Use him.Take his money, his protection, his name.Then leave.
Clara’s voice in my head.Practical advice from a practical woman.The banking branch of the Hughes family had always been better at this, at seeing people as assets and liabilities, at playing the long game.
Raphael was holding himself strangely.Stiff.Careful.Each movement controlled, careful, the way you move when you’re injured and trying not to let it show.The shadows under his eyes were deeper than I had first thought.Signs of strain I might have worried about once, when I had been stupid enough to think I knew him.
I didn’t care.I couldn’t afford to care.
“Fine.You’ve already taken everything else.Why not this too.”
His expression changed.Just for a moment.A flicker of emotion I couldn’t read, gone before I could name it.Relief?Triumph?Pain?
I didn’t want to know.
“Courthouse,” he said.“This week.A ceremony with no guests.Parsons can serve as witness.”
“How romantic.”
“Romance was never what this was.”
The truth of it hit me like a slap.He was right.Whatever I had imagined between us had only ever existed in my head.He had been playing a game.Running a con.And I had been the mark all along.The naive little heiress who thought she could read the predator circling her.
“I have one condition.”I forced my spine straight, forced myself to meet his eyes even though every instinct screamed at me to look away.“I keep running the hotel.My business, my decisions.You don’t interfere.”
He studied me for a long moment.Those dark eyes moving over my face like he was memorizing me.Or searching for answers.I couldn’t tell which.
“Agreed.”
Too easy.Too simple.He had been prepared for this demand, probably planned for it the same way he had planned everything else.I hated that he got to be generous, that he got to give me permission to run my own legacy like it was a gift he was bestowing.
He moved toward the door.Paused with his hand on the frame, not quite looking at me.His profile was sharp against the light from the hallway, carved from shadow and regret.
“I’ll send Parsons when it’s time.”
I didn’t answer.Couldn’t.My throat had closed around all the words I wanted to scream at him, the accusations and curses and grief I refused to let him see.The words that would give him the satisfaction of knowing how thoroughly he had broken me.
The door clicked shut behind him.
I stood there for a long moment, staring at the space where he had been.The room still smelled like him.That warm masculine scent underneath that my body recognized even when my mind wanted to forget.It would fade soon, dissipate into the leather and old paper smell of my father’s office.
But the memory of it wouldn’t.
My legs gave out.I slid down to the floor with my back against the desk, drew my knees up to my chest, and let myself crack.Just for a moment.Just long enough for one sob to escape, ugly and broken and raw, before I shoved my fist against my mouth and forced it back down.
I would not cry for him.Would not waste tears on a man who had never seen me as anything but a means to an end.I had cried enough in the weeks since he had dismissed me.Bled enough on the pages of my journal.Given enough pieces of myself to a man who had only wanted to see me destroyed.
The sun kept streaming through the windows, obscenely cheerful.The mountains kept wearing their spring green.Life kept moving like nothing had changed, like Lena Hughes hadn’t just signed away whatever shreds of freedom she had left.
I stayed on the floor until my breathing steadied and the urge to scream faded to manageable.Then I pushed myself up, smoothed my blazer, and checked my reflection in the window glass.
Pale.Hollow-eyed.But not defeated.Not yet.
A soft knock at the door.Clara’s voice, muffled through the wood.“I saw his car leave.Can I come in?”
She hadn’t left.Of course she hadn’t.Clara never actually left when she said she would, just retreated to a safe distance and waited.It was one of the things I loved about her.
“It’s open.”
She slipped inside, took one look at my face, and crossed to the wet bar in the corner.Two glasses.Whiskey.She pressed one into my hand without asking if I wanted it.