Layla’s POV

I should have known the moment I walked into the damn gala that tonight would be a disaster.

The room was too bright too loud and too full of men in overpriced suits who thought their net worth made them interesting. I adjusted the strap of my dress, black and sleek the kind of thing that said I’m here, but I don’t actually want to be and scanned the crowd for my best friend, Nina. She’d dragged me here under the guise of networking but I knew better. This was a setup. Again.

Third time this month, Nina. You’re on thin ice.

I grabbed a champagne flute from a passing waiter and took a long sip, the bubbles sharp on my tongue. Maybe if I drank enough, I could pretend I wasn’t surrounded by the kind of men I’d spent my entire dating life avoiding smug, self-important, the kind who looked at women like we were either obstacles or conquests.

Then I saw him.

Tall. Broad shouldered and face that belonged on a billboard all sharp angles and a smirk that made my fingers tighten around my glass. He stood near the auction podium, surrounded by people who laughed too loudly at whatever he’d just said. The way they leaned in, the way his gaze flicked over them like he was already bored yeah, I knew his type.

Arrogant bastard.

I turned away before he could catch me staring. Not that he would. Men like him never noticed women like me unless we were of some benefit to them . My lips pressed together, the words arrogant bastard sitting bitter on my tongue.

But the second I turned my back, I felt it the weight of a gaze like a touch against my skin.

Slowly, against my better judgment I glanced over my shoulder.

Oh.

He was watching me. Not the way men usually did with that lazy, entitled once over but with a focus that made my spine stiffen. His dark eyes locked onto mine, unblinking, and the corner of his mouth curled in a smirk that said, clear as day

I saw that.

He’d seen me mouth the words. Heard them in the tilt of my chin, the way my fingers tightened around my glass. And worse? He was amused.

My cheeks burned, but I refused to look away. If he wanted a reaction, he’d have to try harder than that.

“Layla!” Nina appeared at my side, her dark eyes glittering with mischief. “You’ll never guess who just walked in.”

“If you say another one of your amazing blind dates, I’m throwing this champagne in your face.”

She grinned. “Worse. Elijah Cross.”

The name meant nothing to me. I shrugged. “Should I care?”

Nina’s mouth dropped open. “Only if you’ve been living under a rock. Cross Industries? The guy who bought out half of downtown and turned it into luxury condos? The one who—”

“—kicked out all the small businesses and jacked up the rent?” I finished, my voice flat. “Yeah, now I remember. Human garbage.”

Nina groaned. “God, you’re impossible. He’s the most eligible bachelor in the city.”

“And I’m the Queen of Breakups. Which means I know better than to fall for a guy who probably thinks monogamy is a type of wood.”

I didn’t realize he’d moved until I felt it the shift in the air, the sudden awareness I felt down my spine. When I turned, he was right there, close enough that I caught the scent of his cologne something expensive, dark, unfairly intoxicating.

Up close, his eyes weren’t just brown. They were warm, like whiskey held up to the light, and for a stupid, traitorous second, my breath caught.

Then he spoke.

“Human garbage?” His voice was low, amused. “That’s a new one.”

I didn’t flinch. I never flinched. But my pulse kicked up anyway, a traitorous thud against my ribs.

“I’ve got more where that came from,” I said, tilting my chin up. “Gentrifier is my personal favorite.”

His smirk deepened. “Cute. You one of the displaced?”

“No. Just someone with a functioning moral compass.”

A beat of silence. Then, to my surprise, he laughed a rich, rough sound that did things to my stomach I refused to acknowledge.

“Layla, right?” He extended a hand. “Elijah Cross.”

I stared at his fingers. Long. Strong. The kind of hands that could ruin a woman if she let them.

I didn’t take it.

“Wow,” I said flatly. “You even introduce yourself like you’re doing someone a favor.”

His gaze darkened, but not with anger. Something hotter. Something that made my skin prickle.

“Careful, princess.” His voice dropped, just for me. “You keep poking the bear, you might not like what happens when it bites back.”

I should’ve walked away. Should’ve remembered my own damn rule about men like him.

But the challenge in his eyes the heat was like gasoline on the fire I’d spent years trying to smother.

So I smiled, slow and sharp.

“Promises, promises.”

I didn’t sleep well after the gala.

Not because of him Elijah Cross, with his stupidly perfect jawline and the way his voice curled around words like a challenge. No. It was the audacity of men like him that kept me awake, the way they moved through the world like they owned it, like the rest of us were just background noise in their self-important narratives.

I rolled out of bed at exactly 6:03 AM, my bare feet hitting the cool hardwood floor. Routine was my armor. Five minutes of stretching, ten of meditation or at least, glaring at my ceiling and pretending to zen out, then coffee black, no sugar the way I took my men. Nonexistent.

My apartment was small but ruthlessly organized. Books arranged in alphabetical order, spices labeled, not a single dish left in the sink overnight. Control was the one thing my father hadn’t managed to take from me when he’d—

No.

I shut that thought down before it could fully form.

By 7:30, I was at the café down the street from my office, scribbling notes in the margins of a client proposal. The bell above the door jingled, and I didn’t have to look up to know it was Nina. Only she wore heels that click-clacked like a metronome set to dramatic entrance.

“You,” she announced, slamming both hands on my table, “are a menace.”

I sipped my coffee. “Good morning to you too.”

“Do you have any idea what you did last night?”

“Exist? Breathe? Politely decline to shake hands with human personifications of gentrification?”

Nina groaned, sliding into the chair across from me. “Elijah Cross asked about you.”

That got my attention. My pen stilled. “And?”

“And he called you the first interesting thing to happen at one of these events in years. She air quoted with her fingers, eyes wide. “Do you know what that means?”

“That he’s even more arrogant than I thought?”

“It means he’s interested, Layla. Like Google-your-name-at-3-AM interested.”

I snorted. “Great. Another narcissist to add to the block list.”

Nina leaned in. “Or,” she said slowly, “maybe he’s not like the others.”

A memory flickered Derek, from six months ago, his smile too wide, his hands just a little too insistent on my waist after I said no. “Come on, babe. You’re always so uptight.”

My fingers tightened around my mug.

“They’re all like the others,” I said flatly.

Nina studied me, then sighed. “You can’t keep doing this.”

“Doing what?”

“Building walls so high even the good guys can’t climb them.”

I didn’t answer. She wasn’t wrong. But she also didn’t understand the higher the walls, the safer I was.

My phone buzzed. A calendar alert Client meeting 9 AM Thompson account.

I stood, slinging my bag over my shoulder. “Gotta go. Some of us have actual jobs.”

Nina rolled her eyes. “Fine. But this conversation isn’t over.”

Yes it is, I thought as I stepped into the morning sun.

Because no matter what Nina believed, I wasn’t afraid of love.

I was just better at endings than beginnings.