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Chapter 625
Chapter 625:
She looked like power. Like old money and new fury. Like something forged in fire that had emerged sharper for the burning.
Easton tucked her hand into the crook of his arm. His suit was the same shade of gray as her dress, his tie a shade darker. They matched, they complemented, and they announced without a word that they had arrived together.
The photographers recovered first. Shutters exploded into a continuous roar, light bursting in white flowers across June’s vision. She did not blink. She did not smile. She walked.
“Dr. Erickson! Is it true you’ve been appointed to the White House advisory panel p>
“Mr. Hahn! Is this your first public appearance with a companion p>
𝖲𝖺𝗏e 𝗒оu𝘳 𝗳а𝘃о𝗿𝘪𝘁e 𝗻𝗼v𝗲l𝗌 oո
“Dr. Erickson — a statement on the Beasley bankruptcy p>
Her stride did not falter. Her fingers rested lightly on Easton’s forearm, relaxed, her posture that of a woman born to this world who had simply taken a brief hiatus from it.
They reached the entrance. The doorman — a man who had worked at The Pierre for thirty years and had witnessed every variety of arrival, from the triumphant to the tragic — bowed deeply.
“Dr. Erickson. Mr. Hahn. Mr. Astor is expecting you p>
They passed through the revolving doors. The noise of the street cut off as if a switch had been thrown. Here was marble and crystal, the hush of expensive shoes on expensive floors, the distant sound of a string quartet tuning in the ballroom.
Easton’s thumb moved against her hand — a small, private pressure.
“Relax,” he murmured, his lips barely moving. “The prey will arrive soon enough p>
June turned her head and looked at him — at the clean line of his jaw, the gray eyes that held no judgment, only absolute and unwavering focus — and she smiled. Not the smile she wore for cameras. Something smaller, private. The smile of two people sharing a secret that could destroy worlds.
A photographer caught it from across the lobby. The flash was distant and unimportant.
They moved toward the ballroom.
The doors were twenty feet high, gilt and mahogany, already open to admit the stream of guests. As June and Easton approached, the conversation inside seemed to stutter. Heads turned. Eyes widened.
June Erickson — the scientist who had humiliated Alycia Beasley at the Global Summit, the woman who had been married to Cole Compton and had emerged not merely intact but transformed. And Easton Hahn — the lawyer who had never been photographed with a companion, who was rumored to be ruthless enough to make judges weep, who had dismantled corporations with a single filing.
Together. Matching. Unsmiling and absolutely, terrifyingly composed.
They entered the ballroom.
The string quartet played something baroque — all precision and no passion. The room was a sea of gray and black and occasional flashes of jewel tone, filled with faces that appeared in financial newspapers, on museum boards, and in the social registers that still mattered.
June accepted a glass of champagne from a passing waiter. She did not drink. Her eyes moved across the crowd, cataloging, searching.
There.