Chapter 6 - The Question He Did Not Answer At First

"I need to forget someone. Can you make me forget?"

The question hung between us.

One of the bodyguards shifted once more. The tall man in the black suit did not look away from my face. His grey eyes held mine, steady and unreadable, while the question hung between us unanswered, dangerous, and already costing more than I could calculate.

For a moment, nobody moved.

The music from the terrace kept playing behind us. Glasses clinked. People laughed. But in our small corner, near the railing, the air felt still. Like the whole party had stopped breathing with us.

He did not answer me immediately.

He looked at my face first. Really looked. At the champagne bottle I had left on the high table. At my clothes I never changed out of. At my hands that I was trying to keep still, but were shaking a little at my sides.

"You are asking the wrong man," he said finally. His voice was low. Calm. Not soft.

"Why?" I asked. "Because you are Adrian Blackwood?"

"Because I do not do forgetting," he said. "I do remembering. When I touch something, I remember it. When I want something, I keep it."

My heart beat faster. I should have stepped back. A normal girl would have stepped back. But I had just come from the private room upstairs where my own father had chosen Sophie over me. Where my accounts were frozen. Where my mother's life was now hanging on $500,000 and seven days.

I had nothing left to be careful with.

"Then remember me," I said. My voice was quiet, but it did not shake. "Just for tonight. Remember me, not her. Not them."

Something changed in his eyes then. The unreadable grey turned sharper. Darker. Like he had finally decided something.

He lifted two fingers, just a tiny movement, and both bodyguards stepped back at once. They did not leave. They just gave us space. Enough space that no one else could hear us, but close enough that they could still see my hands.

"James," he said, without looking away from me.

The taller bodyguard stepped forward. "Yes, sir."

"Car. Now."

"Already waiting, sir."

I swallowed. This was real now. Not a drunk thought. Not a joke on the terrace. He was really going to take me with him.

"Adrian," I said. I used his name for the first time. "If I go with you, my family will say"

"I don't care what your family will say," he cut in. "Your family just threw you out of a private room like you were a problem to contain. Do you care what they say?"

"No," I said. And for the first time that night, it was true. "I don't."

He held out his hand. Not grabbing. Not pulling. Just offering. The same way a man offers a contract and waits to see if you are brave enough to sign it.

"Last chance, Ava Miller," he said. "If you walk away now, I will let you. I will not follow you. I will not ask again. If you take my hand, I won't pretend tomorrow that tonight was nothing."

I looked at his hand. I looked at the terrace behind me. At the party that was still celebrating without me. At the stairs that led back up to the room where my father had said, "Sophie is carrying the next generation. You are carrying a grudge."

I took his hand.

His fingers closed around mine. Warm. Strong. Sure. Not like Liam. Liam's hands had always been impatient. Grabbing. Adrian's hand felt like a decision.

He led me down the stone steps. Past the groups of people. Past the string lights. No one stopped us. A few people stared, but when they saw his face and the two bodyguards behind us, they looked away quickly.

The car was black and long and silent. James opened the back door. Adrian waited until I was inside before he got in beside me.

He did not touch me in the car.

He sat close enough that I could feel the heat from his suit, but he kept his hands on his own knees, like a man holding himself back on purpose. Like he was giving me one last chance to change my mind in silence.

"Where are we going?" I asked. My voice sounded small in the quiet car.

"Somewhere no one from your family can follow," he said. "Somewhere no one can freeze you, or film you, or use you."

The building we stopped at was not a hotel I knew. It was one of his private suites, high above the city. Marble floors. Big windows showing the whole of New York lit up at night. A bed so large it looked like it belonged in a palace.

The moment the door closed behind us, James and the other bodyguard stayed outside. It was just us.

I stood in the middle of the room, suddenly aware of how small I was in my wrinkled clothes, how much champagne I had drunk, how broken the night had made me.

Adrian removed his jacket slowly. He placed it over a chair like a man who never rushed anything.

"Tell me to stop," he said, "and I will stop. At any point. Do you understand?"

I nodded.

"Say it," he said. His voice was firm, but not cruel.

"I understand," I said.

He walked toward me. Not fast. Not like Liam. Liam had always been impatient, grabbing, laughing. Adrian moved like he was memorizing me. When he finally touched my face, his thumb brushed my cheek so gently I almost broke.

"You're crying," he said.

"I am not," I whispered.

"You are."

I didn't even know it. The tears had come without sound. He wiped one away with his thumb and then he kissed me. Not hard. Not demanding. Just slow, like he was giving me time to change my mind.

I didn't change my mind. I kissed him back, and for the first time that night, I wasn't thinking about Sophie's laugh, or Liam's hands, or my father's cold voice in the private room. I was thinking about the man in front of me, who looked at me like I was not a spare, not a problem to contain, but a woman he actually wanted to see.

What happened after that, I will keep private, because some things are not for the whole world to replay. What I will say is this: he was careful with me. He kept asking if I was sure. He kept waiting for my answer. And when I said yes, he made me forget. Not forever. But for one night, the cold emptiness inside me was replaced by warmth, by being held, by being chosen on purpose, not out of pity.

In the morning, I woke up before him.

The city was grey through the windows. His arm was heavy across my waist. His breathing was deep and even. For a moment, I just lay there, looking at the sharp line of his jaw, the arrogant smirk even in sleep, the way his black hair had fallen across his forehead.

Then reality came back.

My mother. The $500,000. Seven days. My frozen accounts. My family who had thrown me away.

I slipped out of bed quietly. My clothes were on the floor. I dressed fast, my hands shaking again, but for a different reason now.

I opened my bag. Inside was the last cash I had taken from my apartment before the dinner. Five hundred dollars. It was supposed to be for a taxi, for food, for survival.

I stared at it for a long time. Then I did something I still don't fully understand, even now. I placed the five hundred dollars neatly on the nightstand beside his bed. Like a payment. Like a message.

Services rendered.

It was cruel. It was childish. It was my way of saying: you don't own me. I used you, just like everyone else uses me. We are even.

I did not leave a note. I did not look back.

I closed the hotel door behind me and walked into the cold morning air, alone again, with only the memory of his hands on my skin and five hundred dollars less in my bag.

I told myself I would never see Adrian Blackwood again.

I was very, very wrong.