Liam’s POV
Of all the ways this could’ve gone, this wasn’t even on the list.
I stared at the photo again, still open on my screen, like it might change if I just looked long enough. Like it might turn into someone else—someone I hadn’t almost kissed twenty minutes ago. Someone who didn’t laugh too loudly and celebrate too hard and dismantle every carefully constructed defense I’d spent years pretending were still intact.
But no.
Ava Green was a lie.
Avelina Sinclaire was real.
And I—like the world’s dumbest man—had spent the past month watching her, challenging her, wanting her, while she played house in the company I built from the ashes of every woman I was warned never to trust.
I leaned back in my chair and exhaled like I was trying not to scream. My throat was dry. My hands were clenched. The skin behind my eyes was tight.
God, what a joke.
Of course it was her.
Of course the first woman to crawl under my skin in years would be the one running from an engagement to me. That was the kind of poetic cruelty the universe specialized in. Avelina Sinclaire—too good for Duarte money, too wild to be bought, too smart to be fooled—and the entire time, she’d been sitting across from me, pretending to be someone else.
Pretending like I was the one surprising her.
And the worst part?
I had fallen for it. For her.
For the way she smiled like she was stealing something. For the way she looked at me when she thought I wasn’t watching. For the way she fought me—unafraid, unfiltered, on fire.
All of it. I’d bought all of it.
And now I didn’t know what any of it meant.
Had that moment in my office—when she looked at me like she might actually feel it too, that pull, that heat, that maddening undercurrent—had that been real?
Or just another performance?
I’d been down this road before. Lindsey, all wide eyes and soft hands, whispering that money didn’t matter to her right up until the day she took the check and vanished. Brides in white gowns with blood in their smiles. Mothers offering daughters like business proposals.
I should’ve known. I should’ve seen it.
But Ava was different. She felt different.
Didn’t she?
Or maybe that was part of the trick.
Maybe she knew exactly what to say. Maybe she knew that getting close to me meant staying employed. That I’d protect her if I believed she was something special.
And now she had what she wanted—a position. My attention. A shield from the family she so publicly abandoned.
And me? I was just the next idiot in line to be played.
I downed the whiskey in a single pull, straight and unforgiving. It burned, but not enough. Nothing ever burned enough anymore.
My father’s voice echoed in my head: Bring her back. Fix this.
Right. Like I was some glorified babysitter for a girl who’d made a fool of me.
Fine.
Two could play that game.
If she wanted to manipulate me? If she wanted to crawl her way into this company, into my good graces, into my bed—she could.
I’d let her.
I’d let her kiss me. Let her climb me like a ladder and pretend like she wasn’t trying to get somewhere. And when she was done? When she thought she’d won?
I’d walk away. Like they all did. Like she had.
Except this time, I’d be the one ending the story.
I’d get her out of my system, then hand-deliver her to her family, just like she hated. Like a toy that had lost its shine.
And what better time to start than now?