Chapter 1 - The Glare On Marble
Vivian’s stiletto heel stopped less than two inches from my rubber-soled sneaker.
I kept my chin tucked down, folding a stack of white cotton hand towels with hands that felt completely disconnected from my body. The air around her smelled of expensive tuberose, sweet champagne, and the hot, synthetic tang of heated medical silicone.
"Were you standing there the entire time, girl?" Vivian asked, her voice dropping into a razor-thin hiss.
I looked up slowly, forcing my eyes wide and blinking with the innocent bewilderment of an overworked student.
"I just brought up the fresh linen bundle from the basement laundry, ma'am. Mr. Cross asked for extra towels before the dessert service."
Chloe Barrett stepped out of the powder room right behind her, nervously clutching her gold clutch against her hip.
She looked past Vivian’s shoulder, her eyes darting between my apron and the heavy service door leading to the banquet hall. "Vivian, leave it. Damian is waiting for the toast, and people are starting to look around."
Vivian’s cold green eyes dragged down my plain black server uniform, lingering on my scrubbed face and messy ponytail.
She reached out with a manicured hand, tapping the tip of a polished red acrylic nail against the center of my chest. "If I find out you've been lingering around private doors, sweetheart, you won't just lose this waitressing job. I will make sure your nursing license is revoked before you even sit for clinical boards."
"I only do my job, Miss Shaw," I replied evenly, keeping my breathing shallow so she couldn't hear my heart pounding against my ribs.
"Congratulations on the baby."
The word hung between us like a poisoned lure.
For a fraction of a second, Vivian’s painted mouth twitched with arrogant, vicious amusement. She adjusted the heavy drape of her empire-waist silk gown, where the prosthetic swell beneath looked completely seamless once again.
"He will be the heir to everything in this city," Vivian purred, brushing past me with a careless sweep of her silk train.
"Make sure my table’s sparkling water has lemon slices, not lime."
I watched them turn the corner into the bustling banquet room where laughter, violin strings, and crystal clinking filled the air.
My knees gave out instantly, and I had to press both hands flat against the cold subway-tile wall to stay upright. My fingers were trembling so violently that the stack of towels tumbled across the floor, scattering like discarded bandages.
She wasn't just faking a pregnancy to secure a wedding ring and a luxury townhouse in the Gold Coast.
She had spoken of an accident waiting after the honeymoon with the absolute calm of an assassin checking off a grocery list. She had bought off Dr. Pike, forged seven months of ultrasound records, and was waiting for the vows to put Damian Cross in a grave.
I had to warn him.
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But as I stepped toward the kitchen door, reality hit me like a bucket of ice water. Damian Cross was a man who commanded an empire through ruthlessness and deep, unhealed grief.
If a twenty-seven-year-old waitress walked up to him in front of Chicago’s high society and claimed his pregnant bride was wearing a strap-on rubber belly, his security team would drag me out the service exit before I could finish my sentence. I needed absolute proof, and I had exactly twelve days to get it.
