Marla’s POV
After he got me to the car, he drove fast, like he needed to outrun the night. And once we got home, we didn’t waste a second. We did it again. And again. Until I finally passed out, completely undone in our bed.
Now it’s morning. I wake to the quiet reality of the chaos we made. I’m still naked. My hair’s a mess. I’ve got marks scattered across my body like fingerprints on glass. Evidence of every time I said yes. Yeah, I gave him everything. My all. Weirdly, I’m not mad. Not even regretful.
It feels... warm. There was no yelling. No eye-rolls. No sarcastic jabs across the bed. Just… silence. Heavy, fragile, awkward silence. The kind that hums in your ears and makes everything feel too loud and too still at the same time. I don’t even know what time it is, just that the sun is bleeding through his blackout curtains. And I’m sore in places that have absolutely no business being sore.
“Morning,” he said, voice scratchy and too casual for what we just did.
“Hey,” I muttered, sitting up and pulling the blanket with me like that would protect my dignity. He looked over. No smirk, nor sarcasm. Just... Ives. I waited for him to ruin it with a comment. Something about ‘stress relief’ or ‘contract perks.’
Instead, he rubbed the back of his neck and said, “You hungry?”
I blinked. “Are you cooking?”
“God, no.” He sat up. “I was thinking… we could go out. Somewhere.” I stared.
“Like, out out?”
He nodded once. “Lunch. Coffee. You pick.” Okay, now I was suspicious.
“What’s the catch?” I asked.
“No catch.”
“Right. You just want to casually take me on a date the morning after we sleep together? That’s not sketchy at all.”
“I figured you’d want a say before people start spotting us out together again. Let’s control the narrative.” There it was. The Ives Mercer logic. Still, something about the way he said it, calm, not cold, made me pause.
I grabbed my bra from the floor. “You do realize this is the first time we haven’t tried to kill each other before 10 a.m., right?”
“I noticed.”
“And you’re not gonna talk about last night?”
He stood up, bare and unbothered. “You want me to?”
I opened my mouth. Closed it. “No. I mean. I don’t know.”
He nodded. “Then we won’t.” Simple. Like nothing happened. Like it didn’t change everything.
“Fine,” I muttered, heading to the bathroom. “But I swear, if this ends in another tabloid mess, I’m setting your car on fire.”
He smirked just a little. “Noted.”
Later in the afternoon, he meant it. He wants us to go out. There’s nothing casual about going on a fake date with the guy you actually slept with twelve hours ago. I don’t care what he calls it. Lunch, brunch, PR stroll, whatever. It’s not casual when I have flashbacks every time he breathes.
We took his car. Obviously. Because heaven forbid Mr. Control let me Uber myself into “bad optics.” He didn’t speak much on the drive. Just tapped the steering wheel and glanced over every few blocks like he was debating saying something but kept deciding nah. I didn’t ask where we were going. I didn’t want to give him the satisfaction. When we pulled up to a small Italian place, brick walls, moody lighting, just enough people to blend in, I blinked.
“This doesn’t look press-friendly,” I said.
“That’s the point,” he muttered, parking. Oh. Okay. Low-key Mercer.
He opened my door before I could, which felt illegal. Inside, the hostess knew him. Of course she did. Ives Mercer collects private reservations like other people collect parking tickets. We sat in a back corner. Two glasses of water, no menus yet. Still no small talk.
I cleared my throat. “So… this is weird, right?”
He looked up. “Weirder than waking up naked together?”
“Touché.” Silence again. He watched me like he wanted to say something again. And this time, he did.
“You don’t regret it?” he asked. My stomach flipped.
“Regret what?”
“Last night.” My brain screamed: Lie. Lie. Say yes and save your pride. But my mouth? Traitor.
“No,” I said softly. “Do you?” He didn’t answer. Just leaned back in his chair like the question made him itch. Our food came. Thank God, distraction. He ordered for me, and I let him. Why? I don’t know. I think part of me wanted to see if he remembered anything I actually liked.
He did. Rigatoni, extra parmesan, no mushrooms, and I didn’t comment on it. But it messed me up a little. We ate in near silence, both pretending we weren’t spiraling inside. I watched the way his jaw moved. The way his hand flexed when he held his fork, he caught me staring.
“What?”
“Nothing,” I said quickly. “Just... still figuring you out.”
“Good luck with that,” he muttered. “I’m barely figuring things out myself.”
And just like that, something cracked. Not big. Not loud. Just... cracked. We walked out slower than we walked in. Close but not touching. I could feel the tension in my shoulders the whole time. Like something was about to shift. Like maybe it already had.