MARRIED TO MY ENEMY

THE OFFER

CHAPTER 13: THE OFFER

Ximena’s POV

The air conditioning in the Blueview Hotel was set to arctic.

I was sitting in a plastic chair outside the manager’s office literally freezing my ass off. I’d changed out of my stained white dress into a plain white tee and a blue skirt that hit just above the knee. The fabric felt too thin, like it was trying to say, You’re freezing your balls off, princess.

And Diego Salvatore was sitting exactly twelve inches away from me, looking like he’d just stepped out of a cologne ad. Clean black t-shirt stretched across his shoulders. Hair still damp from his shower. Arms crossed over his chest. Jaw sharp enough to cut glass. He looked like… hmmm. Good. The kind of good that made you hate yourself for noticing.

We hadn’t said a single word in the elevator ride down. The receptionist had taken one look at me in my tee-shirt-and-skirt combo and him in his all-black funeral suit and slammed the lobby button like she thought we were going to start a bar fight in her elevator.

We were here because after that incident in the kitchen Diego had marched downstairs to demand a new room I had marched downstairs to demand the exact same thing. The poor girl at the front desk had not even asked for our room numbers. She had just seen our faces and immediately called Elena.

Now we were waiting outside the principal’s office like two kids who had been caught skipping class.

My brain would not shut up. It kept replaying this morning on a merciless loop and I hated it. The kitchen filling with smoke. The fire alarm screaming so loud my ears were still ringing. I still could not believe he had seen me naked. That image was a trauma that would haunt me for the rest of my life.

He had yelled at me. I had yelled back. He had called me a spoilt princess. I had called him a rude-ass nigga. I had slammed the bedroom door so hard the wall shook, then pressed my back against it, heart hammering so loud I was sure he could hear it through the wood. I had told myself it was only because I was angry. It was definitely because I was angry. Not because for one stupid second I had forgotten he was the enemy.

I hated him for that.

The frosted glass door finally opened. The receptionist gave us a smile that was ninety percent pure terror. “Ms. Elena will see you now.”

Diego stood first. I stood second. I made sure my shoulder did not touch his as we walked in, even though the doorway was barely wide enough for two people.

Elena’s office was small and smelled like old coffee and desperation. A dying white orchid sat on the windowsill, leaves curling like they were giving up. A stack of files on her desk looked ready to avalanche at any moment. Two chairs faced her desk exactly like they did in detention.

We sat. Not looking at each other.

Elena walked in fast and closed the door. Same navy suit as last night, same tight bun, but today she looked wrecked. Dark circles under her eyes. Lipstick chewed off on one side. She looked like she had been here all night with drunk tourists.

She dropped into her chair hard. “I’m so sorry to keep you waiting,” she said, giving us that dead hotel smile that never reached her eyes. “I understand there was another… incident in the suite this morning?”

Yes, Diego and I said at the exact same time.

We both shot each other a glare.

Diego leaned forward first. His voice dropped low and calm, the same tone he used when he was closing million-dollar deals. “We can’t stay together. It’s not working. I need another room. I don’t care what it costs. A standard room, a staff room, a closet with a cot. I will pay the difference. Just get me out of that suite.”

I need a room too, I cut in, talking louder so Elena would look at me and not at him. I leaned forward, trying to look serious and not like a homeless person on vacation. “Right now. I have cash. American dollars. I will pay for three nights upfront. I cannot spend another night in that room with him.”

Elena’s smile tightened at the corners. She opened her laptop and started typing fast, nails clicking. “Mr. Salvatore, Ms. Santos, I completely understand. Truly. As I explained last night, we had the unfortunate system error that double-booked the Honeymoon Suite. We’re fully booked this week because of the international surf competition in Uluwatu. We’ve called every hotel within a thirty-minute drive Four Seasons, Bulgari, Raffles. There is literally nothing available.”

You’re not trying hard enough, I snapped. I was running on no sleep, no food, and pure spite. “I cannot stay with him. He plays his music at six in the morning like he’s in an Ibiza club. He is so rude and annoying—”

I insult people? Diego turned his whole body toward me. His knee bumped mine under the desk. His green eyes flashed. “You’re the one who screamed in the lobby like the brat that you are.”

Because you stole my taxi! My face got hot.

“I called that first!”

“No you didn’t!”

“Yes I did, you lying rude guy.”

Enough! Elena held up both hands like a referee. Her voice cracked. “Please. I’m begging you both. Just one more night. We have two cancellations expected for tomorrow morning check-out. I can personally guarantee you’ll both have separate rooms by noon tomorrow. I will upgrade you both for free. Ocean view.”

One more night? I stood up so fast my plastic chair screeched. My hands were shaking. “Are you listening to yourself? I’m on vacation. I’m supposed to be on a beach with a coconut drink, not sharing a bed with a complete stranger who thinks snoring is a personality trait and who saw me—” I stopped myself. I could not say the word naked. “—who has absolutely zero boundaries!”

Diego stood too. He’s taller than me and he absolutely uses it. He looked down at me over Elena’s tiny desk. “I didn’t ask to share a bed with a spoiled princess who thinks the world owes her a penthouse and who almost burned the entire hotel down trying to make spaghetti.”

It was LASAGNA! I yelled. “And you just sat on that couch and watched me fail on purpose instead of helping!”

Someone had to be ready to call the fire department, he said, and that stupid smug smirk appeared.

We were basically nose to nose across her desk now, both yelling, both pointing fingers, both breathing hard. I could smell his soap again clean, expensive, male. It made me madder that he smelled good while I smelled like a kitchen fire.

That’s when the office door burst open without a knock.

A young housekeeping boy in a grey uniform stumbled in, out of breath, holding a tablet like it was the apocalypse. He leaned down and whispered something fast into Elena’s ear in Indonesian. I only caught two words: “batal” and “couple.”

Elena’s eyes went huge. “Apa? Serius?” she shouted. Both Diego and I stopped mid-sentence and just stared at her.

Oh my God, I’m so sorry, Elena said immediately, pressing both hands to her cheeks. Her perfect manager mask shattered. “That was so unprofessional of me. I apologize.”

She stood and started pacing behind her desk, muttering, flipping through files, checking her computer, then her phone. She looked like she might cry or quit. Or both.

Diego and I just looked at each other, confused. For the first time since we’d met at that taxi line, we were on the same team: what the hell is happening right now?

He raised one eyebrow at me in a silent question. I shrugged back, just as lost.

Finally Elena stopped pacing. She took a deep breath, smoothed her navy jacket, and sat back down. She looked at me. Then at Diego. Then back at me again, really studying us.

Slowly, a weird smile spread across her face. Not the tired customer-service smile. A different one. The kind people get when they’re desperate and they just had a crazy idea.

She folded her hands neatly on her desk and leaned forward like she was about to tell us a secret.

Mr. Salvatore. Ms. Santos, she said quietly, voice calm now. “You both clearly do not want to share the suite for another night, correct?”

Correct, we both said together. Again.

She nodded. “And you both said you’re willing to pay for a solution, yes?”

I nodded. Diego gave a short nod.

Well, Elena said, and her smile got wider, “the hotel has a program that allows people to stay free of charge.”

Free of charge.

My brain literally stopped.

Free?

I sat up straighter so fast my chair creaked. Free of charge? I would like that. Because I only paid for one month at the Blueview. One month. That was all the cash I’d dared to pull out before I ran. I have money back home well, my dad’s money but I can’t touch any of it. Not the cards, not the accounts, nothing. If I swipe once, my dad will know exactly what city I’m in within an hour.

In my head, when I got on that plane, I was never going back. Ever. That meant I had to make eighty thousand dollars in cash last me for the rest of my life. A month in Bali, then maybe Thailand, then maybe somewhere cheaper. I had done the math on the plane and it terrified me.

I did not have money to spend on a new hotel. I did not have money to spend, period.

I was willing to do anything to make this work. Anything.

Elena kept talking, still calm. “It is a special opportunity. A paid partnership with our marketing team. It would require you to stay in the suite together for three more nights, minimum. But it pays very well. And of course, your stay would be completely complimentary during the partnership.”

I blinked. “I’m sorry, what?”

Diego frowned, arms crossing again. Suspicious. That was his default face. “What kind of partnership?”

Elena looked right at me, then right at him. She let the pause hang there for a second too long on purpose.

Would you two, she said slowly, enunciating every word, “want to earn some money… by pretending to be a couple?”

The office went quiet except for the hum of the dying orchid. Elena’s smile was wide now, hopeful. She had no idea what she’d just asked us.

I felt Diego’s gaze burn into the side of my face. My heart was still racing from the yelling, but now it was racing for an entirely different reason.

And I knew, deep in my bones, that neither of us was going to say no.