Chapter 8
INDECENT PROPOSAL
VICTOR
Friday morning hits me like a punch of over-roasted espresso—bitter and unwelcome.
Fluorescents hum overhead, flickering like they, too, have complaints. Outside the small, sealed window, Manhattan is draped in gray—rain threatening, taxis honking, the city already annoyed with itself before noon.
My publicist Rachel Stone sits at the head of the table in a slate suit sharp enough to be considered a weapon. Her laptop is open, her pen clicking at precise, metronomic intervals engineered to fray my remaining patience.
I skim her fourteen-page crisis deck. Every page is more deranged than the last.
Harper isn’t here yet.
Which shouldn’t matter.
But it does.
“She’ll be here,” Rachel says, without looking up.
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You made that face.”
“What face?”
“The one where you pretend you’re fine but you’re actually irritated, confused, or suppressing rage. Very subtle tells, Victor.”
I breathe out through my nose. “Let’s just start.”
“We can’t start without her. And you should be relieved, honestly—this is the calmest you’ll feel all day.”
Before I can respond, my phone buzzes.
I check the screen.
Not Harper.
Roman.
ROMAN: Bro. TELL ME you ordered your tux.
I exhale. Of course. Groomsman duties for his wedding. The punishment for having friends.
ME: I’m in a meeting.
ROMAN: Great. Order it in the meeting. Multitask like the CEO you pretend to be.
Another buzz.
ROMAN: Also—you’re bringing a plus-one to my wedding. Pretend your Babushka said so.
Christ.
As if summoned by the thought, another notification appears.
This time from Babushka herself.
A calendar invite.
DINNER — SUNDAY 6PM. Do not embarrass me.
Perfect.
Rachel glances up. “Work emergency?”
“Family,” I mutter.
“Mm. So—emergency.”
I pocket the phone just as—
A knock.
Rachel straightens. “Finally. Come in.”
The door opens and Harper steps inside, giving me that punched-in-the-solar-plexus sensation again.
Carrying a laptop and notebook, she’s wearing a pale cream blouse, dark pencil skirt and minimal makeup that does absolutely nothing to dim how startlingly expressive her face is.
Her toffee-colored hair is pulled back—just enough to expose the line of her neck, the stray chestnut curls escaping near her jaw.
She looks like she slept four hours and powered through on sheer will, sarcasm, and caffeine.
She also looks like she doesn’t want to be here.
“Morning,” she says, golden eyes focused ahead.
"Harper, great to have you. Please take a seat.” Rachel gestures to the chair beside me.
Harper hesitates for half a second, then sits down, maintaining a careful distance between us.
The air shifts immediately, even as her perfume—a warm floral scent—reaches around my throat and squeezes.
Rachel clears her throat. "Okay. Let's get started. Harper, you've read the document?"
"Yes."
"Questions?"
"Several."
"Good. That means you were paying attention." Rachel pulls up a presentation on the screen behind her. "Here's the situation: You two are legally married. The internet knows. TMZ knows. Your families know. And Richard Francis is apparently out of his Vegas jail cell and raging.”
I sit up straighter. "What?"
"Patricia Franklin called me at seven AM. Someone leaked the story to her." Rachel's voice is sharp. “Apparently, Richard claims you should have been better company in Vegas. He’s apparently pissed about it.’”
"Christ."
"My thoughts exactly."
“Well, it’s hard to compare my company to multiple sets of double D’s. And it’s not like I dropped the prostitutes in his lap. I wasn’t even there when he got arrested.”
“A small miracle.” Rachel clicks to the next slide. "Which is why we need to control this narrative. Now."
Harper shifts in her seat. "What does that mean?"
"It means you two are going to be seen together. In public. Looking like a couple who actually likes each other."
Harper’s full lips flatten into a thin line.
Rachel continues. "We have several public events coming up. The Grandview Hotel grand opening a few weeks from now. The StreamEats investor dinner the following week. A meeting with Richard Francis’s board in November." She looks at me. "You're attending all of these with Harper."
"The Grandview opening? That’s not a personal event, Rach. That’s business,” I warn her. "Several CulinaryVision board members will be there. "
"Which is why you're bringing your wife." Rachel's tone leaves no room for argument. "It shows commitment. Stability. That you're a man who honors his obligations."
Harper makes a sound that might be a laugh or might be a strangled sob.
"Something to add, Harper?" Rachel asks.
"No. Just—" Harper shakes her head. "This is surreal."
"Welcome to crisis management." Rachel clicks to the next slide. "Now, let's talk living arrangements."
I tense, and Harper goes very still.
"Living arrangements?" she repeats slowly.
"Yes. You're married. People will expect you to live together."
"We're not actually—"
"Doesn't matter what you actually are. Matters what it looks like.
" Rachel leans forward. "If you're photographed leaving separate apartments every morning, the press will have a field day.
'Ice Prince and Mystery Bride Living Apart.
' 'Marriage Already in Trouble.' You see where I'm going with this? "
Harper's face has gone pale. "You want me to move in with him?"
"Temporarily. For appearances."
“Oh, that is so not happening.”
"Harper—"
“As much I’d love to live in my new boss’s likely sterile, probably plant-less abode, I actually have a lease. A roommate. A life I’d prefer not to uproot.”
Rachel sighs. "Victor, talk to her."
Both of them turn to look at me.
I consider my options.
Option one: Agree with Harper, let her keep her apartment, and watch the press tear apart our "marriage" before the acquisition closes.
Option two: Convince her this is necessary without sounding like I'm demanding she sacrifice her independence.
Option three: Say something that doesn't make me sound like either a dictator or the wobbling dickhead she already thinks I am.
"Rachel," I motion to my publicist. "Could you give us a moment?"
She studies my face for a long moment, then stands. “Okay, fine. I’ll give you both five.”
She leaves, closing the door behind her with a decisive click.
Silence ensues, and Harper stares a hole in the nearest table, her jaw tight when I lean back in my seat, sighing.
“You know, it would help if you didn’t look like you were being held hostage,” I comment, searching her face.
“I am being held hostage,” she mutters, still not looking at me.
“Not by me. By a contract you signed.”
Her laugh is muted. “Right, because that’s the problem here,” she mumbles low. “The paperwork. Not the fact that, up until recently, you practically accused me of orchestrating a multi-state plot to trap you.”
“You have to admit the timing was pretty damn suspicious.”
“Oh my God. You still think that? After everything I said? After Rachel confirmed my hire date? After your own employees vouched for me?”
“I’m cautious.”
“You’re paranoid.”
“I run a multi-billion-dollar company.”
“And I run a cooking show. Where my most dangerous weapon is a mandoline slicer and the occasional rogue onion. Forgive me if I’m not buying the femme fatale narrative.”
I look away before I smile. I refuse to encourage her.
Her arms cross tighter. “Admit it. You just wanted a reason not to trust me.”
“You’re oversimplifying.”
“Am I? You looked at me like I was gangrenous the morning after the wedding.” Her voice wavers.
Just slightly. “I was doing just fine until a forty-million-view news clip tied me to you. The way you treated me in that hotel suite, you’d think I hacked your bank account and stole your childhood dog. ”
“I don’t have a childhood dog.”
“That explains so much.”
Silence folds between us, a weighty blanket of things said and unsaid. This time Harper is the first to look away, her breathing shallow, her voice thinner.
“Rachel wants us to make this work. You want to protect your company. I want to survive this without having a breakdown on live television. That’s all this is. Logistics.”
“It’s more than logistics,” I exhale, jaw ticking now, still in disbelief that I’m doing this shit. “My…grandmother invited you to dinner.”
“Excuse me—I think I just went temporarily deaf. What…did you just say?”
“Sunday night. Babushka sent an invite. It wasn’t optional.”
“Dinner. With… your Babushka.”
“Yes.”
“Does she know we barely speak? Or that you glared at me for twenty straight minutes yesterday when I made the mistake of making eye contact with you on the elevator?”
“I wasn’t glaring.”
“You were absolutely glaring.” She crosses her legs, leaning forward. “Does she know this marriage isn’t… real-real?”
“No. But she knows we’re married. And she wants to meet you.”
“That’s…a lot.”
“It is.”
Before she can say more, my phone buzzes again. Loud. Against the hollow table.
Harper glances at it. “Another crisis?”
“Groomsman chatter,” I mutter. “My friend Roman thinks I should be able to order formalwear while running a company.”
My phone buzzes a millionth time.
ROMAN: DID YOU ORDER THE TUX OR ARE YOU RUNNING THE COMPANY INTO THE GROUND??
Harper watches me as I text. “Is he okay?”
“No,” I ping back. “He’s getting married.”
She snorts—a quiet, involuntary sound that lands somewhere in my gut.
“Well, I guess we’ll know all about that struggle come Sunday,” she hums.
I stare at her. “I’m not sure if you’re being supportive or mocking me.”
“Why choose?”
There it is again—that quick hit of attraction that lands low and sharp.
She doesn’t even try to soften her edges. She just… is—direct, unfiltered, and devastatingly genuine in a way my world never allows.
“Speaking of Sunday,” I say, because redirecting feels safer. “We should probably discuss optics at dinner.”
She nods slowly. “Okay. But we are not acting like a married couple at your grandmother’s.”