A cold-hearted billionaire, a fiery intern, and a forbidden love that defies the odds.
When Hearts Ignite, an all-new angsty, forbidden, billionaire romance from bestselling author Victoria Lum is now available!
He’s the King of Wall Street—cold, methodical, unemotional. Steven Kingsley is the glorious falcon soaring far above me.
I’m the poor, lowly intern—a small fish in this cutthroat ocean of finance, struggling to keep my head above water.
The falcon and the fish were never meant to fall in love. After all, his heart is made of ice, and life has taught me rich men cannot be trusted.
But my body craves him, my heart ignites for him, and from his heated stares and maddening touches, I wonder if perhaps he feels the same.
Until one day, the unimaginable happens, and I disappear from his life. I’ve had to become someone I never thought I’d be in order to survive.
That is, until he finds me.
The cold king is intent on saving me, and this time, he isn’t letting go. Our wills collide, an inferno blazes, but our devastating secrets get in the way.
Can the fish and the falcon find a way to be together? Or is our love doomed from the start?
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“You’re in early today.”
I bite my cheek to suppress a smile wanting to form on my face when I see her hunched over her tablet, the lone lamp illuminating the bullpen as dawn is on the verge of breaking through the inky darkness of the night. I wonder what romance novel she’s reading this morning. My heart is scrimmaging, my hand finding comfort in the hot drink I’m clutching in my grip.
Grace swivels her chair and faces me, her eyes widening in over-the-top shock and her cheeks twitching in suppressed humor as well. “Mr. Kingsley! Fancy seeing you in so early.”
We have done this strange dance every morning the last few weeks without fail, me coming in at six-thirty on the dot, her acting like she hasn’t seen me in the office so early before. Suddenly, waking up in the middle of the night to a dark room doesn’t bother me as much anymore. The stillness doesn’t seem as suffocating, the heaviness in my chest seems more bearable, like I have the strength to push it away and focus on something else.
Or someone else.
When I saw her on the High Line twirling about with a smile on her face, her beautiful hair fluttering around her, my breath caught in my throat and my heart seized. She looked ethereal, something out of the fairytales I read to little Violet whenever I’d visit Jess and James. The moonlight bathed her in a soft glow, imbuing her with…magic.
It’s fucking stupid. Completely unrealistic.
Yet, I find myself ensnared by her aura. When I stepped out of The Shed, I wanted to reply to a few emails regarding TransAmerica that came through during yet another boring speech by some donor of the year. But as soon as I saw her dancing to her own melody with the stars as her company, all my thoughts of work flew out the door. A heady rush of warmth coated my insides and the only thing in my mind was the need to talk to her, to see what had her so mesmerized.
So, for the second time in my life, after the karaoke incident, I shed my heavy cloak of responsibilities, my mind barely registering the buzzing of my phone from more emails and text messages, my brain forgetting the American Lymphoma Research Society gala wasn’t finished yet, and I was supposed to make a speech on Adrian’s behalf. When it finally occurred to me late last night on the drive home, I hastily dictated apology notes to the organizer of the event and to Adrian, who’d no doubt barrage me with questions later.
A sharp pinch of guilt pierced my gut when I realized everything I dropped because of this insane impulse to spend time with her. Father’s warnings in the past echoed in my mind. Kingsley men don’t let emotions get the best out of them. I shoved the thoughts into a black box deep inside me.
I was selfish for once, and I felt alive.
Strolling with her in the darkened pathways, surrounded by carefully manicured gardens and cloaked in silence, I’d never felt more at peace. When she stared at me with those dazzling violet eyes and we talked about the loneliness of being at the top, I didn’t find myself flinching or wanting to run away from her penetrating gaze.
She saw me.
She saw through my words and everything I didn’t say. It wasn’t my wealth or fancy title she noticed, but the deep murky hole inside me, yearning for something to fill it. When she gripped my arm and demanded I make a wish upon a shooting star, the abyss in my chest flooded with bright light, and in that moment, that brief second, I’d remember always, my world shifted on its axis.
I wanted to kiss her.
It wasn’t a fleeting impulse or desire.
It was a desperate need, a sharp craving.
I don’t kiss women. I don’t want the intimacy with any of them. But with her, I found myself hungry for it, the sudden urge flooring me. Even if she’d later curl her lips at the ugliness in my soul, I still wanted to lie bare at her feet.
I wanted desperately to taste those luscious, plump lips, to embed a part of her inside me and to leave a part of me inside her.
It took everything in me to stand still, to not act on this insane desire.
“Steven?”
Glancing up, I catch those inquisitive eyes on me once more. I smile and pull a chair up from the side of the cubicle. Yet another unofficial routine neither of us would admit to. Instead of retreating to my office to begin my workday, I sit with her in her little glass cubicle, surrounded by the peacefulness of the early morning hours, with only the warm glow of her desk lamp illuminating the space.
Wordlessly, like the other days, she takes out her toasted bagel slathered with peanut butter from a Ziploc bag and gives me half. I place the hot coffee I “happened” to have, the drink with brown sugar and oat milk, what she once told me she enjoys on another early morning, and we’d sit down and have breakfast together.
It feels intimate. Better than any dates I’ve been on in the past.
Energy sizzles between us, every cell in my body feeling alive, and I tether down the impulse to touch her, to smell her jasmine scent at the source.
Every day without fail. With both of us acting like each morning was an act of serendipity.
Steven and Grace, two “friends” sharing a meal in the dark.
But friends don’t dream about the taste of the other person’s lips.
Friends don’t jerk off in the morning shower, imagining her in there trembling as I drill my cock inside her. Friends don’t come while growling her name under his breath.
Emotions are liabilities, Steven.
The warnings are faded signs on a chain linked fence, yellowed with age and missing a corner. Trespassers couldn’t care less.
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