Page 105 of Vow Of Fire

“Thanks,” I said curtly.

Didn’t change the fact he looked annoyingly gorgeous in his tuxedo.

I thought about last night, the way he’d rested his head on my breast and how I’d held him against me, before we’d had sex on the couch. I know he’d been drinking, but he’d seemed softer then, more human. For a moment, I’d been hopeful that⁠—

I shook my head. It was stupid. I was an idiot for even thinking there might be something between us. Dante Marcelli was a closed book. A tortured loner, a man of violence. I would do well to remember that.

Except, when he touched me, when his mouth came down on mine, every good intention vanished like the mist on a New York sidewalk.

Bracing myself, I reached for the car door.

Dante put his hand on my arm. “Wait.”

I turned back, frowning. “What?”

“Izzy told me to give you this.” He reached down and lifted up a bag with an item wrapped in tissue paper inside it.

“What is it?” I asked, confused. He’d already given me one thing, and now another. Even if it was from Izzy.

He handed me the bag and I reached inside and pulled out a black rose corsage. The oversized bloom was fashioned from velvety black petals, intertwined with delicate gold sprigs and dark foliage that looked almost enchanted beneath the city lights. Long satin ribbons trailed from the arrangement, brushing against my wrist whenever I moved.

It was dramatic, gothic and decadent. Something I could imagine Izzy wearing.

“It’s gorgeous,” I said, about to pull it on, until he took it from my hand and slid it onto my wrist.

“Suits you,” he said quietly, before turning away and opening the car door.

I let out a breath, my skin still warm where he’d touched me.

Security was tight. Now that I knew what to look for, I spotted private security contractors in tailored black suits standing discreetly near the entrance while museum staff with earpieces and tablets ticked off guests as they went in.

Dante stepped onto the red carpet first. Immediately, I felt the atmosphere shift. Even among New York’s elite, he carried a kind of presence that made people stare or move aside. Danger clung to him as naturally as the black tailored tux stretched across his broad shoulders.

Then his hand closed around mine. It was warm and possessive, and made my pulse skip a beat. I knew it was for appearances, but that didn’t change the tingle I felt up my arm.

Together we climbed the steps toward the entrance.

As I’d expected, Dante didn’t show his ticket stub. The door attendant just nodded and opened the velvet rope so we could pass.

Inside, the vast rotunda had been transformed for the gala. Soft amber lighting spilled across the museum’s iconic spiral walkways while a string quartet played somewhere overhead, the music drifting down through the open space.

Servers in matching uniforms circulated with trays of champagne beneath towering floral arrangements of white orchids and dark crimson roses.

New York high society was out in force tonight.

Art collectors mingled beside tech billionaires and old-money financiers while actresses in couture gowns posed for photographs beside contemporary installations.

I noticed a few famous faces roaming through the crowd, surrounded by investors, curators, socialites, and the kind of obscenely wealthy people who treated seven-figure art purchases like casual shopping trips.

Dante draped my hand over his arm. I could feel the hard muscle tense underneath the fabric of his sleeve. He wasn’t as relaxed as he made out. Together, we surveyed the exhibition floor beyond the cocktail reception area.

The featured works had been arranged gallery-style around the lower rotunda, each piece dramatically lit against charcoal partition walls. Monumental abstract canvases hung beside sleek contemporary sculptures and mixed-media installations designed to provoke more conversation than understanding.

But everyone’s attention kept gravitating toward the centerpiece.

At the far end of the exhibition space, mounted alone beneath focused white light, hung Elias Varela’s Nocturne in Red.

The enormous oil painting dominated the room. Violent crimson brushstrokes collided with deep blacks and fractured gold-leaf textures, creating something both beautiful and unsettling. From a distance it looked abstract, but the closer we moved, the more shapes seemed to emerge from the chaos. Smoke. Fire. Bodies. Ruin.