Playing the Thorne Brothers

I'm the canary the Thorne heir bought for his little brother.

Crying on cue is in the job description.

The job is simple. Love Zane Thorne. Or do a flawless impression of it. Cry when he's reckless. Cling when he's bored. Be soft, be pretty, fall apart on command. It's worked for a year. Two paychecks a month, for a girl who's never once meant a word of it.

So tonight, when I went breathless and teary and grabbed his sleeve. "Zane, please. No racing. I can't watch you get hurt."

He just rolled a cigarette between two fingers and smiled at the track.

"Relax, baby. Your husband always wins."

That's when I felt it coming. I turned around.

There was the prize for tonight's race, propped up on the platform where they usually put the trophies.

A girl. Long hair. White dress.

Well. There goes my double paycheck.

I pulled out my phone and started drafting my boss his resignation letter.

Chapter 1

The first time I met Caspian Thorne, he didn't say a word for a full minute. He just looked at me the way you look at an asset before you sign.

We were in an office that cost more than I'd earn in three lifetimes. I sat. I let him look.

"This is the best the Coterie has," the assistant said. Like she was presenting a watch.

The Coterie, where men with more money than sense pay for a flawless woman on their arm. Charming. Attentive. Exactly what they want to hear. I was the one they asked for by name.

Caspian Thorne uncrossed his legs, picked up a pen, and wrote a number on a check without asking me a single question.

The assistant slid it across the desk.

I looked at the number. I held very still.

Then I smiled. "You want to keep me, Mr. Thorne?"

"The second son," the assistant said quickly.

Ah. The second son.

Zane Thorne. The family's favorite disaster. He wrapped cars around guardrails for fun. He put other heirs in the hospital and called it a night out. Girls clawed at each other over him until somebody's family called somebody's family, and every few weeks his face hit the tabloids and the Thorne Group stock dipped a point.

And someone had decided the cure was me.

The assistant ran down his care instructions. He likes long hair. He likes white dresses. He doesn't like girls with edges, girls who push back. He bruises if you go hard. Go soft.

Soft. I could do soft.

Then Caspian Thorne spoke for the first time. Same flat voice, like the number on the check wasn't a number at all.

"Same amount hits your account every month."

He didn't say if. He'd already decided I wouldn't say no.

I pinched the check between two fingers.

I'd wanted this one. A gig that paid like this didn't come around twice.

I gave him my brightest smile. "Okay."

He was right. I didn't say no.

They dropped me into Zane's orbit, and I got to work.

By the third time he played hero for me, he'd started to enjoy it.

He tipped my chin up with one finger, looked me over, and grinned. "We keep running into each other, sweetheart. Must be fate."

I ducked my head and made my voice small. "Sorry. I keep being a problem for you."

He clicked his tongue and caught a strand of my hair.

"Pretty's not always a gift, huh. Why's somebody always pushing you around?"

The wind lifted the hem of my white dress and pulled my hair off my shoulders. I'd checked the angle before I picked the spot.

I let my eyes go wet. Let the pause stretch. "I'm used to it. It's been like this my whole life."

That part wasn't a lie. When you grow up with nothing, the world teaches you early that nobody steps in for free.

Zane went quiet.

Then his friends spilled out of the bar, looking for him. "Zane? The hell are you doing down a back alley?"

One of them reached for my face, laughing. "Where'd you dig up the pretty one? She's fresh."

Zane slapped the hand away. His jaw set. "Off. Now."

The others backed off fast. "Easy, easy. Blind much? Girl that pretty's obviously yours."

They slunk off.

I let the tears come and grabbed a fistful of his sleeve.

He didn't pull away.

I looked up at him, all trembling and shy. "When you're here, they don't dare touch me."

Zane wiped the corner of my eye with one knuckle.

My lashes fluttered. I went for it. "Do you. Do you have a girlfriend?"

The wind was cold. I let it shake me.

He bent and lifted me off my feet like I weighed nothing.

"Not now," he said, careless. "Not planning on one, either."

I stared at him like the words had wrecked me.

He carried me toward the sports car at the curb. Heads turned all down the street.

I hid my face in his chest and whispered it. "It's okay. I don't need a title."

Exactly what he expected me to say. A girl this in love, this dependent, it was written all over her. I'd made sure of it.

He set me in the passenger seat, leaned in lazy, and kissed me.

"Done," he said.

Signed and sealed. He thought he'd just collected something.

He had no idea he'd just made payroll.

Chapter 2

To everyone watching, it was a love story.

I was beautiful and sweet. I had no clue who the Thornes were. I just loved Zane. Purely, helplessly, for himself.

Loved him enough to worry every waking minute. To beg him off the track and out of the fights. To go pale when another girl drifted too close, because a girl that in love is always one step from heartbreak.

I had no title, so I wasn't allowed to make scenes. I could only cry. Tremble. Plead.

Lucky for me, Zane did like me. One tear and he folded, every time.

So he behaved. For a long, suspicious stretch, the worst boy in the city behaved.

Shopping, movies, long drives. Kisses that didn't go anywhere and naps that did. His friends said he'd turned over a new leaf.

Caspian Thorne must have been pleased too. He tripled my pay.

I was Zane's canary now. Kept, spoiled, adored. Half the city had me penciled in as the future Mrs. Thorne.

Nobody ever asked the canary if she was tired.

I didn't actually know if Zane meant a word of it, or if I was just the new toy he hadn't gotten bored of yet.

But I knew one thing for certain. Caspian Thorne would never let a gold-digger from the Coterie marry into his family.

Not even the gold-digger he'd hand-picked and installed at his brother's side himself.

To boys born that high up, being let into the room was the gift. I wasn't supposed to want more. I knew exactly what I was.

Which is why, the next time I went teary and begged him not to race, he just rolled a cigarette between his fingers.

"Relax, baby. Your husband always wins."

First time he'd ever told me no. Outside of bed, anyway.

"Zane," I said, eyes wet, right on cue.

He didn't look back. He crushed the cigarette out, slow, and walked to the black sports car he hadn't touched in a year. Tall. Easy. Already gone.

The crowd whistled and howled. Zane Thorne was racing again.

I got that feeling. The one that's never wrong.

I turned around, slow.

A girl in a long white dress was being walked up onto the platform where they used to set the prizes. Eyes down, nervous, soft. The kind of pretty that makes men want to fix things.

One of the rich girls glanced at me and went back to her nails. "While you were home sick the other night? That one's a hostess. Got cornered at the bar. Zane played hero."

I blinked, slow, and let it land.

For about ten seconds, a thought clawed at me. Had Caspian built himself a second canary? A better one?

No. Not him. He didn't make sloppy mistakes.

And besides, this girl was scared, but there was a spine under it. A stubbornness. None of my rehearsed helplessness.

She was real. That was the problem.

I sighed and looked up at the sky like a girl with a breaking heart.

My eyes filled right on schedule. Pure muscle memory now. Cry enough times and your body stops asking why.

But I was, in fact, a little heartbroken.

There went my double paycheck.

The rich girl watched me well up and scoffed. "You really don't know your place, do you. This was always going to happen."

I pulled out my phone.

I started searching how to write a resignation letter.

Something professional. Heartfelt. Worded just right to squeeze one last check out of Caspian Thorne.

I had been a very dedicated employee, after all.

Chapter 3

Zane won.

The other heir's car went off the track. Something went very wrong.

The whole scene dissolved into noise and panic, sirens climbing closer by the second.

Nobody dared blame Zane, so they turned on the girl. "If the Ashford boy doesn't make it, you're finished. You hear me? Finished."

She stumbled back, shaking.

Zane stepped in front of her, cold. "Real impressive, all of you. What's it got to do with her?"

I watched them for a few seconds.

Then I walked over, slid the jacket Zane had draped on my shoulders off, and settled it around the girl instead.

"It's cold out," I said, gentle. "You'll catch something."

Zane was studying me. I met it and let myself smile. "You did the same for me once. A night just like this one."

The girl blinked at me, lost.

Then she turned to Zane. "Mr. Thorne, is she"

Zane didn't answer.

He just looked down at me. Kept looking.

Under that stare, I couldn't hold the fake smile. The best I managed was a thin, sour curve of my mouth.

Because here was the thing.

After tonight, forget the resignation bonus. Caspian Thorne was going to claw back this month's pay too.

Fine. Claw it back. I'd saved plenty.

Wait. He wouldn't actually come after me for damages, would he?

The thought hit me like cold water, and the longer I turned it over the more possible it got, until my face fell apart for real.

The girl clutched Zane's sleeve. "Is she okay? Does she not like me?"

Zane dragged his eyes off my face. His voice softened for her. "It's nothing. Don't be scared."

I drifted toward the exit like a ghost.

Plenty of people were still watching the show. None of them had expected me to get dumped this early.

Zane didn't come after me.

The girl was cold-sweating with fear, so he sent someone to walk her off and get her into dry clothes.

I was cold-sweating too, as it turned out.

I dug out my phone. My palm left a smear on the screen.

I wiped it on my dress, opened my email, and sent Caspian Thorne the resignation letter I'd already written. In for a penny.

The wording was a thing of beauty. Heartfelt gratitude for the opportunity. Deep appreciation for the man who had so generously employed me.

Cut the cord before he can pin anything on me.

That was when the Coterie's manager called. "Lo. You free to swing by tomorrow? You left some things in your locker."

I paused, then remembered. "Sure."

I hung up and caught a cab back to the apartment I'd bought on the quiet, in a name nobody would think to check.

Keeping flawless skin for Zane meant I almost never stayed up late. So the second I let go, I let go all the way. Pulled my SIM, played on my phone till dawn, slept till evening.

New SIM, loose T-shirt, shorts, flip-flops. Bare face, no armor. Off to the Coterie.

I hadn't felt this light in a long time.

The manager saw me and froze for half a second before she walked me back to my things.

She didn't ask questions.

I grabbed my stuff, waved at her, and started to turn.

That was when I heard it.

A voice. Low, lazy, magnetic.

"This the place?"

The girl, softly, said yes.

Someone behind them sighed. "Zane's too good. Tracking down the venue for his little stray. Whoever messed with her is gonna pay for it."

Zane looked at the manager. "Bring out the girls who used to work alongside her."

I quietly fished a mask out of my pocket, dropped my head, and made for the far door.

"Sloane?" someone said, startled.

Chapter 4

Seriously? Even like this?

I shoved a hand through my hair and shook my head.

The manager must have read the no all over me, because she stepped forward, smiling. "Who? Never mind her. Let me take you all up to your room."

I could have kissed her.

The next second, a hand closed around my wrist.

Zane's voice rang out across the gilded lobby. Not a request. "Head up. Mask off."

I went stiff.

I didn't move. I locked my eyes on the floor and played deaf.

The whole room went silent.

Then a fragile little voice. "Zane. My stomach hurts."

A few seconds of deadlock.

Then Zane let go of my wrist and went to her.

I walked out one step at a time, wound tight, braced for a second act with my name on it.

It wasn't until I was in the back of a cab that it caught up with me.

The cedar he always wore was gone. In its place, a faint floral.

You don't pick up someone else's scent in an hour.

They'd been close. Close enough, long enough, to start smelling like each other.

A data point. I was out.

The next few days were eat, sleep, games, and TV.

Every second I'd spent next to Zane, I'd burned enormous energy being someone else. Being the girl he liked.

I knew exactly what he'd never like. The real one.

I don't like white dresses. I don't like fussy French dinners. I don't like delicate little heels.

I'm nobody's perfect canary.

So this. This was paradise.

I was finally crawling out of the funk of losing the job.

Until the doom-scrolling fed me a headline. The Ashford heir, hospitalized. Critical.

The press was skinning Zane alive. Lawless brat. The kind of son the Thornes ought to be ashamed of raising.

I sighed, enlightened. So this one hadn't been buried after all.

Which tracked. The Ashford boy was the only child the old Ashfords had. Late in life, precious, the whole family's entire world.

It was carnage out there.

I gloated, picturing Caspian Thorne tearing his hair out over the mess his little brother had made.

Right up until the gossip circled back to me.

Then I stopped laughing.

I went out to buy a watermelon and got walked to Caspian Thorne's office by a bodyguard who'd been waiting at the bottom of my building. A while, by the look of him.

Maybe it was in my head.

But the office felt colder than last time. Like he'd cranked the air down just for me.

He didn't look worn out or frantic, the way I'd pictured.

Just cold. Still. Exactly the same. "It's been a while, Ms. Vance."

I was quiet for a moment, then answered, guilty. "Mr. Thorne."

This time it was only the two of us. No assistant.

"Ms. Vance. I think you've forgotten what you promised me." He lifted his chin a fraction, dark eyes settling on me.

I gave him a weak smile. "Zane fell for someone else. He wanted to stand up for the girl he likes. Not much I could do about that."

Caspian said nothing.

He just looked at me from a great, cold height.

The air congealed. I tried for casual. "You could always put someone else on Zane. That girl's word goes a lot further than mine right now."

His mouth tipped. "Not everyone's like you. In it only for the money."

I blinked.

My first instinct was that he'd just insulted me.

But there was no heat in it. He'd said it the way you read a number off a page. A fact.

So. He'd already gone to the girl. And the girl had said no.

"So why am I here?" I pressed my lips together.

He set both forearms on the desk and looked at me like the answer had been signed and notarized weeks ago.

"The Ashfords are willing to make all of it disappear. The lawsuits. The headlines. My brother's name."

A pause.

"They named one condition."

Another.

"It's you."

Chapter 5

Caspian lifted his eyes and looked me over, unhurried.

Then, flat. "The Ashford one. He asked for you. By name. As his caretaker."

Caretaker? Me?

It was out before I could stop it. "Does Zane know?"

This was an insult, plain and simple. To me, and to Zane. Whatever was left of his feelings, dead and buried or not, he should never have signed off on it.

"Your employer is me." Caspian tapped the desk once. Economical.

Ah. So Zane didn't know.

Caspian wanted to use me to calm Cole Ashford down. To calm the whole Ashford family down.

I sighed. "In case you missed it, Mr. Thorne. I quit."

The office went quiet for a few seconds.

I lifted my eyes and looked dead at him. "Although. I could come back. New position, that's all."

Translation: name the number.

Cole Ashford's little demand was designed to humiliate me, sure. It didn't land. Being somebody's caretaker was a real step up in respectability from being somebody's canary.

Caspian's expression gave away nothing. He just held my gaze.

Then, at last, he pressed two fingers to the space between his brows.

Tore off a check. Set it on the desk. Slid it toward me.

"Fill in the amount. Whatever you want."

Something almost wistful moved through me.

Part of me envied Zane, who always had a net under him, every single time.

Part of me marveled that this time he'd finally crashed into something with teeth.

I picked up the pen, cheerful again, and wrote a long, gorgeous string of zeros.

I knocked on the door of the hospital room.

A voice floated out. "Come in."

I pushed the door open. The man inside had his left arm in a cast and lay sprawled against the pillows, a movie playing on the screen across from him.

Other than the pale face and the bloodless line of his mouth, he looked like he was on a beach vacation.

Then again, from all the months near Zane, getting a read on him, this was always Cole Ashford. Languid. Bored with the entire world.

And, above all.

Generous. Extremely, extremely generous.

I held my professional smile. "Mr. Ashford. Anything you need from me?"

He took his time, head to foot. "I figured you'd be sobbing and clawing the walls, refusing to come."

So the fragile-canary brand really had gone deep.

I gave a small sigh. "Zane caused this. The least I can do is help carry it."

Sincere. Heartfelt.

Cole watched me with a smile that wasn't quite a smile, like he was weighing how much of that was true.

After a moment, he let the last word stretch. "It's warm in here. Help me out of my shirt?"

I paused. Then I lowered my eyes, obedient, and started on the buttons of his hospital gown, one by one.

Bared the chest under the bandages.

"Pants too?" I asked.

That stopped him.

"Sure." Smooth enough.

I should never get into a contest with this man over who has less shame.

But the words were already out.

So I gave a cold little laugh somewhere behind my ribs and went all in. My hand moved for his waistband.

That was when it came from the doorway. Low, ragged, furious.

"Get off me. I want to see exactly how hurt he is. Goddamn it. Every single day, a new way to make trouble for my brother."

I didn't have time to react.

The door flew open.

I froze, my hand still resting at the waistband of Cole's hospital pants.

The noise cut out all at once