Sophie.
“Seven.”
His voice was a metronome, ticking down the seconds of her life.
“Six.”
Her mind raced. Police. Prison. The end of her plan. The end of everything. Her father’s memory would go unavenged.
“Five.”
She looked from the tarnished locket on the desk to the cold certainty in his eyes. There was no escape. No lie would work here. He held all the cards.
“Stop counting,” she said.
The words were quiet, but they sliced through the room. Her voice was different. The soft, fragile tone of Ella was gone. In its place was the hard, flat cadence of Sophie Larkin.
Chase’s countdown paused, but his expression didn’t change. He simply watched her, waiting.
She let the frightened heiress persona fall away like a discarded coat. She straightened her shoulders, lifted her chin, and met his gaze with a defiance she hadn’t shown all night.
“There’s no point,” she said. “You’ve already made up your mind.”
A flicker of something, maybe surprise or respect, passed through his eyes. “I have,” he agreed. “The only question is what I’ve made it up to do.”
“So call them,” she challenged. “Call the police. Get it over with.”
“Oh, I will,” he said smoothly. “But first, you’re going to answer my questions. Who are you?”
She gave a short, bitter laugh. “Does my name matter? My name is worthless. You can call me Jane Doe.”
“I’m not in the mood for games, Jane Doe,” he said, his voice dropping an octave. “Who do you work for?”
“Myself,” she said. It was the truth. “Always.”
“And what does a woman who works for herself want with the Sterling family?”
Sophie gestured vaguely at the opulent room, the priceless books, the sheer weight of the wealth around them. “What do you think I want? What does anyone ever want from a family like this? Money. The kind of money that makes you untouchable.”
He considered her answer, his head tilted slightly. He seemed to accept it. Greed was a motive he could understand.
“How much?” he asked.
“Enough to disappear and live on a beach where no one could ever find me.”
“You chose the wrong family to steal from,” he said.
“I don’t think so,” she countered. “I fooled every last one of them. Your grandfather was crying at my feet. Beatrice was seething with jealousy. I had them all. If it wasn’t for you, I would have walked out of here with a controlling interest in the company within six months.”
He didn’t deny it. “An impressive performance. A shame it had to end so soon.”
“So what now?” she asked, crossing her arms. “Are you going to have me arrested for fraud? Or are you going to do to me what you did to the real Ella?”
He ignored the jibe. He walked around the desk and leaned against its edge, his arms folded across his chest. He looked less like an executioner now and more like a CEO considering a risky investment.
“Calling the police would be… messy,” he said, as if thinking aloud. “A scandal like this would damage the company. The stock would plummet. Arthur’s health would fail. It would create an opening.”
“An opening for who?” Sophie asked.
“Marcus Sterling. Ella’s uncle. Arthur’s only living son. He’s been trying to seize control of the board for years. He’s corrupt, incompetent, and greedy. If he takes over, he will gut this company and sell it for parts within a year.”
Sophie listened, her mind working furiously. She was seeing the shape of a new board, a new set of rules.
“What does that have to do with me?” she said.
“Arthur is dying,” Chase stated simply. “His will leaves his controlling shares to Ella. If Ella is officially declared dead, or exposed as a fraud, those shares go to Marcus. But if Ella is alive, and present, she retains control.”
A cold, terrifying understanding began to dawn on her.
“You’re insane,” she whispered.
“I’m practical,” he corrected her. “You walked into my life tonight presenting yourself as the solution to my biggest problem. I need Ella Sterling to exist for the next three months.”
“I’m not her,” she said, shaking her head. “You know I’m not.”
“I don’t need you to be her. I just need you to play her. You’ve already proven you’re capable. All you have to do is continue the performance. But this time, you’ll be taking your direction from me.”
It was a proposal so audacious, so twisted, she could barely comprehend it. He wanted to hire his enemy to be his puppet.
“Let me get this straight,” she said slowly. “You want to blackmail me into continuing the very con you just exposed?”
“I prefer to think of it as a contract,” he said. “A mutually beneficial arrangement.”
“What’s in it for me?” she shot back. “Besides not going to prison.”
“Freedom. And money. Five million dollars, to be exact. The day the shareholder vote is complete and Marcus is blocked, the money will be transferred to an account of your choosing. Then you disappear. For real this time.”
Five million dollars. It was a staggering amount. More than she had ever dreamed of making from a single con. But the price was her life. For three months, she would belong to him.
“And if I refuse?” she asked, her voice barely a whisper.
Chase pushed himself off the desk. The friendly CEO persona vanished, replaced once more by the wolf.
“If you refuse,” he said, his voice a low, chilling promise, “you’ll have the same problem the real Ella had. You will cease to be a problem. You’ll simply… disappear. Only this time, I won’t be so kind as to give you a burial.”
The threat hung in the airless room, as real and as heavy as the locket on the desk.
He watched her, letting the weight of her options crush her. Prison, death, or a gilded cage. There was no other choice.
“This isn’t a negotiation,” he said. “This is the only deal you will ever be offered.”
He walked over to a bookshelf, pressed a hidden button, and a small panel slid open, revealing a document scanner and a printer. He tapped a few commands on a built-in screen. The printer whirred to life, spitting out two pages.
He picked them up and placed them on the desk in front of her, along with a heavy, gold-plated fountain pen.
“A simple non-disclosure and performance agreement,” he said. “It outlines your duties as Ella Sterling and my obligations to you. It also details the penalties for breach of contract.”
She looked down at the paper. It was written in dense legalese, but the message was clear. She would be his property. Every word she spoke, every move she made, would be dictated by him.
“You had this ready,” she said. It wasn’t a question.
“I believe in being prepared for all contingencies,” he replied.
Sophie looked at his face. He was ruthless, dangerous, and quite possibly a murderer. But he was also offering her a lifeline. A way to stay inside the fortress. A way to continue her mission, even if it was under his command.
She thought of her father. She thought of the revenge she had sworn to get. This was not the plan, but it was a path forward. A darker, more treacherous path, but a path nonetheless.
She picked up the heavy pen. The gold was cool against her skin.
“You own me for three months,” she said, meeting his gaze. “But when this is over, you will never see me again.”
“That’s the idea,” he said.
Her hand didn’t shake as she signed the name ‘Sophie Larkin’ on the signature line. It was the first time she had written her real name in months. It felt like signing her own death warrant and her only salvation, all at once.
She pushed the contract back across the desk.
Chase picked it up, glanced at her signature, and gave a curt, satisfied nod. He offered no smile, no word of encouragement.
He simply said, “Good. Now, let’s go over your new rules.”
