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FIVE

I turned down Joel’s offer to stay with hiht of sleep in , the future was a wash of confusing blacktoI hadn’tto Rafiq’s proposition Once I started to count up the aed to his platinu safely in my own purse next to the front door, relaxation finally fell over et some sleep

The gentle et all about the troubles infor my phone, and saw I had a text froers pulled it up

Hello Evangeline My penthouse is located at 126 Riverview Drive Coreater detail Reh the week

Checking the ti that I would join hi that the door me

Nerves afire and butterflies tossing aroundroutine despite how un-routine thistruly was After allery checked that there were no voicemails on the landline from any clients

Then, I sat doith er and calculator and very, very carefully tallied up the grand total of what Rafiq would be charged for purchasing the art I couldn’t believe the nu back at me, and checked it another five times before I finally let myself cry a few tears of relieved happiness I wrote up an invoice for him, and texted him a photo of it for approval

Wonderful We can ements for delivery today, too I veryyou

He didn’t complain about the price—he didn’t even seem to have noticed it I shook my head in disbelief and, with every I dotted and T crossed, charged his seely limitless platinum card for the full a like an idiot, the weight of the world suddenly having been lifted fro ere closed for the day due to personal business, and returned upstairs to finish polishing my look

Skihed I had no idea what to wear to le issue of Cosmo had prepared me for this eventuality

A royal blue dress ht my eye, and I decided to pair it with a tan calfskin belt and randmother’s diamond necklace coth ood mixture of professional and attractive I had no idea what to expect, but professionalism seemed like a safe choice

It didn’t takefor my stay at Rafiq’s I selected a blend of casual and professional outfits I had no idea what kind of activities ould be engaging in, so I tried to pack for as many eventualities as possible I stuffed toiletries into ood measure

The taxi I flagged took me to a part of the city I had never been to, except h on the way to somewhere I could actually afford to be It was a district of billionaire sky rises, open-air upscale malls, and parks so manicured, they didn’t look real The vie by the , and with every passingseem all the more surreal

I stepped onto the curb next to a glittering glass penthouse toith 126that stretched out to protect residents froet to the door, a well-dressed h the dark glass doors to greet me

“Miss Pryce?” he asked, extending a white-gloved hand my direction

“Yes,” I said

“The Sheikh is expecting you Allow me to escort you up”