The world narrowed down to the pressure of his lips against mine.
This wasn't like the clumsy kiss of our teenage years. It tasted of expensive scotch, and a decade of buried resentment.
For a second, my brain short-circuited. My hands, which should have been pushing him away, hovered indecisively near his chest, clutching the lapels of the jacket he had just draped over me.
Then, the oxygen returned to my lungs, and with it, my sanity.
I shoved his chest, hard. "What the hell was that?" I gasped, my chest heaving. My lips felt branded, tingling with a heat that the Los Angeles breeze couldn't touch.
Adrian didn't even stumble. He just stood there, looking completely unbothered, though his eyes were darker than they had been a minute ago.
He reached out, his thumb grazing his own lower lip as if checking for a stray trace of my lipstick.
"Consider it a rehearsal," he said, his voice dropping into that gravelly register. "I'll be doing that a lot once the cameras are on us. Just reminding your lips of the taste of mine so you don't look like a startled deer on our wedding day."
Oh.
I was speechless. My mouth opened and closed, but only indignant splutters came out. "You.….you arrogant, manipulative..."
"Richard will take you home," he interrupted smoothly, checking his watch as if he hadn't just upended my internal compass. "You'll move into the estate tomorrow. My grandmother is already coordinating the ceremony for Monday. It'll be small, private, but legally ironclad."
"Monday? That's.…..that's just three days from now!"
"Time is money, Alex. And right now, you're costing me both." He gave me one last, unreadable look. "Goodnight, Alex."
"Goodnight," I managed to whisper, retreating to the safety of the Maybach before he could see my ears turning a vivid shade of scarlet.
~
"So... let me get this straight," Penelope said the next morning, leaning against my kitchen counter as she watched me throw my life into two battered suitcases. "You went for a the interview I got you, slapped the CEO, told his butler to shove it, and now you're marrying him on Monday?"
"Summarized like that, it sounds like a mental breakdown," I groaned, folding a pair of jeans.
Penelope and I had been friends since my second year of college. She was the "rich kid" who didn't act like one, mostly because she spent her trust fund on indie art projects and bail for protesters. She had always been my anchor when my mother's drama threatened to pull me under.
"It's fifteen million dollars, Penny. I can pay off the loans. I can get Mom into a real facility. I can.….I can breathe again."
"And you have to live with a guy who looks like a literal underwear model but acts like a glacier," Penelope added, helping me zip a suitcase. "It's a tough life, babe."
"Yeah. Tell me about it."
~
By 2:00 PM, we were at the Reyes Estate. "Estate" was an understatement. It was a fortress of glass and white stone perched on a hill, overlooking the city like it was a peasant.
A legion of staff moved my meager belongings into a wing that was larger than my entire apartment building.
Adrian was nowhere to be found.
"He's at the office," a maid informed me. "He said you should 'make yourself at home, but don't touch the art.'"
"Charming as always," I muttered. Penelope shoved me. "Play nice." She whispered, and I rolled my eyes.
After Penelope left, the silence of the house began to itch. I didn't even have his phone number. I had to text Penelope to get it, then spent twenty minutes staring at the "Add Contact" screen.
I considered texting him to ask when he would be back, then promptly threw my phone across the bed. No, Alexandra. Don't be that girl. He is a business transaction, not a boyfriend.
By 9:00 PM, I was restless. I had spent the evening wandering the halls like a ghost. I had changed into a comfortable pair of shorts and a sports bra, my hair pulled into a messy top-knot. I was in the middle of brushing my teeth, wandering toward what I thought was a storage room, when I pushed open a pair of heavy doors.
It was a gym. A professional-grade, high-tech gym.
Whoa.
He had a gym in here?
Of course he did.
I walked inside, mesmerized by the rows of weights. I reached out to touch a chrome dumbbell, wondering if I could burn off some of this nervous energy.
"Hoping to gain some muscles?"
I yelped, nearly dropping the weight on my toes. I spun around, my toothbrush still clutched in my hand like a weapon.
Adrian was standing by the squat rack. He looked like sin personified. He was drenched in sweat, his black dress shirt discarded on a bench. He was wearing black trousers, his skin glistening under the recessed lighting. His sleeves were rolled up past his elbows, revealing veins tracing down his forearms that made my mouth go dry.
"I.….I didn't know you were back," I stammered.
His eyes didn't stay on my face. They drifted down, tracing the line of my collarbone to the swell of my chest visible in the sports bra.
"Eyes up here, fucker," I snapped, though my voice lacked its usual bite.
"Am I supposed to refuse what is blatantly being offered?" Adrian countered, folding his arms across his chest. The movement made his biceps bulge in a way that should have been illegal.
"I wasn't offering anything! I thought I was alone in this mausoleum!"
He stepped closer, the scent of sweat and expensive soap hitting me. "Hmm. And did that bother you? Being alone?"
I shook my head incredulously. "You are still so incredibly arrogant. Does it ever get exhausting, being this full of yourself?"
Adrian stopped just a few feet away. His eyes dropped to my lips again, and for a second, the gym felt ten degrees hotter.
"You're still eye-fucking me," I whispered, repeating my words from dinner. "Even if you deny it."
"Is that what you would want, Alex?" he whispered back, leaning down so his lips were level with my ear. "To get on a bed with me? To see if I'm as 'stoney' as you think?"
I felt a shiver run down my spine that had nothing to do with the air conditioning. "No," I hissed, forcing myself to look him in the eye. "I loathe you. I despise everything you stand for."
He didn't flinch. He just stared into my eyes, his expression unreadable. "Good. The feeling is mutual."
He straightened up, the heat between us snapping like a broken wire. "My grandmother will be here at ten tomorrow morning. She's taking you shopping for the wedding dress and the gala circuit. Try not to be a simpleton. We have an image to maintain."
Without another word, he turned and disappeared through a side door, leaving me alone in the gym with my heart racing and my toothbrush still in my hand.
"Argh, fuck!" I groaned, kicking a yoga mat.
"Damn it, Adrian. Damn it all to hell."