EIGHT

"You finally decided to come to your matrimonial home," Levi said. 

“More like a prison house,” Lila murmured as she walked into the house. She was trying to take in every detail of the house as she walked by. She could not lie about it. Levi seemed to be doing just a vain job like decorating the house, but he seemed to be doing it too well. He should not be that good at decorating a house in such a short time.  

“Since it is a prison for you, I would like it if we could adhere to all the rules that we had from earlier,” Levi said. He had spoken with his father, and Daniel had told him to stay alert at all times since he could not tell what the Carrington family could try to do with him. 

“Aside from the rules that our families have agreed on, I think we need to have rules of our  own." Lila took out a plain sheet and a pen and dropped them on the centre table before dropping gently beside it. 

“You want to have separate rules?”

“Our families might be at loggerheads, but we are the ones who are being forced to be together, and I strongly believe that if I do not stay in the company of others, I might find myself doing something dangerous.” She added the last part really lowly because she wanted him to be afraid of her capability. “So I think that putting the rules in place would be the best way for us to keep each other in check.”

“I guess that makes two dangerous people,” he said instead of being afraid and asking what she meant by what she was saying. 

“We might kill each other and alongside the dream to take care of the Skyline project. This project means too much for my family, so instead of going in head first, I would try to make peace,” Lila said gently. 

“The project is important to my family as well,” Lila wanted to scream at him and ask him since the project became important to the Beaumont family. These people only went after the same things that the Carrington did, as if they were intentionally trying to hurt them in the process. 

“So it is very important to both families, so I think our rule number one should be that we are not to do anything to intentionally screw up the deal,” she said, dragging out each word as she wrote it down on the paper in front of her. 

“That makes sense,” Levi said, nodding. She swallowed down the urge to be sarcastic to him and just tilted her head to the side and smiled instead. 

“Do you have any that you want to add?”

“No one out of our family must find out that this is a contract marriage,” he said, repeating what his dad had told him. The marriage would be useless if people were to know that the men planned it for their children just to put on a show for the whole city. Skyline might even decide to work with any other company.

“Of course,” she said, twisting her mouth to a corner as she wrote his words to the paper. “Maybe we can put a penalty.”

“A penalty?”

"Yeah, like the person who causes the world to know that this is a fake marriage gets to pay heavily,” she said with a smile on her face. She knew it would be hard for her to fall into that trap. Unlike her, who was always minding her business, Levi spoke a lot, especially to his rivals. She was the only rival who always did not see eye to eye with him.

“Pay heavily? Money?” 

“Money? Of course not,” Lila scoffed. They have been exposed to such large amounts that money did not faze them again, and the best thing was for one of them to step down and the other person to win. “So if I am the one who blabbers and the word gets out there, then I step down from my position as the CEO of the food subsidiary, and if it is with you, then you do the same,” she murmured. 

She could see the way he shifted on his feet uncomfortably before leaning his back to the wall. ”You seem not to like the idea,” she murmured to herself as she scribbled on the paper. “Was it a bad idea?” she added, gently raising her eyes to him. 

He could hear the unspoken challenge and shook his head. “Quite the contrary, I am just afraid that you might be unable to keep up with all of the activities,” he murmured. 

“You should not worry about me, and instead you should focus on yourself,” she said with a smile and scribbled down the penalty before raising her head to him and then smiling. “I am sure that you must not have been introduced to such beauty before in your life, but I have to say that this does not give you the right to fall for me.” 

“Fall for you?” he said, a laugh threatening to come out of his mouth. “If I thought that you were worth falling for, I would have fallen for you a while ago and not just because we are getting married,” he declared. 

“That is wonderful, then,” she smiled and scribbled down before raising her head to him. “This is a contract, and contract it shall be—no kissing, especially in public, no skinship or touching; let us just live like two strangers forced to live together.”

“I agree,” he announced.

"Also, I would like to say this just in case you are not wise enough to know this,” she swallowed and turned her head to him. “You should not play the little games you always play with girls,” he scrunched his nose, but he knew she was right; if people saw him around the place with other girls while he was married, he knew that was going to hurt them badly, so he nodded. 

“Of course, I know that.” 

“I guess we must have covered everything,” she said, holding the paper at a distance and reading over what she had written. “Or do you have something else to add?” 

“I have nothing else to add to your list,” he said, tilting his head slightly. 

“Then it's perfect if you would just read this and sign here,” she said, swinging the pen in his direction. Levi pushes his back off the wall and walks to her before he can get to them; she drops the pen on the table. He picks it up and scribbles his name and signature at the bottom left corner. 

She picked up her pen and scribbled the same at the bottom right corner before standing up with the paper in hand. I will get a photocopy and give you a copy so you can keep it well,” she said, and he nodded. 

He stretched his hand to her with a smile and said, “Let us do this.”

“We are going to do this, but remember that we are not allowed to have contact,” she said, flipping her hair and then walking away. 

“She is crazy; oh, how crazy she is.”