In the dim, decrepit corridor, they clashed—man and woman, tangled as if the walls themselves might crumble under the weight of their collision.

Raised on the precepts of the elite, Selena had always embodied the archetypal society darling, as refined as fine porcelain. Zavier, more exacting still, prided himself on his unrelenting fastidiousness—bordering, some might say, on the obsessive.

Yet here and now, none of that seemed to matter.

Once ...