Page 133 of The Plus One Contract

She doesn’t move, doesn’t deny it because it’s too late to deny anything.

And yeah, maybe we can’t do a damn thing about the heartbreak waiting for us, but I’ll be damned if I let her walk out of here thinking she was just a fling, just a headache, just a week-long arrangement.

My grip tightens.

Her cheeks are flushed, hair wild, lips swollen from last night.

Christ, how am I supposed to walk away from this?

I brush a thumb over her jaw. “I don’t want you acting like this was some chore. You were never an obligation.”

“It was supposed to be a transaction. Right?”

“Fuck transactions,” I say, voice gone rough. “Maybe it was at first, but then you…” I swallow hard. “You turned it into something else.”

Sienna’s eyes glisten, a flicker of hope or heartbreak or both. My mind spins with words I should never say, words likestay,don’t let me leave,I need you in ways that terrify me,but I can’t speak them because I am who I am, and commitment isn’t in my vocabulary, right?

For this moment, at least, I can hold her. So I do. Sliding a hand up her spine, burying it in the messy strands of her hair, pressing her against me.

We stay like that, time stretching, the morning sun drifting higher, each tick of the clock a reminder of how little is left. She grips my arms like she’s bracing for a crash, and I realize that’s exactly what this is.

It’s a slow-motion wreck.

Finally, she tips her head back, eyes searching mine. “Nathan.” Her voice trembles.

I slide my hand along her jaw, letting my fingers slip behind her ear. “Yeah?”

Her lips move, but no words come out. Instead, she just exhales, leaning in, mouth brushing mine in a slow, tentative kiss. It’s different from last night—no desperation, no rough edges—just pure, quiet longing that says everything we can’t say.

I kiss her back, letting her taste me, letting me taste the finality in her trembling sigh. The world shrinks to just us, hearts pounding in sync, bodies clinging to a moment that can’t last.

When we part, her eyes gleam with tears she won’t shed. I press my forehead to hers, forcing out a breath. “We still have a few hours.”

She nods, swallowing thickly. “A few hours.”

Neither of us says what we both know.

A few hours to pretend we’re not leaving each other.

Forty-Eight

Sienna

The zipper on my suitcase hums through the quiet room, finalizing what I’ve been avoiding for the last two hours. I keep my head down, focused on the last of my things, refusing to look at the man standing in the other room. The man who is fully dressed. The man who is leaving.

We already agreed that I’d ride home with my parents since Nathan needs to catch his flight. It made sense. Logical.

That’s all this was supposed to be, a temporary arrangement. A deal. One week. Then real life.

I swallow past the lump in my throat and smooth my hands over the fabric of my suitcase, like if I concentrate hard enough on something tangible, I can avoid the ache in my chest. But it’s not the luggage that doesn’t feel real. It’s him. It’s that I let myself get tangled up in something I was never supposed to touch. I broke my own damn contract: no post fake-dating emotions, no getting attached, no wondering what it’d be like to stretch this out beyond the flimsy boundaries of our napkin deal.

I exhale slowly, forcing my shoulders to relax before I do something stupid, like cry.

Then I feel the weight of his stare.

I look up. He’s standing in the doorway, back in his signature suit, composed and put together. Every inch of him a man who already has one foot out the door.

But his eyes? His eyes aren’t leaving, not yet. He’s just watching me, hands in his pockets, his bag by the sofa, packed and waiting.

---