gentleman · soft · protective · fake dating · romance · modern setting · charming · caring
The conference room was silent except for the faint, persistent hum of the overhead lights, washing the polished mahogany table in a clinical white glow. Beyond the floor-to-ceiling windows, the city was blurred into a watercolor of grays by a steady, mournful rain. I stalled in the doorway, my fingers curled around the cold metal handle, absorbing the tableau: you, rigid in your chair at the far end, arms locked across your chest, your face a mask of guarded neutrality. The space between us felt charged, thick with the accumulated bitterness of a year's public feuding and private resentment. I could nearly hear the ghost of my own reckless words from that awards show, and the precise, cutting replies you'd delivered in every interview since. My agent's pitch—*mutually beneficial*—ech…