EVANGELINE
Evangeline's hands shook as she drove through the city. Red lights felt personal. Every one felt like the universe was trying to slow her down. Her knuckles were white on the steering wheel.
She'd left the party in a blur. Rushed past the string quartet. Ignored people calling her name. Ignored her mother's friends reaching out to touch her arm like they actually cared. Nobody cared. Nobody ever had.
The engagement ring felt heavy on her finger. She almost threw it out the window twice.
Her phone wouldn't stop buzzing. She'd muted it before getting in the car but she could feel it vibrating in her purse like something alive. Like it was trying to escape.
The videos had already blown up.
She'd seen them for maybe three seconds before she couldn't look anymore. Her own face, frozen in shock. Adrian shirtless. Natasha laughing like it was funny. Like humiliating her was a game.
The comments were already in the thousands.
FALLEN HEIRESS CAN'T KEEP HER MAN. NO WONDER ADRIAN WANTED SOMEONE ELSE. WINTERS GIRL MUST BE A NIGHTMARE. HER FATHER'S COMPANY IS FAILING BECAUSE SHE PROBABLY RUNS IT INTO THE GROUND LIKE EVERYTHING ELSE.
The last one made her chest tighten. People didn't just hate her now. They were starting to connect the dots. They were starting to ask questions about her father's company. About why Winters Pharmaceuticals was crashing.
She knew why.
Someone had sabotaged their biggest drug trial. Falsified data. Made it look like the medicine didn't work. Made it look like her father was a liar. Her father who'd spent thirty years trying to save cancer patients. Who'd dedicated his whole life to something good.
And now everyone thought she was a joke.
The hospital parking lot appeared through the rain. When had it started raining? She didn't remember rain.
Evangeline grabbed her purse and ran toward the entrance. Her heels clicked against the wet pavement. People stared at her as she rushed through the lobby, soaking wet, wild-eyed.
She hit the elevator button hard enough to hurt.
The ride to the fifth floor felt eternal. She watched the numbers climb. Four. Five. Her heart was pounding so hard she thought it might break through her ribs.
When the doors opened, she ran.
A nurse tried to stop her but Evangeline dodged left. She knew these hallways. She'd spent too much time here already this week. Her father's room was at the end.
She could hear machines beeping before she got there. Frantic beeping. The sound of panic.
Doctors were around the bed. Two of them. Maybe three. They were moving fast, talking in urgent voices she couldn't quite understand. Medical words that meant nothing.
"Dad?"
Someone tried to hold her back but she pushed past them.
Her father was on the hospital bed and he didn't look human anymore. His chest was heaving. His face was gray. His eyes were closed and he wasn't responding to anything.
"What happened?" Evangeline's voice came out like a scream. "What did you do to him?"
A doctor turned to her. He looked exhausted. "Are you family?"
"I'm his daughter. I'm Evangeline. What happened?"
"Another cardiac event. His heart went into arrhythmia. We're stabilizing him now."
She watched them work. Watched them put wires on his chest. Watched machines start doing the work his heart wouldn't do.
Her father looked so small in that bed.
So broken.
An older nurse ushered her out of the way, kind but firm. "We need space to work. You can wait in the family room."
"No. No, I'm staying here."
"Sweetheart, you need to let us help him."
Evangeline backed into the corner of the room, her arms wrapped around herself. She watched them work on her father like he was already gone. Like they were trying to bring him back from somewhere far away.
Time stopped making sense.
Minutes or hours passed. She couldn't tell anymore.
Finally the doctor turned to her. "He's stable. For now. His heart is very damaged from the stress. From the first attack and now this one."
Evangeline couldn't breathe right. "Is he going to be okay?"
The doctor's expression was the worst kind of honest. "His next attack could be his last. We need to keep him calm. Completely stress free. No bad news. No surprises. His system can't take any more shocks."
The words felt like they were being said in slow motion.
"He needs peace," the doctor continued. "Complete peace. His mind needs to stop racing or his heart is going to give out."
Evangeline looked at her father lying unconscious in the hospital bed. Machines were breathing for him. Machines were keeping him alive.
And she was the reason he was here.
She'd told him everything was going to be okay. She'd promised him she'd fix it. She'd promised she'd save the company and save him.
Instead, the videos were spreading. People were mocking her. Her father's company was still crumbling. Adrian had already probably sold their story to the tabloids for money.
And now her father couldn't handle any more stress or he'd die.
She sat in the plastic chair beside his bed and felt something inside her crystallize. Not break. Not shatter. Crystallize. Like broken glass being fused into something harder.
She was done being the girl who believed in people.
She was done trusting.
She was done hoping Adrian or Natasha or anyone else would help her.
She was alone now. Completely alone except for a father she had to keep calm at any cost.
Her phone buzzed in her purse.
She almost didn't look at it.
But the notification made her stop cold.
It was an email from her father's lawyer. Subject line: URGENT. FINAL NOTICE.
She opened it with numb fingers.
The pharmaceutical company had twenty-four hours to address the FDA investigation or Winters Pharmaceuticals would be seized by federal order. Everything would be liquidated. Every asset. Every scrap of research.
Her father's entire life's work would be gone.
And she had less than a day to find a solution.
She looked back at her father lying unconscious on that hospital bed, completely fragile, completely dependent on her to fix this.
And she had no idea how to save him.
Her phone buzzed again. Another notification. This time it was a news alert.
WINTERS PHARMACEUTICAL HEIRESS CAUGHT IN CHEATING SCANDAL. INSIDER SOURCES SAY COMPANY COLLAPSE CONNECTED TO CEO'S DAUGHTER'S RECKLESS BEHAVIOR.
They were blaming her now. Connecting the dots between her public humiliation and the company's destruction. Making it look like her personal failures had brought down her father's business.
Evangeline closed her eyes and sat in the darkness of that hospital room and realized she was drowning.
The company was dying.
Her father was dying.
And she had less than a day to find someone willing to save both of them.
Someone powerful enough to fix this.
Someone cold enough not to care about her reputation.
She opened her browser with shaking fingers and searched for exactly what she needed.
The search results loaded.
And there, at the very top, was a name that made her pulse race.
Sebastian Thornfield.
The Ice King.
The man who bought broken companies and fixed them. The man who had enough power to stop a federal investigation if he wanted to. The man who was known for one thing above all else.
He honored his contracts absolutely.
Evangeline looked at the clock on her phone.
It was 11:47 at night.
She had less than a day to convince a ruthless billionaire to save her dying father's company.
She had less than a day to gamble everything on a man known for having no heart.
But she had no choice.
She pulled out her laptop right there in the hospital room and started writing a proposal that would change everything.
A contract so brilliant and so desperate that a man like Sebastian Thornfield would have to listen.
She had no idea what she was about to do would cost her.
She had no idea what price she was about to pay.
But as she typed through the night while her father lay unconscious and machines kept him breathing, one thing became crystal clear.
She would do anything to save him.
Anything at all.
Even if it meant marrying a stranger.