Chapter 1
Hope
Okay, so apparently rock bottom had a basement.
I was standing in the Plaza Hotel’s bathroom, which, by the way, is nicer than any place I’ve ever lived in, wearing a borrowed dress, about to auction myself off to rich weirdos for charity.
And this was just Tuesday.
“Stop making that face,” Kim ordered, brandishing her mascara wand on my eyes. “You look hot as hell, and if you ruin my makeup masterpiece, I will end you.”
“What face?” I asked, trying not to blink as she attacked my eyelashes.
“Your ‘I’m about to make terrible life choices’ face. Same one you made before you dated that guy with the man-bun who turned out to be married.”
“Hey, Tacio was very convincing about his divorce proceedings.”
“Tacio was very convincing about a lot of things. Including his name, which was actually Brad.” She stepped back to admire her work. “There. You look like a goddamn goddess. These rich dudes are going to lose their minds.”
I checked myself out in the mirror and barely recognized the person staring back. The midnight blue dress fell beautifully, accentuating my curves. My dark hair was curled, which took Kim two hours to perfect, and my makeup was flawless.
“Damn, Kim, I don’t even recognize myself.”
I felt like throwing up.
“You look beautiful, babe.”
“Remind me why I’m doing this again?” I asked, even though we both knew the answer.
“Because your student loans are basically holding you hostage and your art career is currently stuck somewhere between ‘starving artist’ and ‘maybe I should have listened to my guidance counselor about accounting.’”
Harsh but accurate. The ten thousand dollars I’ll get for one night of playing arm candy could actually solve some of my problems. Not all of them, let’s be real, I’d need to win the lottery for that, but enough to breathe for a minute.
“Plus,” Kim continued, applying lipstick, “it’s not like you’re selling a kidney. You’re just going to dinner with some rich guy who’s probably too shy or weird to get a date the normal way. You smile, nod at his stories about yacht clubs or whatever, and boom. Problem solved.”
“What if he’s a creep?”
“Then you text me our code word, and I’ll call with a fake emergency. Easy.”
“What if he’s a serial killer?”
“Hope, babe, this is the Plaza Hotel, not some sketchy newspaper ad meetup.”
She had a point. Still, something about this whole thing felt... off. Like, the invitation was hand-delivered by a guy who looked like he moonlighted for the mob, and the organizer, Vivian something, kept staring at me like she was trying to figure me out.
“You’re overthinking this,” Kim said, reading my thoughts like she always did. We’d been best friends since college, when we bonded over instant ramen and shared delusions about making it as artists in New York. “Worst case scenario, the guy’s boring and you spend three hours pretending to be interested in his cryptocurrency portfolio. Best case, he’s hot and charming and you have a great time.”
“What’s the middle-case scenario?”
“He’s mildly attractive but talks too much about his ex-wife, and you get really good at saying ‘wow, that’s crazy’ in different tones.”
Despite my nerves, I laughed. This was why I loved Kim; she could make anything sound reasonable.
“Time to go,” she announced, checking her phone. “Showtime in fifteen.”
The ballroom was... a lot. Like, ‘how the one percent lives’ on steroids. Crystal chandeliers, marble floors, and enough flowers to open a florist shop.
But it’s the people that made me want to hide behind the nearest potted plant.
They were all gorgeous in that expensive, intimidating way that screamed ‘I have people for things you do yourself.’ The women on stage were all gorgeous, and the men all had that confidence that came from never having to check their bank balance before buying a cup of coffee.
I felt like I wandered into the wrong party wearing the right dress.
“First time at one of these?”
I turned and found a woman about my age with platinum blonde hair. She was beautiful.
“That obvious?” I asked.
“You just looked overwhelmed. I’m Sophia. Don’t worry, these guys are harmless, at least in my experience.”
“Hope. And thanks for the confidence boost.”
She smiled. “Trust me, you’ll be fine. Just smile, walk in a straight line, and try not to fall off the stage. The rest takes care of itself.”
Then a voice boomed through the room.
“Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to tonight’s charity auction benefiting the Supernatural Outreach Foundation!”
Supernatural Outreach Foundation. Weird name, but okay. Rich people love their quirky charities.
“Our first lot tonight is the lovely Sophia.”
I watched from the sidelines as Sophia glided onto the stage like she was born for this. The crowd went quiet in a strange way. And the numbers they were calling out were insane. Fifty thousand. Seventy-five. One hundred thousand.
For a date. A single date.
“Holy shit,” I tried to take a breath.
“Language,” someone said behind me, and I turned to find Vivian, the event organizer. Up close, she was even more unsettling: pale eyes that looked almost white, and a smile that showed an unnatural amount of teeth. “You’re up next, dear.”
My stomach dropped. “Already?”
“Lot number seven. That’s you.”
Lot number seven. Like I’m a piece of furniture being sold at an estate sale.
“I don’t think I can…”
“Of course you can.” Her hand touched my arm, and her fingers were ice cold. “You’re exactly what we’ve been looking for.”
What we’ve been looking for. Not who I’ve been looking for. What the hell did that mean?
But before I could process that weird phrasing, the auctioneer called my name, and suddenly I’m walking onto a stage in front of a room full of strangers who are about to bid on me like I’m a prize at a carnival.
This is fine. Everything is fine. It’s just one night.
The spotlight hit me, and for a second I was completely blind. Then my vision cleared, and I was staring out at a sea of faces that were all focused on me.
I forced myself to smile and tried to look like the kind of person worth spending obscene amounts of money on. The dress helped.
“Miss Buckley is a talented artist,” the auctioneer was saying, “new to our community but certainly not unwelcome.”
New to our community. What community? The rich people community? The charity auction community? The ‘people who apparently have money to burn on strangers’ community?
The bidding started, and I watched the numbers climb with growing disbelief. Ten thousand. Twenty. Fifty. These people were insane.
That’s when I saw him.
He’s standing at the back of the room, leaning against the wall like he owned the place. Tall, dark, and handsome didn’t even begin to cover it. This guy looked like he definitely didn’t want to be here.
Dark hair, sharp jawline, and a suit that was definitely tailored specifically for his body. But it’s his stillness that caught my attention. While everyone else was moving, talking, bidding, he was just... watching me.
And I could feel it.
“Two hundred thousand,” someone called out.
“Five hundred thousand.”
The room went quiet, and I realized the voice that just called out that ridiculous number came from somewhere I couldn’t see. But then the man at the back of the room pushed off the wall and started walking towards the stage. Towards me.
He didn’t hurry. Didn’t push through the crowd. People just... moved out of his way. Like they knew to give him space.
When he got close enough, I could see his eyes. Dark brown with flecks of gold that caught the light in a way that looked unnatural. And they were staring at me like I was the only person in the room.
“One million,” he said, and his voice carried easily through the silent ballroom.
One million. For a date with me. Hope Buckley, who burns mac and cheese and once got lost in her own neighborhood.
Someone else bid higher, but I barely heard it because the Mystery Man was now standing directly in front of the stage, and I could see the intensity in his expression that made my stomach turn.
“Two million,” he said quietly.
Two. Million. Dollars.
The silence that followed was so complete I could hear my own heartbeat. No one else bid. No one else moved. It was like the entire room was holding its breath.
“Going once... going twice... sold!”
The gavel came down, and I felt like I just signed my life away to a stranger who looked at me like he knew something I didn’t.
He walked up the stage stairs, approaching me. When he reached me, he stopped just close enough that I could smell his cologne, which made me want to lean closer.
“Miss Buckley,” he greeted.
“That’s me,” I managed, then immediately wanted to kick myself for sounding like an idiot.
“Augusto Russo.”
The name meant nothing to me, but from the way several people in the crowd looked at him, he clearly was a big deal.
He extended his hand, and when I took it, the contact almost made me lightheaded.
“Thank you for participating tonight,” he said, but his thumb brushed across my knuckles in a way that felt too intimate.
“You paid a lot of money for one date,” I pointed out, because apparently my mouth has decided to work independently of my brain.
He almost looked amused. “It’s for a good cause.”
Right. Charity. Even though something told me this had nothing to do with charity and everything to do with something I wasn’t smart enough to figure out.
“So,” I said as he guided me off the stage with his hand on my back, making my skin tingle, “what exactly do you expect two million dollars to buy you?”
He leaned down so his mouth was close to my ear, and when he spoke, his words sent a shiver down my spine.
“That depends on whether you’re ready to find out what you really are.”
And despite every rational thought in my head screaming that I should run, I found myself thinking that I wanted to find out exactly what he meant.
***
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— Cat
