Adriano turned his eyes back to Clara.

“There’s a difference.”

Something about that sentence struck her harder than it should have.

Adriano kept his hand extended.

“Dance with me.”

Clara looked toward the quartet.

Then at the ballroom.

Then at Martin.

His face told her not to move.

Three years earlier, that expression would have been enough.

Maybe even three hours earlier.

But something had shifted.

Clara placed her hand in Adriano’s.

“Yes.”

He led her away from the table.

The ballroom seemed to breathe again.

The quartet transitioned into a slower piece.

Adriano’s hand settled carefully at Clara’s waist.

Not possessive.

Not demanding.

His other hand held hers.

“You’re shaking,” he said.

“So would you if you were me.”

“I doubt that.”

That surprised a laugh out of her.

A real one.

Adriano studied her.

“There.”

“What?”

“That’s probably what he wanted.”

Clara glanced toward Martin.

“What?”

“To make you perform.”

Her smile disappeared.

Adriano continued quietly.

“Men like Hale enjoy making quiet people prove they can be loud.”

“You know him?”

“I know enough.”

There was something in the way he said it.

Clara looked directly at him.

“Why is he afraid of you?”

Adriano’s eyes moved toward Martin.

Across the room, Martin was already speaking urgently into his phone.

“Perhaps you should ask him.”

“I’m asking you.”

Adriano looked back at her.

“You really are having an unusual evening, Ms. Bennett.”

Clara stiffened.

“I never told you my name.”

“No.”

“How do you know it?”

For the first time, Adriano’s expression changed.

The warmth vanished.

His gaze dropped briefly toward the small black clutch on Clara’s chair across the ballroom.

Then he leaned closer.

“Because three weeks ago,” he said quietly, “your name appeared on a document that Martin Hale has been trying very hard to keep me from seeing.”

Clara stopped dancing.

Adriano did not.

He guided her through the next step so smoothly that anyone watching would think nothing had happened.

“What document?”

“Keep smiling.”

“What?”

“Hale is watching.”

Clara forced herself to move.

Her pulse accelerated.

“What document?”

Adriano’s voice dropped.

“A transfer authorization.”

“I process hundreds.”

“This one moved forty-eight million dollars.”

Clara stared at him.

“That’s impossible.”

“Is it?”

“I would remember forty-eight million dollars.”

“I believe you.”

“Then why is my name on it?”

Adriano’s gaze moved over her shoulder.

Martin had stopped speaking on the phone.

He was staring directly at them.

“That,” Adriano said, “is exactly what I intend to find out.”

The music ended.

Applause rippled through the ballroom.

Adriano released Clara’s waist but kept her hand for one extra second.

“Go home tonight.”

Clara frowned.

“Why?”

“Do not return to the office tomorrow.”

“You can’t tell me—”

“Then consider it advice.”

He released her.

Clara stood motionless.

Adriano began walking away.

“Mr. Moretti.”

He stopped.

She lowered her voice.

“Why should I trust you?”

He turned.

“You shouldn’t.”

Then his gaze moved behind her.

Clara followed it.

Martin stood near the ballroom doors.

He wasn’t looking angry anymore.

He looked frightened.

And in his hand was Clara’s black clutch.

Her phone was missing.

Martin met her eyes.

Then he slipped something into his jacket pocket.

Clara’s stomach dropped.

Adriano spoke quietly behind her.

“But before you decide who to trust, Ms. Bennett…”

She looked back.

“…you should probably find out why your boss just stole your phone.”

And for the first time in three years, Clara Bennett realized that working for Martin Hale might not merely have cost her dignity.

It might have placed her in the middle of something far more dangerous.

And before the night was over, Clara would discover that Martin had been hiding something inside her own office—something bearing her signature.