POV Floris
I walked into my room planning to barricade myself in and maybe scream into a pillow for therapeutic purposes. The fight with Sia had left me feeling raw and defensive, and honestly? I needed space to figure out what the hell was happening to my life.
Instead, I found a black box on my bed with a note that made my stomach drop.
Be ready by 7 PM. - E
“Oh, come the fuck on,” I muttered, staring at the elegant script.
I’d been planning to avoid Eric for the foreseeable future—put some distance between us, figure out if Sia was right about me being a delusional idiot.
But apparently the universe had other plans.
The dress inside was gorgeous and I hated that I loved it. Deep green silk that would probably make my eyes pop, cut in a way that was elegant without being overtly sexual.
It was the kind of dress you wear to dinner with someone’s parents, not to whatever twisted power play Eric usually preferred.
Which somehow made it more unsettling.
I spent twenty minutes staring at it, having a full internal debate. Don’t get dressed. Don’t play his games. Show him he can’t just snap his fingers and make you dance.
But then I thought about Jake’s treatment, about the contract I’d signed with my fucking teeth, and put the dress on anyway.
At exactly 7 PM, there was a knock on my door.
Eric stood there in a charcoal suit that probably cost more than my college tuition, holding a bouquet of white lilies. The kind my mom used to grow in our backyard, the kind that smell like summer and childhood and everything I’d lost.
“How did you know?” I asked, taking the flowers before I could stop myself.
“You mentioned them once. When you were talking about your parents’ garden.” He looked almost nervous, which was deeply unsettling. “I thought they suited you. Elegant but resilient.”
Jesus. He’d been listening. Actually listening, not just waiting for his turn to manipulate.
“This is very… normal,” I said, gesturing at his outfit, the flowers.
“I’ve never done this before.”
“Done what?”
“Taken someone on an actual date.”
The admission hit me sideways. “You’re joking.”
“I’m not.”
“What about all your previous assistants? All those women?”
“Those weren’t dates. Those were exercises in control.” He stepped closer, and I caught his cologne—expensive and understated. “This is different.”
“How?”
“Because you’re different.”
***
He took me to a small restaurant tucked away in the Jordaan district. The kind of place that doesn’t advertise, where the owner greets regulars by name and the menu changes based on what’s fresh. Candlelit tables, soft jazz, couples having quiet conversations over wine.
It was perfect. And that scared the shit out of me.
“So,” I said once we’d ordered, needing to break the weird domestic normalcy of it all. “Sia thinks I’m going to end up dead.”
Eric’s expression didn’t change. “I saw the argument on the security feed.”
“Of course you did. And?”
“She’s jealous.”
“She’s not wrong, though. About your pattern. About what you do to the women who work for you.”
“She’s not telling you the complete truth.”
“Which part is she lying about?”
Eric swirled his wine, considering. “Sia wasn’t like the others. The other women left when their contracts ended, and moved on with their lives. Some of them even thanked me for the experience.”
“Thanked you?”
“For the financial security. The connections. The skills they learned.” He shrugged. “I’m not a monster, Floris. I’m just… thorough in my approach to relationships.”
“And Sia?”
“Sia thought she was different. Special. The one who would change me.” His smile was sharp. “Sound familiar?”
“Ouch.”
“The difference is, when her contract ended, she didn’t leave. She stayed. Took a different position. Convinced herself it was about career advancement, but it wasn’t.”
“Then what was it about?”
“Obsession. Hope. The belief that if she just waited long enough, proved herself valuable enough, I’d eventually see what she wanted me to see.” He leaned back. “Fifteen years later, she’s still waiting.”
The words hit like ice water. “So she’s not trying to save me. She’s trying to eliminate competition.”
“She’s trying to save herself from watching someone else get what she never could.”
I stared at my plate, appetite gone. “What if I turn out the same way? What if I become another Sia?”
“You won’t.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“Because if you were going to become obsessed with me, you already would have.” He reached across the table, fingers brushing mine. “You would have stopped fighting by now. Stopped questioning everything I do. Stopped being the most frustrating, unpredictable person I’ve ever met.”
“Is that what you want? Someone frustrating and unpredictable?”
“It’s what I need.” His grip tightened. “Everyone else becomes predictable eventually. They fall into patterns, start giving me what they think I want instead of what they actually think.”
“And I don’t do that?”
“You elbowed me in the face yesterday.”
Fair point.
“This is still fucked up,” I said. “This whole situation. The contract, the surveillance, the fact that my brother’s life is hanging in the balance.”
“Yes, it is.”
“So what happens now?”
“Now we see if you can handle being with someone who’s fundamentally broken without trying to fix him.”
“And if I can’t?”
“Then Sia was right about everything.” He smiled, but there was something vulnerable in his eyes. “And you’ll end up hating me as much as she does.”
I looked at him—this man who’d admitted to never going on a real date, who’d brought me flowers because he remembered a random comment about my dead mother’s garden, who was offering me a choice between salvation and damnation with the same casual tone most people used to discuss the weather.
“I already hate you a little bit,” I said.
“Good. That means you’re still thinking clearly.”
And despite everything—the manipulation, the control, the fact that I was probably making the worst decision of my life—I laughed.
Because maybe Sia was right about me being delusional. But at least I was self-aware about it.