The next morning began with a hum of anticipation as the buzz around the upcoming auction electrified the air.The designs from the previous day’s showcase would be bid upon by buyers, collectors, and investors, and the piece that fetched the highest price would cement its designer as the undisputed star of the event.Elise, Alexander’s head designer and a long standing rival of Sarah, was brimming with confidence as she approached Alexander during breakfast in the lavish dining hall.Her elegant outfit and perfectly styled hair screamed self assurance, but her smug smile was what grated on Sarah most."Good morning, Alexander," Elise greeted him with a flirtatious edge, completely ignoring Sarah’s presence.She leaned slightly closer to him, her voice a mix of syrup and steel. "I hope you’re as excited as I am for the auction. I can’t wait to see the Blake Group take the top spot. My design is guaranteed to steal the show."Alexander nodded politely, his expression neutral. “It’s a b
Sarah’s cheeks flushed. “Margaret introduced us,” she said quickly, her words spilling over each other. “She thought it might be helpful to connect with someone like Liam.”Alexander’s brow furrowed. His instincts were on high alert. “Helpful?” he echoed, his voice laced with skepticism. “Is that so?”Liam, sensing the tension, offered a smooth smile. “Purely professional, Mr. Blake. I’m sure you understand how connections in our industry can open doors.”Alexander’s gaze hardened. “I understand plenty.”An awkward silence fell between them, and Sarah fidgeted with the stem of her glass. “Perhaps we should all head toward the auction area,” she suggested, desperate to defuse the situation.Alexander’s piercing look lingered on Liam for a beat longer before he nodded. “Yes. We wouldn’t want to miss anything.”As they moved away, Sarah’s heart pounded.She felt Alexander’s presence beside her, his silence louder than any words he could have spoken.His hand briefly brushed hers as they
Alexander’s gaze flicked between the stage and Sarah, who sat poised but quiet.She seemed lost in thought, her eyes occasionally drifting toward the shimmering choker.Was she admiring Elise’s work, or was there something else on her mind?Alexander couldn’t tell, and it irritated him.He wanted to know what Sarah was feeling, thinking, but she remained a mystery, even to him.“Seventy thousand euros!” came a booming voice from the back.The room murmured in approval as the stakes rose higher.Elise’s lips curved into a triumphant smile. She glanced toward the bidders, her confidence building with each successive paddle raised.“Seventy five thousand!” another bidder declared.“Eighty thousand euros!”The bids continued, each one eliciting gasps and murmurs from the audience.Elise could barely sit still, her excitement bubbling over. She turned her gaze toward Alexander and Sarah, her smugness palpable.“It’s my design,” she whispered loudly enough for those around her to hear. “Thi
The room gasped audibly. Even the auctioneer paused for a fraction of a second before continuing. “Six million euros! Do I hear six point five?”Liam’s smirk faltered slightly. He leaned forward, clearly debating whether to press on. Then, with a nod, he raised his paddle again. “Seven million euros.”Sarah’s heart pounded as the bidding war continued.She wanted to shout at both of them to stop, but she was frozen, caught between fear and exhilaration.This wasn’t just about the jewelry anymore, it was about something unspoken and deeply personal.“Eight million euros,” Alexander countered, his tone icy as he shot a glare in Liam’s direction.Liam raised an eyebrow, clearly enjoying the tension. “Ten million euros,” he announced, his voice laced with challenge.The crowd was on the edge of their seats now, the stakes unlike anything they’d seen before.“Fifteen million,” Alexander said, barely looking at the auctioneer. His focus was entirely on Liam now, his jaw set with determinati
The applause began to die down as the evening drew to a close, and the auctioneer took the stage again for a final note.“Congratulations once more to Mountain Rose and all our participants this evening. Your talent and artistry have set a new standard for excellence. Thank you all for joining us at this prestigious event. We look forward to seeing you again next year!”The audience began to disperse, the energy in the room buzzing with post event discussions and networking. Alexander, however, remained still, his thoughts fixated on one person.Sarah, who now sat with her hands clasped in her lap, appeared smaller, as though the weight of the world rested on her shoulders.As the crowd began to thin, Alexander leaned closer to Sarah, his voice low but firm. “Care to explain why Margaret Windsor looked at you like that?”Sarah froze, her pulse quickening.Her lips parted as if to respond, but no words came. Instead, she forced a strained smile and said, “Let’s go back to the hotel. It
Sarah closed the case gently, her mind racing.She wanted to knock on the study door, to tell Alexander everything, but fear held her back. Fear of his disappointment, fear of his anger, and, most of all, fear of losing the fragile connection they had begun to build.Instead, she sank onto the plush sofa in the living room, the case resting on her lap.Her thoughts swirled in a chaotic mess of emotions, gratitude, guilt, frustration, and longing.Behind the locked door, Alexander sat at the large oak desk, his hands clenched into fists.The room was dimly lit, the glow of a desk lamp casting long shadows across the walls.The jewelry he had bid so fiercely for was now in Sarah’s hands, yet the satisfaction he had expected to feel was nowhere to be found.He leaned back in his chair, running a hand through his hair.His mind replayed the events of the night, Liam’s smug grin, and the way she seemed to trust everyone but him.“Damn it,” he muttered under his breath, slamming a fist onto
And she did. She told him about Margaret, about how Mountain Rose had started as a small dream and grown into something she never could have imagined.She told him about the fear that had kept her from sharing it with him, about the guilt that had eaten at her every day.When she finished, Alexander was silent for a long time.He looked at her, his expression unreadable, before finally speaking. “I’m not angry that you have your own dreams, Sarah. I’m angry that you thought you had to hide them from me.”“I’m sorry,” she said, tears streaming down her face. “I never wanted to hurt you.”He sighed, his shoulders sagging. “I know.”For a moment, neither of them spoke. Then, slowly, Alexander reached out a hand. Sarah hesitated, then took it, her heart aching as his fingers curled around hers.“We’ll figure this out,” he said softly. “But no more secrets, Sarah. I mean it.”She nodded, a fresh wave of tears spilling over. “No more secrets.”As Alexander gently took Sarah's hand, he pulle
Sarah shifted slightly on Alexander's lap, her fingers fidgeting with the edge of his shirt.The intimacy of their position, her perched delicately on his lap while they sat in the quiet of his study, had eased some of the tension between them, but her curiosity gnawed at her.“Alexander,” she began softly, tilting her head to meet his gaze. “I’ve been meaning to ask… why did you bid so fiercely for the Mountain Rose jewelry? Especially when Blake Group already had Elise’s designs on display. Was it just business strategy?”His dark eyes held hers for a moment, searching, as if deciding how much of himself to reveal. Finally, he sighed, leaning back slightly, though his arms stayed firmly wrapped around her waist.“At first,” he admitted, “it was a calculated move. The Mountain Rose brand was gaining a lot of buzz, and I couldn’t let Blake Group miss out on the chance to align with such a name, even if it wasn’t ours.” He paused, his thumb lightly brushing over her back. “But then I s
Sarah stayed curled in Alexander’s arms for a long moment, breathing him in like he was the only tether keeping her from floating away.His hand cradled the back of her head, his chest rising and falling in unsteady waves as if he still couldn’t believe she was real, that she was here.But then her eyes drifted down.Her gaze locked on the white sheets, crumpled and slightly lifted around his lower half.Something tugged at her memory, the shot.The sharp crack of a bullet.The sight of him falling behind her as she ran, screaming his name. Her stomach twisted.She leaned back slightly, her hand moving instinctively to the edge of the blanket, brushing against the thick padding of a cast beneath.Her voice was soft. “You were shot… I remember… I...”Alexander caught her hand gently, pressing it to his lips. “It’s okay. I’m here.”But Sarah’s heart had already begun to race again. “You were limping… and I saw… but I didn’t know it was this bad.” Her eyes darted toward the crutches now
The first thing Sarah registered was the scent of antiseptic, clean, sharp, and nauseating.Then came the ache. Deep in her bones. In her chest. In the marrow of her soul.She stirred, her fingers twitching over crisp hospital sheets as her body shifted ever so slightly, and her mind scrambled to catch up.She wasn’t tied down. She wasn’t cold anymore. She wasn’t in that dark room. That house. That… nightmare.She was safe.Or… something like it.Her eyes fluttered open slowly, lashes damp from tears she hadn’t even known she’d been crying.The ceiling was a sterile white blur. The walls hummed faintly with distant activity, soft footfalls, medical monitors, the low murmur of conversation somewhere outside the door.But none of it mattered.Because he wasn’t there.And without him, none of this felt real.Her lips parted, cracked and dry, and she tried to speak. Tried to push out the name that had lived on the edge of every prayer she'd whispered during captivity.It came out broken a
Alexander turned his head, his eyes bloodshot and glistening. “I’ll be a burden now. She’ll never say it, but I’ll see it in her eyes. Pity. Guilt. I’d rather she hate me than pity me.”“She’s not that kind of woman,” Darius said firmly.A pause. Then Alexander swallowed hard and asked the question that had been clawing at him since the moment the doctor said the word paralysis.“What if she stays… just because she thinks she owes me?”Darius’s brow furrowed. “Then you remind her what you both have been through. Remind her who the hell you are. And what you mean to each other.”Silence again.Then Alexander leaned back against the pillows and stared up at the ceiling. “Gerald got away.”Darius’s expression hardened. “Barely. One of my men put a tracker on his vehicle before he escaped. Victoria got caught in the crossfire. Gerald used her,” Darius replied coldly. “He doesn’t care who dies as long as he gets what he wants.”Alexander’s jaw clenched. “Then we’ll burn every last shadow h
The sterile beep of Alexander’s heart monitor filled the hospital room like a metronome, steady and soft. The worst had passed, so the doctors said. He had survived the bullets, the blood loss, the surgery. He had defied death.But outside the room, just as Darius turned to check on Sarah again, something in her expression shifted.Relief.That was the first thing he saw.A full bodied, all consuming relief that weakened her spine, dulled her eyes, and uncoiled every taut muscle that had kept her upright through pain, fear, and heartbreak.Then she crumpled.“Sarah...!” Darius lunged forward and caught her just before her knees slammed into the polished floor.Her body was limp in his arms, barely conscious, her breathing shallow and unsteady. Her bloodied hands slipped against his shirt as he pulled her close, his voice sharp and commanding as he yelled over his shoulder, “Get a doctor! Now!”Within seconds, nurses flooded the corridor. A gurney was wheeled over, and Darius laid her d
The woman he’d secretly crushed on since the first night he saved her bleeding and defiant.“Holy shit,” he muttered.But she was already in the driver’s seat.The moment her fingers wrapped around the wheel, she changed. Her spine straightened. Her breath slowed. The fear didn’t vanish, but it sharpened, fused into her bones like steel.And when her foot hit the gas, the tires screamed their fury into the night.The SUV became a blur under her hands.Trees melted past them. Headlights glared like ghosts. The world narrowed to instinct and motion.Sarah didn’t flinch when they nearly sideswiped a truck. She didn’t panic when the back tires fishtailed across loose gravel. She was in it.. back.Back to the part of herself she’d buried when she married into the Blake family.Back to Sparrow.“Hang on,” she said under her breath, glancing at Alexander in the mirror, his head resting in Darius’s lap as the man tried to stop the bleeding.“He’s fading,” Darius warned. “We’ve got fifteen min
The air turned electric as Darius’s boots pounded the forest floor, his rifle cradled tight against his shoulder. His men moved ahead of him like shadows, silent, fast, lethal.Their coordinated breaths were drowned out by the distant echoes of gunfire erupting from the estate.Alexander was still fighting.He was alive.But for how long?“Alpha to all units,” Darius growled into his earpiece, “entry on my mark. Hostile count is high. Primary objective, get Alexander out alive. Secondary level anyone who tries to stop us.”“Copy that,” came a chorus of calm, battle hardened voices.Behind him, the night swallowed his words.But not all of it.He turned briefly, his sharp gaze locking onto Sarah, who stood beside the black SUV Darius had arrived in. Her body trembled, her eyes red from tears, but she had not collapsed.She hadn’t fallen apart.And that, Darius admired deeply.“Can you drive?” he asked, voice hard but not unkind.Sarah blinked, startled. “What?”“If this goes south, we’
SarahShe sat on the floor, trembling hands curled around a piece of porcelain, a broken teacup she’d stashed away after a “servant” delivered tea hours ago.The sharp edge glittered in her shaking grip.She was pale.Her lips cracked from dehydration. Her dress hung off her like it didn’t belong to her anymore. Her eyes were void. Empty.As if she was no longer here.“Just one cut,” she whispered to herself. “Just one cut and I’ll see him again.”She looked up, eyes glassy, smile fragile, as if she could see someone standing in front of her already.“Alexander,” she breathed to the ghost in her mind. “I’m sorry I didn’t wait. I couldn’t. I’m just... so tired…”She raised the shard to her wrist.And a hand caught her.Real. Warm. Strong.Her eyes widened in horror and disbelief. “No…”She turned, and for a heartbeat, she didn’t believe it.But he was there.Kneeling before her.Alexander.His chest heaving from the run. Dirt on his clothes. Gun holstered at his side. Eyes red, wild, b
Alexander hadn’t slept.He couldn’t.His mind was a storm of fury, grief, and determination, all tightly leashed beneath the sharp cut of his suit and the red ring around his eyes that hadn’t dulled since Sarah was taken.The private jet cut across the clouds like a missile, Darius seated across from him, tablet in hand, phone to his ear, speaking in rapid fire to his tech team.“She’s still alive,” Alexander muttered under his breath. Not to Darius. Not even to himself. To the universe. As if daring it to prove him wrong. “She has to be.”Darius finally looked up. “We caught a break. One of Gerald’s men paid a contact to move a chopper from that warehouse. The payment route was unusual, and we traced it to a shell company under a different alias… all leading to one place.”He tapped on the screen and turned it to Alexander.An isolated property on the southern coast. Hills. Forest. A private airstrip nearby. No neighbors for miles.Gerald’s new hideout.“You think he’s keeping her th
Alexander pulled at the collar of his coat, suffocating from the weight of regret.When she had insisted he save Raven, he thought he was doing the right thing.He believed that was what Sarah would want. But now, the decision clawed at his chest like poison.He imagined her now, alone, terrified, thinking he was dead. Thinking he’d abandoned her.And that killed him.With trembling fingers, he grabbed his phone and called the only man he trusted in a crisis this dire.“Pick up,” he growled.The line clicked.“Darius,” Alexander said, his voice steely. “They took her. Gerald, he has her. He flew her out in a chopper. I need you to mobilize everything. I don’t care what you’re doing, who you’re with, drop it. Get me a flight path. Scramble every contact you have in surveillance, air traffic, satellites, everything.”Darius’s voice was sharp, ready. “On it.”“And send a second team. Heavy artillery. No questions. I want Gerald hunted down like the rat he is.”“Consider it done.”Alexand