In the room where contracts bind and hearts break.
—-
They moved out of our way the moment we entered in the building.
My mother's presence alone was enough to send the entire building into silence. Sharp heels. Cold eyes. No tolerance for weakness. She wore power like perfume, and I shadowed her step for step, our expressions blank, gaze unforgiving.
No one dared speak.
She didn't want this marriage. I didn't either. Not because it was Lily, though I loathed her but because it was a deal built on betrayal.
However my mother had told me that she hated Lily and her family. I couldn't understand it but she didn't give me reason. But I knew my mother, she did not just say anything without a real reason. When I pressed she just shook it off that it was because she knew my father was playin games which even I believed.
My mother was trying to protect me. And I would protect her too, always.
As for my father, we shared a mutual hatred for him, to each our own reasons. Though I knew why she hated my father. He had humiliated her publicly, privately, with a woman who was nothing. I'd watched the way she broke and stitched herself back together, and every thread she used was made of ice.
She loved him once or maybe that's what I thought. But maybe she did and she still did. Sometimes I caught her looking at him like she still missed something they used to be. A flicker of what once was. Sad, really.
The elevator chimed, and we stepped into the conference room.
A meeting room. That's what they called it. As if this wasn't a noose in paperwork.
My father sat at the head of the table, lawyer beside him, flipping through documents with the intensity of a man sealing a deal with the devil.
Then she walked in.
She moved like someone trying to pretend she hadn't been crying last night. Like she'd stared herself down in the mirror and convinced herself she could survive us.
She looked... good. Too good. The pants clung to her hips in a way that made my mouth dry. The white shirt and corset cinched her waist and lifted her breasts just enough to make me wonder what they felt like bare, flushed, marked by my hands.
Her lips were soft pink, glossed like sin. Her hair was tied back tight exposing her neck like an offering.
Something twisted in my chest. A heat. A hunger.
And I hated her for it.
I shifted in my seat, jaw clenched.
"Alex," A voice snapped me back.
I blinked. Mr. O'Sullivan had his hand outstretched, waiting. Everyone was watching.
"Son, are you okay?". My mother asked, eyes narrowed, sharp with concern.
I nodded stiffly, shaking his hand, avoiding Lily's gaze like it could betray the thoughts I couldn't afford to have.
She sat directly across from me, as if the universe wanted to torture me. Her scent reached me, faint but distinct and I suddenly remembered the way her lower lip trembled when she was afraid.
I wanted to see it again.
"Now that we're all settled," my father said, grinning like the devil at a christening, "shall we begin?"
Lily's confidence cracked for a moment. Her lips parted. Her brow furrowed. She bit down on her bottom lip hard.
I wanted to pull it free and bite it myself. Just to see what she'd do.
The lawyer passed around the contracts, one for me, one for her. The terms of surrender. Legal bindings dressed up as formality.
I stared at the pages, but all I could think about was her mouth. Her body. The way she looked when she walked in, and the fact that every twisted thought I had made me feel sick.
This wasn't supposed to happen. I hated her.
But I hated myself more for how much I wanted her.
***
Lily's Pov
I woke up unsure if the anxiety in my chest was fear or acceptance.
Today I was marrying Alexander Dankworth, a man who looked at me like he wanted to destroy me, then kiss the pieces after. I didn't know which scared me more.
But I knew this much: marrying him meant saving the business. It meant protecting my father's legacy. And maybe… finally being free of Chase.
Even if it meant losing myself in the process.
I stepped into the shower and scrubbed my skin raw. Like it might help me forget the way Chase gripped my wrist the night before like he was owed something. I stared at my reflection after. My eyes looked too wide. My lips too soft. My heart too loud.
I dressed slowly.
The outfit wasn't about vanity. It was armor. Red slacks, tailored. White shirt, crisp. Corset cinched tight around my ribs like a second spine. I didn't usually dress this way, but I wanted them to see me, not as a girl they could break, but as a woman they'd underestimated.
When I walked downstairs, my father's eyes were red-rimmed. Guilt, maybe. Chase froze when he saw me—mask slipping just enough to show the surprise in his eyes.
He thought he'd crushed me last night.
Let him.
"I'm ready," I said, voice sharp. I didn't wait for them. I got into the car.
We rode in silence.
The Dankworth's building rose ahead of us like a fortress, cold glass and steel slicing into the sky. It shimmered in the morning light like it didn't care who it swallowed whole.
Inside, everything was clean. Controlled. Clinical. The people moved like machines, precise, sharp, focused. The building had no warmth, only mirrors and metal.
It reminded me of Alexander.
We approached the receptionist and stated our purpose. She led us through long, echoing corridors. My heels tapped a rhythm I didn't feel. Every step closer felt like stepping deeper into something I couldn't name.
She stopped outside the conference room.
"They're already inside," she said with a polite, empty smile.
Of course they were.
I stood in front of the door for a moment, one hand hovering near the handle.
This was it. This was the moment I stepped into a cage made of paper and ink and secrets.
I drew in a breath.
And opened the door.
Chapter 9: Sold
Bound by ink. Owned by power. Desired by danger.
Lily's PoV
The moment I stepped through the doors, his eyes were already on me, it was dark, unreadable, and utterly consuming.
Alexander didn't just look. He devoured. And I hated how my body reacted to it.
He took me in like I was a secret he meant to unravel, slow and precise. A flicker of something unspoken passed between us. His gaze dipped, unapologetically dragging down the line of my body before returning to my eyes with the same icy detachment.
And somehow… that sickened me and thrilled me in equal measure.
Pathetic, isn't it?
How much I wanted him to like what he saw.
I let my eyes trail down his frame in return. He wore a fitted brown three-piece suit like it had been tailored by the devil himself. Not a single hair out of place. Hands in his pockets. Posture relaxed like he owned the room.
Like he already owned me.
There was something electric in the air around him, a tightly leashed violence or desire, I couldn't tell which. And God, the scent of him. I could smell him from across the room, clean spice, danger, and something cold.
His eyes glinted with mischief, but his face remained unreadable, like it was carved from stone. The contradiction made my pulse stutter. What kind of twisted thoughts were hiding behind that mask?.
My father and Chase made their rounds, shaking hands, pretending to be men of status. When they reached Alex, my father extended his hand, so j a polished, and rehearsed manner.
Alex didn't move. His gaze never left me. As if my father didn't exist.
"Alex," my dad said, a little sharper.
A flicker of something flashed across Alex's face, surprise, maybe embarrassment. Not for being caught, but for being pulled out of whatever thought he'd been having while staring at me.
He turned to my father and his stare was even colder than before. Whatever spell had been there, it snapped. But the heat in my chest lingered.
"Son, are you okay?" a woman's voice asked. Soft but steely. I turned and instantly recognized her. She didn't need introduction, her presence screamed power. She was his mother, Susan Dankworth. She had his bone structure, his elegance, his frost. But unlike him, there was something almost concerned in her eyes… until he nodded. Then she slipped back into ice.
She wore a crimson suit like a queen at war, her heels clicking with menace. There was something about her that made me want to bow, not out of respect but fear.
Eventually, Alex shook hands with my father. We took our seats. I ended up across from him, close enough to feel the tension radiating off his body.
His leg brushed against mine beneath the table barely. But it was enough to make my breath catch.
He didn't apologize. Didn't pull away. Just held my gaze as if testing me. I couldn't read him, and maybe that's what scared me most.
"Now that we're all settled," Alex's father began, too cheerful, "shall we begin?"
I thought I'd accepted this.
I thought I had made peace with this. I had told myself that I was doing the right thing. But now, in this room with his mother's glare, his father's fake cheer, and Alex, the man who'd soon own my name, my body, my future, I was unraveling. It all felt real.
Terrifying real.
The lawyer began passing around papers. The contract. My hands trembled and my heart hammered in my chest. I wasn't just signing papers. I was surrendering.
To him.
"Does anyone have questions regarding the terms?" the lawyer asked, as if we were all equals in the room.
The contract read like a sales agreement. A transaction. I was the merchandise.
Marriage to Alexander Dankworth. Thirty thousand dollars wired to my family. And just like that, I was sold. Thirty thousand for a lifetime.
There was a clause: if I backed out or divorced him, my family would owe the money back plus compensation for any 'damages' to the Dankworth name.
I wasn't a bride. I was liability insurance.
"I want an addition," Alex said, voice flat, eyes fixed on the paper in front of him, "It should be in the contract that she's not to be with any other man during our marriage. This isn't love, we all know that but I won't have her sleeping around."
Not even a glance in my direction.
His words sliced deeper than it should have.
"Yes, we wouldn't want her whoring around," came Susan's voice, laced in poison. "Hardly surprising, given the pedigree.
I gasped in surprise at her statement but even more surprised at my father and Chase who sat quietly. Why would she say such a thing?. No female in my family was a whore or known for being one. Why didn't dad try to defend us?.
It was only her husband that was courageous enough. "Susan!" He yelled.
But she ignored him completely. "It should also be stated that if she divorces my son, she gets nothing. No money. No assets. No handouts."
Then she looked at me. Not looked—glared. Hatred, naked and furious, in her eyes. I'd never spoken to her before today, and already she hated me.
Could be the marriage ? Or maybe this was just who she was.
But it didn't matter.
To her, I was filth.
"If that's all…" the lawyer stood and left to amend the contract. The room fell into a stiff, stifling silence.
No one from my side spoke. Not my father. Not Chase. They just sat there, cowards in suits letting me be torn apart, sold, humiliated. I felt nothing for them. Not even anger anymore. Just cold disgust.
---
The lawyer returned with the updated contract and handed it to Alex. He glanced through it and when he was satisfied his eyes fell on me.
He ran his eyes over me in a way that made my palms sweaty and heat rise to my cheeks. With his dark eyes still locked on mine, slowly, he signed the papers.
I gulped.
Once he was done, the lawyer slid the paper to me. I read through it quietly, feeling his eyes burn into me.
My mind kept racing, I thought of Chase's hands, his threats, the way he owned my life like a spoiled child with a favorite toy.
I thought of my father's silence, his bargains, his disregard.
I glanced at them. They were both watching, waiting. Smiling.
There was nothing to hold on to.
I turned to Alex again and his gaze was ever present. He might be cold, cruel even and his stares may have my mind swirling and my heart twisted in confusion—but i knew he wouldn't hurt me like that.
With Alex, I'd be caged. But I'd be safe.
And that, for now, was enough.
"Please sign". The lawyer said gently.
With my gaze still on Alex and a taunting smile on my lips, I signed the papers. Giving myself him.
I was his now Legally, Publicly.
Everyone stood, shaking hands, congratulating one another like they hadn't just watched a girl sell her soul.
"A wedding will make the arrangement look real to the public," Alex's father said. "The company's image depends on it."
"Yes, the sooner the better." the lawyer added.
"This weekend should do." His voice was clipped, efficient.
Alex didn't respond. Neither did his mother. They just sat there, staring ahead like corpses at a funeral.
"That would be fine, sir," Chase said, all too eager. He couldn't wait to get rid of me.
And I couldn't wait to be gone.
"We'll handle everything. Just show up on Saturday," Alex's father finished.
They shook hands one last time. Then we left the room, me, my father, Chase.
I walked out of that conference room a married woman.
And in some twisted way, that felt like the first real choice I'd ever made.
***
The hallway was quiet. Too quiet.
My father and Chase had already moved ahead, speaking in low voices about something that didn't matter anymore. I didn't follow them.
I stopped.
I felt him behind me before I heard his voice.
"You signed easily." Alex said with amusement in his tone and closer than I expected.
I turned, slowly. He stood a few feet away, hands still in his pockets, face unreadable. But his eyes, they were anything but blank. There was a fire there, tightly leashed. Watching me.
"I didn't realize I was supposed to cry," I said, voice even. "Would that have pleased you?"
One corner of his mouth lifted, but it wasn't a smile. "No. You did exactly what I expected, obedient, and efficient, Like a good little bride."
I straightened my back and a smirk formed on my face. "And you played your part perfectly too," I said. "Insults. Conditions. Ownership disguised as protection."
He stepped closer.
I didn't move.
"You think this is about ownership?" he asked quietly, voice like silk over steel. "You're wrong. It's about control."
My breath hitched, but I held my ground. "Is there a difference?"
His eyes dropped, just briefly to my mouth. My throat. Then back to my eyes.
"Yes," he said. "Control means I don't touch what's mine until I decide it's time. Ownership means I could've taken you already."
My skin flushed hot. I hated that it reacted to him. I hated that I reacted to him.
"And what am I to you, Alex?" I asked, quietly. "A trophy? A transaction?
His expression didn't change. But something shifted in his eyes. Something sharp. Unforgiving.
"You're a complication," he said.
I swallowed hard. "Then stay out of my way, and I'll stay out of yours."
He stepped closer again, close enough that I could smell him. That maddening scent. Clean, cold, expensive.
"That's not how this works, Lily." His voice dropped to a near-whisper. "You don't get to stay out of my way. You're in my way. Every time you breathe. Every time you speak."
My heart was pounding now, too loud in my chest.
"So what then?" I challenged, chin tilted up. "Are you going to punish me for it?"
His smile was slow, dangerous. "Not yet."
He leaned in, just enough for his breath to brush my ear.
"But one day," he murmured, "you'll beg for my attention. And I might give it to you. If I'm feeling generous."
I froze.
Not because I was afraid.
But because some small, broken part of me wanted to know what that would feel like.
Before I could say anything, he stepped back. Composed. Distant again. As if the moment hadn't just shifted everything inside me.
"I'll see you Saturday," he said, turning away. "Wear something white. Or don't. It won't matter."
He walked off down the hall, never looking back.
And I stood there, married, furious, and already burning.