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Lahat ng Kabanata ng The Scandalous Step Siblings: First Enemies, Then Lovers : Kabanata 1 - Kabanata 10

120 Kabanata

1

Anya’s povI closed my laptop with a quiet, decisive thud—the sound of a door slamming shut on an entire career. Below the screen, the final headline of the night glared back at me: Kai Rhodes: A Monument to Mediocrity, Or Just a Man Who Needs a New Hobby? It was vicious. It was unfair. It was exactly what our readers at The Spotlight loved.“Three thousand words of pure, unadulterated bile, Anya,” Maya’s voice chirped from the Bluetooth speaker in the corner of my small, cramped office. She was probably balancing her phone on her shoulder while stirring her third cup of coffee, despite the clock pushing past midnight. “Did you really have to use the word ‘flaccid’ seven times to describe his latest live album?”I stretched, wincing as my back protested the long hours hunched over this cheap, second-hand desk. The chair cushion was flat enough to be a decorative coaster.“It was artistically justified, Maya,” I retorted, pulling my messy, dark hair into a tighter bun. “The man has bee

2

~AnyaThe call with Ethan Cole had lasted precisely eight minutes and thirty-two seconds. When I finally hung up, the silence in my tiny office was immediately swallowed by the chaotic ringing in my ears.Kai has absolutely no idea you’re coming.The audacity of those words, delivered with Ethan’s surgical precision, sent a hot, sickening rush through me. This wasn’t a journalistic opportunity; it was an ambush. Ethan wasn’t hiring a writer; he was hiring a Trojan Horse, and the man I hated was about to be blindsided. The professional thrill was immense, but it was mixed with a sudden, clammy realization: I was walking into a trap set by my secret crush against my step-brother. This was going to be ugly, complicated, and possibly disastrous.Ethan had been all business—cold, concise, and utterly compelling. He hadn’t asked if I was capable, he had simply stated that I was the only person for the job. He knew about my ambition, about The Spotlight’s savage reach, and he understood the

3

Anya’s pov9:00 am.The building wasn’t a building; it was a vertical monument to who had the biggest wallet. It was a dizzying tower of glass and steel in Manhattan’s financial district, perched so high it probably got nosebleeds. It smelled like Italian leather, fresh money, and the ozone that clings to expensive, clean air.I’m not saying I have a death wish, but I did wake up this morning thinking my odds of success were roughly equal to a snowball’s chance in hell. And yet, here I was, standing in the lobby of a building so aggressively wealthy it probably had a gold-plated fire escape. It was the headquarters of Titan Management, perched so high in Manhattan’s financial district that the other buildings looked like my discarded LEGO creations.It smelled like a million dollars, specifically the kind of money that buys Italian leather furniture and ozone generators to filter out the stench of us mere mortals. It reeked of pure, concentrated ambition, and it was the domain of Etha

4

AnyaThe humiliation hit me first, fast and hot. The thought of catering to Kai’s massive ego, of fetching his vitamin waters and sorting his dirty rock-star laundry, it was like a physical assault. He must have put you up to this, you spoiled bastard, I thought, a surge of pure venomous hatred bubbling up. Kai Rhodes could seriously go fuck himself.“It’s the only way, Anya. If you’re his assistant, you’re invisible. No one on the team will talk to a journalist, but they have to talk to the PA. You’ll be in the bus, the hotel rooms, the physiotherapy sessions. You’ll see the struggle firsthand. You’ll see the real pain,” Ethan insisted, his voice dropping to a confidential whisper.“And you’ll write the true story of the tortured artist’s painful road back to glory. We need raw, unfiltered access, and the PA role provides the perfect cover.”The idea of being Kai’s errand girl, having to look my step-brother in the eye every day for thirty days, was physically revolting. It felt like

5

Anya’s POVThe Next Day, 4:00 pmThe escrow account was open. The money was a numerical ghost, waiting in the digital ether. I stared at the contract copies spread across my desk, the bold signature of Anya Sharma glaring up at me. It felt less like a professional agreement and more like a binding spell. Ethan Cole had my ambition, my mission, and now, my immediate future, locked down with two cold, calculated stipulations:I must act as Kai Rhodes’s Personal Assistant for the entire month-long final leg of his tour.If I published anything negative or unauthorized—a single sentence, a private email, a hint of my true opinion, I would forfeit the colossal payment, and my NGO dream would collapse before it even started.It was the cruelest catch, a perfect trap sprung by a man who was as brilliant as he was beautiful. He wasn’t just buying my writing; he was buying my silence and my servitude. He had found the exact point of vulnerability where my alter ego was powerless, my deepest, m

6

Anya’s POV“Who the hell are you?” His voice was low, harsh, and utterly devoid of any recognition. It was the voice of a man in deep, silent agony, and yet, it still held that same imperious rock-star authority.“My name is Anya,” I said, walking slightly further into the room, ensuring I was visible. “I’m the new Personal Assistant. Ethan Cole hired me. I start… now.”Finally, slowly, he raised his head. His eyes—those stormy, green-gray eyes that could look either like a misty morning or a gathering storm—fixed on me.It took him only a fraction of a second to piece it together. The shape of my face, the familiar high cheekbones, the undeniable, unwanted connection. His eyes widened, not with surprise, but with immediate, chilling hostility, like a fuse being lit. The silence that followed felt like an explosion waiting to happen.The glass in his hand slammed down hard on the side table, rattling loudly against the heavy wood.“Anya fucking Sharma,” he hissed, the name sounded mor

7

Anya’s povEthan's voice cuts through the door: "It doesn't matter what you want, Kai! The sponsors are breathing down my neck. If you don't finish this tour, the breach of contract lawsuits will bury you. You’ll be in a courtroom for the next ten years, and they’ll take every cent you have left!"Kai's gravelly reply: "Let them take it. I can't play, Ethan. I'm a circus act now. And you brought a vulture on board to narrate my funeral."Ethan: "Anya Sharma is your insurance policy. Without her 'authorized' story, the police are going to keep digging into that night. You want the truth of that crash to stay buried? Then you make her believe you're a victim of fate, not a liability."Anya’s heart hammers. What truth? She presses closer to the wood, her journalistic instincts screaming. This is the "dirt" she needs.Suddenly, the door handle turns.The door didn’t just open; it was yanked back with such violence that I stumbled forward, my hands flying out to catch myself against the do

8

Anya’s povThe pressure of his hand against my windpipe was cold and trembling, a terrifying contrast to the heat radiating from his feverish skin. Kai wasn't looking at me—he was looking through me, his pupils blown wide, trapped in a jagged memory I didn't understand."Kai, stop! It’s me. It’s Anya!" I wheezed, my fingers clawing at his wrist.The sound of my name seemed to act like a physical shock. His focus shifted, the glassy haze in his eyes fracturing until the stormy grey returned, sharp and lethal. He blinked, the recognition hitting him like a blow to the gut. He let go so abruptly I slumped against the door, gasping for air and clutching my throat.He recoiled, stumbling back until he hit the chaise lounge, his chest heaving. "What... what are you doing in here?" he rasped, his voice thick with the remnants of the night terror. He looked down at his good hand as if it belonged to a stranger, then at the heavy, white bandage on his left."I heard you screaming," I managed t

9

Anya’s POV10:27 AM — Somewhere in the MidwestBy the time the sponsors finally left the bus, I had perfected the art of smiling without warmth.My cheeks hurt. My jaw ached. My soul felt like it needed a very long shower and possibly an exorcism.“Great energy today,” one of the lawyers said as he stepped down the bus stairs, flashing me a grin that suggested he’d bill Kai for breathing oxygen. “Really strong recovery narrative.”Recovery narrative.That was what we were calling this now. Not a man whose hand had been filleted by fate and bad decisions, but a narrative. A consumable arc with bullet points and sponsors.I waited until the doors hissed shut behind them before letting my smile collapse.Ben exhaled loudly beside me. “Well. That was fun. Only three more weeks of this and I can retire to a beach and let tinnitus take me.”I checked my clipboard, because if I didn’t cling to tasks, I might start screaming. “Kai’s press walk-through is in forty minutes. Ethan wants him dres

10

Anya’s POVPress Walk-Through — 11:15 AMIf hell had a waiting room, I am certain it would look exactly like a stadium corridor five minutes before the big sponsors arrived. Everything smelled like strong disinfectant and expensive money. Thick black cables snaked across the concrete floor like sleeping snakes, and crew members moved with a scary kind of purpose. They kept their eyes down and their radios crackled with voices I couldn’t understand. In this place, no one spoke unless they absolutely had to.Kai walked beside me. He didn’t walk with me, he walked beside me. There was a huge difference between the two.He kept a very careful distance between us. He stayed close enough that I could feel the heat of his body when he moved, but far enough away that no one could point a finger at us. He didn’t want Ethan’s lawyer to have any reason to clear his throat. Kai’s face was already set into that “brooding star” version the public loved so much. He looked detached and a little bit s

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