Gabrielle Serenity was twenty years old, heiress of Serenity Resorts. She had grown up in silk and crystal, with staff who bowed when she entered and strangers who only ever saw her as the granddaughter of an empire. But Gabrielle wasn’t content with being just a polished name in the luxury world. For one year, she traded ballrooms for sterile hallways, chandeliers for fluorescent lights. She became a rookie nurse at St. Armand’s Hospital — the most expensive, most prestigious medical facility in the city.
Officially, it was to gain “experience” for her résumé. Something her family’s PR team could polish into a story of humility and dedication. Unofficially, Gabrielle was searching for something else. For reality. For discipline. For proof that she could be more than an heiress in designer shoes.
But hospitals were nothing like hotels, and she was reminded of that every day by the man who despised her most.
Dr. Adrian Veyrac. Head doctor. Her instructor. A man carved of sharp lines and sharper words, whose reputation in the hospital was as cold and exacting as the steel of his surgical tools. He didn’t hide his disdain. In fact, he seemed to savor it. Where others whispered about her privilege, Adrian cut her down openly. He hated her — not quietly, not subtly, but with a venom that made every shift feel like a battlefield.
The first week, she had felt his gaze on her constantly. By the second, it became unbearable. And by the third, it finally broke through in a way she would never forget.
Gabrielle stood at the bedside of a middle-aged man, pale and gaunt, his scalp bald from months of chemotherapy. She adjusted the IV bag with trembling concentration, determined to get it right. She glanced down at him, offering a soft, automatic smile.
"One more thing, then I’ll be out of your hair," she said gently.
The words slipped out before she realized the cruelty of them. The patient gave her a small, tired smile anyway, too kind to correct her.
But the silence behind her wasn’t kind.
"Out of his hair?"
Gabrielle froze. Her stomach dropped. Slowly, she turned her head.
Dr. Adrian Veyrac stood in the doorway, arms crossed, eyes locked on her like a hawk dissecting prey. His voice was low, but sharp enough to slice through the room.
"That’s rich, Gabby."
Her cheeks flamed, but she didn’t move, didn’t speak.
Adrian stepped forward, closer, until the air itself seemed to shrink around them. "You walk into the room of a man who’s lost every strand on his head to chemo, and that’s what comes out of your mouth? Do you even think before you open that pretty little mouth of yours, or are you so used to people laughing politely at whatever nonsense you say?"
The patient closed his eyes, drifting, too weak to intervene. Gabrielle swallowed hard, trying to focus on finishing the task under the weight of his stare.
Veyrac leaned just enough for his words to burn into her ear, voice cruel and low. "This isn’t one of your grandmother’s hotels, Gabby. A wrong word here cuts deeper than any mistake with your hands. Remember that… before you kill someone with your ignorance."
Gabrielle’s grip on the IV line tightened. She blinked back the sting of humiliation, her pride and shame warring inside her chest.
And he just watched her, cold, merciless, daring her to break.