A Hell Of Love

ChapterFive

“I’m not going,” I told the empty room. But my chest said otherwise. It tightened as my mother’s face flashed through my mind—so pale against hospital sheets, her breath careful, the machine beeping soft and steady like a countdown.

Three days.

Pride didn’t pay hospital bills. Anger didn’t buy oxygen. Fury didn’t stop time.

I changed quickly—black dress, clean enough. Hair pulled back. No perfume, no gloss. I didn’t want to impress him; I just didn’t want to look like I’d already lost. I grabbed my bag and walked out.

The bar was the same: low lights, slow jazz, voices blending into a blur. I headed straight to the booth where he’d sat before and slid in, forcing my shoulders to relax. I waited. And waited.

No Rex.

I checked the time, jaw clenched. He said he doesn’t tolerate latecomers, yet he was the one late? I was about to leave when the door opened and a man in a fitted black suit stepped in. He scanned the room like he owned it, then came straight toward me.

“Miss Lyra Carter?” Flat voice. No smile.

“Yes.” My tone matched his.

“Please come with me. Mr. Maddox is expecting you.”

“He couldn’t bother to show up himself?” I said, already knowing the answer.

The man didn’t flinch. “This way, please.”

I wanted to argue. I wanted to say no. Instead, I followed him out to a sleek black car that purred when it moved. We drove in silence—streetlights flashing through the windows, my thoughts running ahead of me. I tried to calm my breathing. It didn’t work.

The place we stopped at looked like money had built it from the ground up. Everything was white—marble steps, white glass walls, white columns. Even the light felt clean and expensive. Inside, the air smelled like lilies and polished stone. No noise. No crowd. Just hallways that swallowed sound and made me feel like I was walking into a mouth that could close behind me.

The man opened a pair of tall doors and stepped aside.

I walked in.

Rex Maddox sat at the far end of a long white table, a dark line in a bright room. His suit was black, crisp, perfect. He didn’t stand. He didn’t greet me. He just looked up, those gray eyes steady and unreadable, as if he’d already measured the distance between us and decided it would remain.

A single chair waited on the other side.

I sat. Not gently.

“You could’ve told me to come here,” I said, voice tight. “Dragging me to the bar first was pointless.”

He didn’t answer. He didn’t even blink. A server appeared from a side door I hadn’t noticed and set a tall glass in front of me—something pale with a curl of lemon on top. Then the server vanished, the door whispering shut.

I stared at the drink, then at him. Silence stretched. My anger fizzed inside my chest, too full to hold. I lifted the glass and took a long swallow. It was cold, sharp, a little sweet. I took another, just to have something to do with my hands.

Rex leaned back, fingers laced, eyes on me. His voice was smooth when it finally came.

“Be my girlfriend for six months.”

I choked. The drink clawed down the wrong way and burned my throat. I coughed hard, eyes watering, and set the glass down with a wet clink. He couldn’t even say sorry!

“Be your what?” I croaked. “Are you serious right now?”

He slid a slim leather folder across the table. It glided to a stop by my hand like this was a magic trick he’d practiced.

“Read.”

My pulse thudded. I opened it.

AGREEMENT FOR TEMPORARY COMPANIONSHIP

That was the actual title. I almost laughed. I didn’t. My eyes kept moving even though my head screamed to stand and walk out.

The first page summarized it: Public girlfriend. Six months. Confidential. Mutual benefit.

I flipped to the next page. My breath stuttered.

Upon signing, a one-time advance of $10,000 would be transferred to my account.

Monthly stipend, listed in a number so large I had to blink and look again.

Completion fee, another number that made my fingers shake.

I swallowed hard and turned another page. That was where the sweetness ended.

Conditions.

They weren’t simple rules. They were lines drawn in steel.

• Availability: You will answer when I call, and you will show up wherever I ask—no explanations, no questions. If I say come, you come.

• Fridays: From 7 p.m. every Friday to 7 a.m. Saturday, you will be at my residence. It is a routine. Do not miss it.

(Note: Separate rooms. Do not enter mine without permission.)

• Public Appearances: Events, dinners, charity functions, meetings with investors, board members, or brand partners. You will attend as requested, on schedule, dressed according to the provided guidelines.

• Image: No public arguments. No scenes. No posts without clearance. No interviews. No talking to tabloids, bloggers, or “anonymous sources.” NDA enclosed.

• Boundaries: No touching in private. In public, follow my lead. If I take your hand, you take mine. If I ask for a photo, you smile. If I say we’re leaving, we leave.

• Privacy: No entering locked rooms. No questions about my family, my home, my work beyond what is given to you.

• Location Sharing: On event days and Fridays, your location will be on. Safety and logistics.

• Phones: No recording. No photos in private spaces. Ever.

• No Dating: You will not date anyone else during the contract.

• No Falling In Love: You will not “catch feelings.” If you do, you will be removed. Completion fee forfeited.

• Termination: If you break the rules, the contract ends. If I break the rules, I pay all remaining fees. If either of us wants out without cause, thirty days’ notice or the specified penalty.

My eyebrows climbed higher with every line. By the time I reached the bottom of the page, my face was hot.

I looked up at him. “No falling in love?” I repeated, incredulous. “Seriously? Who writes that into a contract?”

“I do,” he said, like it was obvious.

“Wow.” I let out a small, disbelieving laugh. “And Friday nights? Every Friday? Why?”

He didn’t blink. “Patterns.”

“Patterns?”

“People watch patterns,” he said, voice cool. “Security, staff, press, competitors. They believe what they can predict. Every Friday makes us predictable. Predictability makes a story look real.”

It was so clinical it made my skin prickle.

“You wrote ‘separate rooms,’” I said flatly.

“Yes.”

“And you felt the need to state we won’t be in the same bed.”

“Yes.”

I stared at him. “So you need a prop.”

“I need a solution.”

“Why me?” I asked, trying to steady my voice and failing. “Why not pick someone who actually likes you? Or someone who… I don’t know… wants this kind of thing?”

His mouth tilted, not quite a smile. “Because you don’t like me.”

It hit with a weird kind of honesty that made my chest thump.

“That’s your reason?” I asked. “You choose me because I don’t like you?”

“It’s one of them,” he said, calm as stone. “You won’t get attached. You won’t misread a polite gesture. You won’t confuse a story with reality.”

A sour taste crawled up my throat. “And the other reason?”

His gaze flicked over me in a quick, clinical sweep that made me grip the edge of my chair. “You look believable.”

I blinked. “Excuse me?”

“In boardrooms, believable is better than dramatic,” he said, unbothered. “You’re not a tabloid magnet. You won’t offend investors, or distract them. You won’t cause noise.”

There it was—the insult dressed as logic. I felt it like a slap.

“So I’m… what? Neutral enough to parade around?” My voice shook. “Unremarkable enough to fit the frame?”

His silence was answer enough.

Something ugly twisted in my chest—hurt, anger, humiliation—but my mother’s face rose again and swallowed it. I looked back at the pages.

“Why six months?” I asked.

“A contract window,” he said. “A very large one. If certain people believe I’m unstable or hiding something, we lose leverage. The rumor needs to die quickly and stay dead long enough to sign. Six months is safe.”

“The rumor,” I repeated, narrowing my eyes. “You mean the one saying you like—”

“I’m aware of what it says,” he cut in, voice flat. “Investors enjoy stories. Competitors feed them. People talk because I don’t date. Not publicly.”

“So what’s the truth?”

“The truth,” he said, “is that I don’t like girls,the thought of them irritate me!

The words were cold, simple, thrown across the table like a fact on a report. He didn’t flinch. He didn’t soften it. He didn’t give me anything to hold onto.

I swallowed. “Then… what exactly do you like?”

A beat. His face didn’t move. “Not relevant.”

“Right,” I said, my laugh thin and mean. “Not relevant.”

I skimmed the numbers again, brain tripping over commas. Ten thousand on signing. The monthly. The completion fee. All the zeros felt like they belonged to someone else’s life.

“It’s immediate,” he said, as if reading my thoughts. “The advance hits your account the minute you sign. Your mother doesn’t have one month to wait for a first paycheck. You know that.”

My throat tightened. He wasn’t wrong. A regular job would give me a start date and a delay and a list of forms. This? This wired money in minutes. Money that could move my mother from the waiting list to the operating room. Money that could keep my brother in school. Money that could make the doctor stop looking at me with pity.

And at least i won’t have to hide from my landlord again!

“And you?” I asked, trying to steady my breathing. “What do you get besides quiet rumors?”

“Control,” he said. One word. Final.

We sat in silence for a moment. The room seemed too bright. My heartbeat was loud enough to count.

I turned the page to the signature lines. There was a pen clipped to the folder. It felt heavy in my hand.

“Say I sign,” I said, voice rough. “What happens then?”

“You don’t tell anyone,” he said. “You learn your schedule. You memorize simple answers about how we met. You memorize enough information about me,I would do the same. You show up on Friday. You follow the rules. If the press asks, you’re calm. If they push, you’re quiet.”

“And if I don’t sign?”

He lifted a shoulder. “Then you don’t.”

“That’s it?”

“That’s it.”

The ease of it made me angrier. I wanted him to twist. To explain. To beg. To show he needed me, even a little. He didn’t.

I stared at the folder. I imagined the hospital hallway, the fluorescent lights, the nurse’s careful voice. Three days. I imagined my brother telling me he’d try to get a job and maybe take a break from school and how his voice shook when he said it.

“Fridays,” I said, one last stab at reason. “Separate rooms. You don’t touch me. You don’t try to.”

“Correct.”

“And we… what… pretend?”

“In public,” he said. “We don’t pretend in private.”

“Right,” I whispered. My fingers went numb around the pen.

“And Lyra,” he added, voice even cooler, “don’t confuse any of this with interest. I picked you because you won’t get ideas. You don’t like me. That’s useful.”

“Trust me,” I said, a bitter laugh breaking free, “no ideas here. You’re the last man I’d—”

“Then it’s simple,” he said.

Simple. Nothing about this was simple.

I closed the folder. The air thinned around me.

“No,” I said.

His eyes didn’t change. “No?”

“I can’t,” I said, heat flooding my face. “Your rules are insane. The way you talk to me is worse. I’m not a prop, or a pattern, or a quiet little nothing you can move around on a schedule. I—” My voice cracked. I swallowed hard. “I can’t.”

He didn’t argue. He didn’t lean in or soften or try to win me over. He just nodded, once.

“Make up your mind before it’s too late,” he said calmly. “The driver will take you home when you’re ready.”

He stood. The chair didn’t scrape. The door sighed as he pushed it open. He left without looking back.

I stared at the white room like it might swallow me whole.

Anger burned hot, hotter than before. It mixed with shame until my eyes stung. I snapped the folder shut and shoved it away like it had teeth.

I didn’t ring for the driver. I didn’t press the neat little button on the table or wait for the silent man in a suit. I stood, ran a hand over my face, and walked out on my own. My heels clipped against the quiet hallway. The lilies smelled too sweet. My head throbbed.

Outside, the night air hit my lungs and made me gasp. I didn’t stop walking until I was past the white steps, past the car, past the gate. The city swallowed me up, loud and messy and honest. I kept going until my feet ached and the anger calmed into something colder.

On a bench under a streetlight, I sat and opened my bag with shaking hands. The hospital bill stared back at me from the top—bold numbers, cruel and impossible. I pressed my thumb to the paper as if warmth could melt the ink.

My phone buzzed. Sophie: Any update? How did it go? Are you okay?

I stared at the screen, then typed slowly: No job. I’m fine.

I deleted I’m fine and typed I don’t know instead. Then I deleted that too. My fingers hovered.

Another message slid in beneath it—Hospital Accounts: Reminder: Deposit required to schedule surgery. Please contact billing before 12 p.m. tomorrow to secure the earliest slot.

I closed my eyes. For a second, I couldn’t breathe.

The folder was still in my head—$10,000 on signing; a number big enough to move us forward; another big number for finishing; Fridays like a ritual; “no falling in love” stamped like a joke that wasn’t funny.

I pressed my palms to my eyes until I saw sparks.

“Not a prop,” I whispered. “Not a prop.”

But the clock didn’t care what I whispered.

I stood and started walking again, the city blurring around me, my phone heavy in my hand. I told myself I had decided. I told myself I wouldn’t even think about it. I told myself I’d find another way.

I told myself a lot of things.

By the time I reached my door, my mind was a tight drum. I slid the bolt, leaned my forehead against the cool wood, and exhaled.

My phone buzzed one more time. Sophie calling

I didn’t answer. Not yet.

I let it ring until the sound died in the small room, and the silence grew teeth.

I set the phone on the table, sat down, and stared at it like it might start talking on its own.

How would this even sound if I decided to tell Sophie? How would my mum feel if she found out I had to be someone’s fake girlfriend in other to pay her hospital bill? But at this point do I really have a choice?

I sat up and decided to tell Sophie about everything because i don’t think I can make this decision alone,on my own!