"They are here." The words hung in the chilled air of the suite. Alia did not wait for his reaction. She rolled off the edge of the mattress, her bare feet hitting the freezing marble floor.
She sprinted toward the bathroom, grabbing a thick white bathrobe off the rack and pulling it tightly around her shoulders to block out the biting air conditioning.
She turned the solid brass faucet. Freezing water gushed into the porcelain sink. Alia cupped her hands, splashing the icy liquid directly onto her face. The shock traveled down her spine, forcing her chaotic nervous system to stabilize.
She lifted her head, water dripping from her chin. The girl staring back at her in the mirror no longer had the naive, terrified eyes of a victim. Her gaze was sharp, predatory—resembling a wolf cornered in the snow.
Her brain calculated the timeline with terrifying precision. Today was the day Gaylen bought off the media. Cherri was leading the paparazzi straight to this door. Five years ago, she had run out of this room in a panic, her clothes torn, blinded by camera flashes—cementing her status as the laughingstock of New York high society.
The bathroom door was shoved open with violent force. Ansel stood in the doorway, his chest bare, his defined muscles tense and coiled. His face was a mask of dark fury.
He stepped inside, his large frame making the spacious bathroom feel suffocatingly small. He backed Alia against the edge of the marble vanity, leaving her nowhere to run.
His long fingers reached out, gripping her chin and forcing her to look up at him. The pressure was firm, bordering on painful.
"So, did I make you feel wronged by being with me?" The man frowned, a hint of fierceness in his expression."Do you like him so much?"
Alia stared up at him. She did not cry. She did not struggle. She looked straight into his dark eyes, tracing the rigid tension in his sharp jawline and feeling the faint, almost imperceptible tremor in his fingertips as he held her chin. From these microscopic fractures in his armor, she finally read the profound, desperate emotion he tried so hard to hide behind his aggression—like a dying, cornered beast fighting for its last breath.
She raised her freezing hand and placed it gently over the back of his hand holding her chin. She felt the muscles in his forearm twitch and lock.
"I do not feel wronged," Alia said, her voice clear and steady. "I just think we should not give them a free show."
Ansel's pupils contracted sharply. He stared at the girl in front of him, completely thrown off balance by her terrifying calm. He searched her face for any sign of deceit, his thumb rubbing over his index finger knuckle in a repetitive, anxious motion.
Alia pushed his hand away. She turned around, pulling open the drawer of the vanity. She dug through the complimentary toiletries and pulled out a small eyebrow razor. The tiny blade caught the harsh bathroom light.
Ansel's eyes narrowed. Thinking she was about to harm herself in despair, he lunged forward, his hand clamping down on her wrist with bone-crushing force.
Alia winced, a sharp pain shooting up her arm, but she kept her eyes locked on his. "Let go. The reporters outside will break down that door in exactly three minutes. Do you want to be on the front page of every gossip rag with me?"
Ansel caught the word reporters. Years of surviving the cutthroat environment of Wall Street kicked in. The haze of anger vanished, replaced by a cold, calculating realization. He knew a setup when he heard one.
He released her wrist, his expression turning murderous. "Gaylen did this?"
"Who else but him and my dear stepsister," Alia sneered.
She walked past him, heading back into the messy bedroom. She picked up his discarded silk tie and his heavy platinum watch from the floor, shoving them deep under the pillows.
Ansel leaned against the bathroom doorframe, watching her erase his presence with practiced efficiency. A bitter, suffocating weight settled in his chest.
"Are you in such a hurry to distance yourself from me?" Ansel's voice was dangerously quiet—a predator preparing to strike.
Alia stopped moving. She turned to face him, her index finger tapping against her thigh in a rapid rhythm.
"Ansel, I am protecting you. The heir to the Vanderbilt empire cannot be dragged into this kind of cheap scandal."
Hearing her use his first name, hearing her prioritize his reputation, extinguished half the rage burning in his veins. He looked at her, a profound sense of curiosity replacing his anger.
Alia did not have time to explain. She scooped her phone off the carpet. The screen was lit up with fifteen missed calls from Cherri.
She ignored them and dialed a heavily encrypted number. Thank God that in her past life, she and Caitlyn had joined that ultra-exclusive private security club just to dodge the relentless paparazzi. The emergency hotline was still active. It rang only once.
"Caitlyn. I am in the penthouse suite of the Waldorf. Bring your most vicious bodyguards. Use the private elevator. You have three minutes." Alia fired off the commands without pausing for breath.
On the other end of the line, Caitlyn Kensington paused for a fraction of a second, shocked by the absolute authority in Alia's tone. But her Old Money instinct for crisis management overrode her confusion. She agreed and hung up.
Alia tossed the phone onto the bed. She walked toward the massive walk-in closet, sliding the heavy mirrored door open. She turned to Ansel and lifted her chin.
"You need to hide in here. No matter what happens outside, do not come out." Her tone left no room for negotiation.
