The helicopter is a stupid flex, and I hate that I'm impressed.
Not that I'd ever tell Adrian. His ego is already operating at maximum capacity, and watching him move through the world like he owns it—which, to be fair, he basically does—is enough without adding fuel to that particular fire. But as we lift off from the rooftop helipad of his downtown tower, the city shrinking beneath us into something manageable and small, I have to grip the armrest to keep from doing something embarrassing like gasping.
"Scared?" Adrian's voice comes through the headset, layered with amusement. He's strapped in beside me, immaculate as always in a charcoal suit that probably costs more than my monthly rent used to. His dark eyes are fixed on my white knuckles.
"Terrified," I deadpan. "But not of the flying. Of the fact that you own a helicopter. It's very serial killer chic."
He laughs—actually laughs, not that controlled exhale he uses in public—and the sound hits something in my chest I've learned not to examine too closely. "Wait until you see the villa."
Of course he has a villa. Probably multiple. Probably has them on every continent, each one staffed with people whose sole job is to ensure his comfort. The thought should make me roll my eyes. Instead, I'm wondering what it looks like, what it smells like, whether Adrian will be different there, away from the boardrooms and the press and the careful choreography of our public appearances.
The press.
Right. That's what this is supposedly about. Adrian's publicist had been very clear: a weekend getaway would "humanize his brand" and "demonstrate his capacity for personal relationships." The photos would be carefully curated—candid moments of us laughing together, holding hands on some pristine beach, looking like we're actually a couple instead of two damaged people trying to convince ourselves that proximity equals connection.
Except somewhere in the last few weeks, the pretense started to feel less like a performance.
I watch the coastline materialize below us—all golden cliffs and turquoise water that looks almost fake in its perfection. Adrian's hand rests on the armrest between us, and I'm acutely aware of every inch of space between his fingers and mine. The cedar scent of him is mixing with the recycled air, something dark and grounding that's become dangerously familiar.
"You're thinking very loudly," he says without looking at me.
"That's not a thing."
"It is with you. Your jaw gets tight. Right here." He reaches over and brushes his thumb against my chin, and the touch is so casual, so brief, that I almost miss the way my entire nervous system lights up like a Christmas tree. "You're worried about something."
I pull away before I do something stupid like lean into his hand. "I'm not worried. I'm just trying to figure out what the endgame is here. We show up, we take some pictures, we come back. Meanwhile, everyone gets to believe that Adrian Kross—ruthless billionaire, destroyer of dreams, man who probably eats puppies for breakfast—has a soft side."
"Do I?"
The question is so genuine that I have to look at him. Really look at him, past the tailored suit and the calculated charm and the way he uses his money like a weapon. There's something in his eyes right now that looks almost vulnerable, which is absurd because Adrian Kross doesn't do vulnerable.
"I don't know yet," I say, and I mean it.
---
The villa is obscene.
Not in a gaudy way—Adrian's too refined for that—but in the quiet, understated way of old money that doesn't need to announce itself. It's perched on a cliff overlooking the Pacific, all clean lines and floor-to-ceiling glass, the kind of place that makes you feel small and infinite at the same time. The interior is all pale wood and neutral tones, with art on the walls that probably costs more than most people's houses.
"The staff has been instructed to remain invisible unless you need something," Adrian says as we step inside, his hand briefly touching the small of my back. "The chef prepared meals that can be reheated. We're entirely alone."
Alone.
The word hangs in the air between us, heavy with implication.
"Right," I say, moving away from him under the pretense of examining the view. The ocean stretches out endlessly, and I focus on that instead of the way my heart is racing. "Very romantic. Very Instagram-worthy. When do the photographers arrive?"
"They don't."
I turn back to him. "What?"
"There are no photographers." Adrian is watching me with an expression I can't quite read. "The publicist is handling the narrative. We're here because I wanted you to be here. The rest is just..." He pauses, and I watch him search for the word. "Noise."
Something shifts in my chest, some carefully constructed wall I didn't even realize I'd built. "Adrian—"
"Don't." He holds up a hand. "Don't do the thing where you make a joke and deflect and pretend this isn't happening. I'm tired of pretending."
The vulnerability in those five words is devastating.
I should leave. I should call the helicopter back and get the hell off this cliff and away from whatever this is becoming, because I can feel it shifting, can feel the performance crumbling away to reveal something real underneath, and real is dangerous. Real is the thing that destroys people like me.
Instead, I sink onto the nearest couch and watch Adrian pour two glasses of wine with steady hands that betray nothing of whatever he's feeling.
"Talk to me," I say. "Actually talk to me. Not the version you show the world."
He hands me a glass and settles onto the couch beside me—close enough that I can feel the heat radiating off his body, far enough that it's technically respectable. "What do you want to know?"
Everything. Nothing. The terrifying answer is somewhere in between.
"Why me?" The question comes out smaller than I intended. "You could have anyone. Someone from your world, someone who understands the money and the power and all of it. Instead you're... this. With me."
Adrian is quiet for a long moment, and I watch him work through something internal, some cost-benefit analysis happening behind those dark eyes. Finally, he says, "Because you don't care about any of it. The money, the power—you'd be happier if I was poor, wouldn't you? Easier to justify."
"That's not—"
"It is." He takes a sip of wine. "When I was seventeen, I stole my father's car. High-end Mercedes, worth more than most people's houses. I drove it off a cliff."
I stare at him. "You what?"
"Not on purpose. I was reckless, angry, and I crashed it." His voice is flat, clinical, like he's reciting facts about someone else's life. "My father's response wasn't concern for my safety. It was rage about the car. He told me I was worthless, that I'd never amount to anything, that I was a stain on his legacy. Then he left. Walked out and never looked back."
The bitterness in those last words is so raw that I have to resist the urge to reach for him.
"I spent the next fifteen years proving him wrong," Adrian continues. "Built an empire. Made more money than he could have dreamed of. And you know what I realized?"
"What?"
"That I still felt like that seventeen-year-old, waiting for him to come back and tell me I'd done well enough. That no amount of money or power could fill that particular hole." He turns to look at me, and there's something broken in his expression that mirrors something broken in me. "Then I met you, and for the first time, I wasn't thinking about him. I was just... thinking about you."
I set down my wine glass because my hands are shaking and I need them to be steady. "That's not fair. You can't just—"
"I'm not finished." Adrian shifts closer, and I don't move away. "There was someone else. Before you. I was engaged. She was perfect—right family, right background, right everything. I thought I loved her. Turns out what I loved was the idea of her, the way she fit into my life like a puzzle piece I'd been waiting for. When she left me for someone with even more money, I realized I'd never actually let her see me. Not like this."
"Like what?"
"Terrified." The word comes out rough. "Absolutely fucking terrified that you're going to see what I actually am underneath all of this and decide I'm not worth the trouble."
The honesty of it hits me like a physical blow.
I'm quiet for a long time, watching the sun paint the sky in shades of orange and pink. When I finally speak, my voice is barely above a whisper. "My mother got sick when I was sixteen. Cancer. The kind that takes everything and gives nothing back. My father left when the bills started coming in—said he couldn't handle it, which I think meant he couldn't handle anything that wasn't easy. Marcus was only fourteen, and suddenly I was the adult. I worked three jobs, went to school, took care of both of them, and watched my mother die anyway. Watched her die despite everything I did, everything I sacrificed."
Adrian doesn't say anything. He just listens, which is somehow harder to bear than any response would be.
"I told myself I would never be that vulnerable again," I continue. "Never depend on anyone, never let anyone depend on me in a way that mattered. And then Marcus's addiction nearly destroyed us, and I realized I'd failed at that too. I couldn't protect him from himself, couldn't fix him with money or will or love. All I could do was watch and hope he chose to save himself."
"He did," Adrian says quietly. "He's been sober for four months."
"I know." I turn to look at him, and his expression is so tender that it makes my chest ache. "But I can't take credit for that. That's all him. And I think... I think I need to learn how to let people have their own lives, make their own choices, even if those choices scare me."
"Including me?"
The question is loaded, dangerous, everything I've been avoiding.
"Especially you," I whisper.
Adrian reaches over and takes my wine glass, sets it on the table beside his. Then he's pulling me toward him, and I'm too surprised to resist, and suddenly I'm pressed against his chest with his arms around me like he's afraid I might disappear.
He smells like cedar and smoke and something darker—bergamot with an undertone of rain, and it's so perfectly him that I have to fight the urge to bury my face in his neck and just breathe him in.
"I'm going to hurt you," I say into his chest. "Not on purpose, but it's going to happen. I'm broken in ways that probably can't be fixed."
"So am I." His hand comes up to cup the back of my head, and his voice rumbles through me. "Maybe we can be broken together."
It's the worst, most romantic thing anyone has ever said to me, and I hate that I believe him.
---
We spend the rest of the night talking.
Actually talking, not the careful verbal sparring we usually do, not the performance of a couple for public consumption. We move to the bedroom—not to do anything, just because it's more comfortable, and Adrian pulls me against him with my back to his chest, his arms around me like he's anchoring me to something real.
He tells me about his mother, who died when he was twelve, and how his father's coldness got worse after that, like he blamed Adrian for surviving when she didn't. He tells me about the first company he built from nothing, how he slept in his office for two years, how he nearly destroyed himself in the process.
I tell him about the day my mother died, about holding her hand and knowing there was nothing left to do but let go. I tell him about Marcus's overdose, about the moment I realized I couldn't love him into recovery, that I could only love him through it.
We talk about fear—the specific, intimate kind that comes from letting someone see the real you, the broken parts that no amount of money or success can fix.
Somewhere around three in the morning, Adrian's breathing evens out and he falls asleep, his arms still around me, his face buried in my hair. I lie awake and listen to the ocean and try not to think about how dangerous this is, how completely I've let him in.
The problem is that I'm not sure I can let him back out anymore.
When dawn breaks over the water, painting everything in shades of gold and rose, Adrian is still holding me like I'm the most precious thing he's ever owned. I can feel his heartbeat against my back, steady and strong, and for the first time in eight years, I let myself imagine what it might feel like to not be alone in this.
My phone buzzes on the nightstand.
It's a text from an unknown number: You're making a mistake. He'll destroy you just like he destroys everything else. -D
The message hits like ice water, and I'm suddenly very aware of Adrian's arms around me, of how completely vulnerable I am right now.
I should show him.
Instead, I delete it and say nothing, because some part of me—the part that's learned to survive—knows that acknowledging the threat makes it real.
And I'm not ready for real yet.
Not when it feels this good to pretend.
