Everyone has a price
707 Words
The silence in the car was deafening. Mia stared at Damien, her eyes wide and trembling. She looked like a deer caught in the headlights of a hunter’s truck. Her lips parted, but no sound came out. She couldn't tell him the truth, but she couldn't find a lie fast enough to satisfy the fire in his eyes.
Her silence only fueled his frustration. Damien had spent his whole life getting answers. He moved markets with a phone call and crushed enemies with a word. But this girl... this fragile, quiet girl was a wall he couldn't climb.
"Answer me!" he growled.
When she only blinked, a tear finally escaping and rolling down her cheek, something in Damien snapped. It wasn't logic. It wasn't business. It was a raw, primal need to break through the wall she had built between them.
He reached out, his hand cupping the back of her neck, and pulled her toward him. He crashed his lips against hers in a kiss that was nothing like the gentle memory of that hotel room. This was hard and rough. It was a kiss full of anger, possessiveness, and a hunger he had been trying to starve for weeks.
Mia gasped into his mouth, her hands flying up to his chest to push him away, but he was like a mountain of solid muscle. The scent of him that cedar and rain flooded her senses. For a terrifying second, her body betrayed her. Her heart hammered against her ribs, and a spark of heat flared deep in her belly.
But as quickly as it started, Damien tore himself away from her.
He was breathing heavily, his eyes dark and clouded with a mix of desire and self-hatred. He looked at her swollen lips and her shocked, tear-stained face. He felt out of control, and he hated her for it. He hated that he wanted her more than his own empire.
He straightened his shirt, his expression turning back into a mask of cold, cruel stone.
"Is that what you want, Mia?" he asked, his voice dripping with bitterness. "Is that the game? You act weak and mysterious so I’ll chase you?"
"No," Mia whispered, her voice trembling. "I never asked for this."
Damien let out a harsh, dry laugh. He reached into his inner suit pocket and pulled out a leather checkbook. With a flick of his wrist, he grabbed a pen and scribbled something down. He ripped the paper out and slapped it onto the dashboard between them.
Mia looked down. It was a check for five thousand dollars.
"What is this?" she asked, her voice barely a breath.
"You said you needed money for your father. You said you were drowning in debt," Damien said, his voice sounding like ice cracking. He didn't look at her. He looked straight ahead at the dark road. "The contract says we don't have to be a real couple. But I’m a man with needs, and you are a woman who needs cash."
He turned his head slowly, his gaze landing on her with a look of pure disrespect.
"Five thousand dollars," he said coldly. "That’s the price for tonight. If you sleep with me, the money is yours. No questions asked. No more 'mysterious' illness. Just a transaction."
Mia felt like he had slapped her across the face. The man she was starting to love, the man who had saved her father, looked at her like she was something he could buy from a street corner.
She looked at the check, then at her stomach, where his child was secretly growing. The irony was a bitter poison in her mouth.
"Is that all I am to you?" she asked, her voice cracking. "A transaction?"
"In this car, everyone has a price, Mia," Damien replied, his jaw tight. "What’s yours?" "How much?"
The hot pot she had craved was forgotten. The hunger in her stomach was replaced by a hollow, aching hole. She realized then that in Damien's world, there was no room for the truth, and there was definitely no room for love.
- Writer
