Too Curvy To Be A Side Piece

Chapter 4

Isla's pov

“You freaking pervert!” The words tore out of me the second my brain caught up with the half-naked man standing over the bed.

I scrambled backward until my spine slammed against the cheap wooden headboard, clutching the thin, scratchy blanket to my full chest like it could somehow shield me from the absurdity of the situation.

My forehead still throbbed from where I had collided with him earlier, and my heart was hammering so hard I could feel it in my throat.

Cassian Hale—the face I had only ever seen on the covers of business magazines and the screens of late-night financial reports—stared down at me like I was the one who had lost every remaining scrap of sanity.

“Me? A pervert?” His voice was low, controlled, and edged with pure, cold disbelief. “You’re the one standing in my f*****g room.”

“It’s my room,” I shot back, even though the protest sounded weak and ridiculous the moment it left my mouth. The key card was still lying on the nightstand where I had dropped it. The clerk downstairs had given it to me with his own hands. This was supposed to be the cheapest room in a hotel that looked like it had given up on itself years ago. “What the f**k is a billionaire doing in a room like this?”

He moved faster than I expected. One second he was standing at the foot of the bed, the next his hand was over my mouth—warm, firm, not hard enough to hurt but strong enough to stop the next accusation from flying out.

His eyes, cool grey and sharp enough to cut glass, locked onto mine with an intensity that made the small room feel even smaller.

“Keep your mouth shut,” he said, voice barely above a whisper. “Do you have any idea what happens if someone hears you screaming my name in a place like this?”

I shoved his hand away hard enough that he took a half-step back. My breath came in short, uneven bursts. “I don’t care about you. I just want to sleep. That’s all I wanted when I walked in here—to sleep and forget that my entire life just exploded in my face. So take your billionaire problems somewhere else.”

Something flickered across his face, annoyance or maybe a reluctant recognition that I was not the usual kind of problem he dealt with in boardrooms and private clubs.

He stood there for a long moment, water still beading on the broad planes of his chest and the ridges of his stomach, the white towel hanging low on his hips. The silence between us was thick enough to choke on.

“I’ll leave,” he said finally. “But you mustn’t tell anyone I was here. Not a single word to anyone. Do you understand me?”

I nodded once, too exhausted and too hollowed-out to argue further. All I wanted was the dark and the thin blanket and the chance to stop seeing Rhys’s hands on Talia’s body every time I closed my eyes. Cassian turned, unlocked the door with a soft click, and stepped out into the hallway.

He was back in less than ten seconds.

The door slammed shut behind him hard enough to rattle the cheap frame. The lock turned and he leaned against the wood like he was bracing for a physical impact, jaw clenched so tight a muscle jumped in his cheek, eyes already scanning the small room as if searching for an exit that didn’t exist.

“They’re here,” he said.

My stomach dropped. “What are you talking about? Who’s here?”

“Reporters.” The word landed like a stone in the middle of the room. “They followed me, or someone tipped them off. I don’t know, but they’re outside.”

I swung my legs over the side of the bed. The floor was cold and slightly sticky under my bare feet. “Then get off the door. I’ll go instead. This is my room, but I’ll leave and you can deal with whatever circus is waiting for you out there.”

“You can’t.” His voice was sharp enough to cut glass. “You can’t go out there.”

A sudden white flash cut through the half-open window. Someone was already taking pictures of the room, of the silhouette of a man who was not supposed to be here. Cassian crossed the space in a few long strides and yanked the curtain closed so hard the metal rod rattled against the wall.

“Shit.”

I stared at the closed curtain, then at him. The full absurdity of the night pressed in on me from every side—Rhys’s laughter at the table, Talia’s moan, the rain that had soaked me to the bone, the empty wallet, and now this. A billionaire locking himself in a cheap hotel room with a plump woman who had nowhere else to go while reporters waited outside like vultures.

“Do you billionaires ever catch a break?” I asked, the question slipping out before I could stop it. My voice sounded thin and frayed.

He let out a short, humourless breath that was almost a laugh. “No. Never. That’s exactly why I’m here. I thought they wouldn’t find me in a place like this. I was wrong.”

We didn’t speak after that. There was nowhere else to go and nothing left to say that wouldn’t make the situation worse. Cassian took the single armchair near the window, still wrapped in the towel, and I crawled back under the thin, scratchy blanket on the bed.

The room was too small for the silence that settled between us. I could hear every shift of fabric when he moved, every quiet breath. The mattress was lumpy and the pillow smelled faintly of someone else’s shampoo.

Sleep came in uneasy, broken fragments. Every time I closed my eyes I saw Rhys’s face above Talia. Every time I opened them, Cassian Hale was still there—a dark, motionless silhouette in the chair, watching the closed curtain like it might explode.

I must have drifted eventually, because the next thing I knew pale morning light was leaking around the curtain and the chair was empty.

Cassian stood at the foot of the bed, fully dressed now in dark trousers and a crisp white shirt he must have pulled from a bag I hadn’t noticed the night before.

His phone was in one hand and his face looked like it was carved from stone. The transformation from half-naked stranger to billionaire CEO was so complete it almost hurt to look at.

“Wake up.”

I pushed myself upright, hair a tangled mess around my face, the soft weight of my body shifting under the blanket, the events of the previous night slamming back into me all at once like a physical blow. My body ached and my eyes felt gritty. “What?”

He turned the phone toward me without a word. The screen was filled with photographs. They were blurry, taken through the gap in the curtain before he had closed it, but clear enough. Me on the bed, bare soft shoulders and the full curve of my figure visible above the blanket and him standing over me in nothing but a towel.

Another shot of us closer together, his hand near my face from the moment he had covered my mouth. The headlines forming in real time across every major gossip site were already vicious and relentless.

Hotel Scandal, Cassian Hale Caught with Mystery Woman

Billionaire CEO’s Secret Night in Budget Hotel

Who Is the Woman in Hale’s Bed?

My stomach turned so hard I thought I might be sick.

“My business deal,” he said, voice tight and low. “The one I’ve spent the last eight months negotiating. The board is already calling, partners are questioning my judgment in real time. If this spins the way it’s already starting to spin, the entire acquisition collapses by the end of the day. Possibly sooner.”

I stared at the pictures, then at him, trying to force my exhausted brain to catch up. “What does that have to do with me?”

He didn’t look away. “Everything, because right now the story is that I spent the night with a woman no one can identify, in a hotel no one expected me to be in. The speculation alone is enough to kill the deal. The board doesn’t care about the truth. They care about perception and perception right now is that I am reckless, distracted, and compromised.”

I wrapped my arms around myself, the thin blanket suddenly feeling completely inadequate against the cold that had nothing to do with the temperature of the room. “Then fix it. You’re a billionaire. Isn’t that what people like you do? Throw money at problems until they disappear?”

“Money won’t fix this.” His jaw flexed once. “Perception will and right now perception is the only thing standing between me and the collapse of a deal that has taken nearly a year of my life.”

The silence stretched between us, thick and heavy with everything that had already gone wrong in the last twelve hours.

Finally he spoke again, quieter this time, but no less certain. “I need a favour.”

I looked up at him, exhaustion and residual heartbreak still thick in my veins, the image of Rhys and Talia still burned behind my eyes. “What kind of favour?”

Cassian Hale met my gaze without flinching, without softening, without offering a single unnecessary word.

“Marry me.”