ANASTASIA
The next morning, Damien left early. He had meetings in London he couldn't miss and a flight to catch. But before he went, he sat at my tiny kitchen table and walked me through everything.
"The Duke is difficult," he said. "He'll test you. Everyone will test you. The team is small but sharp. Miranda does tech and intelligence. James is ex-military, handles security. Marcus runs media and public relations. Eleanor is a strategist, old family, knows everyone who matters. They all report to my father, not to me. You'll be the first person who reports to me directly."
I poured more coffee. "So they'll see me as a threat."
"They'll see you as an outsider." He pulled a folder from his bag. "I had these prepared. Dossiers on the key players. Family trees. Political alliances. Press clippings going back five years. It's not everything, but it's a start."
I flipped through the pages. Names I recognized from newspapers. Names I'd never heard before. The Queen. The Duke. Members of Parliament. Business leaders. A whole web of people I'd need to understand.
"There's more," he said. "I'll send you digital files once you're settled. Financial records. Trust documents. The legal framework around my father's estate. It's a mess, honestly. Centuries of amendments and loopholes. But you'll find the pattern. You always do."
"When do I start?"
"The team meets daily at the townhouse. I'll introduce you on your first day. After that, you'll have a week or two to get your bearings before anything major hits."
I nodded. My lawyer brain was already clicking into place. Research first. Understand the landscape. Find the weak points.
"I'll be ready," I said.
He smiled. "I know."
---
After he left, I stood in my doorway and watched the Aston Martin pull away until it disappeared around the corner.
Then I turned back to my empty apartment and started packing.
The eviction notice was still on the counter. I threw it in the trash. Damien had left an advance, a check with more zeros than I'd ever seen in my personal bank account, and I used it to pay off the back rent and break my lease. The landlord was happy to see me go. One less problem for him.
I didn't own much. Law books and work clothes and a few boxes of kitchen supplies. Most of the furniture came with the apartment. I shipped the important things to the London address Damien had given me and sold the rest. It took three days.
Every night, I sat on the floor of my emptying living room and studied the files he'd left. Family trees. Business connections. Old scandals and older grudges. I made notes in the margins. Drew lines between names. By the time I boarded the plane, I had a working map of the world I was about to enter.
It wasn't complete. It couldn't be. Real intelligence only comes from being inside. But it was enough to keep me from walking in blind.
On the last night, I sat in my empty apartment and ate takeout from the same cardboard container I'd been eating from for years. I thought about my mother and her and her revolving door of men. I thought about Mark Caldwell and his cold smile. I thought about Dominic Blackwood and his green eyes and the way he'd looked at me like I was nothing the moment I handed him that keycard.
Then I stood up and closed the door on all of it.
The flight to London was long and I didn't sleep. I stared out the window at the ocean below and tried to figure out who I was supposed to be now. The good girl was dead. The lawyer was dead. What was left was still taking shape.
Damien met me at Heathrow. He looked tired but happy, and he talked the whole drive into the city about the team and the townhouse and the latest developments I'd missed. I listened and nodded and tried not to look as terrified as I felt.
The townhouse was bigger than I expected. White stone and black shutters and a heavy front door that opened onto a marble hallway. The kind of place that had been standing for centuries and would stand for centuries more. The kind of place where people like me didn't belong.
I walked in carrying my suitcase and felt every pair of eyes land on me.
That was the moment the first year began.
.....
It was hard at first, mostl cold stares, closed doors and the heavy feeling that I didn't belong.
Our base was a fortified townhouse in Mayfair, the kind of place where old money and quiet power mixed together and everyone watched everyone else.
I had nothing and no one except Damien.
The staff whispered behind my back. The board members frowned when I entered rooms. Duke Alistair, the man funding the whole operation, made no effort to hide what he thought of me.
Our first meeting was cold. January rain hit the windows while he stood by the fire with a glass of scotch, looking me over like I was a stain on his carpet.
"You're American." He circled me slowly. "And young. And unvetted."
I stood still and said nothing.
"Damien sees something in you." His voice was flat. "Let's hope it isn't blindness."
I got the message. I wasn't here to make friends. I was here to survive.
So I did.
I learned every hallway of that townhouse and every unspoken rule. Damien pushed me into meetings and negotiations and strategy sessions, and I kept my head down and my mouth shut until I understood the game.
The team I inherited was sharp and suspicious. They didn't want me there.
So I worked. Sixteen hours a day, fixing problems before they reached Damien's desk. My silence became my armor and my work became my weapon.
The turning point came three months in.
Miranda, our tech specialist, slammed her laptop shut. "We have a problem."
A photo had leaked to a political newsletter. Damien at a university party, laughing with a red cup in his hand. The caption called his friends "anti-monarchy activists" and questioned Alistair's judgment.
Marcus, our media guy, frowned. "This is a test. Someone wants to see how we react."
James, the former soldier, cracked his knuckles. "Who leaked it?"
"Doesn't matter," Eleanor muttered. "If this spreads before we control it."
I studied the photo. The activists were Damien's old debate teammates. One worked for a clean water nonprofit and the other did disaster relief. This wasn't a scandal. It was bait.
I looked up. "We don't deny it. We confirm it."
The room went quiet.
"Miranda, find every award those two have won. Marcus, draft a statement. Damien's proud of his friends and disappointed they're being dragged into this. James, find the leak."
By morning, the story had flipped. A major paper ran a piece about Damien's humanitarian friends, and the trap collapsed.
James found me later by the window. "The leak came from one of the Duke's rivals. Handled." He paused. "Good instincts, Blues."
After that, the team changed. They stopped second-guessing me and started asking for my orders.
I was finally winning.
Then I saw Dominic Blackwood again.