Chapter 1

Mom died at 11:32 PM on a Tuesday, and seventeen minutes later, I found a bleeding stranger in the hospital stairwell.

I was carrying her stuff—an old guitar and a notebook full of half-written songs—down to my car. My eyes were so blurry with tears I could barely see the steps. The stairwell lights were half-broken, just the green EXIT signs flickering in the dark.

Then I heard breathing. Heavy, painful, like someone trying really hard not to scream.

I wiped my eyes and saw him—a tall figure hunched against the wall on the landing below. Blood-soaked bandages wrapped around his head. His expensive suit was ripped to shreds, exposing cuts all over his chest.

"Help..." His voice came out raspy and desperate. "Please... don't call anyone... just hide me..."

I should've run. Any sane person would've run.

But Mom had died alone in that room upstairs, and the doctor said if someone had caught her symptoms earlier, maybe she'd still be alive. I kept thinking—what if someone had been there for her?

So I knelt down, my hands shaking. "Are you okay? Should I get a doctor?"

"No doctors." He grabbed my wrist so hard it hurt. "They'll find me... they'll kill me..."

His eyes were covered by the bandages, but I could feel his fear. Real, bone-deep terror.

"Who's 'they'?" I whispered.

"I don't know." His voice cracked. "I can't remember... anything..."

That's when I heard footsteps pounding up the stairs below us, voices shouting about finding "Sterling." Whoever this guy was, people were hunting him.

I made a decision I'd probably regret.

"Can you walk?" I asked.

He nodded.

I hauled him up—God, he was heavy—and half-dragged him back to Mom's room on the fifth floor. The nurses had just wheeled her body away. The room was empty, waiting to be cleaned.

I shoved him onto the bed and threw a hospital gown at him. "Change. Fast."

While he struggled with the gown, I stuffed his bloody suit into the trash bag with Mom's things. My hands were shaking so bad I could barely tie the knot.

A nurse walked in just as I pulled the blanket over him.

"Visiting hours are over," she said, eyeing us suspiciously.

"He's my boyfriend," I blurted out. "He just got here. Can he stay? Please?"

She looked exhausted, probably from the chaos downstairs. Some explosion at the Tony Awards had flooded the ER with casualties. "Fine. But keep it quiet."

The second she left, I collapsed into the chair. My heart was hammering so hard I thought I might throw up.

"Thank you," he said quietly. "What's your name?"

"Chloe. Chloe Carter."

"Chloe." He repeated it slowly, like he was trying to memorize it. "I'm... I don't know who I am."

I checked his ruined suit for clues. Brioni label—I Googled it. Five thousand dollars, minimum. In the pocket, I found a cufflink engraved with "AJS" and a backstage pass for the Tony Awards.

My phone buzzed with a news alert: "Tony Awards explosion injures dozens. Lighting malfunction suspected."

I scrolled down and my stomach dropped. A smaller headline read: "Sterling Entertainment heir Alexander Sterling feared dead in accident."

The photo showed a cold, impossibly handsome man in a tuxedo. I looked at the stranger in the hospital bed, then back at the photo.

Same sharp jawline. Same build.

"Oh my God," I whispered.

"What?" he asked.

"Nothing. Just... rest."

I couldn't tell him. Not yet. Not when I didn't understand what was happening.

The next morning, the hospital billing department cornered me. They wanted $12,847 for Mom's treatment. The funeral home needed another $6,500 for the cheapest package.

I had $47.82 in my checking account.

I went back to the room and just... broke down. I'd been holding it together all night, but suddenly everything crashed over me. Mom was gone. I was broke. I'd hidden a maybe-dead billionaire in a hospital room. What was I doing?

"How much do you need?"

I looked up. He was sitting up in bed, still blindfolded, but his voice was steady.

"What?"

"I don't know who I am," he said, "but I know I'm rich. I can feel it." He held out the cufflink. "Take this. Sell it. It should cover what you need."

"I can't—"

"You saved my life, Chloe. Let me save you back."

I sold it at a pawn shop in Midtown for $25,000. Paid for Mom's funeral. Paid the hospital. Had enough left for two months' rent.

That afternoon, the hospital needed the room. I snuck him out the back entrance and into an Uber.

"Where are we going?" he asked as we pulled away.

"My apartment in Brooklyn. It's tiny, but it's safe."

"Thank you." His hand found mine in the dark. "I owe you everything."

"You don't owe me anything," I said. "Let's just... survive this together. Okay?"

"Okay. Together."

As we crossed the bridge into Brooklyn, my phone lit up with another news alert: "Breaking: Alexander Sterling confirmed dead. Sterling Entertainment heir, 28, leaves behind $2 billion empire..."

I glanced at the man beside me, then at the photo in the article.

Same person. Definitely the same person.

But someone wanted him dead. Someone had made the world think he was dead.

And I'd just brought him home.

What the hell had I gotten myself into?