She carried a silver tray with a bottle of San Pellegrino—sparkling, of course. Tap water was for the help, and we weren't the help. But I barely registered the water.

She was… a fucking masterpiece.

Late twenties, maybe thirty. A stunning mix of ethnicities that gave her light brown skin and features both delicate and strong enough to cut glass.

Her hair was a wild cloud of natural curls pulled into a high ponytail that bounced with every step. Her body was a mathematical impossibility—curves so obscene they made the word 'hourglass' feel inadequate, with an athletic musculature visible through a professional dress that managed to be both office-appropriate and a declaration of pure, unadulterated sin.

One of Catherine's girls. No question. The advance scout, sent to get a preliminary read on the new asset.

She set the tray on the coffee table with a liquid, practiced grace that spoke of hours spent training her body to be a perfect instrument of pleasure. Then she straightened and met my eyes head-on.

"Eros Velmior Desiderion," she said. Not a question, but a statement of fact. Her voice had a faint, exotic accent I couldn't quite place—Haitian, maybe? Jamaican? "I'm Sienna. Catherine asked me to keep you company while she finishes up."

"Thoughtful of her," I said, letting a little of the Taboo Aura hum in the space between us.

"She's very," Sienna replied, settling onto the couch opposite me with a fluidity that was both a invitation and a challenge, "very thoughtful."

Her eyes swept over me, an assessment that was at once clinically professional and ravenously hungry. "You're younger than I expected."

"Disappointed?"

"Intrigued," she purred. "Catherine doesn't recruit often. When she does, it's because she's found something… exceptional."

The Lust Presence pulsed, a gentle wave of pure, uncut desire. I watched her body respond with a scientist's fascination. Pupils dilating. Breath deepening. One hand moving up to toy with the sensitive skin of her neck, an unconscious gesture of pure surrender.

She noticed her own reaction. A slow, hungry smile spread across her lips. "And you're very, very good at what you do. Apparently."

"I haven't done anything."

"Exactly," she breathed, crossing her legs with a deliberate slowness that made her skirt ride up just enough to be a promise. "You've been in the room for ninety seconds and I'm already calculating angles. That's not just talent. That's power."

"You always this direct?"

"Honey," she laughed, "in this business, coyness is for amateurs. We're all selling the same thing: world-class orgasms delivered with a smile. Wasting time on euphemisms is bad for business."

I liked her. No games. No pretense. Just the brutal, beautiful honesty of a professional.

"How long have you worked for Meridian?" I asked.

"Four years. Started as a legit model—still do the occasional high-fashion catalog—but the private work pays better and, honestly? It's more fucking satisfying. Spend twelve hours on a set getting the light just right, or spend two hours making a CEO so happy she cries and doubles your fee as a tip? Not a tough choice."

"Catherine train you herself?"

"Oh, yeah. Personally. She trains everyone. Three months minimum before they let you anywhere near a client. You learn the obvious—technique, how to read bodies, which positions make which types of women lose their goddamn minds. But you also learn the real skills. Conversation. Emotional intelligence. How to figure out what a woman needs, not what she thinks she wants."

Sienna leaned forward, her elbows on her knees, her gaze a physical weight that felt like it was stripping me bare, layer by layer.

"You're seventeen," she stated, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper.

"Occasionally," I confirmed.

"The youngest she's ever recruited," she said, her dark, knowing eyes tracing the line of my jaw, the pulse in my throat. "Any theories on why she's breaking her own rules?"

"You're the evaluation, aren't you?" I countered with a grin. "You tell me."

Her laugh was a rich, throaty sound that made my cock twitch. "Smart, too. Good. Yes, I'm your first exam. Catherine wanted one of her best to give her an honest, unfiltered read before you sat for the interview."

"And?" I let the word hang in the air, thick with challenge.

"And..." Sienna stood, moving with the predatory grace of a panther closing in for the kill. My auras roared to life between us, and I watched the war in her eyes—the professional composure that was her armor trying, and failing, to hold back the tidal wave of pure, primal instinct.

Her body swayed toward mine, a magnetic pull she couldn't resist.

She leaned down, her hands gripping the armrests of my chair, caging me in, her face just inches from mine. Her expensive perfume—a floral scent with dark, musky undertones of vanilla and sex—invaded my senses. I could see the gold flecks in her chocolate-brown eyes, feel the heat radiating off her skin.

"And I think Catherine is about to learn that age is just a number, and you are a force of fucking nature," she whispered, each word a confession meant only for me.

"I've been doing this for four years, Eros. I've been with dozens of men—clients, not boyfriends—who paid twenty grand for a two-hour slice of heaven. Men with skills, with experience, who knew how to make a woman see God." Her breath hitched, a tiny, betraying sound. "And in ninety seconds of just sitting near you, breathing the same air, I am wetter than I have been with ninety-five percent of them in a full-on, two-hour session. You do not make a woman see a god, you're a god

"And all that without even touching me!"

She straightened, stepping back with a visible effort, her professional mask slamming back into place, though I could see the cracks spreading through it. "So, my assessment for Catherine? You're either going to be Meridian's single greatest asset, or its most magnificent, cataclysmic disaster. Maybe both at the same time."

Before I could reply, the door swung open again.

A different woman stood framed in the doorway. Older, perhaps fifty, but aging like a myth—refined, potent, more powerful with every passing year. Silver-blonde hair cut in a razor-sharp bob.

A tailored pantsuit that whispered of five-figure price tags and bespoke tailoring. A presence that didn't just command the room but owned it, lock, stock, and barrel.

Catherine Reynolds.

Madison's aunt. The queen of this particular castle. The woman who'd built a fifty-million-dollar empire on a divorce settlement and an exquisite understanding of what powerful, lonely women secretly craved in the dark.

Her sharp eyes took in the entire scene in a nanosecond: me, relaxed and radiating power in my chair; Sienna, flushed and vibrating with residual energy like a plucked violin string; the electrified air that still crackled between us.

"Sienna. Thank you. Your assessment?" Catherine's voice was cool, measured.

"Recruit him. Now. Before someone else does."

Catherine's eyebrow arched in a perfect, skeptical curve. "That definitive?"

"You sent me to evaluate presence and impact," Sienna said, her voice steady even if her body wasn't. "He has more presence sitting still than any men have while actively trying to dominate a room. Every woman in this building is going to feel him the moment he steps out of it. Including you." She moved toward the door, pausing to deliver her final, fatal blow. "Especially you."

Then she was gone, the click of the door sealing her verdict.

Catherine studied me in a silence that stretched, thin and sharp as razor wire. Her expression was a masterclass in unreadable. Finally: "Eros Velmior Desiderion. A rather… ambitious name."

"Comes with the territory," I shot back, meeting her laser-like gaze without so much as a blink.

"Victoria, Anya, and Ortega speak very highly of you," she continued, circling my chair slowly, a shark assessing a potential rival. "Though I'll admit, when those three informed me a seventeen-year-old wanted to work as a professional escort, my first instinct was to call security rather than my headhunter."

Sixteen. Is it forbidden to say my real age or something?

"And now?"

Her lips curved into a faint, appreciative smile. "Now I understand why Sienna just gave the strongest recommendation in her four-year career."

Catherine stopped directly in front of me, and I felt her will push back against the Taboo Aura—not immunity, but a practiced, disciplined control born from decades of mastering power and submission.

"You have something," she said softly. "Charisma is too weak a word. Presence is insufficient. It's like…" She paused, her eyes drifting down my body before returning to mine. "Like standing too close to a fire. You can feel the heat, you know you'll get burned, but you can't bring yourself to step away."

"Is that a problem?"

"That depends entirely," she said, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper, "on whether you can control the fire." She settled onto the couch Sienna had just vacated, crossing her legs with a precision that was both elegant and a warning.

"My clients are powerful women, Eros. They are accustomed to being in control of everything. They pay premium, exorbitant prices for the experience of safely surrendering that control. But safely is the operative word. They need to trust that you will not abuse the power dynamic, that you will not expose them, and that you will not become a liability."

She leaned forward, her voice dropping even further, wrapping around us both in a cocoon of conspiracy. "So let's skip the bullshit, shall we? Let's talk about what working for Meridian truly entails. And more importantly… let's talk about what you're truly capable of."

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