Page 44 of Falling for Mr. Ruthless

"Through leverage." His shoulders tighten. "It's how the game is played, Chanel."

"This isn't a game." I stand, needing the height, needing any advantage.

"I know." He finally turns, leaning back against the counter, eyes finding mine across a kitchen that suddenly feels too small. "Which is why we need a strategy."

"What kind of strategy?"

His gaze doesn't waver. "One that changes the narrative."

"Meaning?"

"We go public."

"With what?"

"Us." He says it simply, like it's the most obvious solution. Like he's not suggesting we walk back into the very fire that nearly consumed us both. "We control the story by making it ours."

I stare at him, the implication crawling up my spine like ice-tipped fingers. "You want to pretend we're back together."

"I want people to believe we never fully separated." He steps closer, voice dropping to a register that once made my skin hum. "That we've been quietly reconciling for Jaden's sake. That the photos aren't scandal—they're family."

"That's—" I shake my head. "That's insane."

"It's practical." Another step—close enough now that I can smell his cologne. The one I used to buy him. The one that still haunts my dreams on nights I can't outrun memory. "If we're together, the audit isn't compromised—it's expected. The photos aren't damning—they're explained. The narrative shifts from professional impropriety to personal choice."

"And when the audit ends?" My voice betrays me, catching on the question I'm afraid to hear answered. "What then?"

"We let it fade." His eyes never leave mine, even as something shadowed passes behind them. "Quietly go our separate ways."

He's lying. Not about the plan—about his indifference to it. I can see it in the tension around his mouth, the careful way he holds himself just out of reach.

"And how would this work?" I press. "Logistically."

"You and Jaden would move in. Temporarily," he adds, like that single word might make this less dangerous than we both know it is. "Public appearances together. Family outings. Perhaps a gala or two."

The proposition hits like a physical blow. "Move in? Here?"

"It's the most logical solution." His voice is steady, reasonable, betrayed only by the pulse hammering visibly at his throat. "The penthouse has security. Space. And it sells the narrative completely."

I move to the window, needing distance from the heat of him, from the insanity of what he's suggesting.

Manhattan glitters below, lights blinking on as dusk settles. The same view I used to stare at when we were married, watching for his car, waiting for him to come home, wondering if building empires would always matter more than building a life together.

This isn't just a business arrangement. It's mutual self-destruction wrapped in strategic necessity.

I'm not naive. These past weeks have already unraveled my defenses one careful thread at a time.

The late nights working side by side. The shared meals at his dining table. The way my body still responds to his proximity like it never forgot the map of him.

I should be drawing firmer lines. Setting clearer boundaries. Running in the opposite direction. Instead, I've drifted closer. Let the walls thin. Let old habits resurface—the way I reflexively refill his coffee when I get mine, the easy rhythm we fall into when discussing the audit, the private language of glances we never quite unlearned.

Because it’s as natural as breathing.

But this—living together, playing at family, creating a fiction that is too close to the dreams that haunt me—is like stepping off a cliff with nothing but blind faith that the fall won't kill me.

Or worse, that it will.

"It could work," I admit finally, the words tasting like surrender. "From a strategic perspective."