Izzy_Star_3112

✦ SYNOPSIS ✦

Title: His Cunning Smile

Zayden Vale is everything the world worships—powerful, wealthy, and devastatingly charming. His easy smile fools the public, but those who work under him know the truth. Beneath the kindness lies a calculating mind, a heart made of stone, and a narcissist who believes no one is worth his time. Nicknamed “The Fox,” Zayden destroys competitors with a smile on his face and never lets anyone close enough to touch him.

Elara Blake is the daughter no one sees. The youngest in a family that only values power and image, she’s spent her life being ignored—shipped to distant schools, kept out of the spotlight, and treated like a placeholder. When her family needs a favor from Zayden Vale, they send her—not out of trust, but because she’s expendable.

But Zayden sees her. Not for what she can offer, but for the flicker in her eyes—the quiet fire, the silent defiance. She doesn’t worship him like others do. In fact, she challenges him without saying a word.

To him, she becomes a game.
To her, he becomes a danger she never saw coming.

What begins as a strategic alliance turns into a tangled web of secrets, manipulation, and desires neither of them expected.
And when a narcissist falls in love… he doesn’t fall.
He claims.

His Cunning Smile

The room was quiet, save for the soft scratch of Elara's pen across the notepad.

She sat cross-legged on her bed, scribbling ideas.

She was going to hit back harder. Not just a petty gift—no. She'd do something bigger. Something the media would never expect from "the girl who glared at Zayden Vale."

She tapped the pen against her lip, mind spinning.

A butler's voice: "Your father wishes to see you. In the study."

The study smelled like wood polish and smoke. Tall shelves lined the walls, filled with books no one in the family had ever read. Her father sat behind the massive desk, papers strewn in front of him, a crystal glass of something amber-colored in his hand.

"Sit," he said without looking up.

"Did you think your circus performance at the press conference wouldn't reach me?"

"You humiliated this family," he spat. "Your mother had to lie to her friends. Your sister refuses to leave the house."

"I said good," she repeated. "Maybe they'll finally understand what it feels like to be ashamed."

He reached for a silver paperweight—a heavy engraved one—and before she could react, he threw it.

Pain bloomed instantly. She staggered back, hand flying to her forehead.

She just stood there—straight and silent—with crimson slipping between her fingers.

He froze, suddenly aware of what he'd done.

She walked toward the door without a word.

And before leaving, she glanced back—expression calm, voice razor-sharp:

"You might control my last name. But you don't own me."

Back in her room, Clara gasped the second she saw her.

Elara sat down quietly on the edge of the bed, her hand still pressed gently to her brow.

"It's fine," she whispered. "Just a scratch."

Clara fetched the first-aid kit immediately, working with shaking hands as she cleaned the wound.

But Elara was far away—mentally flipping through her idea list again.

And if Zayden Vale thought he'd met his match?

Chapter 17: Bruised, Not Broken