chapter 9

The headlines were everywhere.

I could feel them crawling under my skin, even when I wasn’t looking at my phone. They lingered in the air, carried by half-hidden smirks and the hushed way people suddenly fell silent when I walked into the room. Damian Blackstone’ Latest Conquest — the phrase had been splashed across every gossip column for the past hours, painting me into the perfect tabloid caricature. Not a chef. Not a finalist. Just the woman who had caught his eye.

My stomach knotted as I leaned over the stainless steel counter, trying to steady my breath while my hands chopped onions into perfect, uniform slices. Focus. Keep your head down. Let the work drown out the noise.

But the whispers never stopped.

“So much for getting here by your own hard work.”

The comment was thrown carelessly from the far end of the prep station — loud enough to be heard, quiet enough to pretend it wasn’t meant for me. I froze, the knife gripped tight in my fingers. My gaze flicked up just in time to see Clara smirking at her phone she has being on my neck since she witness my encounter with Chris on the first day here, and didn’t even bothering to hide the satisfied little curve of her mouth.

I forced my hands to keep moving. One slice. Then another.

Don’t react. Don’t give them the satisfaction.

But the words had already found the cracks — burrowing deep into the place inside me that had fought so damn hard to be seen. To be more than someone’s pity case or pretty distraction.

By the time the lunch prep was finished, the noise had settled in my chest — thick, suffocating. I barely made it to the bathroom before the lock clicked behind me, my back pressed against the cold tiles. My breath shuddered out as I pulled my phone from my pocket and opened the article for the fifth — tenth? — time.

The woman who captured Damian blackstones’ attention…

I gritted my teeth. The tone dripped with condescension, turning me into nothing more than a passing footnote in his larger-than-life story. It didn’t matter how many hours I’d spent honing my craft, how many nights I’d stayed up perfecting recipes. The moment a powerful man had stepped into the picture, all anyone wanted to talk about was how I’d earned that attention.

I squeezed my eyes shut, jaw clenched so hard it ached.

It shouldn’t hurt this much. Not after everything I’d been through. I’d spent years swallowing down every slight, every offhand remark that tried to box me into something smaller, something less. I should’ve been used to it by now.

But this… this was different.

Because buried beneath the anger — beneath the sick knot twisting in my stomach — was something far more dangerous.

A flicker of heat. A flash of memory.

Damian standing up for me. His voice cutting through the room like a blade, slicing through the doubt and the accusations with that effortless, infuriating confidence.

I didn’t need him to fight my battles — I never had — but something about the way he’d done it… like it had mattered to him… like I had mattered…

I shoved the thought down hard.

It was just misplaced gratitude. Nothing more.

I let out a slow breath, forcing the tremor from my hands. The contest was bigger than this — bigger than him. I’d worked too damn hard to let anyone reduce me to a headline.

By the time I pushed out of the bathroom and back into the chaos of the kitchen, I’d stitched every crack closed. My mask firmly in place. I kept my head down and threw myself into work, trying to bury the noise beneath the rhythm of chopping, stirring, plating.

But the whispers followed.

And then he showed up.

I felt him before I saw him — that slow, lazy heat rolling into the room like he owned every square inch of space he walked through. My whole body tensed, eyes fixed on the cutting board as his shadow slid into the corner of my vision.

“I didn’t know I was your type.”

My hand jerked mid-slice, the knife clattering onto the board.

Of course he would find a way to make this worse.

I turned slowly, schooling my face into something neutral. Damian leaned casually against the counter, arms crossed, the faintest smirk curving at his mouth. The tabloids hadn’t done him justice — he was even more infuriating in person. All sharp lines and lazy confidence, like the rumors barely even touched him.

I hated that he looked amused. Hated that I noticed.

“Don’t flatter yourself,” I muttered, grabbing the knife again.

He made a soft, thoughtful sound, his gaze sweeping over me like he was cataloging every flicker of tension I couldn’t quite hide.

“You’re really letting them get to you.” The teasing edge in his voice made my blood heat.

I snapped the knife down onto the cutting board harder than necessary, turning to face him fully. “Don’t act like you don’t know exactly what you did. I didn’t need your help. Now everyone thinks I slept my way out of trouble.”

His smirk flickered — quick enough that I almost missed it.

“Would you rather they think you’re guilty?”

The breath punched out of me. My nails dug into the counter, the words scraping something raw inside me. He said it so casually — like he hadn’t just summed up my entire life in one brutal sentence.

I shouldn’t have let him see how close he’d hit.

But I did.

The amusement faded from his eyes, something sharper slipping in as he straightened — just a fraction. Enough to feel the shift in the air.

“You’ve been fighting so hard to prove you’re not what they say… that you’ve forgotten it’s okay to let someone stand beside you.” His voice was quieter now, low and cutting.

My throat tightened.

I wanted to throw it back in his face — to tell him he didn’t know a damn thing about what I’d fought for, what I’d clawed my way through just to be standing here. But the words lodged in my chest, tangled up with the sick, humiliating truth buried deep beneath all my anger.

Because some small, fractured part of me wanted someone to stand beside me.

Even if it was him.

I swallowed hard, shoving the feeling down where it belonged.

“I don’t need your help.”

Damian’s eyes lingered on me for a long moment — too long. Like he saw every wall I was trying to hold up and was deciding whether or not to break through them.

Then that damn smirk returned.

“If you say so, Evelyn.”

He pushed off the counter, brushing close enough that I caught the faint trace of cedar and something darker beneath it. My heart thudded treacherously against my ribs — and from the flicker in his gaze, he knew.

I hated him for it.

I hated myself more.

By the time I turned back to the prep station, my hands were shaking. I gripped the knife tight, forcing myself to breathe through the tight knot in my chest.

I hated him.

I hated that he was in my head now — that he’d wormed his way under my skin without even trying.

And most of all… I hated that some part of me wondered what it would feel like if I let him stay.