

Description
I've been groomed for power my entire life-Duarte Enterprises, arranged alliances, public image, legacy. Love? That's a liability. I stopped believing in it the day my first love took a payout to disappear from my life. So when my father schedules yet another engagement to secure political favor, I don't care who she is-I'm ready to reject her. But then she disappears. And weeks later, she walks into my office. New name. New story. Same fire I've never been able to look away from. She thinks I don't know who she is. She thinks I'm the enemy. And I plan to keep it that way-until I realize I don't just want her working beside me. I want her. Everywhere. Always. Even if it ruins me.
Chapter 1
May 6, 2025
Liam’s POV:
The girl didn’t ask my name. Smart.
Kneeling on the cold glass floor of my penthouse, naked save for a pair of fuck-me heels, she moaned as I wrapped her hair around my fist and pulled. The skyline twinkled behind her—New York in all her filthy, glorious indifference. Below, the world spun. Up here, I stopped time.
“You don’t speak unless I tell you to.” My voice was flat, clipped, the kind that made women shiver and obey.
She whimpered. Good girl.
Her lips parted around me, slick heat and tight suction, her hands bound behind her back with my tie. I watched her—watched her need—and felt absolutely nothing. My body was reacting, sure. I was hard as steel, my grip tight on her jaw, my breath ragged. But emotionally? I was ice. Detached.
That’s the way I liked it.
Because I’d been in love once. Once.
Her name was Lindsey. She smelled like almond soap and fresh paperbacks. She laughed like life didn’t terrify her, like money was just paper and love could pay rent. She was everything I wasn’t supposed to want.
But I wanted her anyway.
Until my father, Arthur fucking Duarte, handed her a check the size of a mortgage and a quiet suggestion to disappear.
And she took it.
I learned something that day: Love is for idiots. Rich ones. Gullible ones. Ones too blind to see a price tag until it’s stapled to their fucking chest.
Now, women were recreation. Disposable. A way to kill a night, not make a life.
“Get dressed,” I told the girl after I came in her mouth. “The driver’s downstairs. He’ll take you wherever you like.”
She blinked up at me, eyes shining with hope or need or something equally stupid. “That’s it?”
I slipped into my slacks, shirt hanging open. “You expected a wedding ring?”
“You’re a heartless fucker,” she spat, snatching her dress from the floor.
“That’s me.”
She slammed the door. I didn’t flinch. The silence returned and I welcomed it.
Then my phone buzzed. I tried to ignore it. It buzzed again. And this time, I glanced down. It was my father.
I answered with a sigh. “Arthur.”
“Liam. You’re meeting your fiancée tonight.”
Silence stretched.
Then I laughed—sharp, dark. “You think parading a new pawn in front of me will make me change my mind?”
“It’s not a request.” His voice was cold steel wrapped in silk. “Dinner. Seven. Wear something that doesn’t scream you’ve just fucked a stranger in your penthouse.”
The call ended before I could tell him to go to hell.
Fiancée.
Another lamb for the slaughter.
I’m sure as hell, this one wouldn’t last either.

Falling for My Runaway Bride
30 Chapters
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My Passion
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