“Security! Detain her right now! She just stole proprietary company hardware! Call the police—we have an active case of corporate espionage!”
The two behemoths in navy blazers moved with a practiced, predatory grace. One grabbed Romy’s arm. His grip was a vice. The other snatched the tote bag, nearly ripping the strap from her shoulder. Romy pulled hard against the nylon strap, but the canvas tore free. She tugged, but the bag, with Gemma’s laptop and her precious thumb drive inside, was already out of reach.
“Let go of her,” a voice commanded, low and dangerous. It was Maximilian, but it wasn’t the familiar, bumbling tone of a man who ‘found’ designer gowns in a lost-and-found bin. The playful lilt was gone, replaced by an edge that could scour rust from iron.
The hired muscle, momentarily startled by the sudden intrusion, paused. They looked at Max, then at Gemma, their faces blank. Max stepped fully from the corridor’s dimness into the main ballroom’s iridescent glow. His posture, usually relaxed, even a bit deferential, had straightened into something rigid and imposing. He no longer looked like a man who ferried the wealthy. He looked like the man who *owned* the vehicles, the roads, and possibly the city blocks they traversed.
His dark suit, which Gemma had just mocked as borrowed, now seemed to absorb the light, making him appear taller, more formidable. His gaze, usually warm and filled with an almost absurd affection, was now arctic, sweeping over Gemma and her guards with an unnerving intensity.
“Release my wife,” Max repeated, his voice barely a whisper, yet it cut through the murmurs of the gala like a shard of glass. “Now.”
The man holding Romy’s arm hesitated, his fingers slackening against her sleeve. The second escort still clutched the tote bag, his gaze darting from Gemma’s furious face to Max’s flat glare.
“Max, what are you doing?” Romy hissed, her mind reeling. This wasn’t her fake husband, the affable chauffeur. This was someone else entirely. Someone who radiated cold, aristocratic power.
Gemma, however, recovered quickly, her expression twisting into a sneer. “Don’t be ridiculous, Romy. He’s just your… *acquaintance*. A glorified Uber Black driver, by the looks of it. And you,” she pivoted to Max, her voice dripping with venom, “you need to step aside before I have you escorted out as well. This is a private event. And an internal agency matter.”
Max took a slow, deliberate step forward. The pair in blazers tensed, bracing for an assault. But Max merely tilted his head, a gesture so subtle, yet so utterly condescending, it pulled Gemma's mouth into a sharp sneer. “An agency matter, you say? How quaint.” A mirthless smile touched his lips. “I suggest you reconsider your current course of action, Ms. Prentiss. You see, I have a rather… *aggressive* acquisition strategy. And I find myself with a sudden, overwhelming urge to purchase Sterling & Quill Publishing. Effective immediately.”
Silence descended upon the immediate vicinity. A few guests, drawn by Gemma’s earlier shouting, had stopped their conversations, their champagne flutes frozen mid-air. Tamsin Fray, who had been lingering nearby, watching the drama unfold with a predatory gleam, now had her mouth slightly agape.
Gemma let out a short, incredulous laugh, a brittle, high-pitched sound that grated on Romy’s nerves. “You? Buy Sterling & Quill? You can barely afford that suit, much less a global publishing house! What, did your ‘boss’ give you some pocket money, *driver*? Get real. This isn’t a rom-com, darling. You’re a nobody. And Romy, your little stunt is going to cost you everything. And him? He’s just a deluded accessory.”
Max tilted his chin up. The air around him seemed to drop several degrees. “Delusion, Ms. Prentiss, is believing that my current attire dictates my financial liquidity. You mistake my discretion for destitution. I assure you, if I wanted Sterling & Quill, your entire department would be liquidated by morning, and your office space converted into a premium dog spa before lunch. You’d be looking for a new career, perhaps in professional clowning, given your current performance.”
Gemma’s face went crimson, her initial amusement replaced by genuine fury. “You absolute buffoon! You have no idea who you’re talking to! I have connections, influence, a… a *career*! And you’re just a… a…”
Just then, Max’s phone, which he held loosely in his left hand, vibrated with an insistent ring. Without breaking eye contact with Gemma, he casually tapped a button. The speakerphone activated, its volume surprisingly loud, echoing through the now almost completely silent ballroom.
“Maximilian! Finally! Where in the seven hells are you?” a frantic, high-pitched voice blared from the tiny speaker. “We have an absolute crisis! The acquisition of Aeroluxe Global just closed ahead of schedule! The board is asking where you want the new four-hundred-million-dollar fleet of Royston private jets parked! The ground crews at Bellwether Airfield are already overwhelmed and demanding answers! Do you want them at the East Wing hangar, or should we commandeer the entire North quadrant? And what about the new ultra-luxury yacht we ordered from the Aegean shipyards? The delivery is set for next Tuesday, and you still haven’t approved the helipad design for the deck! Maximilian, are you even listening? This isn’t a game! We need your directive, Boss!”
The words hung in the air, a series of increasingly absurd, impossibly wealthy declarations that pulverized the fragile silence of the gala. Every single head in the ballroom swiveled. The clinking of champagne glasses, the hushed conversations, the distant strains of the string quartet – all of it ceased.
The room went dead silent. Romy stared at Max's profile, the skin along her ribs prickling cold. Royston. The last name on the cufflink. The name the restaurant manager had blurted. The name of the conglomerate that owned private jets, entire fleets of them, worth hundreds of millions. The name of the man who had casually bought a Michelin-star restaurant and threatened to buy a publishing house. The man who had shown up to her blind date claiming to be a chauffeur, offering her a fake marriage for a fictional housing bonus.
Her broke chauffeur husband, the man who had charmed her with his awkward attempts at secrecy, who had driven her in a Rolls-Royce and dressed her in gowns he claimed ‘fell off a truck,’ was Maximilian Royston. The City’s most ruthless billionaire.