The first thing I notice is the weight. Not physical, not really. It’s the quiet pressure of reality settling over me, heavy and inescapable, pressing down on my ribs until each breath feels deliberate. Sunlight slices through the gap in the curtains, painting a sharp gold line across the rumpled sheets. I don’t move. I don’t want to. Because if I shift, I’ll feel him. And if I feel him, I’ll have to acknowledge that he’s here.
Liam.
My stepsister. My fake fiancé. The man who’s spent the last three months pretending to love me in front of our families, in boardrooms, on red carpets, in the quiet spaces between press conferences and charity galas. The man who’s also been the only person who’s ever looked at me like I’m more than a convenient alibi.
His arm is draped across my waist. His breathing is even, deep, the kind of sleep that only comes when you’re completely at ease. Or completely exhausted. I trace the edge of the sheet with my thumb, staring at the ceiling, trying to piece together how we got here. The gala. The champagne. The way he’d pulled me into the balcony shadows when the music grew too loud, his hands on my hips, his voice a low murmur against my ear: *Tell me to stop.* And I hadn’t. I’d pressed closer. I’d let him. And then… God. Then everything blurred into heat and friction and the desperate, unspoken truth we’d been circling for weeks.
I should get up. I should roll out of bed, throw on a dress, walk out the door, and pretend last night never happened. That’s the smart move. That’s the move that keeps the contract intact, that keeps our families happy, that keeps me from unraveling completely.
But I don’t move.
Because before I can make a decision, Liam stirs.
A low groan escapes him as he shifts, his forearm sliding from my waist to rest against the mattress. His eyelids flutter open. For a second, he just stares at the ceiling. Then his gaze drifts down. To me. To the space between us. To the fact that I’m still wearing the black slip dress I’d changed into at midnight, though it’s wrinkled, twisted, the neckline falling dangerously low.
His breath catches. Just slightly. Just enough.
“Morning,” he says. His voice is rough, sleep-roughened, but he keeps it level. Controlled. The same tone he uses when closing a merger or shutting down a rival executive.
“Morning,” I echo. My voice sounds thinner than I want it to. I clear my throat. “You slept well.”
“Like a stone.” He finally turns his head, propping himself up on one elbow. His hair is a mess. Dark strands fall across his forehead, sticking slightly to his skin. He looks devastating. And entirely too calm.
He reaches for his phone on the nightstand. Taps it on. The screen lights up his face. He checks the time. Then he glances at me again, and I see it—the careful distance he’s building between us, brick by brick.
“We should talk about last night,” he says, rolling the words around like they’re still on trial. “Before it complicates things.”
My stomach drops. “It already has.”
He doesn’t flinch. “It was a mistake. A lapse in judgment. We were both tired. The champagne was strong. It doesn’t mean anything.”
“Nothing?” The word slips out sharper than I intend. I press my lips together, then release them. “You don’t get to decide that it meant nothing.”
He sits up fully now, the sheet pooling around his waist. His torso is pale, corded with muscle, a thin silver chain resting against his sternum. He doesn’t cover himself. Doesn’t pretend he’s not aware of how I’m looking. That’s the problem. He’s never pretended before. Not when we’re alone. Not when the cameras are off and the performance ends.
“Zoe,” he says, and my name sounds like a warning now. “We have a contract. A public relationship. Our families are relying on this. I can’t let a one-night thing derail the merger, the trust, everything we’ve built.”
“You’re talking like it’s a business deal,” I say, pushing myself up against the headboard. The sheet falls to my thighs. I don’t care. “But you don’t talk like that when you’re negotiating. You talk like that when you’re trying to convince yourself.”
His jaw tightens. A muscle flickers near his temple. “I’m not trying to convince myself. I’m stating facts. We kissed. We got carried away. It happens. It means nothing.”
“Does it?” I swing my legs over the edge of the bed, feet hitting the cool hardwood. I stand, the dress slipping further, and I don’t bother adjusting it. “Because I remember your hands on my neck. I remember how you whispered my name like you’d been saying it for years. I remember the way you looked at me when you thought I was asleep, like you were memorizing every line of my face. Do actors do that, Liam? Do they pretend to care that much?”
He’s silent for a long moment. The kind of silence that stretches thin, ready to snap. When he finally speaks, his voice is quieter. “You’re reading into it.”
“Am I?” I step closer. Not aggressively. But I don’t back down. “Or are you just terrified that if you admit what happened, you’ll have to admit why it happened?”
His eyes darken. “Don’t play games with me, Zoe. We’re past the point of pretending for the cameras. We’re in my bedroom. In the middle of the day. This isn’t a scene we’re filming. This is real. And real things have consequences.”
“Good,” I say. The word tastes like iron. “Maybe we need consequences. Maybe we need to stop lying to ourselves every time the lights go out.”
He laughs. It’s short. Bitter. “Lying? You think I’m lying?”
“I think you’re running,” I shot back. “You always run when things get complicated. When things get real. You build a wall, you draft a contract, you make everything a performance so you don’t have to feel anything that might actually matter. But last night wasn’t acting. You felt it. I felt it. And you’re terrified because now you can’t control it.”
His hand clenches. I see it. The tension in his forearms, the way his fingers curl like he’s gripping something invisible. He stands. The sheet falls away completely. I don’t look away. I let him see that I’m not afraid of him. Not of this.
“You don’t know what I’m terrified of,” he says, voice low, controlled to the point of cracking.
“No,” I agree. “But I know you. I know how you operate. You don’t let people in. You don’t let anyone see you fall apart. So you pretend. You pretend we’re just playing a part. You pretend I’m just a convenience. You pretend last night was a mistake.” I take another step. Close enough that I can smell him. Sandalwood and sleep and something fundamentally, irrevocably *him*. “But you’re not pretending anymore. You never were. And I’m done letting you rewrite what happened.”
His breath hitches. Just once. Then he moves.
Not away. Toward me.
His hand shoots out, fingers wrapping around my wrist. Not hard. But firm. Unyielding. I don’t pull back. I hold his gaze, my chest rising and falling too fast, my pulse hammering in my throat.
“You keep saying that,” he murmurs, voice dropping to something rough, something raw. “Like it’s a truth you’ve discovered. But you don’t get to decide what’s real, Zoe. You don’t get to stand there and dissect me while I’m still standing in the wreckage of my own restraint.”
“Restraint?” I laugh, but it’s shaky. “You had no restraint. You tore that dress off me. You pinned me to that bed. You made love to me like you were trying to prove something. Or like you were trying to forget something. Pick one. Because you can’t stand there and tell me it was nothing when your hands are still shaking.”
His thumb brushes over my pulse point. The contact sends a jolt straight through me. “I’m not shaking.”
“You are.” I lean in, close enough that my lips nearly brush his jaw. “And I’m not backing down.”
Something snaps.
His free hand fists in the fabric of my dress, yanking me forward. I gasp as I stumble against him, my body meeting his chest, his thighs, the hard line of his hips. His mouth crashes into mine, not gentle, not careful, but hungry. Desperate. A claiming. A punishing. I meet him with equal force, my fingers tangling in his hair, pulling him closer, deeper, like I’m trying to crawl inside his skin.
He groans into my mouth, the sound vibrating against my lips. His hands are everywhere. One slides down my back, pressing me flush against him. The other grips my hip, fingers digging into the soft flesh, lifting me slightly. I wrap my legs around his waist without thinking, without planning, just instinct. He catches me, adjusts his grip, and carries me backward until my back hits the wall. The impact knocks the air from my lungs, but I don’t care. I only care about his mouth on mine, his tongue sweeping past my lips, tasting me, claiming me like he’s been starving.
“Say it,” he rasps against my throat, teeth grazing the sensitive skin below my ear. “Say it’s not real.”
I shudder. “I can’t.”
“Why not?” His hand slips under the dress, palm sliding up my thigh, rough and hot. “Because you want to? Because you finally got what you’ve been pretending not to want for months?”
“Because it’s true,” I whisper, my voice breaking. “Because I’m tired of pretending I don’t look for you in every room. Tired of pretending I don’t memorize the way you take your coffee, the way you bite your pen when you’re thinking, the way you look at me when you think I’m not paying attention. I’m tired of lying, Liam. I’m so fucking tired of it.”
He curses, low and visceral, and drives his hand higher, fingers sliding through the damp heat between my legs. I arch into him, a broken sound escaping my throat. My dress rides up, the hem pooling around my hips. He doesn’t bother with slow. Doesn’t bother with care. He pushes the fabric aside, his fingers finding me, circling, pressing, and I cry out, my nails digging into his shoulders.
“You don’t get to tell me it’s acting,” he growls, his voice ragged, stripped bare. “Not after this. Not when you’re trembling like this. Not when you’re pushing back into my hand like you’ve been waiting for it.”
“I have,” I admit, the word tearing out of me. “I’ve been waiting. I’ve been fucking waiting since the night you first held my hand at the charity dinner and didn’t let go. I’ve been waiting since you looked at me across that boardroom like you already knew I was trouble. I’ve been waiting, Liam. So stop pretending. Stop lying. Stop treating me like I’m just another line in your contract.”
He pulls back just enough to look at me. His eyes are dark, blown wide with desire, with something dangerously close to fear. “You think this is simple? You think I haven’t fought this every single day? You think I don’t know the consequences? If we do this, if we let it happen, there’s no going back. The press will eat us alive. Our families will fracture. The merger could collapse. I can’t risk—”
“I don’t care,” I interrupt, my voice fierce. “I don’t care about the merger. I don’t care about the press. I care about you. I care about us. Or what we could be. And if you’re too scared to admit that, then you don’t deserve me. You don’t deserve any of this.”
His breath hitches. For a second, I think he’ll pull away. I think he’ll retreat behind the wall I’ve been trying to tear down since the beginning.
Instead, he kisses me again. Harder. Deeper. Like he’s trying to devour me. Like he’s trying to burn the words out of my mouth and replace them with something else. Something real.
His hand leaves my thigh. He turns me around, pressing my chest against the wall. I gasp as his body pins me there, his heat radiating through me, his weight settling between my legs. His fingers work at the clasp of my dress. The zipper slides down with a soft hiss. The fabric falls away, pooling at my feet. I’m bare from the waist up, from the waist down. I don’t care. I only care about the way his hands slide over my skin, rough and reverent all at once.
He leans in, lips tracing the line of my shoulder, my spine, the curve of my hip. “Tell me to stop,” he murmurs against my skin. “Tell me to walk away, and I will. But if you keep looking at me like that, if you keep saying my name like you mean it, I won’t be able to.”
I turn my head, pressing my lips to his jaw. “I’m not telling you to stop.”
He doesn’t need to be told twice.
His fingers slide between my legs, parting me, finding me slick and aching. He presses two fingers inside, curling them just right, and I cry out, my forehead dropping against the wall. His other hand wraps around my throat, not squeezing, just resting. Claiming. His thumb strokes my pulse point while his fingers work me, slow at first, then harder, faster, matching the rhythm of his breath against my skin.
“Look at me,” he demands.
I turn my head. His eyes are burning. Dark. Unreadable. Beautiful. He watches my face as he pumps his fingers in and out, as he circles my clit, as I tremble and shudder and fall apart under his touch. He doesn’t look away. He takes it all. Every gasp. Every broken sound. Every drop of sweat on my skin.
“Fuck, Zoe,” he breathes. “You’re so tight. So fucking perfect.”
I don’t answer. I can’t. My hips roll back, meeting his hand, chasing the friction, the pressure, the unbearable pleasure building low in my belly. He adds a third finger, stretching me, filling me, and I sob, my nails scraping against the wall. He curses, his pace relentless, his thumb pressing hard against my clit, his grip on my throat firm but never painful. Just enough to keep me grounded. Just enough to remind me he’s here. That this is real.
“I’m close,” I gasp. “Liam, I’m—”
“Let go,” he orders. “Let go for me. I’ve got you.”
And I do. I let go. I shatter. My back arches, my knees buckle, and he holds me up, one arm around my waist, the other still working me through the tremors. I cry out, his name on my lips, my body clenching around his fingers, waves of pleasure crashing through me until I’m trembling, breathless, completely undone.
He doesn’t stop. Not right away. He keeps his fingers inside me, feeling me pulse, feeling me come down. His breath is ragged against my neck. His body is pressed flush against mine. And when he finally pulls his hand out, I whine, the loss instant, aching.
He turns me around. Lifts me. I wrap my legs around his waist, my arms around his neck, and he carries me to the bed. He lays me down, but he doesn’t give me space. He climbs over me, caging me in, his weight familiar and heavy and exactly where it belongs. His mouth finds mine, slow this time. Deep. Searching. Like he’s making up for lost time. Like he’s memorizing me all over again.
His hands work at his clothes. Shirt. Pants. Boxers. He kicks them aside, shedding them like armor. When he’s bare, when I can see every line, every scar, every truth he’s been hiding, I reach for him. Pull him down.
He enters me in one smooth thrust, and I gasp, my back arching off the mattress. He’s thick. Hot. Perfect. He stills, buried to the hilt, his forehead resting against mine. “Say stop,” he whispers, voice wrecked.
I shake my head. “Don’t.”
He groans, a sound torn from his chest, and begins to move. Slow at first. Deep. Measuring. But I’m not patient. I never have been. My legs lock around his waist, pulling him deeper, harder. My nails rake down his back. He curses, his pace breaking, his thrusts becoming frantic, desperate. He grabs my hips, holding me in place as he drives into me, each stroke hitting that exact spot, each movement stealing the air from my lungs.
“Look at me,” he pants.
I do. I hold his gaze as he pounds into me, as he loses control, as the fiction between us dissolves into something raw and undeniable. He’s not acting. I’m not pretending. We’re just two people, completely exposed, completely undone.
“You’re mine,” he growls, the words torn from him, raw and true. “Say it. Say it’s real.”
“It’s real,” I whisper. “It’s always been real.”
He breaks. His thrusts become erratic, desperate. He buries his face in my neck, his breath hot and uneven, his body tensing as he climbs toward the edge. I feel it. The shift. The inevitability. I clamp down around him, milking him, urging him over. He cries out, his name echoing in the room, his body shuddering as he spills inside me, hot and thick, pulse after pulse, until he’s completely still, completely spent.
I hold him. Keep my legs locked around him. Keep my arms around his shoulders. His breath is ragged against my skin. His heart hammers against my chest. And for the first time in months, for the first time in my life, I don’t feel like I’m playing a part.
He rolls off me slowly, careful, like I might break. He pulls me against his side, his arm draping over my waist, his hand resting over my heart. We don’t speak. We don’t need to. The silence is loud. Heavy. Real.
Eventually, he presses a kiss to my temple. His voice is quiet. Rough. “We’re in trouble.”
I smile against his chest. “I know.”
He doesn’t answer. He just pulls me closer, his fingers tracing idle patterns on my hip. And I let him. Let him hold me. Let him be here. Let the line we crossed burn behind us, leaving only what’s real.
The contract doesn’t matter anymore. The cameras don’t matter. The performance is over.
Because last night wasn’t a mistake.
And today? Today, we finally stop pretending.