ChapterFive
1232 Words
How did I not see it coming? I’d walked into this interview thinking I was ready. I wasn’t even close.
Alexander sat across from me, completely still, just watching. Not saying a word. I gripped my bag and tried to look like I wasn’t falling apart on the inside.
Then his mouth curved — barely — and he finally spoke. “I’ve already looked over your qualifications.”
“And?” I said.
“You’re talented.” My heart did something stupid and hopeful.
“However,” he said, “I have a different offer.” The hope died. “If this is a joke—”
“It’s not.” “Then what?”
He didn’t answer. He just pushed a thick folder across the desk toward me and waited.
I looked at it. “What’s this?”
“Open it.”
I stepped forward and flipped it open.
I read the first line. “Marriage Agreement”. My head snapped up. “What?”
“I want you to marry me.”
I just stared at him. “No,” I said flatly. “Absolutely not.”
“Let me explain—”. “I don’t want an explanation.” I shut the folder hard. “You think your money gives you the right to just— what? Pick a random woman and offer her a ring? Who does that?”
“I do. But not for the reasons you think.” “Then you’re insane.”
He laughed. It was low and relaxed and it annoyed me more than silence would have.
“I’m not insane.”
“Then talk.”
The laugh stopped. His face changed.
“My grandfather died three months ago.” His voice was quieter now. “He started Voss Tech. You know that.” I nodded. Everyone knew that. “He left a will. And the will has a condition.”
He stopped. His jaw tightened for a second.
“If I want the company — full ownership — I have to be married within six months of his death. And the marriage has to last at least one year.”
I blinked at him. “That’s ridiculous.”
“He believed you couldn’t run a family business without having a family of your own.”
“That’s controlling.”
“Yes. It was.” He didn’t try to defend it.
“If I don’t do this, thirty-five percent of the company goes to my cousin.” His voice hardened. “My cousin would tear it apart. Sell it off. Everything my grandfather built would be gone.” He looked at me steadily. “No one in my family knows the will exists. My father told me before he died. If this gets out before I’ve handled it, everything falls apart.”
I looked down at the folder. “You could find someone else. Anyone else.”
“I could.” “So why me?” Before he could answer, someone knocked.
The door opened and a woman walked in. Tall, blonde, dress so fitted it looked uncomfortable. She was holding a tablet. She walked straight to Alexander’s side without even looking at me.
She leaned over his chair. Too close. “Alexander, your reports.” I watched his face. Nothing changed. Not one thing. “Thank you, Lila.”
She put her hand on his shoulder. “I can stay if you need me.” He lifted her hand off like it was something he’d done a hundred times before. Didn’t even look at her. “I won’t.”
Done. Over.
Lila straightened up. Her smile went tight at the edges. That’s when she noticed me standing there. She left without a word.
I looked at Alexander. “Friendly.”He sighed. “I know.”
I almost smiled. Almost.
Then the reality of my situation came back and sat heavily on my shoulders.
“Why me?” I asked again. He was quiet for a beat. Then he stood up and walked towards the window.
“I’ve been around users my whole life. People who smile at me because of what I can do for them. “You’re not doing that. You’re just standing there being exactly who you are.”
“If you agree,” Alexander said, “you get five million dollars.” I forgot how to breathe for a second.
“You’d also come on as Creative Director at Voss Tech.” He let that sink in. “Your own salary. Your own career. A place to live. Stability.” Everything I’d lost.
“No,” I said.
He looked at me. Actually surprised this time.
“I appreciate it. I do.” “But I won’t marry for money. That’s a line I won’t cross.”
Something shifted in his face. Not disappointment — something more like quiet respect. Then he smiled. A small, genuine one. Like I’d just said the exact thing he’d been waiting to hear. He opened a second folder.
“Not for money,” he said. “But what about this?”
“What is that?” He turned it around and slid it across to me.
Photographs.
I looked down and felt the air leave my lungs. Jade and Maren. Together. Holding hands. Kissing. Laughing at some dinner, her leaning into him, him with his arm around her like.
I turned each photo over slowly. There were dates on them. Some were from before our engagement started. Some were from months before I ever had a single doubt. Some were from nights I remembered — nights he said he was stuck at work, nights he said he needed time alone.
He wasn’t alone. The room went a little blurry.
“Oh, God.” My voice broke on the two words.
“This whole time?” I set a photo down. My hands weren’t steady. He had been lying to my face. I blinked hard. I was not going to cry. I’d already cried more over Jade than he deserved and I was not doing it here.
“There’s more,” Alexander said quietly. “He’s been telling people it was your fault. The breakup. He’s saying you were the problem calling you lazy, Clingy, Jealous of him. Says you held him back.”
The anger came fast. Really fast. Like it had been sitting just under the surface waiting for permission. After all the times I made myself smaller and quieter and less so that he could feel bigger.
He was acting the victim.
Alexander watched me for a moment. Then he said the thing that changed everything. “The Voss Foundation Gala is next month. Come with me.” I looked at him.
“Every important person in this city will be there including Jade ana Maren.
The gala, the photos, the headlines, all the people who’d heard Jade’s version of events — the one where I was broken and pathetic and couldn’t hold my relationship together — they’d all be there.
And they’d watch me walk in on Alexander Voss’s arm. I knew it was petty but I wanted it badly.
Alexander held the contract out across the desk. His face was calm, unreadable. “No pressure.” I looked at the contract, then at him, then back at the photos.
I picked up the pen and I signed.
- Writer
