Chapter 1

One night. One mistake. A life unraveling.

When Tapiwa wakes beside a stranger, she flees—only to discover he’s her boyfriend’s brother, CEO Jadon Paterson. Their forgotten night ignites obsession: Asher hunts her with roses and rage, while a blackmailer dangles explicit photos over Jadon’s empire. As attempted murder crashes into their chaos, Tapiwa and Jadon must confront a burning truth: Was their passion poison... or salvation? Trapped between a brother’s vengeance and a killer’s shadow, they race to expose a plot that could destroy everything.

The deeper the secret, the deadlier the price.

There was a naked man in bed with her. Tapiwa blinked and then blinked again as though that would change the scene in front of her. But no. It remained the same horrifying scene. There was an unfamiliar man, completely naked in her bed. No, wait. It wasn't her bed.

Ten minutes before, when the ray of sunshine fell across Tapiwa's face, she hadn't thought anything of it except the irritation of being woken up early on her day off. Irritated, she had kept her eyes tightly shut, threw an arm over her face, and mumbled something unintelligible before she rolled over to her side.

Just five more minutes, she thought and willed her brain to shut down again. But her brain was awake and firing all sorts of information about her body. God, she felt terrible, as though she was coming down with a vicious cold. She could have sworn part of her felt too warm while goosebumps from a chill pebbled the rest of her body.

To add to her puzzle, the shift of her body away from the warm sun on her face made her aware of aches in her body that she couldn't comprehend. Maybe she was really getting sick. That would just be her luck. Either way, more sleep looked like the best option.

Unfortunately, her bladder had other ideas. The damn organ felt as though it was about to burst. Great. With a groan of frustration, Tapiwa flung her arm off her face and opened her eyes, intent on just jumping out of bed and getting it done. And then maybe she could shut her eyes for five more minutes.

She got as far as sitting up. That's when she realized she should have paid more attention to how her body felt. She should have also remembered that her bed never got direct sunlight, even when she left the curtains open.

In conclusion, she wasn't in her bed. She wasn't even in her bedroom. Tapiwa's room had more color and personal touches all around. What she could see through her squinted, pained eyes told her the room was as plain and impersonal as a cheap hotel room. Then she saw the naked man softly snoring on the other side of the unfamiliar bed.

Tapiwa forgot how her vision swam, and her head pounded. She forgot her full bladder. Swallowing back a scream just in time, she stumbled off the bed with such uncoordinated haste that she ended up on the cold, tiled floor. A gasp escaped her lips when another piece of the puzzle dropped. She was also naked. The reality of that slammed into her like a punch to the gut.

"No," she whispered, her throat dry and scratchy. Damn it! She hadn't been that stupid, had she? Tapiwa closed her eyes and felt the burn of tears welling up behind her closed lids. Apparently, she had. Shit! But how had she ended up in bed with a perfect stranger? And where was she?

For a few beats, she stared at herself. Then, more curious than devastated by her own stupidity, Tapiwa slowly rose to her knees and stared at the sleeping man. He hadn't woken up while she had moved around like a newborn giraffe, and she was grateful.

Right then, she thought she could do without the awkward humiliation of the dreaded morning after that she'd heard her friend talk about every time Nicole had a random hook-up. Tapiwa shuddered at the thought of being subjected to that. No. She would rather not. Thankfully, she didn't have to.

Sleeping on his back, the man was laid out perfectly for Tapiwa to take in every detail, and she did. She devoured every detail with her eyes from the dark hair cut so close to his scalp it was almost non-existent, to his surprisingly thin eyebrows women would kill for.

The man's face was all angles with high cheekbones and a sharp jawline with the slightest shadow of a stubble. He didn't have the heavy beards Tapiwa had noticed most of the young men were obsessed with. And the man was young. Not young like her twenty-two years, but she doubted he was anywhere near thirty.

He looked so relaxed in sleep and good-looking it was almost disconcerting. Tapiwa wanted to be angry and hate him for being there. She didn't know what had happened but it was just the principle of the matter. But for some unknown reason, she couldn't bring herself to fully embrace the emotion.

It also didn't help her confusion that there was something familiar about his looks. But for the life of her, she couldn't put her finger on it. Regardless, with her more detailed assessment of the man, Tapiwa knew she had never met him before. Not even in passing.

She doubted she would have forgotten that face. Or the tall, toned body she was trying so hard not to ogle. Thankfully, a faded yellow bed sheet with flowers covered the lower half of his body.

Yeah, Tapiwa didn't want to see that part of him, even though the ache between her legs made her curious to see what on earth she had allowed into her body. But, nope. She shook her head. She wasn't going there.

Just then, the man's brows drew together in a frown, and his nose twitched. Oh, god. No! Tapiwa's heart slammed into her ribcage hard enough to jolt her. He was waking up. Feeling suddenly frantic, she jumped into action. She couldn't be there when he opened his eyes.

A glance around the unimpressive room that only had a double bed and two bedside tables revealed a pile of clothes at the foot of the bed. She hastened to it and retrieved her jeans and favorite blue top. That's when it hit her, the party.

Tapiwa's eyes snapped back at the man on the bed and narrowed. She had been at a party her boyfriend invited her to last night. The man in the bed was not Asher. More dread pooled in her gut, twisting it painfully. Tapiwa clasped the clothes to her abdomen and drew a shaky breath through her nose. What had she done?

Now that she knew what to look for in her brain, she remembered the party. It had been a loud affair with too many people. Definitely not her kind of atmosphere. But she had been desperate to show Asher she could be fun and spontaneous.

Tapiwa stared at the man. She had definitely gotten the spontaneous part down with a gold star; she thought bitterly, clenching her jaw to stop the groan of frustration and self-loathing from slipping out.

Her fingers tightened on the fabric of her jeans. She felt the tears pool in her eyes once more and this time, one fell and rolled down her cheek. Damn it! Tapiwa freed her right hand and jerkily wiped at her cheek.

Crying wasn't going to solve anything. What was done was done. She had thrown caution to the wind for one night and her virginity went flying with it.