Why me, Zayn?

Zayn

I smiled instantly at his words, recalling how I had met with his father. The man still thinks our meeting was purely coincidence.

Cassiel, Rome's stepbrother, leaned forward, a smirk on his smug face. “Don’t be ridiculous. You’d be front and center. Something tragic for the gallery wall. The boy who broke too easily.”

Rome slammed his hand on the table, the sound echoing like a shot in the air. “Say that again, Cassiel,” he almost yelled. “Say that again and I will break your nose this time.”

Cassiel only smiled, but even he shifted back in his seat.

Santiago stepped in, his voice laced with indifference as if he didn't care he had agreed with me to sell his son for alliances with the Sanchez family. “You’re embarrassing yourself.”

Rome ignored him. He turned to Genevieve instead, his eyes filled with something like betrayal. “You threw me out when I came out. Told me no son of yours would wear eyeliner and fuck men. Now suddenly I’m good enough to barter with?”

“You’ve matured,” she said, clearly unbothered. “So has our perspective.”

“Liar.”

I didn’t need to jump in. But I wanted to.

So I did.

“This isn’t about love,” I said evenly. “It’s about preservation. You get your heirlooms. Your father gets his bailout. I get what I want.”

Rome’s eyes locked on mine, his rage melting into confusion and disbelief. “And what exactly is it that you want, Zayn?”

The way he said my name… it was as if it burned his tongue. My name rolled of his tongue like something that disgust him so much.

“Someone I know how to handle.”

He stared, stunned into stillness. A slow breath dragged into his lungs. “Is that it? You want a charity case to leash?”

I stepped closer. “No. I want the boy who burned the world around him and still refused to kneel.”

“And if I refuse again?”

I leaned in, just enough for him to hear me clearly. “Then I wait. I’m good at waiting. But the world isn’t. You don’t have time to be proud, Rome. You only have time to choose who holds the leash.”

He flinched as my words sank into him.

Genevieve stood. “Perhaps we should all take a moment to…”

Rome shook his head. “No. No moments. No breaks. You want my answer?”

His eyes flicked to Santiago’s neck, where the vault key caught the light. Then to me.

He smiled, a cruel, tired thing.

“Here’s my counteroffer,” he said. “Burn the contract. Hand me the box. And forget I ever wore your fucking name.”

Santiago’s voice dropped an octave. “You have no leverage.”

“You’re wrong,” Rome said, pointing straight at me. “He wants something. Or he wouldn’t be here.”

I held his stare quietly, waiting for him to ask the question he had been meaning to sskp.

Rome’s voice cracked, not weakly, but too full of fury. “Why me, Zayn?”

Because you were the only thing I ever wanted that I wasn’t allowed to touch. Because you left me bleeding, and I liked the pain. Because you taught me hunger, and now I can’t eat anything else.

But I didn’t say any of that.

I leaned closer, let the room fade, and spoke so only he could hear:

“Because power tastes sweeter when the whole world sees them kneel—and only you know why they did.”

He inhaled deeply, like he’d just touched something burning. Good.

I straightened, looked at Santiago. “Threaten him again, and the deal dies.”

Santiago scoffed suddenly, disbelief crossing his features. “You think you can dictate terms in my house?”

“I already am.” I smoothed my sleeve like the conversation bored me. “You should thank me. I could’ve bought you out without a ring.”

Rome shoved his chair back, the scrape of it loud, angry. Then without another word, he stormed toward the terrace doors.

I let him go. Counted five beats. Then followed.

...

Outside, the cool night air slapped us both. The garden lights cast long scars of shadow over the stone balustrade. Rome gripped that rail, breathing like he’d sprinted a mile.

“You don’t need to follow me,” he said without turning. "I don't know the fuck you are planning but trust me, I want nothing to ever do with you."

I stepped beside him, close enough to feel the tremor in his arms. “I go where my investment goes.”

“Investment,” he repeated, a very breathy laugh escaping his rosy lips. “That’s what I am to you now?”

“Always were. Even when you walked out the first time.”

“Walked out? I walked out?" He turned, his eyes burning with fury. “Why me, Zayn? You could buy a thousand prettier toys.”

“I don’t buy toys.” I let my gaze travel from his bruised cheek down to the fist still white on the rail. “I buy leverage. You come with built‑in leverage: a family that hates you, a sister who needs saving, a father who needs silencing.”

His jaw flexed; he hated how neatly the words fit. “And what do you need?”

“An asset that bleeds.” I leaned in. “Empires bore me. You don’t.”

His swallow was almost silent. “I won’t break, you should know I won't ever fall for your lies.”

“You won't break baby, you’ll bend.” I said it gently, like a promise. “You’ll bend because your sister’s bills are drowning you, because your mother’s things are locked away, and because some twisted part of you still wants to see if I’ll keep my word.”

He exhaled, his breath shaky. I kept going.

“One year, Rome. Marry me, satisfy the press, give the stocks time to blend. Your debts cleared, your sister in the best clinic in the hemisphere. After twelve months, walk... or stay. Choice is yours.”

He barked a laugh. “Right. Choice.”

I shrugged. “Refuse, and I still buy the clinic. Then I buy the land under it. You’ll sign just to breathe.”

A fitful gust of wind blew past us; he looked past me to the ballroom, shadows of his father, stepmother, Cassiel, all waiting to see him crawl.

“Why me of all people?” he asked softly, more to the dark than to me.

I eased closer, letting him process my answer like poison in a glass. “Because storms are rare, Rome, and I collect rare things.”

Silence reigned between us as I held his gaze. His eyes held fury, fear, a reluctant pull he hated me for.

I offered a thin smile. “Clock’s ticking, baby. Decide before someone else signs for you.