Keeping Hot Mr. Sterling.

Eye F*cking The Construction Man.

"You're eye-f*****g him again."

Eve didn't look away from the window where Dom was currently lifting something that should have required two people, his muscles doing things that made her forget how to breathe properly. "I'm observing the construction progress. It's called being an invested business owner."

"Invested in his ass, maybe." Mia Rodriguez appeared at her shoulder with two iced coffees, grinning like she'd just won the lottery. "You've been staring for twenty minutes. Mrs. Chen asked if you were okay. I told her you were having a stroke."

"You're fired."

"You've been trying to fire me for two years. It hasn't worked yet." Mia handed her one of the coffees. "So when are you going to actually talk to him instead of just mentally undressing him through the window?"

Eve took a long sip of coffee, still watching Dom as he set down whatever he'd been carrying and reached for a water bottle. Even drinking water, the man looked like s*x on legs: head tipped back, throat working, a trickle of sweat running down his neck that she wanted to lick off with her tongue. "I talk to him every morning."

"You take his order and his money. That's not talking, that's transaction." Mia leaned against the counter. "When are you going to actually make a move?"

"I don't make moves on customers."

"He's not really a customer though, is he? He's just the guy who comes in at six-thirty every morning, orders black coffee, and makes you forget how to form complete sentences."

"I do not—" Eve's phone buzzed on the counter between them, and her stomach dropped the second she saw the name on the screen. "Shit."

Mia's expression shifted from teasing to concerned in an instant. "Richard?"

Eve picked up her phone with hands that wanted to shake but she wouldn't let them. She'd spent too many years being afraid of Richard Smith. She was done with that.

Richard Smith: Evelyn. We need to discuss your business. The café is doing well, I hear. Family should share in family success. Call me.

Her jaw tightened. Of course he'd heard about Page & Pour's success. Of course he wanted his cut. Richard always wanted his cut of anything good in her life.

Another text came through before she could respond.

Richard Smith: Don't ignore me. You know I hate being ignored. We raised you, fed you, gave you everything. The least you can do is share your success with your family.

The rage that flooded through Eve was white-hot and clarifying. Raised her. Right. Like the thirteen years she'd spent in his house were some kind of gift instead of a nightmare she'd barely escaped.

"What does he want?" Mia asked quietly.

"Money. What else?" Eve set down her phone before she threw it against the wall. "He thinks because Page & Pour is successful, he deserves a piece of it. Like he deserves a piece of everything I've ever earned."

"That's not how it works. You built this place yourself."

"Try telling Richard that." Eve's hands curled into fists on the counter. "He thinks he owns me. That I owe him for 'taking care of me' after my parents died. Never mind that he collected state checks for fostering me. Never mind that—"

Her phone buzzed again.

Richard Smith: Patricia and Marcus agree. 50/50 split seems fair. After all, we're family. I'll have Gregory draw up the papers. This doesn't have to be difficult, Evelyn.*

Eve stared at the message, her vision going red around the edges. Fifty-fifty split. Of her business. The café she'd built from nothing with money she'd earned, in a building that had nothing to do with Richard or his toxic family.

"He wants half of Page & Pour," Eve said, her voice coming out cold and deadly. "He thinks I'm just going to hand over fifty percent of my business because we're 'family.'"

"That's insane. He has no legal claim—"

"He has Gregory. His lawyer brother who specializes in finding loopholes and manufacturing claims." Eve's grip on her phone tightened until her knuckles went white. "And Richard doesn't care about the law. He'll use every weapon he has. Money. Connections. Fear."

The memory slammed into her before she could stop it, it was seventeen years old, Richard's study, the smell of expensive whiskey thick in the air. She'd gone to say goodnight. That's all. Just goodnight.

But Richard had other ideas.

His hand had caught her wrist when she turned to leave. Pulled her back. His body blocking the door, trapping her against the wall. His breath hot and alcohol-soaked against her neck as he told her she owed him. Those good daughters showed gratitude to the fathers who took them in. That he'd saved her from foster care, given her a home for twelve years, and didn't she want to show him how thankful she was?

His hand had slid up her thigh. Under her shirt. Groping. Claiming.

She'd been seventeen, she was terrified and frozen.

Until his hand reached for her jeans button and something inside her snapped.

She'd kneed him in the balls as hard as she could and run. Locked herself in her bedroom, shoved her dresser against the door, and stayed there shaking until morning. Had avoided being alone with him for the entire next year, counting down the days until her eighteenth birthday when she could finally leave.

Richard had tried to rape her, he would have raped her if she hadn't fought back.

And now he wanted her business. Wanted to take the one thing she'd built that was completely hers.

"Eve." Mia's hand landed on her arm, gentle but grounding. "You went somewhere. You okay?"

Eve forced herself to breathe. To focus on the present, to the café around her, the smell of coffee and books, the safety of her own space. "I'm fine."

"You're not fine. You're thinking about him."

"I'm thinking about how to stop him." Eve looked back out the window at Dom, who was now talking to another worker, gesturing at something on a blueprint. Even from across the street she could see the authority in his posture, the way the other man deferred to him. "Richard thinks I'm alone. Vulnerable. The same scared girl I was at seventeen. But I'm not her anymore."

"No, you're definitely not."

"I have money now. Power. A business worth millions." Eve's voice hardened with determination. "And I'm going to get myself some protection."

Another text came through.

Richard Smith: Think about it, Evelyn. This can be easy or it can be hard. Your choice. I'll be in touch soon.

The barely veiled threat made her skin crawl. Easy or hard. She knew what Richard meant by "hard." She'd lived through it once already.

Not again. Never again. Eve untied her apron with sharp, decisive movements. "Cover the counter."

"What are you doing?"

"Hiring myself a weapon." Eve grabbed her phone and keys, her eyes locked on Dom across the street. "Richard wants to play games? Fine. Let's see how he handles it when I show up with someone who makes him think twice about touching me."

"Eve, you can't just—"

"Watch me." Eve was already heading for the door, adrenaline and rage singing through her veins in equal measure. "I'm done being scared of Richard Smith. I'm done letting him think he has any power over me. And I'm damn sure not giving him my café."

The summer heat hit her like a wall as she stepped outside, but she didn't slow down. Her heels clicked against the pavement as she crossed the street toward the construction site, her chin lifted, her shoulders back.

She was Evelyn Smith. She'd survived Richard's and Patricia's house, built a multimillion-dollar business from nothing, and she wasn't backing down now.

Dom looked up as she approached, those dark eyes locking onto her with an intensity that made her stomach flip. He was even more devastating up close, all sharp angles and raw masculinity, sweat-slicked skin stretched over muscle that suggested he could break someone in half without much effort.

He was perfect.

He set down whatever tool he'd been holding and straightened to his full height, which had to be at least six-foot-two, maybe taller. "Can I help you?"

Eve stopped three feet away, close enough to smell sawdust and sweat and something underneath that was purely him. She looked him up and down deliberately—taking in every inch of muscle, every drop of sweat, the way his jeans hung low on his hips.

Then she met his eyes.

"I need to hire you," she said. "Twenty thousand dollars a month. Cash. All you have to do is stand next to me, look like you'd kill anyone who touches me, and f**k me when I say so."

Silence. He stared at her, completely still, and Eve held his gaze without blinking.

"You serious?" he finally asked, his voice rough.

Eve pulled out her phone, showed him her banking app—the balance that proved she could back up every word.

"Dead serious," she said. "So what's it going to be? Do you want the money or not?"