The car ride blurred together in Vivienne’s mory like watercolors bleeding into each other. Smooth leather seats that slled faintly of expensive conditioning oil. Classical music drifting from hidden speakers at just the right volu. Her father’s voice as he pointed out constellation patterns through the sunroof, naming each cluster of stars and sharing the ancient stories that gave them aning. Orion the eternal hunter. Cassiopeia the vain queen who challenged the gods themselves. Perseus and his impossible quests that sohow always ended in victory.
Vivienne fought to stay conscious through sheer determination. She wanted to absorb every story, morize the exact cadence of his voice when he explained how ancient sailors used these sa stars to navigate vast oceans and find their way ho across impossible distances. But her eyelids kept growing heavy. Her head kept dipping toward her chest.
"Sleep if you need to, ma chérie. Don’t fight it."
"But you’re still talking," she protested, words slurring together as sleep tugged at her consciousness. "I want to hear all the stories."
"The constellations will still be there tomorrow night, and the night after that. The stories aren’t going anywhere."
"Do you promise?"
"I promise with absolute certainty."
She let her head drift to rest against his shoulder. The suit jacket felt impossibly soft against her cheek. He slled like cedar wood and sothing sweetly complex—his cologne probably, layered with the lingering fragrance of roses still cradled in her arms.
Papa’s hand settled on her hair with butterfly lightness. His fingers moved in gentle strokes, the sa rhythm he’d used when she was tiny and scared of thunderstorms that shook the manor’s windows.
"I’m so incredibly proud of you," he said quietly, his voice pitched for her ears alone. The words felt secret and precious, like a gift ant only for her. "Not simply because of the performance, though it was breathtaking to watch. But because you worked so relentlessly hard. Because you refused to give up when the turns were difficult and frustrating."
Warmth flooded her chest—pure love and safety and the bone-deep certainty that soone truly saw her. Not the heiress in training. Not the perfect daughter performing for caras. Just Vivienne, exactly as she was.
"Love you, Papa," she mumbled into his shoulder.
"Je t’ai, mon étoile. Plus que tu ne le sauras jamais."
The car rocked gently as they navigated the city’s evening traffic. Streetlights blurred into streams of gold and white outside the windows. Papa’s heartbeat thrumd steady and strong beneath her ear, each pulse a silent promise that he would always be there, always catch her when she stumbled, always postpone etings in Chicago because his daughters mattered infinitely more than any business obligation.
Sleep claid her completely, pulling her down into perfect darkness.
Safe. Loved. Warm. Protected.
The dream held her in its embrace like her father’s arms—until reality crept in at the edges.
Vivienne surfaced from sleep slowly, consciousness returning in reluctant waves.
The mory clung to her awareness like morning mist, sticky and persistent and refusing to dissipate. She could still sll cedar wood lingering in her nostrils. Still feel the phantom warmth of her father’s protective arm around her shoulders.
But sothing was wrong with the sensory details.
Not cedar. Coffee and clean soap and sothing fundantally masculine that definitely didn’t belong to Papa.
The heartbeat beneath her ear carried an entirely different rhythm than her father’s.
Awareness assembled itself piece by careful piece. Her current position registered first—she was lying completely on top of soone else, her cheek pressed against a chest that rose and fell with steady, unconscious breaths. An arm encircled her waist, holding her with loose, natural possession. Her legs had sohow tangled themselves with soone else’s limbs.
The Range Rover. The drive ho from Hartwell Academy. Rock paper scissors and the ridiculous seating arrangent that had followed.
She’d won the ga.
mory clicked into place like puzzle pieces finding their proper configuration. She’d climbed deliberately into Isaiah’s lap, positioning herself sideways across his thighs with calculated precision. Felt his hand settle on her waist, fingers spreading over the strip of bare skin where her costu ended and her thigh-highs began.
The car had started moving with Sabrina behind the wheel. Cassidy had slouched against her window in sullen silence. Harlow had chattered from the front seat, her voice bright and endless as always, filling the space with comntary about everything and nothing.
Vivienne had intended to stay awake throughout the journey. Had fully planned to maintain perfect composure, keep her spine straight and controlled, demonstrate that winning the ga ant nothing beyond efficient space allocation.
But exhaustion had staged a successful ambush.
The performance demands. The festival setup requirents. Her mother’s endless phone calls about quarterly projections and brand positioning. The gala preparations. The kiss in the bathroom that had consud every spare thought since it happened.
Sleep had conquered her defenses completely.
And now she’d apparently repositioned herself entirely during her unconscious state. Moved from a controlled sideways perch across Isaiah’s lap to sprawling fully on top of him like he was a custom-fitted mattress designed specifically for her comfort. Her head rested on his chest as if it belonged there. Her arm draped across his stomach with casual intimacy. One of her legs had sohow worked itself between both of his.
This transcended efficient seating arrangents.
This was cuddling.
In a moving vehicle.
With three witnesses who would never let her forget it.
Her face burned. Heat flooded her cheeks so fast it made her dizzy. Vivienne considered moving. Sitting up. Restoring the professional distance that should exist between an heiress and her employee.
But Isaiah’s hand tightened slightly on her waist. Not conscious. Reflex. His breathing stayed deep and even.
He was asleep too.
The realization made sothing flutter in her chest. Isaiah Angelo, who never stopped moving, who worked himself into the ground, who survived on coffee and four hours of sleep—he’d fallen asleep with her on top of him. Trusted her enough to lower his guard.
Vivienne’s throat went tight. The dream replayed itself behind her closed eyes. Her father’s voice. His warmth. The absolute certainty that soone loved her without conditions or quarterly reviews.
Isaiah’s heartbeat thudded steady beneath her ear. Slow. Calm. The rhythm matched her father’s almost exactly.
She pressed closer. Let her weight settle more fully against him. Her fingers curled into his shirt, the vest from his vampire costu. The fabric was soft beneath her grip, worn from use in a way that spoke of thrift stores and careful maintenance. Not silk or cashre, but sohow more comforting for its honesty.
The dream was gone. Papa was gone. Two years in the ground, leaving her to carry the company alone while Mama traveled and her sisters drifted and everything fell apart. The board etings where she was the youngest person by twenty years. The contracts she reviewed until her eyes burned. The strategic decisions that kept her awake until three in the morning, second-guessing every choice.
But this warmth was real.
This heartbeat was real.
Isaiah was real.
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