The Billionaire's Calm Obsession

CHAPTER SEVEN — Weather Forecast: Life Ruining

By the time I left the building, the sky had given up pretending to behave.

Rain pelted the city in sharp diagonal lines, soaking through my umbrella in defiance of physics and courtesy. Neon lights bled into puddles. Car horns wailed. Somewhere, someone laughed too loudly under a bar awning.

I ducked under the bus stop shelter, clutching the folder under my coat like it was made of glass.

The contract felt heavier than it was. My entire life, printed in neutral legal font.

“Nice weather for dramatic life decisions,” a voice said beside me.

I jumped.

Efe, my oldest friend, raised her hands in surrender, curls frizzing adorably under her headscarf.

“You really need to stop looking like you owe the mafia money every time someone speaks near you,” she said, pulling me into a quick hug.

“I thought you were working late,” I said, clinging to her a second longer than usual.

“I bribed my supervisor with plantain chips,” she said. “You texted ‘am I crazy or is this insane?’ Which is either an early psychosis sign or a man problem, and I’m not qualified for the first one.”

I tried to smile. It came out crooked.

“Come on,” she said. “My place. I made jollof. We’ll feed your nervous system, and then you can tell me why you look like someone proposed murder as a side hustle.”

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Efe’s apartment always smelled like something warm—food, candles, and laughter. She shoved a bowl into my hands, sat cross-legged on the rug, and nodded at the folder like it was a bomb.

“So,” she said. “Show me the madness.”

I hesitated.

“Amara.”

“It’s… complicated.”

“You once dated a man who thought crypto was a personality trait,” she said. “We have survived complicated. Open it.”

I sighed and slid the contract out.

Her eyes widened as she skimmed the first page. Then, it widened more.

Then she made a sound that was somewhere between a gasp and a cackle.

“Is this a prank?” she demanded.

“I wish.”

She flipped another page. “He wants to marry you?”

“Temporarily.”

Her head snapped up. “What is he, a visa?”

“It’s… for inheritance reasons,” I said weakly.

“So he can keep his billions. He wants to rent a wife.”

“When you say it like that, it sounds worse.”

“It is worse,” she said. “Why you?”

I repeated Leon’s reasons, minus the parts that felt too private to share.

Efe listened, expression shifting from disbelief to annoyance to something like reluctant understanding.

“And he’s offering… this much?” she said, tapping the sections about my family.

“Yes.”

“And no pressure for—” she wiggled her eyebrows suggestively.

“Efe,” I groaned. “Can you take this seriously?”

“I am taking it seriously,” she said. “I’m also respecting your privacy by not saying the word. But he actually wrote that?”

“He added it himself.”

She stared at me. “Your boss is either the most emotionally repressed gentleman alive or dangerously good at contracts.”

“Both, probably.”

She sat back, staring at the pages spread between us.

“Okay,” she said. “Pros and cons.”

I blinked. “We’re… doing a list?”

“Yes, responsible adulting. Pros: Your family gets help, your sister’s surgery happens, and you don’t end up living in a cardboard box chatting with pigeons about your dreams.”

“Dark, but fair.”

“Pros,” she continued, “you get stability for a year. You get money. You get out from under this constant survival panic.”

She paused.

“Also, let’s be honest,” she muttered. “He’s… intensely attractive in that silent ‘I know ten ways to destroy my enemies’ kind of way.”

“Efe.”

“I’m just saying, if you must suffer, at least let it be aesthetically pleasing.”

“You’re not helping.”

“Fine,” she said. “Cons: power imbalance. It’s his world, his rules. Even if he promises not to punish you, the reality is—he’s the one with the safety net.”

“I know.”

“Another con: feelings,” she said.

“Excuse me?”

“You are not a robot, Amara,” she said softly. “You’re already… affected. Being that close to someone—living with them, sharing their life, pretending to be their wife—it does things. Even if you start this as a contract, your heart might not stay professional.”

I looked away. “I don’t even know if he has one,” I said.

“Incorrect,” she said quietly. “He just keeps it in a vault. Maybe for good reasons. Maybe for selfish ones. Either way, if you walk into that vault, don’t be surprised if you come out changed.”

My chest tightened.

“What would you do?” I whispered.

She sighed. “It’s easy to say ‘I’d never’ from outside the fire. But I’m not you. I don’t know your thresholds. I just know this: you’ve been carrying too much for too long. If you say yes, it can’t be because you gave up on yourself. It has to be because you chose a strategy, not an escape.”

“I don’t know how to tell the difference.”

“You do,” she said gently. “You’re just scared of what the answer will ask of you.”

Rain drummed softly against the window. Somewhere in the building, someone played music too quietly to identify.

“And if I say no?” I asked.

“Then we hustle,” she said simply. “We find three jobs. We beg. We crowdfund. We cry. We keep your sister alive and your sanity… somewhat functional. It will be harder. But we’ve done hard.”

I swallowed the ache in my throat. “I don’t want you to carry more for me.”

“We promised each other at fifteen we’d trade burdens, remember?” she said. “You handled my mess last year. Let me return the favor.”

I stared at the contract, the neat black letters on white paper.

“Friday,” I whispered.

“Friday,” she echoed. “You don’t owe anyone the answer until then.”

That night, when I lay on Efe’s couch with the city humming outside and the contract folder on the table like a third presence, I finally admitted something to myself in the dark:

I was less afraid of marrying Leon Mercer…

…than I was of what saying yes would reveal about the kind of woman I was becoming.

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