The next morning, Dominic’s driver eased the black Mercedes to a stop in front of the Reid Manhattan.
He stepped out into heat that hit him like a damp towel.
The doorman—a tall, silver-haired man in a perfectly cut uniform—opened the revolving glass door with a practiced smile.
“Good morning, sir. Welcome to the Reid.”
“Thank you,” Dominic said, allowing the faintest hint of amusement into his voice.
The lobby was as he remembered from past industry events. Vast. Marble floors polished to a mirror sheen. A chandelier overhead that looked like a frozen cascade of glass petals. Seating areas arranged in clusters, each one a study in understated opulence: velvet, leather, muted jewel tones. The kind of place where you could spend thousands of dollars without a single thing ever raising its voice.
It was…beautiful.
It was also, in his opinion, impersonal. So focused on being tasteful that it forgot to be alive.
“Mr. Steele?” A young man in a navy suit approached, tablet in hand. “I’m Mark. I’ll escort you up.”
“Thank you.” Dominic fell into step beside him.
“You’re meeting Ms. Reid and Ms. Reid,” Mark added with a small, nervous laugh. “Senior and junior.”
Dominic’s mouth twitched. “That sounds…efficient.”
The elevator whisked them upward, smooth and silent. Mark kept his eyes trained on the floor numbers, clearly too intimidated to make small talk.
When the doors opened onto the executive floor, the air felt cooler. Quieter. The carpet thicker.
Mark led him down a hallway lined with black-and-white photographs of the brand’s early days: Eleanor and her late husband cutting the ribbon at the first Reid Hotel in London. A young Eleanor shaking hands with a celebrity chef. A much younger Eleanor on the cover of *Forbes*, headline blaring: *Queen of Hospitality.*
Dominic had grown up looking at those kinds of images in magazines he’d read in laundromats and waiting rooms, the glossy pages shining with lives that seemed as far from his as the moon.
Now, he walked the same halls.
“Here we are,” Mark said, stopping before a pair of massive wooden doors.
He knocked once, then cracked one open, speaking quietly to someone inside. Then he stepped back.
“Ms. Reid will see you,” he said.
Singular.
Dominic’s jaw tightened a fraction.
“Thank you,” he said, and walked in.
The office was larger than his first apartment. Wall-to-wall windows looked out over the city, the morning sun turning the glass of neighboring towers into a blaze. A massive desk of dark wood sat in front of the windows like a command center. To one side, a seating area with cream sofas and a low table. On the walls, more photographs. No art. Eleanor’s face in various stages of her empire-building.
The woman herself rose from behind the desk as he entered.
She was older than the last time he’d seen her in person—at a Davos panel where she’d dismissed his approach to “democratizing luxury” with a chilly, “We’re not in the same business, Mr. Steele”—but no less formidable.
Slim. Impeccably tailored navy suit. Snow-white hair in a precise chignon. A brooch at her lapel that probably cost more than his first car.
“Mr. Steele,” she said. “Thank you for coming.”
“Ms. Reid,” he replied, extending his hand. “The pleasure is mine.”
Her grip was firm. Cool.
He glanced around, scanning for a second figure. Younger. Blonder.
“Your daughter isn’t joining us?” he asked.
The faintest tightening around her eyes. “She is running late.”
Interesting.
“Then perhaps we can begin without her,” he said.
“We can begin,” she said, gesturing toward the seating area. “But we will wait to make any decisions until all stakeholders are present.”
He followed her, file in hand.
Julian was already there, perched on the edge of the sofa like a nervous bird. He leaped to his feet as Dominic approached.
“Dominic,” he said. “Good to see you.” He turned. “Eleanor, as you know, this is—”
“We’ve met,” Eleanor said coolly. “At several conferences.”
“Yes,” Dominic agreed mildly. “I believe last time you told me my idea of offering flexible check-in times would lead to the collapse of civilization.”
Her mouth twitched. “So far, civilization appears to be holding. Though I can’t say the same for my sleep patterns when I walk into a hotel lobby at ten p.m. and see people checking in in sweatpants.”
He smiled slightly. “Your guests wear better sweatpants than mine.”
“Possibly,” she conceded.
Julian’s gaze ping-ponged between them with something like awe. “Well,” he murmured. “This is…fun.”
They sat.
An assistant appeared with coffee on a silver tray, deposited it, and vanished as silently as she’d come.
“Let’s be clear up front,” Eleanor said, folding her hands. “I’m here out of…curiosity. Not desperation. I do not want my daughter’s…pet project…” The slight sneer on *pet* made Dominic’s brows lift. “To be anyone’s charity case. One whisper of ‘bailout’ in the press, and any partner will find themselves persona non grata in my properties forever.”
“Understood,” Dominic said evenly. “I don’t do charity. And I don’t do bailouts.”
“Then what,” she asked, eyes sharp, “do you do?”
“Partnerships,” he said. “Strategic ones. I don’t come in to rescue failing concepts. I come in when a project has strong fundamentals, but structural or governance issues are preventing it from reaching its potential.”
He held her gaze.
“Aspen has strong fundamentals,” he said. “But you have a governance problem.”
Silence.
Julian swallowed.
Eleanor’s lip curled. “Bold,” she said. “To tell me how my company is run.”
“You wouldn’t have invited me here if you were entirely happy with how things are running,” he said.
“I didn’t invite you,” she replied. “Mr. Park did.”
“And you agreed to the meeting,” Dominic said. “Which suggests something isn’t working as you’d like.”
Her eyes flashed.
Before she could retort, the door behind them opened.
“Sorry I’m late,” a female voice said, breathless. “There was a—”
She stopped.
Dominic turned.
The world narrowed.
She stood just inside the doorway, one hand still on the handle, the other clutching a slim leather portfolio. Blond hair twisted up in a knot that looked like it had been redone three times on the way here. Navy dress. Bare legs. Simple heels.
And eyes.
Blue-gray, ringed with darker lashes. Widening as they met his.
For a heartbeat, there was no office. No Eleanor. No Julian.
There was only rain on glass and the soft murmur of London traffic below and the feel of those legs wrapped around his waist.
Her fingers tightened on the portfolio. He saw the exact moment recognition hit her.
Her knuckles went white.
He forced his face to remain neutral.
“Charlotte,” Eleanor said, annoyance threading her voice. “You’re late.”
“I’m—” She swallowed. Looked away from him to her mother. “There was a subway delay.”
“You live three stops away,” Eleanor said. “Try again.”
Charlotte’s jaw set.
“There was a subway delay,” she repeated evenly. Then, as if she’d just remembered they weren’t alone, she turned toward him.
“Mr. Steele,” she said.
Her voice was perfectly polite. Perfectly professional.
He almost smiled.
“Ms. Reid,” he said. “Pleasure.”
Up close, he could see the faint freckles across her nose. The way her mouth pressed into a line when she was annoyed. The tiny scar at the edge of her left eyebrow he remembered tracing with his tongue in the dark.
She moved to sit on the sofa opposite him, carefully not looking at him again.
If Eleanor noticed the electric current suddenly humming between them, she gave no sign.
“Now that we’re all here,” she said briskly, “let’s dispense with dramatics. Mr. Steele, you have half an hour. Convince me why I should let you anywhere near my mountain.”
Dominic leaned back, crossing one ankle over his knee, letting the picture of casual confidence settle around him.
“Your mountain is bleeding money,” he said.
Julian closed his eyes briefly.
Eleanor’s brows arched. “We’re investing in the future,” she said. “Cost overruns are part of any development.”
“Not at this scale,” he said. “Not without consequences for the rest of the portfolio.” He glanced at Charlotte. “Your downtown San Francisco property is underperforming your peer set by nine percent on RevPAR. Chicago by seven. Miami by twelve.”
Color flicked along her cheekbones. “Those numbers are within acceptable variance given—”
“Given you haven’t refreshed your brand positioning in five years,” he cut in. “Given your marketing still leans on a fifty-year-old story about ‘timeless elegance’ in a world where your next gen of wealthy guests cares more about whether your Wi-Fi can handle three teenagers streaming at once than the provenance of your crystal.”
“Mr. Steele,” Eleanor said coolly, “if you think insulting my properties is the way to worm yourself into my good graces, you’ve been misinformed.”
“I’m not insulting,” he said. “I’m observing. You have an extraordinary brand. Incredible assets. Deep loyalty from an aging base. Aspen is your attempt to capture the future.” His gaze slid, just briefly, back to Charlotte. “The idea is solid. The execution is flawed.”
“You’ve never seen our plans,” Charlotte snapped, composure cracking. “You don’t know what we’re building.”
He looked at her fully then.
“On the contrary,” he said softly. “I know exactly what you’re trying to build.”
Something flickered in her eyes. An old, shared memory, quick and sharp as lightning behind storm clouds.
He let it pass.
“You’re trying to make Reid feel human,” he continued. “Less museum, more…home. You want kids running through the lobby without someone in a suit flinching. You want a bar where a couple in ski gear feels just as welcome as someone in couture.”
Her fingers curled into the leather of her portfolio.
“You’re romanticizing,” Eleanor said with a faint scoff. “Families are messy. Hotels are businesses, not playgrounds.”
“And yet,” he said, “your daughter is right about one thing: your guests are changing.”
He reached into his case and pulled out a slim tablet, tapping to bring up a graph. He slid it across the table.
“These are our numbers on multigenerational travel packages at Steele properties over the last three years,” he said. “Up thirty percent. Our family suite bookings? Up twenty-two. Your growth in those segments over the same period?” He nodded toward the graph. “Flat.”
Eleanor’s mouth thinned.
“You see a problem,” he went on. “But your solution is stuck in old patterns. You’re pouring money into physical product—stone, glass, wood—but not enough into experience design. And your board is losing its nerve.”
Julian shifted uncomfortably.
“You’re overextended,” Dominic said. “Not in terms of debt—you’ve been cautious there. But in terms of executive attention. The same small circle of people is trying to steer fifty ships at once while pretending nothing needs to change.” His gaze flicked between mother and daughter. “You’re also…not entirely aligned.”
That was an understatement.
He’d done his homework. Anonymous quotes in trade press about “creative tensions” between the old guard and “younger leadership.” Rumors of fights in boardrooms about brand direction. Gossip about the “princess” pushing a family-friendly Aspen while the “queen” sniffed and wrote checks with one hand and contingency plans with the other.
“If you’re here to psychoanalyze us,” Eleanor said, “I suggest you send a therapist’s invoice and spare us the theatrics.”
“Let’s talk terms, then,” he said calmly. “You need capital. I have it. But I don’t put my money into anything I can’t influence. I’m not a passive investor. If Steele comes into Aspen, we come in as partners. You keep majority equity. You keep your name on the building. But we take point on operations. On experience. On marketing.”
Charlotte’s head snapped up. “Operations?”
He turned his attention fully to her.
“Yes.”
“You want to walk into *my* project,” she said, voice low and dangerous now, “and tell me how to run it? Like I’m some intern who just slapped a mood board together between Pilates classes?”
He felt a strange, inappropriate kick of admiration.
“There’s no Pilates on your calendar,” he said. “You don’t have time.”
Her eyes flashed. “You went through my calendar?”
“I went through your public appearances, your internal memos where your name was mentioned, your comments on earnings calls, your presentations at industry events,” he said. “It’s my job to know what kind of partner I’m getting. You’re smart. You work hard. But you’re spread thin. You don’t have a team under you with enough autonomy because your mother doesn’t trust anyone who hasn’t been here for twenty years, and you don’t have the authority to change that.”
The muscle in her jaw jumped.
“You don’t know *anything* about my authority,” she bit out.
He held her gaze, and for a second, something else crackled there. Something private. Old.
*You didn’t have authority that night either,* he thought. *You just…took what you wanted.*
“You’re right,” he said instead. “I don’t know the specifics of your org chart politics. I do know that your project is over budget, behind schedule, and under-resourced. I know that bringing Steele in could fix all three.”
“And in return,” Eleanor said, ice in her tone, “you get a foothold in our brand. Access to our guest lists. The prestige of being able to say you’re the first partner we’ve ever had.”
“Yes,” he said simply. “We both get what we want.”
“And what,” she asked, “does my daughter get? Aside from watching you dismantle her vision?”
He looked at Charlotte again.
Her lips parted, just slightly.
“She gets to make it real,” he said.
Silence pressed in.
From the corner of his eye, he saw Julian relax a fraction. They were past the initial sparring, into the meat.
Eleanor steepled her fingers. “Terms.”
“We take a thirty percent equity stake in Aspen,” he said. “We co-invest with WestRock for an additional five, if Mr. Park wants to play. We inject the full two hundred eighty million you need to complete at your current specs. In return, Steele Hotels is granted the management contract for the property for a minimum of fifteen years, with two five-year extension options at our discretion.”
Eleanor’s brows snapped together. “Absolutely not. We manage our own properties.”
“Historically, yes,” he said. “And you’ve done very well. But you’ve also never built in the shadow of six other branded luxury mountain properties, all chasing the same guests. Aspen requires a different approach.”
“And you’re the only one who can offer that?” she asked.
“No.” He smiled slightly. “But I’m the only one sitting in your office right now with a signed term sheet ready to go.”
He slid another folder across the table.
Her fingers didn’t move to take it.
“Steele branding?” she asked.
“Subtle,” he said. “On back-end systems. On loyalty program integration. Publicly, it’s ‘Reid Aspen, in partnership with Steele Hotels.’ You get my algorithms, my data, my influencers, my event partners. Your daughter gets the playground she wants. Your board gets an asset that starts printing money in three years instead of six.”
“You’re very confident in your projections,” Eleanor said.
“I’m very good at my job.”
“And what if I say no?”
“Then someone else will say yes,” he said. “Maybe not Reid. Maybe another legacy brand with a mountain project in trouble. There are a few.” He held her gaze. “And I’ll use that success to take more of your market share in every city where we overlap.”
Julian glanced between them, clearly wondering if now was a good time to fake a heart attack and escape.
“And if I say yes,” Eleanor said softly. “What then?”
“Then we build something extraordinary,” he said. “Together.”
A beat.
Then another.
Eleanor looked at Charlotte.
“You’ve been very quiet,” she said. “For you.”
Charlotte’s fingers had been tracing the stitching on her portfolio. She stopped.
“I’m thinking,” she said.
“Care to share with the class?”
She looked at Dominic.
He felt the weight of that gaze like a touch.
“I agree with him,” she said.
His brows lifted.
Eleanor’s head snapped back as if slapped. “Excuse me?”
“Aspen needs help,” Charlotte said. “We’ve… I’ve…pushed it as far as I can inside our current structure. We don’t have the digital reach Steele does. We don’t have the operational flexibility. We…” She took a breath. “We need a partner.”
Eleanor’s eyes went flat. “You’re willing to give away control that easily?”
“It’s not giving away,” Charlotte said quietly. “It’s sharing. It’s…letting someone who’s good at the things we’re not help us be better.”
Her voice shook just slightly on the last word.
Dominic felt something twist in his chest.
“I have all the emotional arguments against this,” she went on. “Pride. Legacy. The idea that we should be able to do it all ourselves. But emotionally… I’m not supposed to be leading with that, am I?” Her gaze cut to her mother. “You’ve told me that enough times.”
Eleanor’s jaw clenched.
“So I’m looking at the numbers instead,” Charlotte said. “And the numbers say we’re at risk. If we don’t pivot, we don’t just endanger Aspen. We endanger other properties too. I don’t want that. For the company. For *you*.”
The last word was so soft Dominic almost missed it.
Eleanor’s expression flickered.
“And you trust him?” she asked. “This man? This…interloper?”
Dominic held his breath despite himself.
He shouldn’t care.
He did.
Charlotte didn’t answer immediately.
She looked at him, and in that look, he saw everything they weren’t saying.
*Do I trust you? The man who walked out before sunrise without saying goodbye? The man whose eyes my son has and who doesn’t even know he exists?*
She inhaled.
“Trust is earned,” she said finally. “We’d put protections in place. Veto rights. Performance clauses. But yes.” She swallowed. “On a professional level. I think…he knows what he’s doing.”
Eleanor looked between them, something sharp and speculative in her gaze now.
“You’ve met before,” she said suddenly.
It wasn’t a question.
The room seemed to shrink.
“No,” Dominic said smoothly, almost on top of Charlotte’s, “Yes.”
They both stopped.
Silence roared.
Eleanor’s brows arched, voice like a blade. “Which is it?”
Charlotte’s fingers tightened until the leather creaked. “We’ve…crossed paths,” she said. “At conferences. Panels. Industry events. You know that, you’ve been in some of the same rooms.”
“Mmm.” Her mother’s gaze flicked to Dominic. “Mr. Steele?”
He forced his face into a mild, polite mask.
“I’ve seen Ms. Reid speak on a panel,” he said. “We’ve never been introduced formally.” *Not with our clothes on,* his treacherous mind added.
Eleanor studied him for a long, unnerving moment.
Liar. He could almost hear the word in the air.
He met her gaze without flinching.
The truth would detonate this room.
The truth—that two years ago, her daughter had slipped out of her golden cage and into his arms for a night—would not just derail this negotiation. It would shatter whatever brittle, fraught equilibrium existed between mother and daughter.
He couldn’t say it.
He also couldn’t shake the image that had been burned into his brain from the second he’d walked in:
On the corner of Eleanor’s desk, among the curated photos of ribbon cuttings and gorgeous lobbies, sat a small silver frame. An anomaly. More personal.
He hadn’t meant to look at it. But the human eye was drawn to movement and to faces, and his gaze had snagged on it before he could stop himself.
The photo showed Charlotte, hair loose around her shoulders, in a striped T-shirt and jeans, no makeup. She was kneeling in the grass, arms wrapped around a small boy who looked about two.
The boy’s hair was soft brown, a little messy. He was squinting at the camera with a mischievous grin, one fist holding up a plastic dinosaur.
And his eyes.
His eyes were Dominic’s.
Dark gray, stormy, ringed with a faint darker halo.
For a second, his heart had stopped.
The room had faded. The sound of voices had gone dim.
His body had known before his brain caught up.
*Mine.*
He’d dragged his gaze away, forcing his expression to remain neutral.
Now, as Eleanor’s gaze darted to that photo and back again, something like horror twisted in his gut.
*Does she know?* he thought wildly. *Did she always know?*
Of course she didn’t. How could she? They’d never exchanged last names. Never talked about their real lives.
Unless…
Unless she’d done what he had, after. Used resources. Dug quietly. Found out.
His palms felt damp.
“Be that as it may,” Eleanor said at last, voice cool. “We will take your proposal under advisement, Mr. Steele. I do not make decisions of this magnitude in half an hour.”
“I wouldn’t respect you if you did,” he said.
“I’ll have our legal team review your term sheet,” she went on. “If we have questions, we’ll follow up. In the meantime, I expect absolute discretion.”
“Of course.”
She rose. Meeting over.
Charlotte stood too, movements a bit too quick. Her portfolio slid. He caught it before it hit the floor and handed it back to her.
“Thank you,” she said, not quite meeting his eyes.
His fingers brushed hers.
A jolt. Instant. Sharp.
He pulled back like he’d touched a live wire.
“Ms. Reid,” he said again, inclining his head.
“Mr. Steele.”
As he turned to go, Eleanor said, “One more thing.”
He paused.
“Yes?”
“If we do this,” she said, “we do it on our terms. You may be used to people falling over themselves to be in business with you. That is not how this will go.”
His mouth curved, humorless.
“I wouldn’t have it any other way,” he said. “I enjoy a challenge.”
He walked out, Mark scurrying to keep up.
In the elevator, alone, he let his composure crack for the first time.
His reflection stared back at him in the mirrored panel. Eyes a little too bright. Jaw clenched.
“A son,” he said under his breath. Trying the word on like a foreign tongue.
He’d never wanted children.
He’d told himself that for years. Children were…ties. Vulnerabilities. He’d spent his life cutting himself free of everything that could be used against him.
He’d never imagined that decision being taken out of his hands.
Yet here he was.
Somewhere in this city, a little boy toddled around putting Legos in his nose, and that boy had his eyes.
“He didn’t know,” he muttered. “You didn’t know. She didn’t tell you.”
Anger rose. Hot and cold at once.
At her. At himself. At fate, if he’d believed in such a thing.
The rational part of his brain considered the facts.
Two years ago. London. One night. No protection?
He flinched.
They’d started with a condom. He remembered tearing the packet open, remembered the snap as he rolled it on.
But later. Somewhere between the second and the third time, in the dark and the rain and the heady mix of need and something almost like tenderness, he’d…forgotten? They’d both been drunk on each other, on the fantasy that nothing else existed.
Had there been a third time?
He pressed his fingers to his brow.
“Yes,” he whispered. “There was.”
He’d taken her from behind at the window, rain streaking down the glass, her breath fogging small, desperate circles. He remembered thinking he should stop, should fumble for another condom, but she’d said, “Don’t, please, just…don’t stop,” voice wrecked, and he’d—
He closed his eyes.
*Idiot.*
He prided himself on being controlled. On never letting desire override judgment.
He’d failed.
And somewhere, a child had been born.
The elevator doors opened.
He walked through the lobby in a daze, aware of the murmured greetings, the scent of expensive perfume, the cool brush of air conditioning on his skin. He registered none of it.
Outside, the heat hit him. Honks. Sirens. Voices.
White noise.
He slid into the backseat of the car.
“Home, sir?” his driver asked.
“No.” His voice came out harsher than he intended. He cleared his throat. “The office.”
As the car pulled away from the curb, he pulled out his phone.
His thumb hovered over Gillian’s number. His lawyer.
Not yet.
He scrolled instead to another contact.
*Maya.*
He typed: *Emergency. My office. Now.*
Her reply came in seconds.
>*What did you do?*
He almost laughed. It came out strangled.
>*I’ll be there,* she added.
He stared out the window as the city blurred by.
Two years ago, he’d made what was supposed to be a contained, anonymous choice.
Today, he’d looked into the eyes of its consequence.
He didn’t know yet what he was going to do.
He only knew one thing with absolute, bone-deep certainty:
Backing away from this deal was no longer an option.
Because this wasn’t just about Aspen. Or Reid. Or market share.
This was about a little boy in a silver frame on a powerful woman’s desk.
A boy with his eyes.
A boy who, if his mother had her way, would never know his name.
Dominic Steele was many things.
Passive wasn’t one of them.
He watched the Reid tower recede in the rearview mirror.
“Game on,” he murmured.
And somewhere, in an office high above the city, Charlotte Reid stood staring at that same silver-framed photo, her heart pounding, her mother’s voice a cold hiss in her ear.
“You will *not* tell him,” Eleanor said. “Do you understand me, Charlotte? You will not *ever* tell that man about my grandson.”
And the slow burn truly began.