When he saw Ayla, the violence in his expression dissolved, replaced by dark, predatory amusement.
He took a slow sip of whiskey and walked toward her, his footsteps soundless on the thick carpet. His eyes dragged slowly over the oversized, ridiculous white chef’s jacket she was wearing.
“You broke into a highly secure corporate fortress,” he murmured, a cruel smirk playing at his lips, “dressed as a delivery boy. You must really want to see me, Miss Joyce.”
Ayla didn’t back down. She met his gaze with absolute defiance.
She unzipped the brown paper bag and pulled out the thick stacks of unmarked hundred-dollar bills, dropping them onto the rosewood desk. The cash fanned across the polished surface.
“One hundred thousand dollars,” she said, her voice freezing cold. “That covers the Maybach door. The debt is paid. Give me my driver’s license right now.”
Cassius looked down at the pile of cash.
Then he threw his head back and let out a low, dark laugh – genuinely amused, the sound echoing through the cavernous office.
He closed the distance between them and stopped mere inches away. Ayla could feel the heat radiating from his chest. The scent of cold mint, expensive whiskey, and faint gunpowder washed over her, her heart accelerating against her will.
Cassius leaned down, his lips dangerously close to her ear.
“You think you can buy your way out of my game with pocket change?” he whispered, his voice sending a shiver straight down her spine. “The game just started, Ayla. And your ID isn’t here.”
Ayla’s heart slammed against her ribs. The air in her lungs suddenly felt like thick, freezing water.
She took a step back, forcing herself to maintain eye contact with Cassius.
“What do you mean it isn’t here?” she demanded, her voice tight. “You put it in your jacket pocket yesterday. I saw you do it.”
Cassius walked casually to the wet bar, picked up the crystal decanter, and poured another splash of amber liquid into his glass. He watched her through the mirror’s reflection.
“I did,” he said smoothly. “But after I left you in the garage, I flew down to Washington D.C. for a congressional hearing. I changed suits on the plane.”
He turned around and leaned his hip against the edge of the bar, taking a slow sip of whiskey, his dark eyes gleaming with sadistic amusement.
“My security team left that particular suit at a dry cleaner near Dupont Circle,” he said, his tone completely indifferent. “Your license is currently sitting in a plastic bag, three hundred miles away.”
A sudden, violent wave of dizziness hit Ayla. The floor seemed to tilt beneath her feet.
“Call them,” she ordered, her breathing quickening. “Call the dry cleaner. Tell them to overnight it. I need that ID by tomorrow.”
Cassius raised a single dark eyebrow and swirled the whiskey in his glass.
“A billionaire doesn’t call a dry cleaner, Ayla,” he said softly, his voice laced with mockery. “And I certainly don’t run errands for a woman who breaks into my office and throws dirty cash on my desk. I left it there on purpose. I wanted to see how long it would take for you to panic.”
Ayla’s hands curled into tight fists at her sides, her fingernails digging into her palms until the skin nearly broke.
She was trapped. Without that ID, she couldn’t finalize the biometric registration for the Chelsea apartment. Without it, the Gilliam Group HR department couldn’t run her mandatory background check on Monday. And if Axel’s hackers flagged her name at the DMV when she applied for a replacement, they would ping her exact location within minutes.
The realization crashed down on her all at once. The walls of the massive office seemed to shrink, pressing inward, crushing her ribs.
Ayla’s chest heaved. She tried to draw a breath, but her throat locked. Her vision blurred at the edges, bleeding into grey.
She stumbled backward. Her shoulder struck the cold glass wall and she slid down it, both hands rising to grip her own chest.
She was having a full-blown panic attack.
Cassius’s mocking smile vanished instantly.
He recognized the signs immediately – the rapid, shallow breathing, the dilated pupils, the complete loss of motor control. He had seen it a thousand times in his own mirror. He knew exactly what it looked like.
He slammed his whiskey glass down on the bar. The crystal shattered. He didn’t care.
He crossed the room in three strides, dropped to one knee directly in front of Ayla, and grabbed both of her arms. His grip was firm and anchoring.
“Ayla. Look at me,” he commanded. His voice was no longer mocking – it was a deep, authoritative rumble designed to cut through the noise in her mind.
Ayla’s head thrashed from side to side. Tears of uncontrollable panic spilled over her lashes. Her lips were turning pale.
Cassius moved closer and slid one hand up to the back of her neck, his large, warm fingers gripping her firmly.
“Look at my eyes,” he ordered, his tone leaving no room for anything but obedience.
Ayla’s blurry gaze finally locked onto his.
“Breathe in for four seconds. Hold for four. Out for four,” he instructed, exaggerating his own breathing so she could mirror it. “Do it. Now.”
Ayla’s hands reached up instinctively and grabbed the front of his dress shirt, twisting the fabric and holding on like a drowning woman clinging to a life raft.
For ten long minutes, the only sound in the dark office was their heavy, synchronized breathing.
Slowly, the grey fog receded from her vision. The violent trembling in her muscles subsided. She became aware that she was practically sitting in Cassius’s lap, her face buried against his chest, her hands gripping his shirt so tightly her knuckles ached.
Ayla gasped and immediately released him. She scrambled backward, pushing herself away as though she had been burned, and pressed her back against the cold glass wall. Her heart still hammered a frantic rhythm against her ribs. She wiped her wet face with the sleeve of the chef’s jacket, cheeks burning with humiliation.
She had just exposed her deepest, most broken vulnerability to the most dangerous man in the city.
Cassius didn’t move. He remained on one knee, watching her with piercing, analytical intensity.
“A simple PR director doesn’t have a clinical panic attack over a lost piece of plastic,” he said, his voice low and dangerous. “You aren’t just looking for a job, Ayla. You are running for your life. Who are you hiding from?”
Ayla bit the inside of her cheek until she tasted blood. She couldn’t tell him about Axel. If Cassius knew she was the wife of his greatest rival, he would use her as leverage without hesitation.
“I owe money to loan sharks in Brooklyn,” she said, her voice raspy and exhausted but layered with forced ice. “Without my ID, I can’t access my safe deposit box. If I don’t pay them by Monday, they will kill me.”
Cassius stared at her. He knew she was lying. The sheer audacity of it – lying to his face, even in the aftermath of a panic attack – fascinated him.
He stood slowly, brushed the wrinkles from his ruined shirt, and walked to his desk. He pressed a button on the intercom.
“Vance. Dispatch the private jet to D.C. immediately. Have the security team retrieve the black suit from the Dupont cleaner. I want it in my hands by tomorrow night.”
He released the button and looked down at Ayla, still sitting on the floor.
“Your ID will be here tomorrow,” he said, his voice returning to its cold, arrogant baseline. “But you are going to pay for the jet fuel.”
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