Chapter 4

Arielle Brooks

“Kiss me or I’ll talk.”

The words hung in the air like smoke, thick and impossible to ignore. I stared at him, frozen, heartbeat pounding in my ears.

“You can’t be serious,” I managed, my voice barely above a whisper.

Xavier stepped closer, the school hallway suddenly feeling ten degrees warmer.

“Do I look like I’m joking?”

My mouth opened, then closed. No words came out. He looked dead serious, but not in the way I was used to. This wasn’t cold Xavier. This was calculated Xavier. Strategic. Dangerous.

“You’re insane,” I breathed.

“And you’re panicking. Relax,” he said, his voice too calm for someone threatening a public kiss. “A little PDA won’t kill you.”

“It might if your fan club sees”

I didn’t get to finish the sentence. His hand slipped behind my neck, and before I could move, his lips brushed mine.

Soft. Sure. Intoxicating.

I froze, my eyes wide as heat flooded every inch of my skin.

He pulled away just as quickly, his eyes unreadable.

“There,” he said, his voice low. “Now they’ll believe it.”

I stood there like an idiot, my lips tingling and my heart racing.

What the hell just happened?

Cafeteria – Ten Minutes Later

I slumped into a seat next to Mira, who was scrolling her phone with wide eyes.

“You good?” she asked, glancing up at me. “You look like you just got hit by a bus.”

“Worse,” I mumbled.

She raised an eyebrow. “Tell me you didn’t.”

“Didn’t what?”

She turned her screen toward me. There, on the Empire Gossip page, was a grainy photo of me and Xavier kissing in the hallway. It already had 3,000 likes and a hundred comments.

I groaned, burying my face in my arms.

Mira squealed. “Okay, that kiss looked real. Like, real real.”

“It wasn’t,” I said quickly. “It was staged. He’s just trying to cover his butt.”

“Well,” Mira whispered, “he covered it really well. That boy looked like he meant it.”

I didn’t respond.

Because deep down, a terrifying part of me wondered the same thing.

Later That Day – Art Class

I stared at the blank canvas in front of me. My sketchpad lay open beside it, untouched.

I couldn’t focus.

Not on shading. Not on technique.

Just lips. His lips. On mine.

And the way he looked at me afterward like I wasn’t just a pawn in some political chess game.

“Ms. Brooks?” the teacher called. “Are you okay?

I blinked. “Yes. Sorry.”

Bianca, sitting across the room, snorted.

Of course she was in this class.

She’d been quiet all day — too quiet. Which meant she was planning something.

And I was too distracted to care.

Evening – Knight Mansion

I didn’t go down for dinner. Again.

Instead, I sat curled up on the couch in the guest room, scrolling through hate comments and kissing memes like a glutton for punishment.

“She’s using him. You can tell.”

“Bet she paid someone to post that kiss.”

“He could do so much better.”

I wanted to scream. I wanted to run. I wanted to throw my phone off the balcony.

A soft knock came at the door.

“Go away,” I muttered.

“Arielle,” Xavier’s voice came through, calm and quiet. “Let me in.”

I didn’t answer.

A moment later, the door creaked open and he stepped in, holding a plate.

“I figured you skipped dinner again.”

I kept my eyes on my blanket.

“You didn’t have to do that.”

“I know,” he said, setting the plate down on the nightstand. “But I did.”

He didn’t leave.

He stood there, like he wanted to say something more.

Then finally, “That kiss…”

I sat up straighter.

“What about it?”

He ran a hand through his hair. “It wasn’t just for the cameras.”

I stared at him.

“Then what was it for?”

He hesitated.

And in that one breath of silence, I saw something different in his eyes. Not arrogance. Not cruelty.

Confusion.

“I don’t know,” he finally said. “But I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it.”

And just like that, I forgot how to breathe.

Xavier Knight

I shouldn’t have kissed her.

Not because it wasn’t part of the plan — it was. A distraction. A headline.

But because I felt it.

Her lips. The way she trembled. The way her hand almost reached up to grab my shirt but stopped halfway.

I felt something real.

And that terrified me.

Knight Mansion – Later That Night

I sat in my room, staring at the campaign spreadsheet my dad sent over.

Donor events. Public appearances. Monthly image analysis reports.

Nowhere on the list was “falling for the girl you’re pretending to marry.”

I wasn’t supposed to care.

I was supposed to be ruthless.

Efficient.

Unattached.

But Arielle?

She was getting under my skin.

The way she looked when she was mad. The way her voice cracked when she was hurt. The way she still managed to stand her ground in a school full of vultures.

She wasn’t like anyone I’d ever known.

I grabbed my phone, typing and deleting a dozen messages before finally writing:

"You okay?"

I hit send.

No reply.

A minute later, I got up and walked to her room.

Arielle’s Room – Midnight

I stood at her door for a full five minutes before knocking.

No answer.

I turned to leave, but something on the floor caught my eye, one of her sketches.

I picked it up.

It was me.

Not smiling. Not fake. Just… me.

And next to the sketch, she’d written:

“I hate him. I hate him. So why does my heart feel like this?”

I swallowed hard and left a note under her door.

“For what it’s worth… I didn’t regret the kiss.”

X

Next Morning – Xavier’s POV

My dad was already waiting in the car when I came out of the mansion. His tie was perfectly knotted. His scowl was permanent.

“We’re late for the press meet,” he barked. “And next time, wipe that look off your face. You’re not in a high school romance.”

I said nothing.

But inside?

I knew that was exactly where I was.

And it was getting harder to pretend otherwise.