Chapter 1

Morning light crept through the hotel's heavy blackout curtains, casting a dim strip of brightness across the carpet.

The air was thick with the sour smell of a hangover and lingering alcohol.

Michael Vitale rubbed his throbbing temples and pushed himself up from the king-sized bed. He reached out to the side, expecting warm skin, but his hand landed on a thick stack of paper with an inky smell instead.

He looked down. A neat pile of crisp hundred-dollar bills sat right next to the pillow.

"You're up?"

A cool, flat female voice came from nearby.

Michael shook his head and waited for his vision to focus.

Standing in front of the room's full-length mirror was a tall woman.

She had already changed into a perfectly tailored designer blazer and was standing with her back to him, calmly fastening the French cuffs on her shirt.

Even from behind, her slender waist and sharp posture were enough to make anyone's pulse quicken.

Fragments of the night before flashed through his mind. The bar, the party, the drinking, and then... a whole night of madness.

Michael's eyes dropped to the stack of cash by the pillow. He let out a cold, self-mocking laugh, picked it up, and tossed it in the air. "We were both drunk last night. It was mutual. Do you really need to insult me like this, sweetheart?"

He threw off the covers, bare-chested, and looked her over without any shame.

The word "insult" made the woman freeze for just a moment.

Lucia Bianchi turned around. A flush of embarrassed anger swept across her delicate face, but it vanished almost instantly, replaced by an icy coldness.

The sharp, tearing pain between her thighs was a constant reminder of what had happened last night.

This bastard had been like an animal with no leash. What made it even more humiliating was that it had been her first time.

"So what do you want then?" Lucia crossed her arms, lifted her chin slightly, and looked down at Michael with cold, dismissive eyes. "Not enough? Name your price. Within reason, I can make it work."

Michael stared at her superior attitude and laughed despite his anger.

He was the top mercenary in America, known as the "Grim Reaper" on battlefields across the world. He carried one of only a handful of unlimited black cards in existence, and his wealth was more than even he could keep track of. And now, in a hotel in America, a woman was treating him like a male escort?

"Taking money for that is illegal, you know," Michael said, leaning back against the headboard with a raised eyebrow. "We were both drunk. If you feel like you got a bad deal, I'll buy the drinks tonight, and we can run through last night's whole program again. How's that sound?"

"Shameless."

Lucia let out a cold laugh, her eyes full of contempt.

As president of New York's Starship Group, she had built a net worth of hundreds of millions before thirty. In the business world, she was always the one setting the terms.

"You want the whole program?" Lucia pulled a pen from her bag, scrawled a number on a notepad, and flicked it at Michael's face. "One million. Consider yourself lucky. I can afford it. Do whatever you want."

Michael didn't catch it and let it drift to the floor. He shrugged and smiled, then threw off the covers to get up and find his pants.

But the moment the sheets pulled back, something stopped him cold.

There in the center of the bed was a dark, dried red stain, impossible to ignore.

Michael went completely still.

He stared at it, and his mind went blank, like a grenade had just gone off inside his skull.

The woman from last night, dancing at the bar, drunk out of her mind, looking every bit like she'd done this a hundred times before... had actually never been with anyone?

And on top of that, they'd both been too drunk to think about protection.

He was screwed.

Michael's jaw tightened. If something came of this, things were going to get very complicated.

Lucia saw him sitting on the edge of the bed without moving and assumed the "one million" she'd casually thrown out had completely thrown him off.

Even the so-called rising stars of the business world hesitated when she named her price. This rough-edged man in front of her would be no different.

"What, never seen a check like that before?" Lucia's smirk sharpened. She picked up her bag and turned toward the door, tossing out one last line. "Honestly, your performance last night was pretty average. Take your money and get out."

With that, she clicked her heels toward the exit.

"You just said I was... average?"

A low voice, loaded with quiet danger, cut through the room.

Before Lucia could react, the air shifted. A sudden, overwhelming pressure came at her from nowhere.

Michael hadn't even finished pulling on his pants. Barefoot, he crossed the room in one stride, and just before her hand could unlock the door, a thick arm covered in scars slammed against the door panel with a sharp crack, pinning her between the wall and his chest.

The sudden physical closeness made her whole body tense.

He was too close.

She looked up and found herself staring straight at his bare chest.

It was covered in scars, layered and crisscrossing each other. Bullet holes. Knife wounds. Wide, scorched patches from what looked like explosives.

This wasn't the body of someone who spent time in a gym. This was someone who had crawled out of hell more than once.

Lucia's heart skipped a beat. Her natural arrogance faltered in the face of something raw and genuinely dangerous.

But she was the CEO of a company with thousands of employees. She pushed down the panic, forced herself to meet Michael's eyes, and shot back through gritted teeth, "Not good enough means not good enough. What, do your scars make you special? Let's see who ends up with shaking legs."

Michael looked at her face, inches from his, flushed and fierce with anger, and watched the stubborn fire in her eyes. He took a slow breath.

Fine. He wasn't going to argue with a woman over this.

The arm against the door dropped. The tension left his body in an instant, and he shifted into something closer to a laid-back street tough.

"Alright, alright, you win. I was average. Happy?" Michael raised both hands in surrender and stepped back, dropping onto the couch.

He reached over to the nightstand, dug out a crumpled pack of cigarettes, lit one, and looked at her through the smoke. "We still need to sort this out. Name a number. We walk out that door and go our separate ways."

Lucia rubbed her wrist, which was still a little numb, and snorted. "Name a number? Do I look like I need money?"

Starship Group's daily revenue was astronomical. She wasn't interested in pocket change.

"We're both adults. Last night was just an unfortunate accident. Now open the door. I have a meeting to get back to." Her voice was flat and cool.

"One hundred million. Is that enough?"