His Unwanted Fiancé Is A Genius Heiress

The blinding Manhattan morning sun sliced through the gaps in the heavy blackout curtains, hitting Karmen's face like a physical blow.

She flinched, her eyelids heavy with the toxic residue of cheap champagne and forced smiles. Her mouth tasted like copper and ash.

Without opening her eyes, Karmen shifted on the massive mattress. She reached out to stretch her cramped muscles. Her fingertips brushed against something solid. An unexpectedly warm expanse of skin.

It was a chest. Hard, rigid muscle wrapped in taut skin.

Her heart slammed against her ribs, a violent thud that sent a rush of ice-cold adrenaline straight to her fingertips.

Karmen's eyes snapped open.

Less than two feet away lay Earl Calderon. His face, usually a mask of terrifying corporate calculation, was relaxed in sleep. The sharp line of his jaw, the straight nose, the dark lashes resting against his cheek-it was a face that commanded boardrooms and destroyed rivals.

The memories of last night's engagement party crashed into her skull. The flashing cameras. The nauseating toasts. The forced proximity to maintain the illusion of this grotesque business merger.

Karmen immediately looked down at her own body. Panic clawed at her throat.

The oversized, custom-tailored men's dress shirt was still fully buttoned to her collarbone. Beneath it, the tight, suffocating compression binder gripped her ribs, flattening her chest into a masculine plane. Everything was intact.

She let out a breath she didn't realize she was holding. Her lungs burned.

She needed to get out of this bed. Now.

Karmen shifted her weight, pressing her palms into the mattress to silently slide toward the edge.

A single mattress spring groaned. A microscopic sound.

Earl's thick eyebrows snapped together.

Before Karmen could freeze, his eyes opened. There was no morning haze in his gray-blue irises. Only absolute, freezing hostility. They locked onto Karmen like a predator calculating a kill.

Earl didn't move his body, but his gaze dragged across Karmen's face. A flicker of profound, somatic disgust instantly crossed his features, his throat bobbing as if holding back bile. His eyes then stopped abruptly on her left cheek. Right where the grotesque, jagged silicone scar stretched from her cheekbone to her jawline. The fake remnant of a car crash that defined her twin brother's ruined life only amplified his relentless contempt.

He threw the heavy duvet off his body and stood up in one violently fluid motion. He was fully dressed in his trousers and a wrinkled dress shirt. His massive height instantly swallowed Karmen in a dark, suffocating shadow.

"Don't flatter yourself, Kem," Earl's voice was a low, gravelly rasp that vibrated in the quiet room. "Last night was for the press. If you ever think about crossing that line, I will break your neck."

Karmen's fingernails dug so hard into her palms that she felt the skin break. The humiliation burned like acid in her stomach.

But she couldn't be Karmen right now. She had to be Kem. The useless, scarred, degenerate playboy.

She forced her