Chapter 6
POV: YOU’RE TRAPPED IN A FAKE ENGAGEMENT WITH A MAN WHO LOOKS LIKE A CALVIN KLEIN AD IN GRAY SWEATPANTS. #SENDHELPANDSELFCONTROL
DAKOTA
Five hundred and seventy-three likes on last night’s post. Ouch. Definitely worse than my usual numbers, and half the comments section looked like a dumpster fire, but it could be worse.
At least someone still thought I hung the moon.
She’d been one of my most consistent followers since I started.
Always first to like, always ready with the compliments.
Rain or shine, PR scandal or not, there she was.
A little over the top? Yes, I’d argue that commenting, You look stunning in yellow.
It brings out your eyes, just like that sundress you wore four months ago, constitutes as over the top.
But in a world where people dropped you faster than last season’s trends, that kind of loyalty was … nice.
One less thing to worry about, I guess.
I’d already taken the photo with my artisan ceramic mug with the tasteful speckles, not the chipped mug I actually preferred, positioned just right with the morning light. Everything in frame conveyed casual morning elegance I’d post tomorrow. Everything out of frame screamed temporary exile.
I’d set up my lighting equipment in the corner of Axel’s office, arranging the portable ring light and diffuser to hide the twin bed that might as well have had unwelcome visitor carved into its headboard.
Now came the real work. I pulled up the image on my laptop, studying my expression in the photo.
My genuine smile—the one I’d captured mid-laugh at something ridiculous on my phone—looked too real.
Too unguarded. My eyes crinkled at the corners, and there was something vulnerable in the tilt of my head.
I clicked through to the next shot. This one was better. Practiced. The smile that said effortlessly happy without actually revealing anything.
You’re selling aspiration, not fraud, I reminded myself as I prepared to replace the real smile with the safer one. Keep posting like nothing’s wrong. Tonight’s the exclusive that turns this disaster into opportunity.
The acid in my stomach churned at the thought, but I swallowed it down. Again.
“What are you doing?” The deep voice from the doorway made me jolt.
My heart slammed against my ribs as I spun around to find Axel leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed over his chest, hair still damp from the shower.
Dark strands fell across his forehead in a way I’d never seen.
The water separated them into points, one piece curling slightly at his temple.
It was unsettling how much I wanted to reach up and brush it back.
Like he needed yet another thing to make him look like the sexiest man alive.
“Jesus.” My hand flew to my chest. “Knock much?”
But he wasn’t looking at me. His cerulean eyes were fixed on my laptop screen, and something in his expression made my stomach drop.
His jaw clenched, the muscle actually jumping beneath the stubble that darkened his face and made that sharp line even more pronounced.
The tendons in his forearms flexed as his grip tightened on his biceps while I caught the clean scent of his soap, something that shouldn’t have been distracting but absolutely was.
“This is my home.” His voice came out rough, and when his gaze finally met mine, there was something cold in it.
“And this is the corner you designated me to,” I countered, gesturing to the sad little ten-by-ten space he’d graciously allowed me to occupy. “My very own Dakota detention center.”
He pushed off the doorframe and moved into the room. “You were switching them.”
“Switching what?”
“The photos.” He stopped a few feet away, and I hated how his white T-shirt clung to his still-damp chest, how his gray sweatpants hung low on his hips.
How, even angry, he looked unfairly attractive.
“I watched you. You had a real smile, and you were about to replace it with …” He gestured at the screen with something like revulsion. “That.”
Heat crawled up my neck. “It’s called editing. Every influencer does it.”
“I know what it’s called.” Something flickered across his features. Pain maybe or memory. His hands curled into fists at his sides. “I’m asking why you do it.”
“Because the real one wasn’t good enough.” The words came out defensive.
“Wasn’t good enough,” he repeated slowly, like he was tasting something bitter. “Or wasn’t fake enough?”
My spine stiffened. “You don’t know anything about my business.”
“I know plenty about faking it for an audience.” His voice dropped, went rough. “I know what it looks like when someone performs their whole life. When everything is curated and calculated and hollow.”
The venom in that last word made me blink. This wasn’t just generic disapproval. This was personal.
“Why do you even care?” I stood, closing my laptop with more force than necessary, the cut beneath my bandaged hand biting. “What does it matter to you if I edit my photos or swap out smiles or stage my entire feed?”
His eyes flashed. “Because I promised your brother I’d keep an eye on you.”
“Oh, please.” I let out a harsh laugh. “You’ve barely spoken to me in years. If you’re so concerned about Knox’s little sister, you’ve been doing a terrible job.”
“I don’t need to talk to you to keep an eye on you.”
The admission landed between us like a grenade.
I took a step toward him, pulse hammering. “You follow my social media.”
“It invades my feed,” he protested.
“You can block it.” Another step. “Mute it. Scroll past. But you don’t.”
A cord of tension stood out in his neck. “Someone needs to watch when you’re about to do something catastrophically stupid.”
“Or maybe”—I closed more distance, had to tilt my head back to hold his gaze—“you just like watching.”
The air between us crackled, charged. His eyes darkened, dropped to my mouth for a fraction of a second before snapping back up.
“Careful, Sunshine.”
“Of what?” I was close enough now to smell his soap even more and feel the heat radiating off his skin. “The truth?”
“You wouldn’t know the truth if it bit you.” But his voice had gone low, rough. Dangerous. “You’re too busy performing.”
“And you’re too busy judging me for it.” My heart was racing, and I couldn’t tell if it was anger or something else entirely.
He moved closer, and suddenly, the desk was at my back, the wall of his chest in front. “Every single post. Every caption. Every carefully curated moment. It’s all pretending, Dakota.”
“It’s my job.”
His hand came up to rest on the desk beside my hip, caging me in. “One day, you’re going to forget where the performance ends and you begin.”
My breath caught. The way he was looking at me, like he could see straight through every filter, every carefully constructed facade, made something in my chest ache.
“You don’t know me,” I whispered.
“I know you better than you think.” His other hand braced on my opposite side, trapping me completely.
His face was inches from mine now, and the intensity in his eyes made my knees weak.
“I know you switched mugs because the real one you wanted—the one you have lined up in the cabinet for tomorrow—probably wasn’t pretty enough.
I know you set up your lighting to hide the bed you’ll be sleeping on. ”
Each word hit like an arrow finding its mark.
“And I know”—his voice dropped even lower—“that right now, you’re looking at me like you want to do something that has nothing to do with strangling me.”
My mouth went dry. Heat pooled low in my belly as his gaze drifted to my lips and stayed there.
“You’re infuriating,” I managed, but it came out breathy.
“So are you.” His thumb traced along the desk, close enough to my hip that I felt the ghost of movement. “But you’re going to need to hide that anger tonight. When I touch you. When I hold your hand. When I whisper in your ear.”
“I know the script.”
“Do you?” He leaned in, his mouth close enough that I felt his breath against my skin.
“Because when I put my hand on the small of your back tonight, when I brush your hair behind your ear, when I look at you like you’re the only woman in the room, you can’t flinch away.
You can’t look at me like I’m the enemy. ”
“That’s going to require Oscar-worthy acting.”
“Is it?” His hand came up to trace the line of my jaw, featherlight but burning. “Because right now, Sunshine, you’re looking at me like you want something entirely different than an Oscar.”
Every nerve ending in my body was screaming. The tension was so thick, I could barely breathe, and for one wild moment, I thought he might actually kiss me.
Instead, I pressed my palm against his chest to push him away, to regain some space, some sanity, but the movement sent a sharp bolt of pain through my injured hand.
I couldn’t stop the small gasp, the involuntary wince.
Axel froze. And for a heartbeat, something that looked like hurt flashed across his face. He jerked back immediately, putting several feet between us.
Then his gaze dropped to where I was cradling my hand against my chest, and his entire demeanor shifted. The hurt vanished, replaced by something sharp and focused. In two strides, he closed the distance again, but this time, there was nothing seductive about it.
“Let me see.” It wasn’t a question.
“It’s fine.”
“Dakota.” My name came out like gravel. “Let. Me. See.”
The intensity in his voice made me hesitate, then slowly extend my hand. The beige bandage I’d wrapped this morning had a small spot of red seeping through.
His fingers were surprisingly gentle as he took my wrist, turning my hand over to examine it. The muscle in his jaw moved again, but this time, it wasn’t disgust. It was something else entirely.
“What happened?” The question came out quiet.
“It’s nothing. I just—”
“What. Happened?” His eyes snapped up to mine, and the protective fury there stole my breath. His thumb brushed carefully over my wrist, just below the bandage, and the tenderness of the gesture clashed so violently with the storm in his expression that I couldn’t form words.
“Did someone do this to you?”
The raw concern in his voice, the way his hands held mine like I was something precious and breakable, sent my heart into overdrive for an entirely different reason than before.
And I realized, staring up into those blazing blue eyes, that Axel wasn’t just dangerous to my sanity.
He was dangerous to every wall I’d ever built.