The Billionaire's Substitute: Her Final Escape

Elease pushed open the heavy walnut doors of the Manhattan penthouse. The dim lighting in the foyer obscured her vision for a split second, but when her eyes adjusted, her heart slammed violently against her ribs.

Brogan was sitting on the genuine leather sofa in the center of the living room. He was supposed to be in London for another week.

The shock of seeing him sent a sharp, involuntary squeeze through her chest.

He didn't stand up to greet her. Instead, he tossed a thick document onto the glass coffee table. The heavy paper bore the gold-foil crest of the Walton Group's legal department. The sound of the paper sliding across the glass sliced through the dead silence of the room.

Elease swallowed hard, forcing down the dull, throbbing ache radiating from her breastbone.

She tried to stretch her lips into a welcoming smile and took a step forward.

Brogan raised his hand. His palm faced her, a rigid, unyielding stop sign that froze her in her tracks.

"We are terminating the non-disclosure companionship contract," Brogan said. He had taken her in when she was a nobody from the orphanage with a fabricated genetic defect rumor hanging over her head, and this contract was the ultimate, cruel reminder of her purely transactional existence.

His voice was entirely flat. There was no hesitation, no inflection. It was the exact tone he used when liquidating a failing asset.

The glass of water Elease had been holding tilted. Warm water splashed over her knuckles. A somatic, icy chill started at the base of her neck and rapidly spread down her spine, freezing the blood in her veins.

Brogan reached into the inner pocket of his tailored suit jacket. He pulled out a Montblanc fountain pen and pressed it precisely onto the signature line of the document. The motion was so fluid it looked rehearsed.

Deep inside Elease's chest, a familiar, tearing sensation erupted. It was the severe, psychosomatic angina-a physical manifestation of the intense psychological trauma and the suffocating rumors about her supposed genetic defect that had been weaponized against her for years.

She bit down on her lower lip so hard she tasted copper, desperately trapping the groan of pain in her throat.

Brogan's eyes flicked to her pale face. His brow furrowed, the corners of his mouth tightening in obvious annoyance. He thought she was weaponizing her tears to guilt him.

Elease caught that flash of disgust in his dark eyes.

Her remaining pride kicked in, forcing the moisture back into her tear ducts. She relaxed her facial muscles, pasting on a mask of total indifference.

"If you sign this now, the severance package is three times the total amount you've received over the past five years," Brogan offered, throwing out the bait. He was trying to buy his way out of a messy goodbye.

The angina was getting worse. The pain was a physical weight crushing her lungs.

To hide her struggle to breathe, Elease dragged a heavy dining