For a lingering moment, both Cassian and Cixi seemed to wait for the other to speak first.

Cixi stood rigidly, throwing silent daggers at him with her eyes. At the same time, he received her fury with that maddening composure of his, as if her wrath were merely another small inconvenience he had chosen to endure.

At length, with all the ceremony of a gentleman he barely resembled, he inclined his head towards her and stepped back.

Then, at last, he closed the door.

Cixi did not move at once. She stood where she was, clutching the blanket to herself, listening to his footsteps.

Only when she heard the retreat of his footsteps, did she rush to her bedroom door and shut it behind her with far more force than necessary...

Taking a deep breath, she started changing into fresh clothes, while muttering every curse she knew against Cassian Crown, and if she did not know enough, she silently invented a few more for his benefit. By the time she had dragged on a pair of jeans and a black T-shirt, her anger had by no means softened. It had only found a better footing.

When she stepped out of the bedroom, she found him seated on the sofa with his eyes closed, his expression still, like sleep had stolen upon him without warning. He looked peaceful like the moon in the dark night. And she couldn’t believe herself she was comparing his radiant devilish face with the moon. Even that sight did nothing to sweeten her temper.

She decided to head to the washroom instead. With a gentle touch, she carefully opened the door, then, with a sudden force, she slammed it shut to wake Cassian up.

It worked just as she had intended — Cassian jolted awake.

His eyes opened at once, staring at the bathroom door, and he gave the faintest shake of his head, and a sigh escaped his lips, though whether it came from weariness or from her petty vengeance, he could not tell.

He reached inside his blazer and drew out his silver cigarette case. With quiet ease, he opened it, slid one cigarette free, and held it for a moment between his fingers. He did not light it. He merely brought it near and breathed in its scent with his eyes closed, as though even that much might offer some small consolation.

He did not light it. He merely brought it near and breathed in its scent with his eyes closed, as though even that much might offer some small consolation. And he kept inhaling the tobacco scent until the moment he heard the lock shift behind the door. When he opened his eyes, he returned the cigarette to the case and slipped it neatly back into his blazer.

The door opened, and he looked at her.

And she looked at him.

The air between them tightened at once.

Cixi did not so much glare as assault him with her eyes. Cassian met the look in steady silence, and for one absurd instant, he found himself wondering whether the two of them had fallen into some strange contest of endurance and who would look away first, who would break first, who would surrender even the smallest inch.

He might gladly have looked away if he thought it would calm her.

He knew better.

Nothing short of rewriting the morning itself would have calmed her.

After several charged seconds, Cixi stepped out properly, shut the washroom door behind her, and walked straight to him. Then, without invitation, she sat beside him.

"I am really angry with you." The declaration came with such gravity that, under other circumstances, it might have amused him.

He could already see as much in her face. Her eyes shone with the sort of furious moisture that belonged less to tears than to pride struggling under offence.

He kept looking at her and said nothing.

"What you did," she went on, holding his gaze for a moment before glancing away, "was far out of line. You know it was, and yet you sit there like you have done nothing wrong." Her eyes dropped to the floor.

For a brief instant, the anger in her face gave way to something far more: reaction, mortification, confusion, and a touch of wounded helplessness. And that did something to him more than her temper did....

While she had been splashing cold water over her face in the washroom, two thoughts had battled for place in her mind. The first was outrage. The second was the contract.

Yesterday, in a fit of displeasure, he declared that he would not sign it. Today, if she played this badly, she might lose the only opportunity she had of drawing him back into that absurd arrangement.

So she swallowed pride, at least for the moment.

To her astonishment, Cassian spoke before she could frame her next accusation.

"You are right. I made a mistake."

Cixi turned to him so quickly that some bright spark lit behind her eyes.

’What did he say?’

’Did he truly admit fault?’

She searched his face at once, certain some mockery must follow.

Cassian continued in the same calm tone. "I asked one of the women who works for me and happened to be available to change your clothes. I shouldn’t have lied to you!"

Cixi stared at him with open suspicion.

"You lie as naturally as breathing," she said flatly. "And if some woman truly changed my clothes, then why did she not leave me wearing anything?"

Cassian frowned very slightly at Cixi’s words. The look he gave her suggested that she had said something so peculiar he hardly knew how to answer it.

"You wear clothes while you sleep?"

"Of course I do!" Cixi replied at once. "Why, do you not—" She stopped herself mid-sentence, horror dawning too late. "Wait! Do not answer that."

Cassian’s mouth shifted by the smallest degree. "Only people with no confidence in their own bodies sleep clothed."

That earned him another murderous glare.

"What if a thief breaks in?" Cixi asked him to consider logically rather than labelling her as a less self-assured person. "If you are naked, how are you supposed to chase after him? First, you would have to look for clothes, then wear them, and by then the thief would already be gone."

"He would be dead before he reached the gate," Cassian replied simply. "I have people to guard my place."

That, infuriatingly, was said with such simplicity that she could not tell whether to scoff or believe him. Still, she realised at once that the conversation was drifting from the main point.

She pulled it sharply back. "That is not the point," she said. "The point is that you should have left me exactly as I was. How am I meant to trust your word? I have only ever seen men around you. Never women."

Cassian interrupted with a glance that was almost offended. "You make it sound as though I am interested in men."

Cixi blinked. "That is not what I meant. I meant your bodyguards. They are all men."

"Yes," he said, without the least embarrassment. "And I have lady cleaners." The answer came so smoothly that she nearly choked on her own annoyance.

She searched his face for deception, for the smallest crack, for any sign that he was inventing servants out of thin air merely to vex her. Yet his expression remained impassive.

That only irritated her more. "So the cleaners follow you around?"

"Yes!"

"I still do not believe you," she stated. "And you should have knocked before entering my Bedroom! You cannot simply open my door whenever you please, especially a woman’s bedroom. But You stood there looking at me when you knew perfectly well I was not dressed."

At the last words, she looked away. A flush rose in her cheeks again despite herself.

She wanted to slap him. Truly, sincerely, and with wholehearted conviction. Yet the contract. The contract mattered more.

Once he signed it, she promised herself she would take revenge for every ounce of humiliation he had caused her.

Cassian received every ounce of her blame with such unnerving ease that, for a moment, Cixi could not even decide whether she was scolding him, praising his patience, or merely carrying on some absurdly ordinary conversation with a man who had no business making anything feel ordinary.

Then he spoke. "The door was open," he replied, as though he were stating the simplest fact in the world. "And when I heard your voice, I came to see how you fared, only to find you standing there in nothing but your Pink panties." His gaze moved to her lower belly, and that earned another glare from Cixi. "How was I to know you would not consider that another person might remain in your home when you had gone to sleep bruised and half-senseless? Did that truly not occur to you?"

Cixi opened her mouth, then shut it again.

The wretched part was that he was neither wholly wrong nor wholly right, and that only made him more unbearable. But how was she supposed to come to that conclusion? She was definitely at fault.

"You are speaking like you do not know me," she said at last, feeling offended. "We had a conversation in which I made it perfectly clear that there would be no crossing of boundaries." 𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞

"And yet," Cassian countered, "you came to me with a kissing contract!"

The words struck her so cleanly that they sealed her lips before she could form another protest.

This time, however, the ease faded from him. Cassian turned serious. The shift in him was quiet, yet it altered the very air between them. What remained was far steadier, far more intent, and it drew Cixi’s attention as surely as if he had reached out and caught her chin in his hand.

"What do you take a kissing contract for?" he asked, and his voice had lost its teasing lilt. "A joke? Some little game? Or is it meant to win you something from me that I have not yet seen?" His eyes did not leave her face. "You are the first woman who has ever come to a man with such a thing in her hand. Typically, it is the man who negotiates the terms. He often requests an agreement, probably a phoney engagement, possibly as a means to gain access to a woman’s bed. However, you—" A faint, almost disbelieving breath left him.

"You came to me," he continued, "and not only placed a contract before me, but chose to demonstrate your case with a kiss."