The chilly voice didn’t hold a candle to its owner.
I swiveled, pasting on a vacant smile of the Reggie variety. The type that screamed: I have nothing but dust and the latest Chanel collection between my ears.
“Ohmigod, it’s you. Zach Sun. I’ve been wanting to meet you forever.”
I was not above stroking men’s egos if it meant they left me alone. They were normally simple creatures, easily distracted by compliments.
Unfortunately, Mr. Sun appeared about as thawed as Iceberg B-15.
“I asked you a question.” He stepped forward, his eyes a dark vortex, so empty I feared I’d fall into their pits. “Now would be a good time to answer.”
It didn’t help that his presence distracted me. That he was tall, his angled jaw so defined I could sharpen knives on it. His hair and eyes blacker than the tip of a raven’s wing.
He wore a tux with a tailcoat, hair parted on the side and slicked back.
He was power, elegance, and beauty. Dripping charisma like it was molten gold.
And yet, too clinical.
Too cold.
Like a lifeless, deserted planet.
I’d seen him countless times—unbeknownst to him—and I could never get used to his magnificence.
His right brow popped up. “Cat got your tongue?”
More like I’m pussying out after getting caught.
“I got lost trying to find the art gallery.” I bowed, peering up at him behind a curtain of heavy lashes. “I’m so sorry. I couldn’t help myself. The rumors precede it.”
“The art gallery is in the garage.” Zach reached for the switch, edging the dimmer up to its highest setting. White light poured from the ceiling. “And if you know it exists, you’re also aware that it is strictly off-limits. Besides, you don’t like art.”
He said it with such confidence that, for one jarring moment, my breath stuck in my throat.
Like he could see right through me.
He closed the door behind him, leaning against it to block my escape route, arms folded over his chest. “Let’s try again—why are you here?”
With a parting glance, I dragged myself away from the jade pendant and sauntered across the room, eating up the distance between us with swayed hips.
In lieu of a sword, sex was a great weapon.
“I don’t like parties.”
Or you.
Or the fact that you waltzed into my life and snatched what’s mine so easily, as if I’m nothing of consequence.
I buried the words beside my pride and dove in for the kill, adjusting the neckline of my gown. His eyes didn’t even budge.
Ouch.
On to Plan B.
I fanned my face, tossing my hair over one shoulder. “I needed to catch my breath, and my legs led me here.”
“Well, I respectfully ask that they lead you off the premises, unless you wish to spend your night in a jail cell.”
That he wasn’t a nice guy didn’t surprise me, but he was being a downright prick. Then again, I had come here to steal from him.
I floated around the room, ignoring the way his words hung in the air like a blade. My knuckles fluttered over business books, paintings, and upholstered couches.
Zach discarded his whiskey tumbler on an end table, his eyes tracking my every movement like a hawk. “Are you dumb?”
Dumb? No.
Determined? You bet.
And I had a feeling Zach wasn’t accustomed to women who didn’t fawn all over his every request.
The Go board nestled between two tufted sofas caught my eye. Kaya wood. Yunzi stones. Mulberry bowls.
He must’ve dropped an entire mortgage payment on this baby.
Stones littered the board as if someone had abandoned a lengthy game. Or more likely—run away.
On instinct, I plucked a black stone from the bowl and set it beside a star point.
From across the room, Zach’s brows snapped together, his eyes dropping to the board. “It’s not chess.”
His low voice reeked of ridicule. But something else had laced into it. A pang of panic. He didn’t like it when others touched his things.
Classic only-child syndrome.
“Obviously.” I gauged Black’s thickness, fingertips tingling with the urge to snatch another stone. A lifetime had passed since I’d last played. “Chess dolls are cute and pointy. These circle thingies are for checkers.”
His eyelid twitched.
All that money, and he couldn’t afford a sense of humor.
Tsk. Tsk.
Before me, the stones broadcasted all I needed to know about the players.
Black—cautious, generous, and gentle.
White—ruthless, aggressive, and decisive.
Zach is White, I decided.
I arched a brow, burying my curiosity about Black’s identity. “I assumed it was Black’s turn.”
“And why would you assume that?”
Because I can count.
I opted for something slightly more offensive.
“Because White was dumb enough to respond to Black’s ko threat, so I imagine after destroying his own group, he begged Black for a timeout in order to lick his wounds and regroup.” I shook my head. “Didn’t have the balls to resign, did he?”
Silence.
I flicked an errant blade of grass from my dress, deciding I liked Zachary Sun best with his mouth shut.
His expression remained an impenetrable fortress, blank and unreadable. He didn’t look at me. Instead, his entire attention clung to the board.
There was something so detached about this man that I seriously doubted he was capable of functioning humanly.
It made him unpredictable.
And that made him a very dangerous opponent.
“Yikes.” I rolled my lower lip into a pout, tilting my head sideways. “You’re White, aren’t you? Don’t worry. Your secret’s safe with me.”
The slight flare of his nostrils was the only telltale he was breathing. “I didn’t avoid resigning.”
I eyed the door, wondering whether he’d notice if I wormed my way out. “Glad to hear it. That would be terrible sportsmanship.”
The French windows tempted me.
Not like I needed my ankles intact these days.
“No.” Zach stalked toward me, one deliberate step at a time. His scent, of citrus and dark woods, burned through my nostrils, warning me that danger lurked nearby. “I did not back out,” he insisted, so close to me now that our shoulders almost touched.
We both glowered at the board.
He gestured to the high point. “Look.”
I did.
At his hands.
Hands that had never seen a day of hard labor. Perfect, clean, and cut cuticles. Long tan fingers. Smooth, even skin. Thick wrist with a De Bethune strapped to it.
So perfect.
So glamorous.
So soulless.
“I smell a bet,” I challenged, realizing this so-called genius hadn’t caught on to my intentions.
Holy hell.
I was actually going to get away with trying to steal from him.
My feelings ricocheted between relief and disappointment for not capturing the pendant.
Yet.
“All I smell is bullshit.” He claimed the seat across from Black, dropping his elbows to his knees and lacing his fingers together with a frown. “Sit.”
Sit. Go.
It wasn’t lost on me that every command he’d given me could be mistaken for a dog’s.
“Why?”
“Because I’m about to wipe the floor with you. Your journey will be shorter from the settee.”
I studied him, half-scandalized, half-frightened. “You really think you’re smarter than the rest of the world, don’t you?”
“The theory is backed by facts.” He meant it.
Poor whomever-he-decided-to-marry. I hoped for her sake his dick was as big as his ego.
“I think—”
“You believe,” he amended. “Most people lack the capacity to truly conjure real, original thoughts. Even dissertations are recycled theories of greater minds. I couldn’t care less what you believe. Now sit down, or I call security.”
I blinked. “Are you forcing me to play with you?”
“Yes.”
“Let me guess—you weren’t the most popular kid in the playground.”
“Never been to a playground.” He pushed his sleeves up, lifting the mulberry lid covering the white stones. “Though my parents did rent out Disneyland for a weekend for my fifth birthday. Flew my entire grade there. Didn’t hear any complaints. Sit.”
I did so obediently, figuring the game would be a welcome distraction while I calculated my next move. “Ah, rich people. They’re just like us.”
He didn’t even ask who I was.
For my name.
The sheer intrigue and outrage of the prospect of being outsmarted at a dated mind game made him throw all caution to the wind.
Zachary Sun wasn’t used to losing.
What a terrible existence.
If you couldn’t mourn your losses, how could you celebrate your wins?
I eyed his relaxed shoulders. “Don’t you have a party to go back to?” He hadn’t once glanced at the door.
Zach ignored me, collecting a stone between his index nail and middle fingertip. Without pausing to think, he blocked my attack.
It happened in less than a second. All with flawless stone etiquette.
He reclined against the plush upholstery, propping one leg over the other, finally gifting me a sliver of his attention. His slacks rode up until the hem revealed his sock—black.
Just like his heart.
“Where’d you learn to play Go?”
I knew an accusation when I heard one. Used to it, unfortunately.
“Korea.” I didn’t offer more, leaning forward to assess my next move.
Outside, music, laughter, and champagne glasses clinking together seeped past the door. My hectic thoughts drowned them out.
I needed to escape.
I’d come for the pendant another day. Another time.
His left brow arched a millimeter. I was sure he wanted to ask what a white American girl was doing in Korea, but he held himself back.
I had a feeling he prided himself in not caring about others. Or perhaps he simply didn’t care, and pride was his default setting.
I stole a quick glance his way, checking to see if his face still made my pulse accelerate.
It did.
“If it makes you feel any better, I participated in some Go competitions when I was there.”
His lip curved up in a snarl. “Why would it make me feel better?”
“When I annihilate you.”
“Now who’s being cocksure?”
“Please, Zach. There’s only one dick in this room, and I think we both know that it’s you.”
Yup. That just left my mouth.
Vera was right.
Maybe I was impossible to civilize.
Zach moved another stone. He’d cornered me, both literally and figuratively. He was a fantastic player. Calm, pragmatic, steadfast.
It didn’t surprise me. Just annoyed me. I’d grown used to having an edge analytically. Dad always warned that the price of stupidity is always paid.
Maybe that was how Zachary Sun had built his wealth from Forbes-worthy inheritance to the nominal GDP of Luxembourg.
He possessed no weakness to exploit. Had no stupidity to pay for.
I twirled a stone in my palm as I waited for his move, ignoring stone etiquette, knowing it would bother him. “Shouldn’t you go back to your guests?”
“No,” he said decisively. “They’ll have more fun without me.”
He maneuvered a stone, leaning closer to me to do so. I did not interest him in the slightest. One could argue that I was practically half-naked, on a platter before him, completely at his mercy.
He didn’t care.
Those poor girls downstairs didn’t stand a chance.
Zachary Sun didn’t do love, nor passion. Humans did not thrill him. Numbers and mind games did.
I cleared my throat. “You have a nice house.”
I needed to fill in the silence somehow. To keep him from asking questions about me.
At the same time, I worried he’d recognize my voice. All the other times we’d met, we both wore masks.
A few moments passed before he looked up in my direction. It didn’t even last a second. “That’s not a question.”
Christ.
“Is it true that your mother is forcing you to marry by the end of the yea—”
“I wish to play in silence.”
I buried my knuckle into my temple, hoping to relieve the building pressure. “And then you’ll let me leave in peace?”
“And then I might let you leave in one piece. That’s my best and final offer.”
“That’s not much of a bargain for me.”
“I think it is. Unless you’re fond of prison food.”
“I’m not picky.”
At the very least, I’d no longer have to fork over rent to live in my own childhood home.
“Neither are the people who will corner you in the showers.”
“Are you imply—”
“I do not imply things. I outwardly say them. And right now, I am outwardly saying, ‘Make your move. Without a word.’”
I obeyed him.
For the next two hours, we lost ourselves in the game.
Every twenty minutes or so, someone would knock on the door and attempt to lure him back to the party. They were all met with lazy waves, a wordless instruction for them to leave.
Zach’s full attention remained on our game, which was why I tried hard to prolong it as much as possible. I didn’t want him to start interrogating me again.
But dammit, he had skill.
If he told me he competed at the Majors, I’d believe it.
Sweat beaded at my temple. We entered our third hour with flourish.
Me—with burning feet, ready to sprint out the door as soon as he’d let me.
And him—with a perpetual frown etched onto his lips.
His frown morphed into a full-blown scowl when our stalemate became evident. We’d reached a dead end.
The music and chatter subsided downstairs, indicating most guests had left. The host had spent the entire party here. With me.
Sure enough, we hadn’t talked.
Not a single word.
I broke the silence first. “I’m going to have to think about my next move.”
I rubbed my cheek, jutting out my lower lip. I hated losing. Plus, I wasn’t even sure what getting out of the lion’s den would look like.
This afternoon, before I’d arrived, I’d parked my car two blocks away from his mansion with the intention of strolling to it, prized pendant safe in hand.
Obviously, I’d gotten too cocky.
Zach’s eyes didn’t budge from the board. “You’re about to lose.”
“Keep telling yourself that.”
I stood, stretching my arms and feigning a yawn. He rose to his feet, too, that scowl still wilting his lips.
I snapped the stone bowl shut. “Well, thank you for th—”
“When will we finish the game?”
He removed his phone from his pocket and thumbed through it. His calendar app flashed before me. Goodness, it didn’t even occur to him that I’d say no.
His thumb shot up with each scroll, probably sorting through dates convenient for him. “Tomorrow is no good for me, and I have a meeting in London the next day, though I will not be staying overnight.”
My jaw clamped shut with an audible snap.
It shouldn’t have surprised me. Zach wanted to be challenged. No, he needed to be challenged. Everyone around him bored him.
Unfortunately for him, I would rather drive home blindfolded and handcuffed than spend another second in his presence.
I scratched my cheek. “I, uh, have a busy schedule.”
“More parties to crash?”
I smoothed a hand over my dress, my palm sweaty. “That’s rude.”
“But not wrong. Who are you?”
His eyes were like two barrels of a gun, digging into the soft flesh of my temple, threatening to pull the trigger.
Death lurked behind those eyes. I wondered what they’d witnessed to suck the soul out of them.
“I’m a guest.”
“I’d remember if I invited you.”
“I’m someone’s plus one.”
“Name that someone.”
Would it kill him to budge?
I conjured the name of a man I guessed would be here. “Pierre Toureau.”
A client of mine. A very wealthy one. He owned restaurants, malls, and a fleet of Mid-Atlantic conservatories.
I bet Zach had invited him and his pretty grad student daughter Anamika.
A vein bulged in his neck. “Really?”
“Really.”
“Interesting. Does his wife know?”
Shit.
“I’m his niece.”
“The one from France?”
“Y-yes.”
“Where are you from in France?”
Jesus.
He wasn’t supposed to be hot and smart.
Again—not a surprise. Just alarming to be on the receiving end of a lethal dose.
“Uh… Yes?”
He shook his head, like I was a lost cause.
“You’re not one of us,” Zach concluded, hands resting in the pockets of his slacks, jaw harder than the granite surrounding us.
Shit.
Also—screw you.
“How do you know?”
“For one thing, you’re wearing a nightgown.”
Double shit.
It was the only dress of Reggie’s that didn’t have feathers, leather, or other dead animal parts. Should’ve known it was too good to be true.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I kept my chin up, retreating a step, my fingers patting my surroundings, searching for a weapon. How much jail time would I get if I clubbed him with one of these sleep-inducing finance textbooks he couldn’t possibly have finished? “It’s okay not to like my dress, but don’t offend it. I don’t tell you that you look like a penguin in that tux.”
He stalked toward me, stoic and unrelenting. “Give it up, little octopus. You’re wearing holed sneakers.”
Little octopus?
What?
“They’re comfy. You never know when you need to make a run for it.”
Another step back.
“Now would be a good time.” He stopped about ten inches from me. Close enough to be intimidating, but far enough not to touch me. “I’ll even give you a head start, seeing as you’re such easy prey.”
He underestimated me.
Normally, I loved proving people wrong. But with Zach Sun, I doubted my own abilities. Both physically and intellectually.
I extended my neck to look him in the eyes. At 5’8”, I wasn’t often dominated by men, but Zach made me feel miniature. Smashable as a tender teenage heart.
He was lean, tall, and muscular. Proportioned like a Roman sculpture.
Everything about his face was divine. The arches of his thick brows. His bottomless eyes—so dark I couldn’t see where the pupils ended and the irises started. And the pillowy, hand-drawn lips any woman would die to call her own.
They were all bracketed inside a jaw so square, between cheekbones so high, he looked half-human, half-demon. An art collector that was a work of art himself.
“Look…” My back hit the door. I grabbed the knob digging into my lower back on instinct.
The pendant behind him all but winked at me.
Fuck.
I needed to return for it somehow. By inviting me back, he’d offered me a gift, packaged with sharpened spikes and wrapped in poison ivy. But a gift, nonetheless.
Too bad I didn’t trust either of us to open it.
I raised one palm. “I can explain.”
One final step, and he cornered me completely.
His body pinned me to the door, not quite touching mine but close enough that the invisible hairs on my arms stood at attention. “I wholeheartedly doubt it.”
“You can’t do anything wholeheartedly. You don’t have a heart.”
I didn’t know what made me provoke him, but I couldn’t stop even if I wanted to. Not with the surge of momentum behind me. With the zap of electricity bleeding into my veins.
And beyond logic, not with every fiber of my pride wishing to chisel a scar onto Zachary Sun.
His face remained unmoved. “I may have no heart, but my brain compensates for its absence, and it is telling me to punish you for your—”
I didn’t stick around to hear what he had in store for me. I whipped around, jerked the double doors open, and bolted outside.
Zach was at my heels in seconds. His smart shoes clanked against the marble in long strokes.
I sprinted to the edge of the stairway and hopped onto the banister, zipping down the handrail as fast as I could.
Zach snapped his fingers. “Chase her.”
In an instant, two people materialized, scrambling up the stairs after me. Zach was still the closest, but even he wasn’t as fast and nimble as I was.
Olympic material, baby, I wanted to taunt.
In another life, Zach and I would be friends. Maybe. We’d play Go. Do mental math. Exchange ideas.
I’d win.
Sometimes, anyway.
Keep him on those even-heeled toes of his.
At the bottom of the stairs, I sprang off the handrail and did a little twirl and wink before charging for the exit.
The place had emptied out. No one but cleaners and an event manager milled about. They shrieked at my sudden intrusion.
A mop went flying out of a hand, jetting soapy water across what was probably an original Baselitz.
Oops.
Without missing a step, I burst out the front doors, startling a valet on a cigarette break. The crisp air did nothing to cool my flesh.
I picked up speed, thighs burning with the strain. Andras would perform a human sacrifice if it meant I trained this hard every practice.
My heavy pants drowned out the choir of crickets. Sweet summer sweat crawled down my spine.
The gown’s slit tore higher with every stride.
I was scared as hell.
But also more alive than you’ve been in a while.
I snatched a discarded water hose from the grass and pointed it at his employees, spraying them down and knocking them over like dominos.
Breathless laughter hiked up my throat.
What are you doing, Fae?
Having fun.
Something I’d almost forgotten how to do.
I tossed the hose aside and picked up pace. By now, I’d lost the employees. Only Zach could keep up.
“Wouldn’t do that if I were you.” Somehow, he sounded composed. Neither out of breath nor dumbfounded by my sudden bravery. “You can run, but you cannot hide. What I want, I get. And right now, I want answers.”
My sneakers sank into the soft ground, ruining his carefully trimmed grass. The sprinklers turned on, no doubt on purpose.
Water sprayed me from every angle, weighing down the nightgown until the satin plastered to my body.
But I refused to slow.
A dark chuckle curled around my wet skin like ivy. “You’re top entertainment, Octi.”
“Why are you calling me Octi?” I screamed into the air.
I didn’t want to show how much he riled me up, but I couldn’t help it.
Of all the nicknames in the world, I couldn’t conjure a single one less flattering. Not even if I workshopped it for a decade.
“Because you’re an octopus.” He said it conversationally. Like I wasn’t running, and he wasn’t chasing me. “Exceptionally smart. Hands everywhere. And venomous. Plus, female octopuses hurl shells at males that harass them.”
“If you know you’re harassing me, stop.”
“How’s Friday for you?” He managed to scroll through his phone while picking up speed. What a weird, weird man. “I can fit in a game between eleven p.m. and one in the morning.”
One in the morning?
For Go?
There was only one thing I wanted more than turning around and flipping him off—surviving this bizarre encounter.
I swallowed my pride, legs pumping so fast, I was seconds from igniting a friction fire out of Reggie’s nightgown.
“Octi.”
I wasn’t going to answer this stupid nickname.
I wasn’t.
“Octi, you need to stop. I’d hate to put a hole in your skull—yours actually contains something inside it—but we both know I will.”
“It’s the only hole you’re interested in tonight,” I hissed, hiking up the gown’s slit when I almost tripped. “Too bad the female population of Potomac hasn’t caught on yet.”
He ignored me. “Friday, eleven p.m.?”
“The next time I’ll voluntarily be in the same room with you is to attend your funeral to make sure you’re dead.”
A sudden whoosh pierced the air. The scent of metal burned my nostrils. A fancy gold knife landed in the grass mere inches away.
Shit.
He’d thrown that at me.
Actually tossed a knife at me.
That escalated quickly.
Vera always said my smart mouth won me stupid prizes. But I never thought I’d anger someone to the point of assassination.
I shifted to zig-zags, knowing it would slow my pace but also not wanting to leave here with a souvenir the shape of a second asshole.
Zach’s dark and broody laughter rang behind me.
He’s enjoying this.
Sociopath.
According to legend, Zach Sun never laughed. Barely ever cracked a smile. That he was a morose man, tough as nails, his heart full of rust.
This was what cracked his façade?
I’d get revenge on this prick if it was the last thing I did on Earth.
In my haste, one of my sneakers loosened from my foot, spearing into a pocket of mud. I had no time to look back. To stop.
I continued galloping forward with only one shoe on. Water doused my bare foot in an instant.
When I reached his iron-wrought gate, I knew he thought he had me cornered. I also knew once I made it past the bars, Zach wouldn’t be dumb enough to stab me.
Self-defense was hard to prove when your victim sported a hole in their back, even if you were the fifth richest man on Planet Earth and everyone treated you like you wielded a gold-plated dick.
Watch and learn, sucker.
With flourish, I planted my foot on the metal bar and scaled the monstrous twelve-footer. The rails were absent of nooks, but I had enough momentum and core to hoist myself over it.
Once I leapt to the other side, I bowed theatrically, this time clutching the muddy hem of the gown for emphasis.
When I tipped an invisible hat his way, his jaw squared.
The tiny reaction felt like a victory.
Octopus: 1.
Lobster: 0.
I was drenched like a stray cat, my hair a mess and my heart a wreck, but I would never give Zachary Sun the pleasure of seeing me break. “So long, Lobster. And thanks for the fish.”
“Lobster?”
“Octopuses’ favorite snack.”
I disappeared into the night before the heavy gates crawled open.
His men hunted me like hounds, flashlights piercing through the night, golf carts humming in my ears. But I evaded them, cutting through the wooded acres surrounding the property.
The thing about octopuses?
We camouflaged very well.
When I returned home, I mustered just enough energy to crawl into bed. Mud dried in thick cakes around my calves and ankles.
Tomorrow, I’d wake up with a cold from the drenched dress.
Tonight, all I could do was spend every minute until morning weeping into my pillow.
For the pendant I couldn’t retrieve.
For the dreams that had fallen out of reach.
For Dad.
Next time, Pops. Promise.
