C6

“Eat the salad, Alice. The news photographers outside the floor-to-ceiling windows don’t pay to take pictures of an untouched plate.”

Sylvester doesn’t even look up from his tablet as he speaks, his tone dropping over the long, black marble dining table like a block of ice.

I slam my silver fork down against the fine porcelain, the sharp clatter echoing through the massive penthouse. “I am not an animal you can feed on a schedule, Mr. Arlington. And I certainly don't eat on command just so your corporate board thinks I’m a well-trained pet.”

Sylvester slowly sets his tablet down, his dark, calculating eyes locking onto mine. “You are paid five million dollars to look content. Right now, you look like a hostage.”

“That’s because I am one,” I snap back, resting my elbows on the table and leaning forward. “You lock me in this sky-high fortress, hand me schedules printed by your assistant, and expect me to smile like a brainless trophy wife whenever a camera flashes.”

“I expect you to execute the terms of a legal contract,” Sylvester says, his voice flat, dangerously quiet. “You signed the paper. You took the check for your mother’s medical debts. That makes you an employee with a ring, nothing more.”

“Then treat me like an employee and fire me,” I say, my heart hammering against my ribs as I glare into his cold, handsome face. “Because every time you open your mouth, I remember why half the city hates your guts.”

A tiny muscle twitches in his jaw, the only sign that my words actually land. “Eat your dinner.”

“No.”

For three straight days, these forced dinners have been our battlefield. We sit at opposite ends of this ridiculous glass-and-steel table, trading sharp, bitter words while Lily stands by the doorway taking notes on our public appearances.

The charity galas started yesterday. Six events in thirty-six hours. Every single one required me to wear a different thousand-dollar dress, paste a glowing fake smile on my face, and stand precisely two inches away from Sylvester while he held my waist with a hand so cold it felt like iron. The media is calling us the ultimate power couple—the grumpy billionaire tycoon and his radiant, ground-level bride.

They don't see the way his fingers dig into my hip when a reporter asks about our sex life. They don't see the way I step on his leather designer shoes under the banquet tables whenever he tries to order my drinks for me.

The grumpy-and-sunshine act is a lie, and the explosive friction between us is rising so fast the air in this penthouse feels like pure electricity.

After dinner, Sylvester disappears into his office without another word, slamming the heavy wooden door shut.

I walk away from the table, my soft velvet slippers making no sound against the polished hardwood floors. Instead of heading to my designated bedroom, I walk down the long, dim hallway leading toward the east wing—the wing Sylvester explicitly told me was off-limits.

The penthouse is silent, save for the low hum of the central heating. I reach the double doors at the end of the corridor. The lock is disengaged, the door resting half an inch open.

Curiosity pulls me forward. I push the door open and step inside.

The room is dark, smelling faintly of cedar, expensive varnish, and old paper. Heavy velvet drapes hang over the floor-to-ceiling glass, blocking out the bright, twinkling lights of the Manhattan skyline.

I step deeper into the dark room, my eyes adjusting to the shadows. Mounted on the central wall, framed in heavy, antique gold leaf, hangs a massive oil painting.

I stop dead in my tracks. My breath catches in my throat.

The painting is a portrait of a breathtakingly beautiful woman sitting on a velvet settee. She wears a deep emerald dress, her dark hair pinned back with diamonds. But it isn't her beauty that freezes the blood in my veins—it's her eyes. They are dark, sharp, and terrifyingly cold, brimming with an unholy, calculating intelligence.

The bone structure of her face—the high, sharp cheekbones, the straight nose, the rigid, unyielding jawline—is identical to Sylvester's.

This is Eleanor Arlington. Sylvester's mother. The notorious socialite who stripped his father’s estate bare, bankrupted the family foundation, and abandoned her ten-year-old son in this very penthouse thirty years ago to run off with an offshore financier.

I stand frozen, staring up at the canvas, realizing in a terrifying flash why Sylvester looks at every woman like she’s a lethal trap. The wound I accidentally touched by entering his life isn't corporate—it's a deep, festering scar left by the woman who gave him life and then destroyed it.

"I told you never to come in here, Alice."

The voice comes from directly behind me, dark, heavy, and low.

I jump, spinning around on my heel. Sylvester stands in the doorway, his massive frame blocking the light from the hallway. His black suit jacket is gone, his white shirt unbuttoned at the collar, revealing the thick muscle of his throat.

"I... the door was unlocked," I stammer, my chest heaving as I back up an inch until my lower back hits the frame of the portrait.

Sylvester doesn't yell. He doesn't move fast. He walks into the room with slow, deliberate steps, his eyes fixated on the painting above my head.

"She took everything," Sylvester says quietly.

I blink, stunned. For the first time since I met him, the ice in his voice is completely gone. In its place is a raw, jagged edge that sounds almost human.

"What?" I whisper.

"My father bought her this penthouse, three yachts, and four art galleries," Sylvester says, stopping just two feet in front of me. He looks up at the portrait, his jaw clenching hard. "She smiled at him just like you smile at the press. Sweet. Radiant. Harmless. And while he was sleeping, she signed over seventy percent of the holding company's liquidity to shell accounts in Panama."

My pulse races fast against my collarbone. I look at his face, seeing the sudden, rare crack in his impenetrable armor. "Sylvester..."

"My father drank himself to death in this very room six months after she left," he continues, his voice dropping into a dark, rough rasp. "He died broke, broken, and believing that love was real. She proved it was just a transaction."

He slowly lowers his gaze from the painting, his dark eyes snapping back to mine. The raw vulnerability vanishes in a fraction of a second, the thick, icy steel slamming back into place over his features.

"So when you look at me with those big, innocent eyes, Alice, don't expect me to fall for it," he says, stepping closer until the heat radiating off his broad chest presses against my shoulders. "I know what women are capable of when there's five million dollars on the line."

A mix of deep pity and sharp, dangerous fear coils tightly in my stomach. "I am not your mother, Sylvester."

"You are a woman in my house taking my money," he growls, his gaze dropping down to my lips. His chest rises and falls hard against mine, the physical proximity making my skin burn with a sudden, dirty, intense heat. "That makes you dangerous enough."

He leans in closer, his breath hot against my cheek, his fingers twitching at his side as if he wants to grab my waist and crush me against him. My thighs press together beneath my silk dress, a sudden, wet ache blooming between my legs at the sheer, possessive anger rolling off him.

Before either of us can move, the phone in Sylvester's pocket buzzes with a loud, violent vibration, shattering the charged air between us.

Sylvester rips himself away from me, pulling out his encrypted smartphone and sliding the screen open. He puts it on speakerphone without taking his dark eyes off my face.

"Speak, Jefferson," Sylvester commands, his voice tight and rough.

Jefferson’s smooth, urgent voice fills the quiet room through the speaker: "Sylvester, we have a major problem. The board just finished an emergency closed-door meeting."

Sylvester’s eyes narrow. "The marriage certificates were filed this morning. The will's deadline is met."

"The certificates aren't enough anymore," Jefferson says flatly. "Victor Hale brought up the lack of physical chemistry at the luncheon today. He called your marriage a paper arrangement, a fraudulent transaction designed to bypass the trust clauses. The board is filing an injunction tomorrow morning to freeze your voting shares."

Sylvester's hand tightens around the phone until his knuckles turn dead white. "They can't freeze the shares without proof of fraud."

"They have enough suspicion to force a stay," Jefferson counters sharply. "Unless you give them indisputable, public proof before the markets open tomorrow. Polite hand-holding and cold dinners aren't cutting it, Sylvester. The board wants to see visible, undeniable intimacy. They want to see that you actually desire this woman, or they move to strip your controlling interest at nine AM."

Alice stands frozen beside the portrait, her hands trembling as she listens to Jefferson's voice echoing off the walls.

Sylvester doesn't speak for five full seconds. The heavy silence in the dark room stretches until it feels like a physical weight pressing down on my chest.

"What are you saying, Jefferson?" Sylvester asks, his voice dropping into a lethal, low register.

Jefferson's final words land like a binding legal verdict through the speaker:

"Kiss her in public at the benefit gala tomorrow night, Sylvester. Kiss her like you own her in front of every camera in Manhattan, or they move against the shares and take Arlington Global away from you forever."

Sylvester ends the call without answering. He slides the phone back into his pocket, his dark, dangerous eyes locking onto mine across the small space separating us.

I look back at him, my heart hammering violently against my ribs like a trapped bird. I see the brutal war already raging behind his dark eyes—a war between his deep, traumatic hatred of intimacy and his absolute refusal to lose his empire.

Above us, the cold, calculating eyes of his mother's portrait seem to watch us both in the shadows, waiting for the lie to finally tear us apart. Tomorrow night's gala will force the first real test of how far our fake marriage can stretch before it snaps completely.