Chapter 12 #2
"Yes," I confirm, my voice coming out low and measured, the kind of tone that usually makes boardrooms fall silent and listen.
"Why?" She leans forward slightly, her dark eyes narrowing with the intensity of someone who has learned to interrogate every detail, every inconsistency. It's one of the things I respect most about her, she doesn't accept surface-level answers, not from anyone, certainly not from me.
I regard her for a long moment, letting my gaze settle on her face.
The question deserves more than corporate speak, more than the polished deflection I'd normally deploy.
"Because you're the best event planner I've encountered in fifteen years of running this company," I say, each word deliberate and unhurried.
"And I pay appropriately for quality. Always have.
It's not sentiment, it's sound business practice.
I don't hire mediocrity, and I don't underpay for excellence. You fall into neither category."
My tusks catch the light as I speak, as she tracks the movement with those sharp, assessing eyes. She's waiting for the real answer, the one underneath the logic. The one I'm not quite ready to give her yet, even though we both know it's there.
"Thrall." She sets the contract down, pressing her palms flat against the table. "This isn't a fair deal. This is you trying to fund my business under the guise of a contract."
"This is me trying to hire the most competent event planner I've ever encountered to handle my company's substantial event needs.
" I step closer, unable to maintain the professional distance any longer.
"Everything in that contract is defensible from a business perspective.
My board already approved it. Legal vetted it. This is legitimate."
"It's too much."
The objection hangs between us, small and defiant. She's gripping the contract like it might burn her.
"You're worth it."
The words come out rougher than I intended, weighted with far too much meaning for what should be a simple business transaction. The rumble of it fills the small space of her kitchen, vibrating through the air between us like something almost tangible.
Her breath catches, a sharp intake that's audible in the sudden quiet.
The pulse in her throat jumps, the delicate flutter of it betraying everything her stubborn expression refuses to admit.
It's a tell, one of the few she can't quite control around me, and I've become pathetically attuned to every variation of it.
Every time that pulse quickens, I know I've landed exactly where I intended.
"I need to do this on my own terms," she says quietly. "I need to know that I built this myself, that I earned every client and every contract through my own skills and reputation. Not because I slept with a CEO who decided to play savior."
The implication that what happened between us was nothing more than sex, nothing more than some hollow transaction to be filed away and forgotten, makes my jaw clench with a fury that surprises even me.
I can feel my teeth grinding together, the sharp pressure of it radiating through my skull.
It's an almost primal reaction, one that belongs more to the feral version of myself that I've spent years burying beneath three-piece suits and quarterly earnings reports.
"That contract has nothing to do with what happened in my cabin. Not a single line item. Not a single clause."
"Doesn't it?" She challenges me, her dark eyes searching mine with that infuriating combination of defiance and vulnerability that makes my chest feel too tight.
"No." I move closer, crowding into her space until she has to tilt her head back to maintain eye contact. "What happened in my cabin was personal. This is business. I'm fully capable of separating the two."
"Are you?" She doesn't back down, doesn't retreat, even with my massive frame looming over her tiny kitchen. "Because from where I'm standing, this looks like you trying to take care of me whether I want you to or not."
"Maybe I am." The admission comes out as a low rumble. "But the terms of that contract are still legitimate, still fair from a business perspective, and still an opportunity that any rational businessperson would accept."
"Any rational businessperson who wasn't sleeping with the client," she counters, her voice sharp with the kind of precision that tells me she's been rehearsing this argument in her head since the moment I slid that contract across her desk.
"We're not sleeping together anymore." The words come out harder than I intend, each syllable deliberately clipped and final. "You made that abundantly clear when you left my cabin three days ago. When you walked out of my life and decided that whatever was happening between us was... expendable."
The words hang heavy in the air between us, suspended like something fragile and dangerous.
The kitchen suddenly feels smaller, the space between my frame and her diminutive form crackling with an electric tension that has nothing to do with the contract and everything to do with the raw wound she just exposed.
Her face shifts through a cascade of complicated emotions as her jaw clenches. Slender fingers tighten around the counter. But those eyes... her dark eyes betray her completely, and that vulnerability is almost my undoing.
"That's not what I—" she starts, then stops herself, clearly deciding that whatever explanation she was about to offer would only make things worse.
"I left because I needed space to build something that was mine," she says. "Not because I didn't—" She stops herself, jaw clenching. "It doesn't matter. The point is that accepting a contract like this undermines everything I'm trying to accomplish."
"How? By giving you financial stability?
By providing consistent, high-value work that will build your reputation in the industry?
" I lean down slightly, bracing one hand on the table beside her.
"You want to succeed on your own merits.
Fine. Prove it. Take this contract and execute it so flawlessly that every other tech company in the city is fighting to hire you.
Use Horde Tech as your flagship client and leverage that success into building the most sought-after event planning agency on the West Coast."
She stares at me, her chest rising and falling with quick, shallow breaths.
"That's not playing savior, Romee. That's giving you a platform to showcase exactly how good you are."
"And what happens when this three-year contract ends and you decide you're done with me?" The vulnerability in her voice makes my chest ache. "What happens to my business when the CEO who's been funding my success suddenly pulls the rug out?"
"Read section twelve."
She frowns, flipping back through the contract until she finds the renewal terms. She scans the text, her expression shifting as she processes the implications.
"Automatic renewal unless either party provides notice," she reads aloud. "With a minimum rate increase of fifteen percent per term to account for inflation and agency growth."
"I'm not building you up just to tear you down," I say quietly.
"I'm offering you a genuine partnership because I trust your skills and I value your work.
What happened between us personally doesn't change the fact that you're the most competent event planner I've ever encountered and I want that competence working for my company. "
She remains quiet for a long moment, her gaze fixed downward on the contract spread before her.
The papers seem to demand all of her attention, though I suspect she's stopped actually reading them several seconds ago.
Her jaw works slightly, as if she's turning over thoughts she hasn't yet decided to voice aloud.
"I need time to think about this," she finally says, and there's something almost fragile in the admission, a rare crack in the armor of absolute certainty she usually wears like body armor.
I nod slowly, acknowledging the request even as part of me wants to push, to argue, to use every persuasive tactic I've honed over fifteen years of closing deals.
But something about the way she's holding herself—shoulders slightly drawn inward, fingers gripping the contract's edge—tells me that pressure now would be a mistake.
"You have until Friday," I reply, my voice measured and professional, the tech CEO reasserting control. "Same deadline I gave you for the gala proposal. That gives you three business days to review everything, consult with whoever you need to consult with, and make your decision."
She lifts her head at that, her dark eyes meeting mine with a flash of something that might be frustration, or gratitude, or some complicated mixture of both.
"Thrall—" she starts, but her voice catches slightly on my name, and she doesn't seem to know how to finish the thought.
"I'm not pressuring you. I'm giving you the same professional timeline I'd give any vendor.
" I straighten up, forcing myself to step back and give her space even though every instinct is screaming at me to crowd closer.
"Read the contract thoroughly. Have a lawyer review it if you want.
Submit questions through Joffrey if any terms are unclear.
This is business, Romee. Treat it like business. "
She looks up at me, her dark eyes searching my face for something I'm not sure I'm successfully hiding.
"Why did you really come here in person?"
Because I haven't been able to think about anything except you for three weeks. Because I check your new business website approximately forty times a day. Because I wake up reaching for you in an empty bed and spend my mornings imagining what it would be like if you'd stayed.