Hired to Break Up Their Wedding

[DUAL POV] [ASPEN POV – Sunday Afternoon] The lawyer on the phone was professional. Polite. Absolutely terrifying. “Ms. Colby, I […]

[DUAL POV] [MARIUS POV] The hotel room felt different in daylight. Less like refuge. More like temporary shelter before storm.

[ASPEN POV] We couldn’t go back to the estate. Couldn’t go to my inn—media would find us. Couldn’t go anywhere

[ASPEN POV] Saturday. 1:45 PM. Fifteen minutes until I destroyed everything. I stood backstage in the estate’s service building—hidden from

[MARIUS POV] I couldn’t sleep. 2 AM in the estate’s east wing guest room—my room until tomorrow when Allegra and

[ASPEN POV] I’d made a mistake approaching him in the garden. Fatal mistake. Amateur mistake. The kind that got plans

[MARIUS POV] The rehearsal dinner was performative torture disguised as celebration. I stood in the conservatory wearing a smile I’d

[ASPEN POV] One week until I ruined someone’s wedding. Seven days to transform from broke bartender into believable ex-mistress of

[ASPEN POV] Bellamy Coffee existed in a different tax bracket than anything I’d ever entered voluntarily. Floor-to-ceiling windows. Minimalist furniture

[ASPEN POV] Eleven PM on a Tuesday, and I was staring at three numbers that would decide whether my mother