison family behave like dogs in heat in public?" Cedrick's voice was quiet, but it carried a lethal threat.

Kevin swallowed hard, his face turning pale. "Uncle Cedrick, this woman, she-"

"Shut your mouth," Cedrick cut him off. "You turn a private family engagement into a public circus over a woman you can buy for ten dollars on Hollywood Boulevard?" Cedrick's gaze didn't even flicker toward Isidora. His wrath was entirely focused on his nephew's incompetence. "You are bleeding the Garrison name dry in front of Wall Street."

Chantelle gasped, her face turning bright red. She opened her mouth to scream, but one look at Cedrick's dead eyes made her snap her mouth shut.

Isidora looked at Cedrick in shock. Why was the man who had just assaulted her in a closet stepping in now?

Cedrick caught her looking. He tilted his head slightly. A dark, amused glint flashed in his eyes.

He wasn't helping her. He was enjoying the show. He wanted to see what the "ugly, scheming woman" would do next.

Cedrick turned to Hyman, who had just arrived, sweating profusely.

"End this circus," Cedrick ordered. "I want the official toast to begin in the main ballroom in exactly ten minutes. Do not make me wait."