Chapter 2 - THE KISS
Dominic led Harper exactly three steps before Trent found his voice.
“Still letting powerful men solve your problems for you?”
Harper stopped.
Of course he would say that.
Trent had spent three years convincing her that accepting help was weakness and refusing help was arrogance.
There had never been a correct answer.
Dominic looked down at their joined hands.
Then, very deliberately, he let hers go.
The gesture was small.
It mattered.
Harper turned.
Trent stood exactly where she had left him, Chloe still beside him.
Several nearby conversations had gone suspiciously quiet.
“You crossed the ballroom to talk to me,” Harper said. “You insulted my job, my life, and apparently my energy. Dominic offered me an exit.”
Trent smiled.
“Dominic?”
There was poison in the familiarity.
“You two suddenly close?”
Harper opened her mouth.
Dominic spoke first.
“No.”
Trent’s smile widened.
Harper looked at Dominic.
He looked back at her.
Then his eyes lowered briefly to her mouth.
Something electric moved beneath her skin.
He leaned closer but stopped before touching her.
“May I make him stop asking?”
Harper’s heartbeat stumbled.
She understood.
Her sensible answer should have been no.
She had spent five years rebuilding herself after one man turned every private wound into public theater.
Using another man to humiliate Trent should have felt childish.
Instead, she looked at Chloe’s enormous diamond.
At Trent’s expectant face.
At the same man who once told Harper no one successful would ever want a woman who cared more about load calculations than being “fun.”
Then she looked at Dominic.
“Ask me properly.”
Something almost amused passed through his dark eyes.
“May I kiss you, Harper?”
Her breath caught.
“Yes.”
Dominic touched one hand lightly to her waist.
Nothing possessive.
Nothing rushed.
He gave her one last second to change her mind.
Then he kissed her.
The entire ballroom disappeared.
Harper had expected performance.
A brief touch.
Something convincing enough to shut Trent up.
Instead Dominic kissed her slowly.
Warmly.
Carefully.
His thumb brushed once against the velvet at her side, and Harper’s hand rose almost involuntarily to his chest.
Beneath the tuxedo jacket, his heart was beating harder than she expected.
That realization did dangerous things to hers.
When Dominic pulled away, the orchestra was still playing.
People were definitely staring.
Chloe’s mouth was open.
Trent looked as though someone had punched him without leaving a mark.
Dominic’s hand dropped immediately from Harper’s waist.
“Was that convincing?”
Her face felt hot.
“Excessively.”
“Good.”
Trent stepped forward.
“What exactly is this?”
Harper picked up another champagne flute from a passing tray.
“A ballroom, Trent. We covered this.”
A few people nearby laughed.
His face darkened.
Chloe tightened her hand around his arm.
“Let’s go.”
But Trent wasn’t looking at her.
He was looking at Dominic.
“You might want to ask what she signed before you put your mouth on her.”
Harper’s amusement died.
Dominic did not react.
“What did I sign?”
Trent smiled.
“You tell him.”
“Trent.”
“The West Wing change order.”
Harper’s stomach tightened.
“What change order?”
There.
For the first time, uncertainty entered Trent’s face.
He had expected her to know.
Dominic noticed too.
“Come with me,” he said again.
This time there was no performance in his voice.
Harper followed him through a side archway into a quiet gallery overlooking the ballroom.
The doors closed behind them.
She turned immediately.
“What is he talking about?”
Dominic removed his phone and opened a document.
“Six-point-eight-million-dollar structural procurement revision.”
Harper stared at the screen.
Her own name appeared at the bottom.
HARPER VALE, PROJECT DESIGN LEAD.
Approved.
Electronically authenticated.
“No.”
“You didn’t sign it?”
“No.”
“Look carefully.”
She did.
The specification replaced the approved high-strength structural steel for part of the West Wing transfer system with an alternate supplier.
Bennett Structural Holdings.
Chloe’s family.
Harper’s stomach turned.
“When was this approved?”
“March eighteenth. Eleven forty-three at night.”
“I was in Boston.”
“I know.”
She looked up.
“How?”
“Your keynote at the Urban Design Conference began at eight the next morning. There are photographs of you at the hotel reception in Boston that night.”
“Then someone used my credentials.”
“Yes.”
Harper stared at him.
“You already knew this.”
“I discovered it this afternoon.”
“And instead of telling me, you kissed me?”
His expression hardened slightly.
“The kiss was unrelated to the audit.”
That should not have pleased her.
It did.
Barely.
“Why were you looking for me before Trent came over?”
“To tell you the Grand Hotel redevelopment audit found irregularities.”
“How many?”
“Enough that I postponed tomorrow’s investor walkthrough.”
“You can’t postpone it without informing Vale & Mercer.”
“I own sixty-two percent of the hotel.”
“That wasn’t my point.”
“I know.”
He paused.
“You’re right.”
The immediate concession disarmed her.
Harper looked through the document again.
Something else bothered her.
“This supplier isn’t in my specification set.”
“No.”
“Who submitted the alternate?”
Dominic opened another file.
TRENT WALSH — BENNETT INFRASTRUCTURE STRATEGY.
Harper stared.
“You’re kidding.”
“Apparently your ex-husband became executive vice president of Chloe’s father’s infrastructure division eight months ago.”
“He told everyone he was in investments.”
“He is.”
Dominic’s expression was dry.
“He invests in infrastructure.”
Harper looked toward the ballroom.
Trent had married into the supplier whose material had replaced hers.
Without her approval.
“That still doesn’t prove he forged anything.”
“No.”
She looked at Dominic.
“Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For not deciding he did it simply because I hate him.”
“I prefer evidence.”
Something in the answer made her study him differently.
The newspapers liked to call Dominic Russo ruthless.
Nothing about him felt careless.
“Why would anyone substitute the steel?”
“Money would be the obvious reason.”
“The Bennett material is cheaper?”
“Twenty-eight percent.”
Harper’s stomach tightened.
“That is not what worries me.”
Dominic’s gaze sharpened.
“What does?”
“The West Wing design uses existing foundation elements beneath the original hotel.”
“Yes.”
“My load calculations assume the approved grade.”
“How serious?”
“I don’t know until I see what was actually installed.”
He picked up his phone.
“I’ll close the site tonight.”
“Do that.”
He began typing.
Then Harper remembered something.
“The original field drawings.”
Dominic stopped.
“What?”
“My father surveyed this hotel before Vale & Mercer won the redevelopment. Years ago.”
“Jonathan Vale.”
“You knew him?”
Dominic’s silence lasted one second too long.
Harper noticed.
“You knew my father.”
“Yes.”
“How well?”
“Professionally.”
“Dominic.”
He looked at her.
“Not well enough to claim friendship.”
That answer was too precise to be casual.
Harper folded her arms.
“What aren’t you telling me?”
Instead of answering, Dominic opened another file.
A security image filled the screen.
Vale & Mercer’s archive corridor.
Timestamp: six months earlier.
A man stood outside Harper’s locked project archive.
Trent.
He held a black drafting tube beneath one arm.
Harper stopped breathing.
She knew that tube.
Red tape wrapped around one end.
Her father’s handwriting had been visible on it since she was fourteen.
WEST WING — ORIGINAL SURVEY.
“That has been missing since January,” she whispered.
Dominic enlarged the image.
Trent’s hand held a key card.
Harper leaned closer.
“That isn’t his.”
“No.”
“Whose?”
Dominic zoomed again.
The card had a company name printed across the top.
VALE & MERCER ARCHITECTS.
Underneath was one name.
MALCOLM MERCER.
Harper stared at it.
Malcolm was her father’s former partner.
Her boss.
The man who had hugged her at Jonathan Vale’s funeral and promised, Your father built this firm for you too.
She looked at Dominic.
“Why does Trent have Malcolm’s access card?”
May you like
Dominic’s expression turned cold.
“That,” he said, “is what I was hoping you could tell me.”
