Chapter 16 – The Performance Begins
1373 Words
The boardroom doors slammed shut behind them, but Cassie still felt the sting of their words clinging to her skin.
Prove it. Or take the blame when it all burns down.
She hugged her arms to her chest as they walked through the marble corridor. Lucien’s stride was steady, purposeful, like a man who had already made up his mind.
Cassie, on the other hand, was unraveling.
“Do you even realize what they’re asking?” she hissed, finally breaking the silence. “They want me on display like some prize you bought and now have to parade around to convince people you got your money’s worth.”
Lucien stopped so abruptly she nearly bumped into him. He turned, his eyes sharp. “That’s not what this is.”
“Isn’t it?” she shot back, her voice shaking. “Lucien, I’m not built for cameras and interviews. I don’t know how to smile on cue or spin a story that isn’t true. I’m just… me. And now the entire city is going to watch me and judge every move I make.”
He stared at her for a long moment, his jaw working. Then his tone softened—just slightly.
“You think I don’t know what they’re doing? You think I want you dragged into this mess?” His voice lowered, steady and deliberate. “But if we don’t take control of the narrative, Victor will. And when he does, he won’t just destroy my company—he’ll destroy you, too.”
Cassie’s chest ached, but his words carried a brutal kind of logic. She hated it. She hated that he was right.
Still, she shook her head. “I didn’t sign up for this part of it.”
Something flickered in his eyes—frustration, but also something softer, something that almost looked like regret.
“No,” he said finally. “You signed up to save your brother. I know what I promised you, Cassie. But circumstances have changed. And now…” He reached out, brushing a loose strand of hair from her face, his touch lingering longer than it should have. “…now we adapt.”
Her breath caught in her throat. His nearness always did this to her, short-circuiting her anger, leaving her trembling between resistance and something she didn’t want to name.
She stepped back, needing the distance. “So what? You’re just going to… schedule our public love life? Like it’s another board meeting?”
Lucien’s lips curved in the faintest, most infuriating smirk. “Something like that.”
Cassie gaped at him. “You’re serious.”
“Deadly serious.” He pulled his phone from his pocket, scrolling with swift precision. “The first interview has already been arranged. Tomorrow night. A live segment on prime-time television.”
Her knees nearly buckled. “Tomorrow?”
“You’ll have a stylist, a media coach, everything you need,” he continued, ignoring her panic. “And you won’t be alone. I’ll be at your side the entire time.”
“That’s supposed to make me feel better?” she muttered.
His eyes lifted from the screen, locking onto hers. “It should.”
The intensity in his gaze sent another rush of heat through her, but Cassie tore her eyes away, pacing down the hall. Her mind whirled with images of cameras flashing, strangers dissecting her words, her body language, her smile.
“They’ll see right through me,” she whispered.
Lucien followed, his footsteps steady. “Then we make sure they don’t.”
Cassie turned on him, her fear bubbling into anger. “And if I can’t? What then? What happens when I freeze, when I mess it up, when the whole world sees exactly what this really is?”
Lucien stopped just a step away, lowering his voice until it was almost a growl. “Then I take the fall. Not you. Me.”
Her breath caught. For all his arrogance, for all his control, he meant it. He would burn with her if she fell.
The realization made her chest ache in ways she couldn’t explain.
Before she could respond, the elevator doors slid open. Lucien stepped inside, holding the door for her. His eyes were unreadable, but his voice carried quiet certainty.
“Rest tonight,” he said. “Tomorrow, we show the world exactly what they want to see.”
Cassie hesitated, her body frozen halfway between resistance and reluctant acceptance. She stepped in beside him, her reflection trembling back at her from the elevator’s mirrored walls.
As the doors slid shut, she whispered the truth neither of them could deny.
“What if the world wants more than just a show?”
Lucien’s gaze lingered on her, dark and unreadable, before he finally answered.
“Then, Cassie… we give them more.”
---
Cassie sat at the edge of the massive bed in Lucien’s penthouse suite, her hands twisted together so tightly her knuckles were white. The stylist had just left, her closet was filled with carefully chosen dresses, and the media coach’s words still rattled in her head. Smile naturally. Don’t look down. Never contradict Lucien on air.
Her pulse thundered. “I can’t do this,” she whispered into the silence.
“You can,” Lucien’s voice cut in from across the room. He stood near the window, city lights burning behind him like a crown of fire. His tie was undone, his sleeves rolled up, but his presence was still larger than life. “And you will.”
Cassie’s head snapped up. “You make it sound so simple. Like I can just switch off my fear.”
Lucien turned, crossing the room with deliberate, unhurried steps until he was standing in front of her. He crouched slightly, his eyes locking onto hers. “Fear is useful. It keeps you sharp. What you need to kill is doubt.”
Her throat tightened. His nearness made it hard to breathe, and not just because of the pressure. “And if I doubt myself anyway?”
“Then borrow my certainty.” His voice was low, steady, almost hypnotic. “I know what I’m doing. I know how to win this. All you have to do is follow my lead.”
Cassie searched his eyes, trying to find arrogance there, but what she saw instead unsettled her more: conviction. He wasn’t lying. He believed in this plan. He believed in her.
And damn him—it made her want to believe too.
Her voice cracked. “What if I make a fool of myself? What if I ruin everything?”
Lucien’s lips curved in the faintest shadow of a smile. “You won’t.”
The certainty in his tone wrapped around her like armor, but it also left her trembling. Because for the first time, she realized how much she wanted him to be right—not for her sake, but for his.
She stood suddenly, needing space, but Lucien caught her wrist before she could move away. The heat of his touch sent sparks racing up her arm.
“Cassie,” he murmured, his voice softer now. “You’re not alone in this. You never were.”
Her heart stuttered. She wanted to argue, to remind him that this marriage had started as a transaction, nothing more. But when she met his gaze, the words died on her lips.
She was too aware of the way he was looking at her—not like a contract, not like a pawn in some corporate game, but like a woman who mattered.
Her lips parted. “Lucien…”
For a moment, the world narrowed to the space between them, to the unspoken pull that had been building for weeks.
Then he released her wrist, stepping back with the same control he always carried. “Get some rest,” he said briskly, as though nothing had happened. “Tomorrow, we make them believe.”
Cassie stood frozen, her pulse racing, her skin still tingling where he had touched her.
She hated how much she wanted to close the distance again.
She hated that her heart whispered the dangerous truth she refused to say aloud.
This doesn’t feel like an act anymore.
- Writer
