1. The worst part is that I like it.

The first day I saw him, I thought he must have been some kind of casting mistake. Too perfect to be standing in that café where I used to waste time trying to write a chapter of my novel. And there he was, standing like the world revolved around his flawless figure. John Blackwell. The John Blackwell. Billionaire, arrogant, and owner of a smile that could easily be registered as a lethal weapon.

He had the kind of presence that hurt to look at. Tall, elegant, wearing a suit that probably cost more than my bank debt. The watch on his wrist didn’t tell the time—it told of power. His dark hair slicked back without a single strand out of place, his grey eyes glinting like metal. Like a secret on the verge of exploding.

And still, what pissed me off the most was how easily he sat at my table. Without asking. Without permission. As if the air, the space, and even my coffee belonged to him.

“Do you always sit alone, or is it just because of me?” he said, smiling like he knew exactly which button to press.

I was wearing a faded T-shirt, jeans that were begging for a merciful end, and my hair was up in a messy bun that screamed functional depression. I didn’t even look at him at first. I sipped my coffee with exaggerated indifference, flipping open my laptop in the hope that my obvious disinterest would drive him off.

“Are you always this arrogant, or just when you’re invading the space of women who clearly don’t want to see you?” I shot back, without raising my gaze.

“Always,” he said, laughing. And his laugh… it had that cursed echo that clings to you, like a song you hate but can’t stop humming.

I tried to ignore him. I swear I did. But he kept coming back. Every day. Every damn day. Sometimes with chocolates from some country I couldn’t even place on a map. Sometimes with books, as if he knew exactly what I needed to read. He’d say he “understood writers,” that “the muse deserved decent coffee and pretty words too.” I tried to be cruel. Sarcastic. But he seemed to enjoy each attempt at rejection like they were moves in a game he already knew how to win.

Until one afternoon I’d had enough.

“What do you want, John? I’m not going to write a book about you or fall at your feet. I’m not your next whim.”

He fell silent for a moment. When he smiled, it was different. Less show. More shadow.

“I don’t want you to write about me. And I don’t want you to fall at my feet. I just want to get to know you.”

That sentence. Empty, worn-out… but it didn’t sound that way. For the first time, it didn’t sound like a cliché. It went straight through me, and I couldn’t stop it.

And that’s when I started falling, without knowing I was falling. With every conversation, every shared silence. He made me laugh. He listened like someone who wanted to keep every word I said safe in a corner of his memory.

And one night, in his glass-walled penthouse, with the city lights burning at our feet, I said it:

“I can’t fall in love with you.”

I didn’t look at him. I couldn’t. I knew that if I did, I’d shatter the wall of indifference I’d so carefully built to keep him out.

His hand brushed mine. The heat that ran through me was as physical as it was emotional. John Blackwell might look like a marble statue on the outside, but his touch was liquid fire.

“I’m not asking you to fall in love with me,” he said softly. “But if it happens… I won’t run.”

I laughed.

It was a bitter sort of laugh, the kind that comes from where I keep all my fears.

“What do you know about love? You live in a bubble. I don’t fit in your world, John.”

He came closer. So slowly it sent a shiver down my spine. And when his fingers touched my cheek, my soul trembled.

“It’s not about worlds, or fitting in. It’s about you and me. That’s all.”

And then he kissed me.

It was a kiss without warning, without permission, without pause. Not planned, not gentle, not shy.

It was the kind of kiss that tore down all my walls, that made me forget my fears, my insecurities. It was pure passion, fire. A fire I hadn’t known I needed, but that consumed me completely.

I don’t know at what point I got lost.

I only know that John Blackwell—the man I hated on sight—had already found a way to stay inside me.

And I didn’t know if that would save me… or drown me.

When the kiss ended, the universe seemed to fall silent.

My lips still burned.

My chest rose and fell like I’d just run a marathon, and for a second, I didn’t know whether to slap him or kiss him again.

What the hell had just happened?

One second we were arguing, and the next, his lips were on mine.

And damn it… I liked it.

Damn it all.