The words had barely left Kitten's mouth before Julian's face went entirely dark.

He reached out, snagging the back of her collar and lifting her off her feet like a disobedient kitten. Julian stared her down, his expression an unreadable mask of exasperation.

"Start talking," Julian muttered. "Who else have you played this game with?"

Kitten adopted a look of profound, soulful grievance. "Nobody! Honestly! I was a perfectly respectable, virtuous girl before I married you…"

"And after?"

"Hey," she smirked, her eyes sparkling with a familiar brand of shamelessness, "don't you check for yourself every single night?"

Julian was momentarily speechless. This little brat's talent for verbal gymnastics was world-class.

"You're not playing," Julian said, his voice dropping into a low, stubborn warning. He knew she was thick-skinned, but he hadn't yet acquired her level of audacity. "Listen to me: even if Damien goes easy on you—which he won't—you are not his match."

"Oh, relax," Kitten chirped, waving a hand as if she were writing a blank check. "My karma is at an all-time high lately. I'm not going to lose."

She turned her focus toward the man sitting across the room. "Well, Damien-ge? What do you say?"

Now that she'd handled Julian, Kitten brought her full "firepower" to bear on the Sovereign. Damien Lancaster was not as easily manipulated as his brother; he required a more tactical approach.

Damien didn't even bother to calculate the odds. He leaned back into the leather chair, his voice a languid, elegant drawl.

"Deal."

Kitten's face lit up. "No taking it back!"

Damien let out a short, quiet laugh. With her "three-legged cat" skills, even if Julian tried to help her from the shadows, she stood zero chance. He was playing with her the way one might toy with a child.

"Open the deck," Damien commanded. "Rules?"

Kitten cleared her throat, suddenly professional. "Chemin de fer. Best of five. We'll draw lots for the banker. Any objections?"

"None," Damien murmured, his tone utterly indifferent. He didn't need to use his brain for a level like hers.

Dr. Alistair Sterling leaned in toward Damien, whispering with a clinical curiosity. "...You're being remarkably patient tonight."

"I am," Damien replied, his pale gray eyes fixed on the cards. "I'm going to liquidate her in three rounds. Then we'll see how Julian handles the fallout of a One Minute Stand in front of a live audience."

Alistair studied the Sovereign's profile, feeling a chill. "What kind of brother are you? You actually have an interest in watching your own brother get intimate in public?"

Damien cut his eyes toward the doctor, a predatory glint in the gray irises. "Do you think Julian is the type of man who performs for a crowd?"

"No."

"Exactly." Damien's mouth curled into a faint, mockery of a smile. "Julian will buy his way out. He'll pay a fortune to keep her clothes on. I'm not here for the show, Alistair. I'm here to bleed my brother dry."

Alistair went silent. The man was a capitalist monster.

The game began.

Julian leaned his head in his hand, unable to watch as Kitten marched toward her own "spectacular sacrifice." If the person at the table hadn't been his wife, he would have walked out long ago.

He knew Damien Lancaster better than anyone. He knew there would be no mercy, and no "heroic" impulse to protect a woman's modesty—especially not Julian's woman. If Kitten were a stranger, Damien might have spared her a shred of dignity. But because she belonged to Julian, Damien would be remorseless.

Julian's heart bled for his bank account. Kitten had zero talent for cards, but her talent for hemorrhaging his wealth grew more impressive every year.

Predictably, she lost the first two rounds in a row.

As they prepared for the third, Kitten slumped onto the table. Suddenly, she paused, looking around the crowded room.

"Wait... where's Mia?"

The name caused Damien to lose his focus for a fraction of a second.

"She's tired," he explained flatly. "She's over there, reading."

"Oh..." Kitten trailed off.

The silence that followed felt wrong. Damien's mind drifted back to the end of dinner. After Mia had finished cleaning up, she had whispered, "I'm going to rest over there for a bit." He hadn't thought much of it. He'd accompanied her to the sofa, tucked a cashmere blanket around her, and let her be.

She had been a silent, ghostly presence ever since—quiet enough to be forgotten.

Damien's eyes drifted toward the far corner of the room. He could see the back of her head, her dark hair falling over her shoulders as she focused on her book. She was facing away from the party, away from him.

A scholar of psychology would recognize that posture: subjective avoidance.

A sudden, unbidden wave of loneliness washed over the Sovereign. His gaze darkened; he realized then that she wasn't just resting. She was hiding.

"She's doing it on purpose, you know…"

A low, gratingly smug voice reached his ears.

Damien looked at Kitten. She had cupped her hands into a small megaphone, whispering to him across the table.

"Mia told me in the kitchen," Kitten murmured. "She knows you don't like bringing her out in public. She knows you don't like people seeing her. So, she's 'auto-avoiding' the crowd to make it easier for you."

Damien's lashes swept down, a nameless, icy emotion flickering in his eyes.

"She also said," Kitten continued, her voice dropping into a soft, needle-sharp sting, "that she knows you don't want to acknowledge her as Mrs. Lancaster in front of the world. She knows you don't want her holding onto that title. So she's going to grant you your wish. She won't fight your decision."

In the middle of the roaring party, Mia Clarke had performed a quiet, sensible exit. She had removed herself from his sight, choosing to suffer her own longing and grief in a place where he couldn't see it.

When you love someone like Damien Lancaster, this is the only outcome. There is no other path.

Mia had accepted her sentence. In a world of heartbreak, others might cut their hair to mark the end; Mia simply cut away her will to resist.