The Contract

The church was too quiet.

Not the peaceful kind of quiet this was the heavy, suffocating kind, the kind that pressed against your ribs until every breath felt like it might shatter you from the inside.

The ticking of the old brass clock above the altar was too loud. The faint creak of the wooden pews beneath me sounded like groans from something ancient and unhappy. Even the sunlight streaming through the stained-glass windows felt too sharp, cutting across Adrian’s face in fractured blues and reds.

He stood directly in front of me, broad shoulders blocking the aisle like a wall, as if he were the only thing between me and the rest of the world and maybe he was.

His earlier smugness, the infuriating confidence that had lit his every movement during the wedding chaos, was gone. He just watched me, still and unreadable, while my pulse pounded in my ears so hard it made me dizzy.

Damn it.

I had just hit a man who was five times bigger than me in height, in power, in money, in the terrifying ability to ruin me without breaking a sweat. And he wasn’t even angry.

That made it so much worse.

“Why?” My voice came out low and raw, my throat tight as if my own words were too dangerous to speak. “Why did you do this to me? What did I ever do to you?”

Adrian’s expression shifted not to kindness, but to something heavier. Something that carried weight. Regret? Pity? I couldn’t tell, and it made me hate him more.

He stepped closer, the echo of his polished shoes on the wooden floor slow, deliberate. “Alyssa, I’m sorry,” he said, voice quiet enough to almost be swallowed by the church’s stillness. “I never wanted to hurt you. I didn’t have a choice.”

A sharp, burning heat spread through my chest. “You didn’t have a choice?” My voice cracked higher. “You humiliated me in front of hundreds of people. My family” My breath caught, a lump rising so hard it hurt to swallow. “They hate me now. They think I’ve been living some sordid secret life behind their backs. And you” My words cut off with the weight of the betrayal pressing down. “Explain yourself.”

He dragged a hand through his hair like a man who’d been holding his breath for hours, his composure slipping just a fraction. “It’s complicated. There are things you don’t understand… things I can’t explain right now.”

“No,” I shot back, stepping toward him. “You’re going to try. After what you pulled, you owe me that much.”

He looked at me for a long, unnerving beat. Then, with a strange finality, he reached into the inner pocket of his tailored suit and drew out a folded document.

“What is that?” I asked, suspicion already crawling up my spine.

“A contract,” he said, unfolding it with the precision of someone used to making deals that changed lives and not always for the better. He held it out to me. “I need you to keep pretending to be my fiancée. Six months. In return, I’ll pay you five million dollars.”

I blinked at him, sure I’d misheard. “You’re insane.” His jaw tightened, but his voice stayed maddeningly calm. “I know how it sounds. But people are watching me waiting for me to fail. Today’s stunt was the only move I had left, and you…” His gaze locked on mine. “…you were the only one I could trust.”

I laughed a short, sharp sound that didn’t feel like laughter at all. “Trust? You don’t even know me.” I know enough, he said quietly. “You’re honest. You have integrity. And…” His eyes flickered, almost reluctantly. “You need the money.” The truth of it was a blade, cutting deeper than I expected. My rent is overdue. My savings are a ghost of what they’d once been. My plans shattered into pieces I could no longer fit them together.

Five million dollars could buy me a future. But at what cost?

“You must be out of your mind,” I whispered, my voice shaking. “I should be running in the opposite direction.”

“Please.” The word was low, intimate in a way that didn’t belong in a church. “Just hear me out. I’ll fix your reputation. I’ll clean up the mess I made. But you have to trust me.”

I stared at the paper in his hand. A lifeline in one palm. A noose in the other.

“No,” I said, sharper now, forcing steel into my voice. “You’ve done enough damage. I’m not your doll to parade around for your games.”

His eyes darkened. “This isn’t a game, Alyssa. It’s survival.”

“Then survive without me.” My voice cracked like glass, ringing against the high ceilings.

Something in him shifted just for a second. The mask slipped, and I saw it: exhaustion, maybe even fear, before it vanished.

“You think you’re the only one paying for this?” he asked, his voice low and dangerous. “I’m in deeper than you could imagine.”

“Good,” I spat. “Drown alone.”

For a long moment, the air between us felt like a taut wire ready to snap. Then, without another word, he placed the contract on the pew beside me and straightened.

“If you change your mind,” he said quietly, “you know where to find me.”

His footsteps echoed down the aisle, slow and heavy, until the sound was swallowed by the slam of the front doors.

I sat frozen, my hands shaking in my lap. The paper lay there like something alive something that might burn me if I touched it.

I should tear it up. I should walk away.

But the part of me that was tired of scraping by, tired of wondering how to make it to the next month, stared at those typed words like they were salvation.

I was still staring when the back doors slammed open. The light from outside cast a long, dark shadow across the aisle.

My stomach dropped.

It wasn’t Adrian.

It was Michael.

And the look on his face cold, tight, disappointed, and almost gleeful told me that whatever I decided about that contract… I might already be trapped in something far more dangerous.

But at the same time, I really do need the money!