Chapter 3: Riverside Villa
1354 Words
The car was black. Not factory-paint black — the kind that absorbed light and didn't reflect anything back. The kind that cost more than a year of my salary.
The driver opened the door without a word. I got in. The interior smelled like leather and something clean and expensive I couldn't name. The seats were heated — I didn't know car seats could be heated.
We pulled away from Sterling Tower. The city slid past tinted windows: financial district, high-end shopping, restaurants with tables I'd never sit at. All of it familiar, none of it mine.
Then the city changed. Buildings got farther apart. Streets got wider. Sidewalks disappeared, replaced by trees and stone walls and iron gates. We were leaving behind the version of Sterling City I knew.
Massive black gates opened automatically as we approached, an S worked into the iron design. And then I saw the house.
No. Not a house. Houses had front porches and neighbors. This was a mansion carved from pale stone and glass, three stories sprawling across grounds that disappeared into darkness. A fountain in the circular driveway. Gardens I could only guess at.
It was beautiful. It was terrifying. And it was supposed to be my home.
A woman waited at the front door — fifties, silver-streaked hair in a neat bun. "Miss Chen. I'm Mrs. Hollis. The housekeeper. Mr. Sterling asked me to show you to your room."
My room. Not our room. I shouldn't have been relieved. I was.
Inside, the foyer alone was bigger than my entire apartment. A chandelier dripped crystal and gold light. Dark marble floors. My scuffed flats left faint smudges, and I watched Mrs. Hollis notice them. She said nothing. She didn't have to.
She led me upstairs. Left at the landing. Third door.
The bedroom was larger than my mother's hospital room — larger than my apartment, maybe. White linens on a bed that looked like it had never been touched. Windows on two walls framing gardens lit by soft lanterns. A robe on the bed, white, monogrammed with an S.
"Dinner is at eight. Mr. Sterling will join you then. If you need anything, dial zero on the nightstand phone."
She left. I stood in the middle of the room, not knowing what to do with myself. I'd never stood on carpet this soft or breathed air that smelled like fresh laundry and flowers and money. I sat on the edge of the bed, gently. The mattress barely moved.
I twisted my mother's ring.
What was I doing here? I was Ava Chen — temp from Floor 3, invisible girl who unjammed copiers and fetched coffee for managers who didn't know her name. I wore thrift-store blouses and scuffed flats and a silver ring my mother gave me when I was twelve. And now I sat on a bed that cost more than my mother's entire treatment, in a house belonging to a man I didn't know, my mother's ring still on my finger — except now it meant something different. It meant I belonged to him.
For one year. Three hundred and sixty-five days of playing wife to a cold, grey-eyed stranger. Three hundred and sixty-five days of pretending. And then what? Back to Floor 3? Back to the copiers and eviction notices?
The settlement at the end of the year would be enough to start over anywhere, do anything. But first — I had to survive the year.
I didn't go to dinner. Not because I was difficult — because I fell asleep. The bed was too soft. I'd laid down "just for a minute" and woken up three hours later. The clock said 10:47 PM.
A knock on the door. Three taps. Precise. The same way he did everything.
Ethan Sterling stood in the hallway. He'd changed — dark slacks, white button-down with sleeves rolled to his forearms. The scar on his left hand was more visible like this. He had forearms. I didn't know why I was noticing that.
"You missed dinner."
"I fell asleep. I'm sorry."
"It's fine." He didn't sound like it was fine. He didn't sound like anything. "Mrs. Hollis left a plate in the kitchen."
He didn't move. Grey eyes studying me with that same clinical detachment. "We need to establish some rules. This is a business arrangement. Both parties should understand the boundaries."
Both parties. Like I was a merger partner.
He stepped inside. The click of the latch was soft but final. "Separate bedrooms. This is yours. Mine is at the end of the hall. Don't enter my private quarters without arrangement."
"Agreed."
"No personal questions. We're not here to get to know each other. The less we complicate this, the smoother the year goes."
"Fine."
"Public appearances as required. Charity events, business functions, press. Twenty-four hours notice. You'll have a stylist and wardrobe budget. Anything you need to look the part."
The part. The performance I'd been hired to play.
"Understood."
He paused. Something shifted in his expression — not softening, but a flicker. "You had a third condition. You wanted to keep your job."
"I meant it."
"I know." He studied me. "Most women in your position would have asked for money. A car. A house."
"I'm not most women."
"No," he said quietly. "I'm beginning to see that."
The words hung between us. I didn't know what to do with them.
"I should eat something. Thank you — for the room, for everything."
He nodded once. Turned to leave.
And that was when it happened.
My bag. The cheap canvas one I'd brought from my apartment, sitting by the foot of the bed. I didn't see it. My foot caught the strap.
I stumbled. I was going to hit the marble floor, I was sure of it.
I didn't.
Ethan Sterling caught me. One hand on my arm, the other on my waist. Strong. Steady. He'd moved so fast I hadn't even seen it.
I was standing in his arms. Close. Too close.
I could smell his cologne. Subtle, expensive — the kind that didn't announce itself, just lingered quietly, the way he did. His hand on my waist was warm. His other hand — the scar ran across his knuckles, old and healed, but I could feel the ridge against my skin.
Three seconds. Neither of us moved.
My heart pounded. I looked up. Grey eyes — storm-colored. And for the first time since I'd met him, something flickered in them. Not coldness. Not distance. Something I couldn't name.
He let go.
Not a retreat — Ethan Sterling didn't retreat. But his hands left my body, and the space returned, and the moment was gone so fast I almost wondered if I'd imagined it.
"You should be more careful."
His voice didn't change. His face didn't change. But I couldn't stop looking at the scar.
"Thank you."
He walked out. The door clicked shut.
I stood there. My arm was still warm where he'd touched it. My waist still held the ghost of his hand.
Ethan Sterling had caught me before I fell. A reflex — any decent person would have done the same. But his hand had lingered a beat too long. And that flicker in his eyes. Whatever it was.
I touched the place on my arm. Still warm.
I lay back on the bed that cost more than my mother's entire treatment. The sheets were cool against my skin. Outside, the gardens glowed under their soft lantern lights. Somewhere in this mansion, in a room at the end of the hall, Ethan Sterling was probably lying awake too.
I wondered if he was thinking about the contract. I wondered if he was thinking about anything at all. I wondered if he felt as trapped as I did.
My mother's ring was still on my finger. I twisted it. The silver caught the light from the garden lanterns and held it, just for a moment.
Then I closed my eyes. And somewhere between the exhaustion and the too-soft bed and the fading warmth of his hand —
I fell asleep.
- Writer
