CHAPTER 4.

David Pov

I sit up, and that's when I see my torn shirt on the floor, and clothes scattered everywhere. The memories come crashing down. The heat, the shame, the desperate moans. My eyes widen in a silent scream. I look down, and my dick is already hard, a betrayal of my disgusted mind.

Fuck.

I scrambled for my jeans, putting it on and it all came rushing back: the knock on the door, the boy with the wild eyes, the taste of his mouth. It was a mistake. 

How could I have done this to Maya, my own daughter, what kind of father am I?

This is a catastrophic, career-ending, life-altering mistake. 

I looked at the living room, at the rumpled sheets on the couch where we had fallen. He was still asleep, his body curled into a ball, his face a picture of innocent vulnerability. 

For a brief, terrifying moment, I felt a tremor in my chest, a foreign warmth I had long since buried. It was a feeling I hadn't allowed myself in decades, the pure, unadulterated desire to protect someone. 

But that was for another life, a life I didn't have and would never have. I was David Petrov, a billionaire, a titan of industry. My life was a series of calculations, a fortress of iron will and self-denial. 

There was no room for vulnerability, no space for a college boy with an unsettling obsession. My daughter, Maya, trusted me. She loved me. This boy, this foolish, beautiful boy, was a weapon pointed directly at her heart. 

My mind, a place of cold logic and spreadsheets, was a mess. Shame, hot and acidic, burned a hole in my stomach. What would the board say? What would my business partners, the Johnsons, think? What would my ex-wife say? And Maya… the thought of her face, of her genuine, unconditional love, was a dagger.

The risk was too great. The cost was too high. I had to end this. Now. Before a single thread could unravel the whole thing. I walked over to the couch and nudged his foot with my own. 

His eyes, a soft shade of hazel, fluttered open. They were still heavy with sleep and clouded with the quiet contentment of the night before. He looked at me, a soft, expectant smile on his lips, and my heart, a cold, dormant thing, gave a single, painful thump. 

It was a sign of life, a warning of what I had just awakened."Get up," I said, my voice as cold and sterile as the morning light. 

The warmth in his eyes immediately vanished, replaced by confusion and hurt. I watched him sit up, pulling the sheets over his bare chest. He was a boy again, small and fragile in my stark, intimidating world.

"David...?" he began, his voice raspy with sleep.

"This was a mistake," I said, the words a hammer, each one more final than the last. 

"It shouldn't have happened. It was a lapse in judgment. An embarrassing, drunken night that we will both forget."

His confusion deepened. "But… last night… it was real. For both of us."

“Nothing about last night was real," I said, a lie so practiced it tasted like truth. "I was drunk. I'm sorry if I gave you the wrong idea. This can never happen again."

“Last night never happened. I was drunk. I was… in a state. It was a mistake. A moment of weakness. Nothing more.” I know he felt hurt. 

“A mistake?” he says, his voice trembling with a rage

 “A moment of weakness? I don’t think so. I remember every second. I remember your hands. I remember your mouth. I remember the things you said. It wasn’t a mistake. It was… a moment of truth. A truth you cannot accept”

I look at him, and my eyes are a cold fury. “You are not a part of this world. You are a tourist, a foolish little boy playing a man’s game. I do not have… relations… with men. Last night, I was not myself. I was high. I was not in my right mind.”

Leo laughs, a hollow, bitter sound. “High? Is that what you’re calling it? You think you can use a few drinks, a little bit of powder, to erase what happened? To pretend it never happened? Or are you trying to assure yourself you are not gay?” I am instantly shocked by his words

“I know this is not a fairytale. You're my girlfriend's father, We're a part of a world that would destroy us if they knew the truth. Your daughter, she’s in love with me. She has been her whole life. You think I don't know that? I betrayed her. I betrayed my parents. I betrayed everything I stand for. And you… you think you can just erase it?”

My face is filled with controlled fury, I am trying so hard to control my emotions. He knows he is getting to me.

“You think you can just tell me to forget it? A fool you can just push around? I am a part of this world. I am a part of this family. And you… you are not going to dismiss me. You are not going to act like this was some kind of… accident. This was a choice. A choice we both made.”

I take a step forward. The air crackles with a dangerous tension. He knows what he has done, challenging me . But I know he is not afraid. 

“Don’t you ever speak of this again,” I say, my voice a low, chilling whisper. “Not to my daughter. Not to your family. Not to anyone. If I ever hear a word about this, I will ruin you. Do you understand?”

He doesn't flinch. “I do,” 

The raw hurt in his eyes was a physical blow. A muscle in my jaw clenched, the only outward sign of the turmoil raging inside me. 

He put on his shirt, his shoes, and stood before me, his face pale and his eyes wide with disbelief.He finally spoke, his voice trembling. 

"So... this is it? You just… discard people?" The words were a brutal truth. I knew what I was. I was a man who put my reputation and my career before everything. 

"I'm a busy man, Leo. My world is not for a boy like you. Go back to your life. Go back to your girlfriend. And don't ever show your face here again." 

He stared at me for a long, quiet moment, his expression a mixture of devastation and a dawning understanding. He had seen the man I was trying to be, but for a night, he had seen the man I was. 

He nodded slowly, the silence broken only by the whisper of his feet on the marble floor. The elevator doors opened and swallowed him whole. 

And I was alone again. In my beautiful, empty fortress, a king in an empty castle. I had my control back, my carefully constructed life safe. But for the first time in years, the silence didn't feel like peace. It felt like a deep, suffocating loneliness.