Page 12 of Bossh*le Daddy
But I needed him to repeat himself. Needed subtitles and sign language and possibly a medical examination to confirm I hadn't just had a stroke. The Albrecht Gala. With him. As his . . . what? The implications crashed over me in waves, each more impossible than the last.
"I need a date to keep the wolves at bay." His tone shifted, becoming conversational in that dangerous way that meant every word was calculated. "Everyone knows my ex-fiancée left me high and dry in February—and my competitors smell blood."
February. Four months ago. I'd read about it in those gossip blogs, the socialite who'd called him emotionally unavailable before very publicly taking up with a senator's son. The headlines had been vicious:Stone Cold: Billionaire's Heart Proves Too Frozen for Love.
"You'll play the doting fiancée for the cameras." He moved closer, each step measured, until I had to tilt my head back to maintain eye contact. "Smile when they expect it. Laugh at my jokes. Look at me like I hung the moon. Standard performance."
Fiancée.
The word lodged in my throat like broken glass. Not date. Not companion.Fiancée.
"In exchange," he continued, studying my face with that penetrating gaze that missed nothing, "I'll add a . . . generous bonus to your next paycheck."
I knew I should ask how much. Should negotiate like someone with backbone and business sense. But all I could think was how I'd have to look at him like I loved him. How I'd have to pretend feelings that had been simmering beneath my skin since day one. How dangerous it would be to play at belonging to him when part of me already believed it.
"Unless," he added, and now that smirk appeared—that cruel curve of lips that meant he already knew he'd won, "you'd rather quit."
There it was. The ultimatum wrapped in silk. Play his perfect fiancée or lose everything. Pretend to adore him or go back to drowning in debt and failure. He knew exactly what he was doing, knew I couldn't afford to refuse, knew he had me trapped as surely as if he'd locked the door.
"I . . ." My voice cracked, and I swallowed hard. "Saturday night?"
"Black tie. I'll have something appropriate sent to your apartment." His gaze swept over my clearance-rack blouse with dismissive efficiency. "Can't have my fiancée showing up in Target's finest."
The casual cruelty of it burned, but underneath was something else. The way he saidmy fiancée, possessive and certain.
"Yes," I whispered, because what else could I say? "I'll do it."
His smile then was different from the smirk. Sharper. Hungrier. Like I'd just signed something more binding than any employment contract.
"Good girl," he murmured, and those two words sent heat spiraling through me despite every warning bell in my head. "Six o'clock sharp. Don't be late, little one."
He turned back to the windows, dismissal clear, and I fled on unsteady legs. Back at my desk, I stared at my trembling hands, trying to process what I'd just agreed to. In three days, I'd be Damian Stone's fake fiancée. Would wear his ring—God, wouldthere be a ring?—and his dress and his claim in front of everyone who mattered.
It was just pretend. Just a performance. Just another impossible task from an impossible man.
But as I touched my fingers to my lips, remembering that phantom moment when I thought he might touch me, I wondered which one of us I was trying to convince.
*
The mirror in my bathroom still had that crack running through it, but tonight it split my reflection into something I didn't recognize. Champagne silk clung to curves I usually hid under polyester and shame, the fabric whispering against my skin like a secret I wasn't supposed to know. The dress had arrived this morning, delivered by a stone-faced courier who'd required three forms of ID before releasing the black garment bag into my trembling hands.
Inside had been a handwritten card on stationery so thick it could have been carved from marble:Don't disappoint me. - D.S.
Like I needed the reminder. Like I hadn't spent the last three days in a state of controlled panic, imagining all the ways I could humiliate myself, him, or both of us at Manhattan's most exclusive social event. The dress itself had stolen my breath—designer label I couldn't pronounce, price tag conspicuously absent but radiating expense from every hand-sewn bead.
The slit ran dangerously high up my left thigh, revealing leg I'd frantically shaved three times to ensure smoothness. The neckline draped in a way that suggested rather than showed, elegant but somehow more provocative than outright exposure. When I moved, the fabric caught the light, turning me into something gilded and unreal.
I'd pinned my hair back with shaking fingers, leaving tendrils to frame my face because the YouTube tutorial had insisted it looked "effortlessly romantic." A thin ribbon—pale gold to match the dress—trailed down from the clip. My one rebellion, my tiny claim to self in all this performance.
My hands wouldn't stop trembling as I applied mascara for the fourth time, having already cried off three attempts while spiraling about everything that could go wrong. Would they know I didn't belong the moment I walked in? Would his ex be there, all sharp cheekbones and effortless sophistication, making my inadequacy obvious? Would I trip in these heels that cost more than my rent and land face-first in some Fortune 500 CEO's lap?
The buzz of my apartment intercom shot through me like electricity. 6:00 p.m. exactly. Of course.
"It's me." His voice through the speaker, just those two words, but they made my pulse race.
I buzzed him in with fingers that barely cooperated, then spent the eternal minute it took him to climb my five flights of stairs trying to remember how to breathe. Last check in the mirror—lipstick unsmudged, hair still pinned, dress still impossibly beautiful on my ordinary body.
The knock, when it came, was firm. Authoritative. Very him.
